For anyone who is interested in pursuing a career in the music industry understanding basic business skills are extremely important. In the last decade we have seen staggering changes in the way the music industry operates. Large record labels are controlling less and less of the overall market shares and independent record labels are steadily gaining more control. We are seeing a spike in more independent musicians managing and controlling their entire careers on their own. The music industry has gone from a point where artists could do nothing on their own, to a point where the majority of the industry is based on a do-it-yourself model. According to the statistics published both in Canada and the United States around 50% of all musicians are self employed, and most perform a variety of differing jobs in order to better create a steady income. The music industry is almost like a living breathing entity of it’s own, and to study the trends, concepts, and current information coming out of the industry is studying culture as it happens. There could be no more exciting time to be an independent musician than now.