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Online Marketing for an Indie Band?
nometa asks: "I'm working with an indie band, and despite excellent reviews, a great album (produced by Sylvia Massey of Tool fame), and excited responses by crowds whenever we play, it seems near-impossible to get past the 'gate-keepers' of the music industry. Majors (and several indies, sadly) don't see a pretty boy band, push for fluffy singles over good songs, and generally act like they still have clue about what people want. We've had great success, however, on our websites selling CDs and pulling in new fans, and would like to push online music marketing further. Do any Slashdot readers have suggestions for pushing our music out further online?" We all know the problem with today's music industry, this is not the place for that horse-pill. Instead let's focus on how an independent music group can go out there and make it on their own, and do so using existing technology (including the Internet), to its best potential. So what suggestions do you have for young, aspiring bands who want to make their music, and not sell their soul in the process?
Weasel your way onto the front page of Slashdot? :)
-Waldo Jaquith
Post the URL link on /. and get so many hits it crashes the server! Millions of Geeks clicking instead of working can't be wrong!
-- I am baseball in Minnesota.
Step #1.
Keep your website online by not having it Slashdotted to death
Give samples and distribution rights to University LAN stations. A lot of University campuses have their own inside-the-firewall Net radio and are starved for material.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
What were you expecting? To be a hit new sensation sweeping the nation? Guess what, that doesn't happen (anymore) without selling out. Be content with what you have.
Here's a great band they should be the Slashdot band! http://www.pressthegreenbutton.net
Make your music FREE (for personal use)! If you signed, you wouldn't get much for your music anyway, sheer .1 cents on each CD. All of your money will come from merchandising and shows. Tour, tell people to dl your MP3s (they will) and spread them to their friends. Make sure you post when you'll be in an area on your websit.
You'll make it. This is the OTHER thing the labels are afraid of...
and we get to watch the major labels crash and die. And then.. freedom from the middleman.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
I would definitely suggest putting mp3s up on Insound.com and Epitonic.com. You definitely need to advertise... sometimes word of mouth is the best carrier for a cash-strapped band. Some bands have been successful by just getting as many places to link and/or host to their mp3s. And plugging the site during a performace does wonders for exposure... especially if people can easily remember your URL.
Joe
jhall@astron.berkeley.edu
I would write up a reocmmendation on Emergent Music (or send them a CD so they can write one up). Word of mouth is great.
I saw DigitalGunfire.com in a post by someone somewhere on the web stating how this website streams bands who aren't tied to labels yet. This site so far only does industrial rock, but I'd love to find indie bands that have good music on the web. The crap on the radio these days, as we all probably agree, sucks. Therefore, most of my music is found on the web and on "streaming" sites. Please please please save us from the RIAA! Get your music promoted on those indie websites ASAP!
Marketing is about real estate. Big part of the reason its hard to break out in the Real World is that most of the real estate (shelves, venues, etc ad nauseum) are owned by a small group of people.
.. thus for very specific products like music, which appeal only to specific graphics, it'd be hard to get a good Return on Investment out of purely online marketing ventures.)
You would need to create valuable real estate online (high traffic) and then stick yourself on the top front shelf.
That said, I'm really skeptical about the ability to market rock online. Seems to me that the Internet is really more of a tool for cross-promotional opportunities, where you can drive people from the Real World to real estate online in order to let them hear/get more of your material. I'm not sure how effective an effort to aquire new fans purely online would be, as the net seems much better suited to expound on the marketing materials we encounter in real life, rather than aquire new people. (This is mostly because in the Real World real estate, you can make your marketing materials highly targetted, where as online it is far more difficult to pitch only to your target geo/demo-graphic
"Old man yells at systemd"
Just sell CDs and MP3s online. Works great!
sulli
RTFJ.
My buddie's band used an indy music distrobution company called 101distribution.
while the business model the RIAA may be antiquated and just plain shitty, the rules for getting your band heard and noticed have not changed. the end result is the same, get as many people to listen to the music as possible...
nothing is more powerful than word of mouth. the simple fact is that you wont increase your online popularity without finding a way to generate some buzz. i would begin by contacting as many independant music review sites as you can...small or large, they have readers who will be intrested in hearing the music...if it is as good as you say. there is no substitute for playing live and plugging your new cd/website...people are much more computer literate these days...and just advertising a site at every show will generate traffic!
there is no subistitute, in my opinion, for playing live as much as is humanly possible...that is where you get the most intrest...people come to bars to hear bands...they will be most open to your music there.
dont think of your online music and sales as a different entity...think of it as a way for the people who come to the shows to go home and learn more and or buy.
I went to the band's website. Suggestion #1: Don't make people click through layers to get what they want - information. I hate Flash intros that have no purpose. If you even need to put a 'Skip Intro' button on the page, you should question if it is necessary.
