Black Artist Database relaunches with expansion announcement and music industry initiatives
Black Artist Database (B.A.D.) has relaunched as a significantly expanded platform, with a number of new initiatives to help people search for, contact and directly support Black artists and Black-owned businesses in the music sector such as record labels.
Formerly known as Black Bandcamp, B.A.D. is a community-led project with a crowd-sourced directory at its core, which has now grown from 2,800 to 3,500 profile listings of Black music organisations, professionals and creatives. This is constantly updated and maintained by a team of administrators and volunteers.
Originally launched June 2020 in response to structural racism and mistreatment of Black people within the electronic music industry, which the pandemic and Black Lives Matter movement shed light on, B.A.D. quickly gathered momentum, making the most of Bandcamp Fridays to promote a direct revenue stream between Black musicians and fans.
B.A.D. has also revealed its new [pause] campaign, with the goal of encouraging businesses in the music industry to create more equitable workspaces and finally bridge the huge employment gap. Currently, just 11.4% of jobs in the sector are filled by BIPoC professionals.
“The [pause] partnership is not intended to be an all-encompassing fix, but rather to be a positive and proactive step in the right direction, by developing strategies to prioritise Black racial equity within industry organisations,” B.A.D. explains on its website. “This will be facilitated via the development of realistic, actionable goals, a mutually agreed-upon roadmap, and regular check-ins.”
An exclusive mix series, Bad.mix, has also been launched as part of a larger editorial offering on the new site. The first set comes from Detroit techno hero Eddie Fowlkes.
Learn more about B.A.D. and check out its database of artists and labels here.
B.A.D. has also launched a Patreon, which you can learn more about here. A number of brands will be partnering with B.A.D. as part of its relaunch. Through B.A.D’s Patreon, Mixcloud will be offering patron’s a free three month Pro Creative account, which will allows users to use the platform’s tools for live streaming, uploading and generating an income on a licensed platform.
One of the founders of Black Artist Database, NIKS, spoke to DJ Mag about the origins of the project in July 2020.
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