While this article was written some time ago, the specific budgets are well worth reviewing carefully at the end. This article tells you a lot more than a couple of recent motion pictures on the realities of economic life for a young artist or group. Whenever I talk to a band who are about to sign with a major label, I always end up thinking of them in a particular context. I imagine these people, some of them good friends, some of them barely acquaintances, at one end of this trench. I also imagine a faceless industry lackey at the other end holding a fountain pen and a contract waiting to be signed.
Nobody can see what's printed on the contract.
It's too far away, and besides, the stench is making everybody's eyes water. The lackey shouts to everybody that the first one to swim the trench gets to sign the contract. Everybody dives in the trench and they struggle furiously to get to the other end. Eventually, one of them capitulates, and there's only one contestant left. Swim again, please.