Attention the Independent Artist
NOBODY CARES SHOW Jay and Dirty Bob Show
For musicians that want to use Twitter in order to promote your albums and shows, here’s one very important tip that often gets overlooked: stick with it!
Picture this– an album is finished– YOUR album– you’ve been recording in the studio for months, wrestling each note into its right place, sweating over every detail; in short, you’ve created a masterpiece and it’s ready for the world!
Ten cardboard boxes arrive in the mail containing a thousand shrink-wrapped CDs. You’re feeling pretty proud. All those precious hours writing, practicing, scrimping & saving, recording…
All for NOTHING!!!
… unless, of course, you can get other folks to take an interest in your music and actually LISTEN. But how?
Guest post by Bob Baker, www.TheBuzzFactor.comBy Chris R. at CD Baby
Don’t feed the sharks. Be a majority stakeholder in your own career!In the “olden days,” musicians only had to worry about 10% of their careers. It was a simpler formula for success– get good, get discovered, get signed; that was about all you COULD do. A few gatekeepers controlled ALL the outlets for production, distribution, and promotion. You had to impress one of these gatekeepers and sign your life away in order to present your music to the world. Even then, you were a carefully managed product, from your style to your sound to your artwork. Sure, someone else was worrying about this stuff FOR YOU, but they held the reins tight and kept most or all of the profit.
Over the last decade, the music industry has done a complete 180. Now 90% of your career is in your hands, and you have all the tools you need to make it happen (from affordable recording and video production technology, to simple physical and digital distribution solutions, to easy social media/blog/marketing solutions).
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In his music business career, David Sherbow has managed and booked major regional and national Rock, R&B, and Hip Hop artists, owned and operated a Rock-n-Roll booking agency, and put out over 25 releases. The list below is an except from one of his articles explaining revenue streams for rappers and musicians in general.
1. Publishing
2. Digital Sales (Individual Or By Combination)
3. Merchandise (Clothes, USB Packs, Posters, etc.)
4. Live Performances
5. Sponsorships and Endorsements
6. Advertising
7. Fan Clubs
8. Selling Fan Created Products Like Videos And Mashups
9. YouTube Subscription Channel
10. Artist Programmed Internet Radio Station
11. Financial Contributions of Support (Tip Jar or Direct Donations)
12. Artist Fan Exclusives
14. Affiliate Sales For Other Artists and Sites
15. Artist Specific Custom Products
16. Music Teaching (Lessons and Workshops)
17. Music Employment (Get A Job In The Music Business)
18. Music Production (Produce Records For Other Artists)
19. Any Job Available To Survive And Keep Making Music
20. Helping Other Artists
Being a musician is awesome. It’s almost a crime that people are allowed to play music for a living. But like crime, music doesn’t usually pay. To get the gigs that pay, and keep getting them, musicians need to exude a high level of professionalism that is often a lot less glamorous than the sexy life of a rock star. While these qualities might seem obvious, you’d be surprised at how many prima donnas out there don’t get it.
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A well written press release is the first step in getting some attention for your new album. Use this template to help you organize your information. Note that this template was written with bands and indie labels in mind as the writers and the media in mind as the readers. PR folks and radio pluggers will want to take a slightly different approach with their press releases, and one sheets for distributors and stores should also be slightly different.
Are you hurting your music career by making these mistakes?1) Sending all your traffic to social networks.
Promoters, bookers, venues and fans – they all know the difference between a free web page (MySpace, Facebook, Bandcamp, Tumblr) and a professional artist website (www.YOU.com). Social media sites are super-important, but they’re not your home base on the web. To have complete control, you’ll need your own domain name where you can build a website. It should be one of the first steps you take to become a pro-musician.
2) Constantly spamming your fans.
You can scream “Buy my album!” from a rooftop all day long, but you’d have better luck politely knocking on doors with a piping-hot apple pie and a smile. Every time you approach someone online and say, “Buy my album” or “Check out my music,” you are essentially spamming them. On the other hand, if you first build a relationship with your online followers by offering something of value (friendship, information, free stuff, apple pie) then you establish a relationship–a relationship that will lead to many selling opportunities down the line.
Letting your website collect cobwebs.
The quickest way to get ignored online is to let your website gather dust. Nothing says, “My band broke up, or I don’t care about self-promotion” like an out-of-date website. Make sure your last blog post wasn’t in 2006. Make sure your gig calendar is up-to-date, and make sure your photo gallery is filled with recent pictures. This way your fans can get to know you and your music better. Stay current!
Not Maintaining a Fan List
Your fans want to connect with you. They want the inside scoop. They want special offers and they want to feel a part of something. Give them a chance to sign up to your newsletter on your website. A Facebook post might only reach 2-5% of your Facebook fans, but an email newsletter will land in almost every email box you send it to. Email will always be the most personal way you can communicate with your fans.
With multi-track recording programs like GarageBand, Pro Tools, and Logic becoming nearly ubiquitous amongst tech-savvy musicians, it’s easier than ever to take your own music all the way from first inspiration to finished audio file without leaving your room. But just because these high-powered tools are available, it doesn’t mean we all know how to use them well.
One big stumbling block that many up-and-comers encounter is learning to deal with virtual instruments (VIs) – the sampled pianos, guitars, drums, strings, and synths – that you can trigger from your keyboard, via a MIDI connection, and record internally in these programs.
Given that many such sounds often come standard with recording software, it can be tremendous fun to lay down a virtual drum groove, record a virtual bass line on top, add a virtual organ pad, and so on. Regardless of how cool your composition is, though, and how inspired your performance may be, the end result can still end up sounding mechanical and rather lifeless. But what’s to be done?
Making your virtual instruments breathe with the music, sound more realistic, and convey the true emotion of the song is a craft unto itself. To help you bring your own pre-packaged sounds to life – regardless of whether you’re using GarageBand or Pro Tools, Logic, or Digital Performer – here are some tips from the pros.
ATTN Mag
O Squared
Attn Correspondent