As both a musician and music fan, allowing your fans to trade live show bootlegs (and explicitly allow taping of same) can do wonders. Look what it did for Phish. In 3 years they went from playing college student centers to selling out Boston Garden. Before you mod me as offtopic, lemme get around to how this relates to online. Get listed on etree.org. Get on Furthur (http://furthurnet.com), which is a program for trading complete live shows in mp3 and shorten (SHN) format. Maybe get the ball rolling by posting a couple of soundboard recordings on Furthur. Don't worry about this cannabilzing your album sales. It won't. It very well may get people to buy more. I know I've bought over 10 Phish albums since I first downloaded a Phish show off Furthur.
TODO: Something witty here...
You've been /.ed
Just get the name out there. Offer free MP3s on Usenet (I'd put a note at the end of the song asking for the person to buy a copy if they liked it).
There is nothing inherently safe about liberty. That's why so many people died protecting it.
Get your stuff out to all of the college radio stations you can find.
Look to the people at College Music Journal http://www.cmj.com
for help.
J, man? - FOREVER!
Hi!
/.) Who knows? Maybe our paper rag editor in chief larry will give you some press in the real rag.
Your best bet would be to look for local music magazines, get some press in those, play lots of shows, and get noticed by the big guns in the industry.
A good place to start if you're in the bay area is Zero Magazine http://www.zeromag.com (shameless plug) We handle all the indi music for the bay area and then some. If you have any shows around here coming up, just submit a story to us and we'll post it (ala
--toq
Oh, they're certainly smart aren't they? Post on slashdot under the guys of "how can we get more hits on our lil indie band site, guys"? Brilliant. You need no help from the rest of us.
I'm not involved with the music industry so I don't know how it works. However, does anyone have any real solutions?
I suggest getting on a college circuit or playing for less money at bigger events to get exposure.
And definately make sure your website can handle publicity like this.
have a hot babe singing in your band who dresses like a tart. feature lots of seedy photos of her on your site. i'm not joking.
I just orderd online and received music from Castle Von Buhler Records. I would suggest learning abou and contacting people like them to see how they have done things.
Don't expect to make much money.
There are two EXCELLENT resources for distribution of music on the Net.
FurthurNET and etree
I *only* support, monitarily, musicians that allow the FREE distribution of their music to their fans...
etree relies on a mailing list and FTP servers to distribute music whereas FurthurNET relies on P2P (in a format much like Limewire, etc).
If you really want your music to go out and don't want to have to pay HIGH bandwith costs, I suggest one of these two methods.
Just send out millions and millions of SPAM messages to everyone. Then your band will be *the* group that "everyone loves to hate," thus toppling Eminem in popularity and sales. And the madatory Step 3 - profit!
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
You could also try one of the many free banner exchange services. The basic idea is that you put an advertisement up on your site and in return you get an advertisment on someone elses site. Not all services have a 1 to 1 ratio though.
Congrats on making some music that you and your bandmates feel good about. Please realize that there is a quiet revolution occuring in the midst of all the copyright hoo-ha, file sharing models, etc, etc. A lot of us indie musicians have woken up from the lure of record deals, fame, and financial promises of 'living off our creations.' We're letting our creations live on their own, completely abandoning notions of musicians before us, who should not be complaining about the bum deals they get from record companies since the musicians are selling themselves out by signing away the rights to their music to publishing companies.
Whatever you do, don't sell the rights to publish your music to anyone. Keep pushing it out there yourselves. Stop trying to go national or global; concentrate on your fan base. Encourage your fans to share the music with others, and explain to them how the only way around the record companies is for us musicians and listeners to work together outside of the system. It will take time. We will continue to starve. But we will maintain control over our creativity, and fick the giddamn big4 record corps by surprise.
Keep fighting the fight, and just keep making the music!
Start e-mailing everybody that you know about your band and where to get the CD.
After you sell enough to get a small server, set it up to e-mail total strangers. If your band is really that good nobody will mind.
A good place to get e-mail addresses is with ODK by FazIgu. It even has a sequential generator that will create e-mail addresses using every alpha-numeric character to make sure you do not miss anybody in a domain. The best places to start this step are microsoft.com and fbi.gov.
thank you
If you really want to make it, follow these steps:
Please don't really do this--every talking head in the nation will be screaming the "Someone must be held accountable!" mantra, your band's potential career will be snuffed, you will all be sent to prison for terrorism, I will be labelled a terrorist ringleader for giving you this idea, and slashdot.org will be closed down under the USA-PATRIOT act.
Better get used to those college towns.
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
Have a little care for the people who need text access (i.e. visually impaired) on your website and make at least part of it accessable to those of your potential customers who might not be enthralled by pretty pictures, flash, java, or whatever.
Ed Craig "Who cares what you think?" George W. Bush, 4th of July 2001
I guess this means that the "All your base..." jokes are out too?
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
Sounds like you already are successful. What else do you want? You want to be "mainstream" in a music market that values style over substance? Good luck.
Enjoy the success you have, build a label with other good bands, and spread out. Success in an art form does not (and should not) guarantee financial windfalls.
Play shows and lots of them, even if they're in dingy basement somewhere. The more you play, the more people will here you and the more people you'll expose to your music.
That and don't overly associate yourself with a local "scene".
