The phenomenon of music artists selling merchandise is nothing new. The classic “band tee” and other forms of merchandise have been around since the 1950s. However, we are seeing an evolution in music artists merchandise and it comes in the form of independent brands. From cosmetics to clothes to even alcohol, music artists whose natural habitat is in studios and on stage are stepping into board meetings and capitalising on their influence more than ever before. In the past, artists who were the face of a brand or a promoter of a brand were labelled as “sell-outs”. Now, with the rise of social media and the mass amount of advertising that has come with it, the term sell-out seems to be somewhat outdated. With the mass amount of celebrities and artists coming out time and time again with collaborations or launching their own companies, fans and general audiences now see what would once be defined as selling out as the norm and expected.
While almost any artist nowadays can launch a brand, the key to finding success with that brand is the purpose behind creating the brand in the first place. Fans and general consumers won’t buy a product that seems inauthentic. Fans love authenticity, but why?
The main reasoning is that it fuels and perpetuates parasocial relationships between the audience and the artist. Harry Styles’s Pleasing and Halsey’s About-Face are two great examples of this. Harry Styles and Halsey aren’t just selling you beauty products, they are selling you beauty products they themselves say they use every day. Not only that, they are selling you a product that they have been associated with wearing such as nail polish or colourful makeup looks.
Harry Styles has been known to paint his nails fun colours and to blur the lines of what is considered feminine or masculine. So starting a beauty company with nail polishes and the goal of the company being to “bring joyful experiences and products that excite the senses and blur the boundaries” and to “dispel the myth of a binary existence” doesn’t seem unlike him. He is also selling the notion that if his fans buy these overpriced nail polishes that he himself wears they will have a closer and more meaningful relationship with the artist.
Similarly, Halsey’s About-Face make-up line is all about using make-up as a form of artistry and using your face as a canvas. Fans of Halsey will know that the singer went to art school and has a deep love for painting. In an interview with Byrdie she says “Makeup has always been something I’ve just been naturally drawn to because I’m very dextrous with a brush and I know a lot about colour.” Halsey has also expressed that she does her own makeup for performances, this also adds another layer to her authenticity with the brand because they are products she uses every day. Painting is a personal love for Halsey and fans having access to this personal side of Halsey perpetuates their parasocial relationship.
Not all artists are creating brands for the sake of profiting specifically from their fans. Instead, they are looking to profit from a broader audience. Music artists like Kid Cudi and Rihanna have pursued clothing and makeup lines as a way of stepping away from music and creating a new career for themselves. This is not an easy thing for an artist to do as fans can confuse these brands with being another form of merchandise for them. When in actuality the artists are trying to cater to a wider audience rather than their fans. They want audiences to see this brand as something serious and having a universal appeal, not just as a brand that caters to fans’ interests specifically. Kid Cudi’s clothing line is a great example of this.
In an interview with GQ, Kid Cudi discussed the launch of his luxury fashion line “Members of The Rage” and expressed how difficult it is to be taken seriously in the fashion world while having the status of a music artist.”Oh, you do fashion and you’re some rapper, sure”. When he launched the first t-shirt of his line which had a heavy price tag of $395, fans were quick to comment that he was robbing his fans with what they thought was merch. One fan took to Twitter begging Kid Cudi not to price merchandise that high, he then replied saying “1. This ain’t merch 2. It ain’t cheap”. With his recording contract running out soon, as well as Cudi alluding to his retirement from music, it looks like Cudi is planning to fully focus on projects such as fashion designing and acting. It’s not clear how fans will take this change after knowing him as a rapper for so long.
Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty as well as her lingerie line Savage X Fenty has had nothing but success since the moment it launched, however fans of Rihanna’s music are crying out for a new album or any sign that she still wants to create music. Her last album Anti was released 7 years ago and she claims it to be her “most brilliant album” and that there’s pressure to top it. She launched Fenty Beauty in 2017 with the goal of ensuring “that women everywhere would be included” and providing one of the most inclusive shade ranges with 50 foundation
Shades. Rihanna recognised this gap in the market as she was personally familiar with the struggle of finding the right shade for her skin. This ethos of inclusivity which follows over into Savage X Fenty has established her as a businesswoman who has transcended the label of music artist and the connotations it holds in the business world. While it is unsure when or if she will ever come back to music, especially after having two children in recent years, her Superbowl performance gives us hope.
While you can never beat the good old band T-shirt, merchandise has evolved to new levels that are tailored to the artist’s personal traits and characteristics that they are best known for and it looks to be more successful than the classic form of merch. This personalisation makes fans feel closer to the artist and fuels their para-social relationships. There are questions as to whether these brands will continue to be successful once the novelty and newness of them wear off and if fans will even care about them in the future. There are also questions as to if non-fans will get sucked into buying their products. I have never listened to a Halsey song in my life but I do have her eye paints in my shopping cart as I write this article, so maybe that answers that question – or perhaps it just shows how easily influenced I am!
WORDS: Sarah Kerr
