I've always admired Chuck D of Public Enemy for the things he's done since his group broke away from the record company that once chained them and put tape over their mouth.
Going Independent or working with an Indy Label brings about freedom that a record company will not give you, plus it gives you a much better cut as well.
The trick though is that the Indy label you are working with has to have money to get you out on the road and touring, or if you are going without a record company you have to fund the touring your self, and know your own connections to get booked and what not.
Thankfully, with the current freedom of the internet, bands are able to spread awareness of their existence without going through all the usual networks as before. Granted one never makes much money through MP3/Flac/CD/Tape/ or Record sales, but the internet does at least allow people to get their stuff heard which in turn raises the chances that there will be a decent turn out when they do a live performance.
Though again as I said, touring has to be paid by the band itself or by the Indy label they are on. For this to happen, people got to work REAL JOBS and raise that money. Hardly anything in life aside of Life itself comes for free, so in the indy world, there is no opportunity to kick off your heels and slide under the boss' desk for a quick promotion. You gotta work hard, you got to develop your talent, and you got to make people hungry for more, without the aid of quick advert enticing promotions.
As for the touring itself, as Chuck D said, doing local tours is dead, they say the best way to make your money is to tour internationally as their seems to be a larger market for musical diversity and depth of lyrics across seas than there is here in America (we seem to flock towards empty fluff for some reason). So all in all, if someone wants to play musick for a living, they are going to have to work hard with or without the record company, but the upside of doing it without is that you get a larger cut of the pay (if not all minus expenses), and you do not have to worry about being censored, or having your own work stolen from you by the company itself, claiming it is their property and their work to be sold and used how they please...
Sort of like how ABC (or was it NBC) has the rights to Dr. Martin Luther King's speeches, for which reason we never see them played in full, because they have now become intellectual property. :/
No doubt, that's why the Prez never fully quotes King during Martin Luther King Day.
When information is owned, it can be more easily (legally) concealed.