I haven't figured out how to do my job, so rather than search on Google, I figure I'll just be lazy and ask you questions. Also, I have a computer for sale thats small, but I dont want to pay for advertising, can you just link to it? Thanks.
Your Friend,
L33t h4x0r
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
Create some spyware that automatically plays singles from your band everytime I boot my computer.
My CD sold 2000 copies by word-of-mouth this way. (It's out of print and not being re-pressed, so this is not an advertisement. :-))
A lot of bands which have enjoyed success on mainstream radio got their start in college radio. Radiohead is one great example (and, er, Tool is another).
There are organisations such as Team Clermont and Addsman who distribute albums for very small labels and independants who are too small to effectively handle their own distribution. Getting one of them to promote your CD is a good start.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Take a couple tracks and make them into mp3's.
Include the song title and then put something like "indie: like Tool" or "produced by Tool's producer" etc.. in parenthesis in the title. Then release the songs out on a bunch of gnutella and opennap winmx networks.
I've seen people do this with good success. The band Sheavy, for example, mentioned "Black Sabbath-like indie band" in a track title, and got a *lot* of downloads.
Loomis
"The television is the retina of the mind's eye" - Videodrome
Perhaps your current market is all that you should hope for.. Remember there are a lot of bands/artists out there, so what makes you think an expensive promotion campaign will be worthwile and not a waste of money? The market just can't handle a million bands trying to promote themselves over each other.
I would stick with local clubs and parties promoted through friends and contacts performed as a service... You don't need to be famous, and you'll get plenty of chicks that way.
If you really want to promote your band outside radio, I would just burn 10k CD's and hand them out to interesting people at area concerts/clubs with your bands contact info saying you'll do parties and what not. A cheap way to get famous.
Try online classified advertising. A great example for this is Fark. You pay a small fee, and get a space of text on the front page that links where you want it to. If it goes nowhere you didn't spend much, and if it worked well you have found a space for banner ads. Penny Arcade also does really nice, big ads cheap. If you have a DSL/Cable connection at home or work, run a P2P node carrying mp3s from your band and other indy bands, and instead of carrying the mp3s on your limited web site's bandwidth, tell users to just search for you.
If nothing else, you'll establish your band as a "band for the people waging war against those anti-mp3 jackasses!" and thus gain a cult following. After that, some record label should pick you up, thinking you'll make them "cool" and "with it."
If that ain't your thang, you can just include the words "Christian rock" in your band's description, and I'm sure you'll get picked up in a hurry. And make sure you have a few songs about women you've hurt so that you can have a crappy music video featuring some B-celeb like Tiffani Amber-Thiessen or Alyssa Milano that'll make you zoom to the top of the Vh1 charts. Wow, this post has become one long rant about nothing.
Check out Amazon for a little ebook called Buzz Your MP3 by a fellow named Brian Freeman It's a nice little reference for exactly this.
Many bands allow audience taping. These bands also sell cd's and they do ok at it.
Historic examples of bands that did very well while allowing fans to tape and trade their stuff are the Grateful Dead, Phish, and Dave Matthews Band.
By allowing taping, fans will share your music legally with each other. If your music is good enough that people actually enjoy it, then those people who received a copy of one of your shows will pay to see you live and possibly buy a CD at the same time.
Many good suggestions are turning up here, but I see one conspicuously missing.
Like it or not, the reason the music business succeeds at promoting talent (or what they pass for it in many cases) is that they have an infrastructure for creating interest. If you can't reliably count on your existing fans to spread the word for you gratis, then you are going to need a full-time person to do it for you. From my own experience (http://www.popes.com/) I can assure you that if you try to simultaneously be a band and your own promotional arm, you will soon find yourself burnt out on both. Hire someone (or enlist a truly dedicated fan) to make your tracks available on every streaming and download site you can find and cultivate relationships with those sites.
Trouble making decisions? Just flip for it.
1) have patience. indie superstars do not happen overnight. all the indie "greats" took quite a while to get to where they could at least pay for a few things. 2) network. tour. make friends with the kids. tour some more. tour with other well-liked bands. get your crap out on a well known indie label. do splits and comps and zine interviews. get on mailing lists, participate, get your name out. loyal followers will follow. get your cd noticed by folks like pitchforkmedia.com or insound.com, who both attract a lot of traffic and will review and sell your cds for you. send free cds to other online zines. become friends with more people in bands. tour. put videos and songs up online. really though, all the internet doings are still not going to have the effect of making the right friends in person as well as online. sadly, diy indie is pretty paradoxical. you really do need all those people. 3) patience. m. http://www.pataphysics-lab.com
It doesn't matter what type of label your band is on (be it self-released, friendly indie, or greedy major) the only way to make any money as a band is either through touring or licensing. So if one is looking to use the internet to help them make rent, it would be best to use it as a research tool for finding places to play and schmoozing.
we're just marketing. marketing our bad attitudes.
How about putting some MP3's out and including contact information in the id tag? This information can be a simple email address or web site address. Something like "for more info contact ...." or "to purchase CD ..." You could release it into the world of P2P networks or newsgroups. You can then see if these distribution methods actually help unlike what the industry tries to make us believe.
