Last week Bandcamp announced that it will help musicians launch their own subscription services, allowing indie artists to control pricing, music releases and messages to fans. This new subscription option gives musicians another avenue for selling their wares, while also growing their fan base and providing an opportunity for steady revenue.According to an article in the Guardian, musicians will be able to price their own subscriptions – similar to how they price their music downloads and products through the site now. Bandcamp says subscription prices will range. The UK band Candy Says, for example, is selling its subscriptions at about $31 a year. Another unnamed band has speculated it would charge as much as $200 a year.Bandcamp chief executive Ethan Diamond told the Guardian, “It’s kinda like what U2 and Apple did, except that it’s music that you actually want!”In addition to product and subscription sales, musicians can offer new subscribers a bonus, allowing fans to choose from 12 million tracks and 1.6 million albums on the Bandcamp site which they download directly to their computers or through the Bandcamp app. Musicians can also release new music or offer discounts to subscribers. What they choose to offer and how they price it is entirely up to the musicians.Bandcamp is similar to a social media site, but its focus is fans and musicians, giving them an alternative for buying and marketing music. Basically, the musicians control everything, while sharing 15% of their digital sales with Bandcamp. After they’ve reached $5,000 in sales, the cut to Bandcamp drops to 10%. According to a recent Mirror article about Taylor Swift on low royalties, iTunes takes a 30% cut of music, making the Bandcamp split sound like a deal to most musicians. But is this model sustainable for Bandcamp?It certainly looks like it. Bandcamp has several unique selling advantages:1) It caters to indie artists, helping them set up microsites and track piracy.2) It is gaining popularity in the indie world because of artists like Amanda Palmer who have started using it.3) The site is a bit of an SaaS for musicians. Artists can sign up for free, but get extra features for $10/month including batch uploads, private streaming, ad-free video hosting, analytics, optional streaming and more.4) Bandcamp is targeting a specific niche, so it is not in direct competition with larger music providers like Pandora, Spotify and Apple.Also, Bandcamp has multiple revenue streams. It makes a cut of music sales from fans, but it also makes money selling its pro services to musicians, including this latest offering. Taking a lower cut than other music providers could put the company at risk for not being financial sustainable, but with lower overhead, multiple revenue streams and a corner on the indie music market, Bandcamp might be on to something!