A year ago, we started with the SonicAngel platform. Our launchparty was on May11 at Depot in Leuven. Happy days, thanks for all the support to all artists, fans, funders, partners and everyone who participated in one way or another.
bart

- – - – -

SonicAngel, which combines crowdfunding with label activities, celebrates first year of operations with strong results and international expansion.
One year ago SonicAngel launched their curated crowdfunding activities for emerging music artists combined with label activities. The first results are strong: 94% success rate in funding, a golden album and platinum single, 9 strategic A-brand partnerships and over 1000 gigs booked via the SonicAngel booking agency.

SonicAngel was founded by Bart Becks and Maurice Engelen. Bart Becks is the former CEO of Belgacom Skynet (Belgium’s leading ISP) and was previously Chief Innovation & New media for European media giant SBS Europe/ProSiebenSat1 media group. Maurice Engelen is the man behind electronic music bands Praga Khan and Lords of Acid, and previously founded the legendary Antler Subway Records (later sold to EMI). The background of the founders indicate the philosophy SonicAngel: combine technology and best music practices to build a crowdfunding platform combined with innovative label activities.

SonicAngel uses a selection method to present emerging artists up for fanfunding. The selection is based on traditional A&R, but also the social media score of the bands is of high importance. The social media score is calculated based on the SonicAngel FanRank, which measures popularity on social media such as twitter, Facebook, YouTube, last.fm and others, plus measures the data intelligence from the NextBigSound tools. The funding amounts vary between 10.000 and 40.000 EUR, and are decided jointly by SonicAngel and the artist. Over the last year, 94% or 15 out of 16 bands, have achieved full funding, and are now in the recording studio or have already released an album. 12 of the finalized crowdfundings happened in the first trimester of 2011, indicating a strong uptake and fan satisfaction with the approach.

In order to manage success, SonicAngel also build out a sublabel, which has various genres. The pop/rock/alternative music label is managed by Nathalie Geradin (formerly at Universal), the electronic music side is managed by Bart Mandonx, who did groundbreaking work with Implant, Neon Judgement & the Bollock Brothers.

SonicAngel also hosts an intern division named F-A-B, which stands for Fans-Artists-Brands. The goal is to seek partnerships with brands, while respecting all parties in the equation. Market feedback is excellent, proven by the agreements with Hewlett Packard, Sony Ericsson, Beck’s (ABInbev), Randstad, Deloitte, ING and KPN which all concluded long term agreements.

After an initial launch in Belgium, SonicAngel is now rapidly expanding. A newly launched audition platform already saw inscriptions from 33 countries (http://www.sonicangel.com/auditions). SonicAngel also selected 8 international bands up for funding, with bands originating from the US, France, Switzerland and Germany. On top of that, SonicAngel Lektroland (http://lektroland.sonicangel.com) is the company’s latest initiative, and includes a platform and label specifically dedicated to electronic music.