Try releasing low quality MP3s (or Ogg, or your format of choice). By low quality I mean studio recorded, but compressed at a low bitrate. It should be low enough that even people with small computer speakers can hear it is unsatisfying. Perhaps 56kbps? Or even 24? Do this with every track you release. If your music is as good as you say it is, then people will come. Plus, because you've got it out first, your low quality version will be predominant among filesharers, so high quality ones which impede CD sales won't have a chance.
:-)
Just a pet idea of mine. I'm sure somebody will pull it apart within minutes
You're asking slashdot how to market?
This is a place where anyone not regularly updating their kernel is derided and ridiculed. Its a place that has a penguin for a mascot, two competing desktops for purely technical reasons, and no way to play quicktime movies.
I've seen the suggestion on slashdot many times to have people able to download songs for a reasonable price. So, why not do that online? Meaning, obviously enough, to have your songs available for download for a small fee. Either that, or let them purchase the CD for a little more than it would cost to d/l all the songs individually, giving them artwork(if any), lyrics, and of course, the fun CD case :).
You can also see if you can get together with other bands doing the same thing you're doing, and gain publicity through all of your efforts instead of just one band doing its own thing at a time. I'm sure there are others out there such as yourselves who want to do things without corporate "assistance".
I hope any of this helps, or at least spurs your brain into more ideas.
Try actually thinking for yourself. It's quite refreshing.
Here's my $.02. Being a musician myself, I can only suggest a few ideas, as I haven't gotten as far as you guys have.
1. Copyrights. I'm sure you've already done this one, but it's important. Once you own the rights to your own stuff, you have one up on the record companies. You can release it however you choose, as you write the license terms. If you haven't yet, it's simple to do. Just get $20 and the right form, send it away to the Library of Congress, and everything is happy. Remember, once you put it in the mail, it's considered recieved, so you can start your plan to take over the music world right away.
2. Take advantage of P2P networks. Rip your stuff to MP3, OGG, or your desired format. When you name the file, stick a refference to the Genre of music in there. That way, people looking for Metal, Pop, Country, whatever your music is, can find it and go "Hmmm? What's this? This is new, I'll check it out. And only release one or two songs, not the entire album. Common sense, I know, but some bands leave that out sometimes, so I put it here just in case.
3. Check out the local radio stations in your area. They probably have some sort of local musicians program. See if you can weasle their DJ into getting you guys on, and once you get on, plug the heck out of your website and the fact that your stuff is available on P2P networks. Free plugs are always good, especially on the air. If you have a built-in fanbase (like our local boys, Stept On (shameless plug, I know, but they F'N ROCK!), your music could end up in regular rotation, as will the plugs for yoru website.
4. Take advantage of any fanbase you have to start a grassroots internet campaign. Some of your fans are likely to frequent chat rooms. That's an advertising blitz waiting to happen. If they can convince one person to try your music out, then it's a success. From there, it has the potential to spread like wildfire.
5. Send your stuff to me! I'm always looking out for new bands to dig on, and I'm interested in giving your music a go-round! The fact that you're circumventing the big boys (and even the indies) is what I'd like to see more bands do!
Blog Prophyts - Right On, Man
Step 1: Hire a good lawyer.
Step 2: Incorporate.
The RIAA will sue you because you're not paying them for the rights to stream your own music. The lawyer will let you run your stream for a few more days until the final court order comes in saying that you owe $800,000 in CARP fees to the RIAA. Then you can allow the corporation to go into Chapter 11 while you regroup and form a new band.
Also buy some heroin for your lead singer so that he gets all moody and suicidal. This is an absolute requirement if he/she is not pretty enough to shoot into space. People love bands with junkie lead singers.
OMG ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!!
Man, some people might be drinking coffee when they read this stuff you know, so don't just unload those comedy guns without a warning!
LOL!! Hahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That is so funny! Oh, I just peed a little!
OMFG I can't breathe!!!!
Put it on napster anonymously, watch it spread, then start suing people.
Linkin Park apparent got on appropriate IRC and other IM/Chat channels where music was being discussed, and pretended they weren't in the band and told people to go check them out. See this article, taken from Time Magazine Jan 28 2002.
Get some of your music on a p2p service. Some people think it helps.
Get yourself a Soundscan barcode, and start tracking sales with it religiously. Labels notice if your soundscan numbers jump.
Finally, ask yourself what's really important to you. Labels will try to make you famous if they think it's a good investment that fits with their concept. They'll take your art and most of the money from the resulting fame, though. If your desire is to be huge, go the label route. If your desire is simply to make music and make a living, re-read the article I linked to above. That artist is making a living in Utah, a place with nearly no real local music venues or radio support. Several others are too. They had something in them that appealed to a large enough audience, and word got out. That's the real trick.
Tweet, tweet.
I used to frequent garageband.com a lot when I was in university (something about not having to pay for all that bandwidth!) and I have to say it's a great way to get exposure and feedback on your music.
Everyone else has said it, you need to get exposure and lots of it. Start working on finding as many online music communities and peddle your wares. Don't forget about your local scene either! If it's not big enough, start branching out to places within a couple hours drive.
Word of mouth is still one of the best ways to get exposure and the net is really just word of mouth.
Really Bored?? http://ivany.org
The problem is one of exposure.
I believe that you should work with a network that exposes you to lots of users (shameless plug: www.clickshare.com)
This sort of network allows you to to tap into a pre-existing network of users, and to sell songs on line one (or more) at a time.
TOUR TOUR TOUR
It sucks, but your fan base will grow exponentially from every town you play in. Make sure you hit the college circut.
It's not that they didn't want to avoid record companies for distribution, it's that they tried and got rejected.
I may be old fashioned, but making good friends with as many DJ's as possible seems the best route if mainstreamism is still the desired goal. Putting stuff online will only work well if people already want said stuff. Remember "push" services failed long ago.
Other have said it and I will too just make sure your name is out there and you have a presence. Also if you have a Borders or similar type store they will carry CD's for local bands.
Anyone know of a website that serves to promote indie music? I'm thinking something similar to mp3.com (which I don't visit any longer because they have more ads than music)
Trying to sell music over the internet is fine, but why keep it limited to that. Send CDs to college radio stations along with a little biography of the band and the web site. This is a relatively cheap way of advertising. You can also talk to the people down at college radio stations. They are usually very happy to do interviews. College radio stations are a very good way to get some attention and college campuses/towns are very easy places to get gigs.
Always make information about the web site available at gigs. You may also want to sell CDs at the gigs. You can usually convince a few people to buy this way. You may want to try throwing some songs on P2P networks as well as systems like mp3.com where people may just come across your page through browsing.
You can spend a little cash and buy some banner ads on various music sites. Also having band members participating in online forums and things like cyberjams on harmonycentral.com could definitely help bring attention from people that are actually interested in hearing other peoples work.
Best of luck.
Long live Indie Rock!
Look at single people like Ani DiFranco who made it through just touring around the country living out of your car and passing out (selling) tapes/CD's out of the trunk. Go on college radio stations, find indie record distributors like cdbaby.com. I have found massive numbers of record producers in, oddly enough, the bars of airports across the united states. Always have a copy of your CD on you. Give it away if you have to -- people will be more likely to get ahold if it if it's free -- or press cd-singles and pass them out. Whatever it takes man. Saturation will put you into the market somehow. Then, let the public decide.
:-)
Or, you could join next year's "American Idol".
I never knew that ODK could do that. Do you have to use the rimlapper module?
BTW, I would stay away from fbi.gov, they are just trouble.
yeah it isnt....i mean it.....
On Demand Distribution
A site recommended by Peter Gabriel
(1st sig) If this were a snappy sig, you'd be reading it right now. (2nd sig) I'm a karma whore. >Insert FUD here
Ten years ago there was no such thing as online marketing for *any* band. Bands have been getting underground, word of mouth press for years -- going online isn't part of the equation. You really want to get recognized? Play your asses off and make your audience sweat. The marketing will take care of itself.
I would like to see more artists using free as in free speech licenses. Remember that you don't have to use the license for all of your album. Most licenses allow you to license individual songs. You could choose to release your singles on the license and then restrict copying of your album tracks. That way you get publicity for your album through legitimate filesharing, you contribute to the musical commons, and your CD sales increase - all at the same time.
You also don't have to worry about piracy. What you're doing is effectively out-competing pirates by giving away what they would steal. There will be no market for their stolen product if everyone could just get it from you.
Read up on the various licenses, decide how you want to do it, and give it a try. That's what I did when I encountered the idea of copylefting music. I also went a step further and tried to write a persuasive essay on the subject (which is harder than you would expect). Not only did I learn a lot of the standard arguements and objections in my research, but I also solidified my own opinion and viewpoint.
for example, phish. they built up an enormous following without the benefit (and curse) of a radio hit. you basically do two things: 1. give away music. you might, for example, allow people to tape your live shows, which you say are good. they will talk about them and trade them online, building up your audience. and fans that you earn this way will be more loyal and more likely to buy your releases. 2. play a LOT of shows. anywhere that will let you. do this for years. word of mouth works, but it takes a long time. in the end you might be famous, and you'll still have your integrity.
The Majors generally act like they still have clue about what people want.
I know everybody here likes to bitch and moan about popular music, but the fact is that the recording industry at large probably does have a pretty good handle on what "most people" want.
These guys sink millions upon millions of dollars into focus groups and various other forms of research to determine what music is going to be the most popular. Obviously you're going to have bands (e.g. Barenaked Ladies) that blindside these studies and turn into mega superstars. But for better or worse, the major labels have gotten pretty good at spoon-feeding the public just exactly what they want. It may be insipid, it may be uninspired, but chances are it's what most people want to hear.
Look at it this way - you and I may not be buying Britney Spears albums, but there's a hell of a lot of somebody out there paying for them.
You also might want to check out Dave Mathews, and the people on his label. He succeeded by touring like mad. Same with David Grey (on Matthews label as well).
The only other thing I can suggest is to SOUND different. I didn't listen to your music on the website (/.ed) but I did catch the little part on the Flash intro. There is a million and one heavy rap metal funk etc. bands already. If you sound like everyone else, why bother? Start a cover band and make more $$$. Originality may not sell more records now, but it certainly will contribute to the longetivity of your band. And that equals opportunity to make more records.
Lastly, pay *special* attention to your SHOW. You could be the best band in the world, but what gets (average) people to return is something they didn't expect to see/hear. I used to be in a band with a guy who was a fire breather. One night he set his face on fire. Not fun. He was ok, (some burn scars on his neck) You should have seen the crowd after that! (I in no way advise setting yourself on fire.) I don't mean gimmicky things (like fire), but pyro, clothes, makeup, movement, and any press (is good press) all have a long history of making a good band great. (see Kiss, Bowie, Marilyn Manson, Stones, Pink Floyd, the Who etc.
I'm more of a Wilco, Floyd, Bowie, Who fan, but whatever makes your sandwich.
Good luck.
I would have called the music industry a different horse product, myself....
I have played music (guitar/drums) for a combined period of 25+ years and what your asking is ... well, it takes time to break into the biz - or never.
...
/. people who know what they do and might not become rich.famous, but dig technolgy because they love it - flame the famers!
Examples:
Ani DiFranco - indy hold-out! good for her!
Guided by Voices - 10+ years before signing
No Doubt - 15+ years of gigs before being signed
-You can upload mp3's(or whatever format you want) to your site and other's e.g. MP3.com.
-Sell t-shirts/CD-s/merchandise on your web site.
-Get interviews in both on/off line publications.
-Go on tour on and off line - web cast a show from your basement/club - fun.
-Go see and make friends with other bands that come through your home town - open for them if possible.
-List your band on all/any downloadable music site(s).
But it really all depends on your formula(it's just a game). I had a friend(drum instructor) who was in the band SR-71 (the name? airplane.) they were on MTV and radio all over the country. But where are they now? Nowhere. the music biz is a $$ making game and the money you get to tour is a loan you must payback with record sales etc. Best advice - play for the love of it, not the fame. That is my best guestimate about people who come to
check out indiepro.com. You can submit your cds/music/press kits here.
Live365.com is the one that comes to mind right away -- but my tastes skew more towards the trance / goa scene for online radio, so the rest of the sites that I know of probably aren't appropriate.
Online radio = a good thing. Even regular radio = a good thing.
Are you trying to make a living playing music or are do you want to be the next Bon Jovi? They're very different goals and unfortunatly the record industry won't let you be like Bon Jovi (or any other multi-million selling band) unless you sound like something they already know they can sell. Yes, they're idiots and they couldn't recognize good music if it punched them in the face, but that's the reality.
Now, if you want to make a living playing music then you're well on your way. It sounds like you have enough local support that you can start expanding your geographic sphere of influence. If you're music is popular and you're getting good crowd reactions then you can certainly build up enough gigs within a 100 miles or so of your base to be able to play every week and at least make a living.
Also, see if your city has a true alternative station that's not already owned by Clear Channel (oh wait, if Clear Channel owned it then it wouldn't be an alternative station would it). You may be able to get your CD played ther. Also look for local public radio stations and college stations. If there's a "local talent" talk show on any of those radio stations then you should bust your butt to get on it and promote your CD and your gigs.
But don't expect anyone in the record industry to suddenly get a clue. Unless of course you're 5 guys with headphone mics dancing on stage. OR you're the next Britney, Christina, Whoever clone in low rise pants and a wonder bra. (Hmmm, notice how nothing in that last sentence had anything to do with the MUSIC. When creativity is lacking sexuality is substituted.)
Good luck. I hope you can at least make a living while having fun playing your music.
Give out free CDs at campuses. If you can't get someone there in person, send them to a local campus group or station.
n00bie!
This is a band my daughter introduced me to, for which I can find only one or two obscure references to on the web, and whom I simply love. How can I get more of their stuff? I think I would do a Google search on their name and then download all the material I could, if it were available.
That is my suggestion on how to make the internet work for you: give away all the songs for free and only charge for live performances. If your music is that good, you might make it! It is the essence of the Napster craze in any case: cut out the middle man, give away the recorded songs, and feed the artist by letting him sing for his supper.
If you want to get rich, don't do this, but if you believe in your creation, in your art, in the expression, you will see how great an alternative this can be!
Do you risk starving? Probably. But you will have given your life for something greater: eventual freedom of the artist from capitalist abusers, and more importantly, freedom of your art form. I'm not kidding. You have to be willing to do it for the art, not the money, first. The rest will follow.
For another alternative, check out disciplineglobalmobile and find out what Robert Fripp (King Crimson) did when he got sick of dealing with the corporate types.
SDMI: Finally! Music that won't rip or burn! Brought to you by the fine folks at RIAA.
they might be giants use the internet a lot. they may not be in exactly the same situation, but they did manage to maintain a fan base and release new music even when they were between having a label to support them.
they did what i thought was a pretty cool thing they did when they sold mp3's on emusic.com. if you bought the entire album's worth of mp3's, they sent you a cd of those songs, too. they also have some mp3's available for free, which i believe helps them sell the others.
check out their techniques on their websites tmbg.com and theymightbegiants.com.
of course, it also doesn't hurt that they are almost always on tour.
you probably shouldn't have read this.
I would also look into sending a CD to Blogcritics for review, it is a fairly new site, but is the effort of a number of high traffic bloggers so it will become increasing known.
:)
and no I am not associated with them, but have friends who are
Ohh, not IndieBand, but "an indie band". I thought he was using some open source version of Infiniband.
....
nevermind
Apparenty the mods (editors) can't take any drug references without beating the post into the ground. What, are you afraid the Feds are going to raid the office? Give it a rest.
Perhaps a game of Modopoly will calm your nerves.
...that everyone sells their soul to make a record. (Since their producer is "of Tool fame").
Kickin' it self-righteous school.
Give away free MP3s of all your songs on your site, and allow them to be redistributed -- make sure your running Gnutella with your songs too. Allow the audience to record your concerts and distribute them.
Then tour a lot, sell t-shirts, sell CDs of the best stuff that you're giving away for free with value-adds (like good artwork, autographs, lyrics sheets, etc.), solicit donations/payback (be specific & upfront about your costs and needs).
Open mouth. Insert cock of A&R man from whatever label.
That's the truth. Otherwise, all you can do is tour your ass off forever, and be happy.
"If you want to get rich by writing, write books for people who move their lips when they read."
Something similar was on the bottom of Slashdot one day. It holds true for every type of artist, however.
... for the show American Indie: The search for a group of people who smell bad and play music only appreciated by a small percentage of the population. Fox would probably pick it up.
(Score:-1, Wrong)
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Allow your audience to tape and trade your concerts freely.
The Grateful Dead did it. Phish does it. Dave Matthews Band does it. U2 does it. Radiohead does it. Metallica did it. Note that I just named six of the top grossing concert acts ever. Combine that with a heavy touring schedule, and assuming your band is decent enough to draw an audience, they will rake in the dough.
However, if your band expects to make their primary income from record sales, you're gonna have to bend to the will of the record companies. Fact of the business.
Have some substance to your material besides a pulsing bass line and inane growls. If you really think you have the talent, play play play. If not, give up and find chicks some other way.
Remember, Bob Dylan started out playing in NY for $1 and a cheeseburger. He didn't mind, he just does what he does.
The RIAA stands in front of Congress and purports to represent artists AND labels.
Uh. No?
The MPAA doesn't represent actors... SAG does. Artists will never have any rights until they find a way to join together and fight the RIAA.
Tell your band to form a union. Get every other rocknroller in this country to join. Boom. Instant power.
It's true, even though I generally consider myself a capitalist and I hate unions.
"Boy bands" is actually a misnomer--groups like N'Sync or Backstreet Boys are, in fact, vocal groups because they do not play instruments.
Those so-called "Live" performances? The first half is spruced up karaoke, the last half is lip synced (as the vocal groups' vocal chords start to give out).
Thus, if you try to hijack a concert, you'll just be singing your song with N'Sync music blaring in the background and your band playing instruments that aren't even plugged in. And nobody wants that.
Nathan
"who want to make their music, and not sell their soul in the process"
You can't. In order to sell (500,000+ units) anything in this country, you have to compromise your values and artistic freedoms.
However, you can go the old-fashioned route and save some of your values and freedoms:
1. Create your own label.
2. Play 300 nights a year all over the country (thus creating a fan base)
3. Sell CDs and Tapes at shows and local music stores. (Large chain stores probably won't sell your CDs, because of contracts and deals with major labels and distributors)
5. Create a web-site with tour dates, photos, band info, message board, etc... and sell CDs and Tapes.
You may not sell a million albums, but you'll certainly make more money than if you hand-over your rights to the big "labels." The old-fashioned way, you retain the rights to your image, music, and all related materials.
The rapper/business mogul Master P started with some capital from another "business," created his own label and sold albums out of the trunk of his car. He only sold 50,000 units of his second single, but made more money that most artists on a major label selling a million plus units.
No substitute for just getting out there and playing shows. Lots and lots and lots of shows.
Hi,
It's me again, the secret spy. I have decided to admit who I am... I am the asshole known as cyborg_monkey.
Please kill me know, and shove some twinkies up my stinky.
Hugs and kisses,
Juan Epstein
Send a copy of the cd to pitchforkmedia.com
CDs which get good reviews on that site generally get popular quickly.
Since fans are digging the shows allow them to tape and trade concerts. Furthur is a great program, disigned to distribute shows. If it worked for the DEAD, MMW, Phish, WORD, Tenacious D, Missippi All Stars, Radiohead, Weezer, Ween, Beasty Boys, etc. I am sure it will work for you!
I know of and have ordered from a number of smaller online stores that sell self-produced as well as indie and major label releases and tend to promote the former two pretty heavily (at least giving them reviews on the websites). These include Village Records and Miles of Music among others.
Since Tallman appears to be something of a hard rock/metal band, neither of these places (which focus on Americana/Alt.country) will be up your alley but there are likely to be similar places where you can find some lovin'.
Other obvious ideas are getting your stuff up on mp3.com, audiogalaxy, etc. Find some online radio shows that feature music of your genre and make sure they have your stuff. College and other community radio stations often have a few hard/metal shows that are always looking for new (not nu) stuff to showcase. Whenever your guys are out of town playing gigs, make sure to get them on at least a college radio program in whatever bumfuck town you're in. The 5 people listening to the show when you're on is 5 more people who otherwise never would have heard of you.
E
There's one thing computing teaches you, and that's that there's no point to remembering everything.
--Doug Copland
-m
... one, be original. Two, give away your best song from one album for free. This will give you exposure.
Assuming that you have more than one good song you will soon find that some people are buying your CD.
You could also try offering a low cost CD that has high quality music and good production. After all, isn't that what everyone wants?
Do not, under any circumstances, accuse your fans of "stealing" from you unless they break into your house to steal your toilet seats or something else like that.
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
Take a few of your back catalog of music and make MIDI files of them. Release them as Public Domain for music search engine research, like what is done here. What is truely keeping searching technology down is the lack of a standard large and public corpus that can be used to compare different techniques. RIAA won't allow any of thier catalogue to be used. If only non-RIAA people show up in these public research indices, then only non-RIAA artists will be findable from them. And if people like the midi, they might look for/purchase the originals. Something to think about.
If you choose the Open Audio License published by the EFF, I would strongly recommending listing the music in the Open Music Registry (see link in my .sig). If you so choose, you can use that listing to request tips/donations from listeners.
(This is directed to nometa, not Milo Fungus, who provides an example of what I'm describing in the 2nd paragraph above.)
No Laughing Allowed!
Make sure that you:
1. Post at the Velvet Rope (http://www.velvetrope.com) telling people how great you are.
2. Make sure the release is available for sale on Amazon. They do consignment-type stuff all the time.
3. Put up samples of stuff at mp3.com.
4. TOUR TOUR TOUR TOUR. Promote the Web site at every show.
RateVegas.com - Vegas Reviews
Try getting on that american idol tv show.. or something :P
Weezer.com keeps me coming back because they update their site daily. They put demos out all the time. All their videos are online. And tons of merchandise. Best Music Model i've seen yet.
Btw, Metallica.com charges $25 a year to look at their bulletin board. (They actually found a way for me to hate them. This coming from a hardcore fan from the 80's)
There's only one way I know of to make it in the
....
...wherever... should all think you are a local
music biz, and that is to play lots of shows. Here's
a way to work it:
1. Make the band's music available online for free
so that
2. When you email a club for a booking you can
send the URL. Most indi bands have two primary
expenses, telephone and CD's. By posting high
quality MP3s or oggs you can potentially get
around both of them. Gas for the van is nothing
compared to the price of setting up a tour by
phone and mailing out crap.
3. Play every night. OK, allow maybe one night a
week for R&R, but seriously, it's a job. It
should be a job that the band members love, but
still, it's a job, and it needs to be treated
like one. That means tour tour tour. Play the
cities. Play the college towns. Play the Southern
frat boy circuit. Play everywhere, and keep
coming back. People in Chicago, NY, Cleveland
band. Ditch the day job, then work, work, work.
3. Do allow live taping. Also let your fans make
their own t-shirts. I've seen several posters
refer to Phish or whatever. Don't be put off
if you don't like that band, it doesn't matter
what kind of music you play the technique will
work. Let the fans tape and share the shows.
This will form an emotional bond with them that
will never end. If you think this is just for
hippy bands, then you should check out how well
this has worked for the avant-guard jazz group
Medeski, Martin, and Wood. Also read up on the
history and politics of Fugazi. Now, they sure
aren't a jam band, but they have been very successful
with NO industry support. Also read up about the
Jesus Lizard.
4. Did I mention that you'll have to play every night?
Also spend all of the time you can sending email
to clubs. Establish relationships. Some club
owners are cool, others will try to rip you off.
Ask the fans what place to play at, but then always
come back to the places that treat you right, maybe
three, four times a year. Successful indi bands
drive for a living, and play every night for fun.
Playing out is better than practice anyhow, always
remember that.
____________________________________
-- I beleve you'll like this -->
How about trying to meet some indie filmmakers and getting your music on the soundtracks for their films with a credit at the end, or maybe a bit part or cameo? Some indie films enjoy a lot of success, some don't, of course.... but it might be sort of a symbiotic relationship- indie filmmakers are trying to achieve the same goal as you.
well known essay
Sleep in the fucking van. Drive all other the whole United States, or North America, or the world for that matter. That is sole way of getting big without "selling out". I won't judge a band without see them live first because until then they could be talentless hacks with session musicans on the CD.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
The best thing a band can do to get their music out is to allow Tapers to tape their live shows and pass their music around the music circles and get the word of mouth going. Allowing your music to be taped and traded allows the fans to get greater access to your music and allows your music to be heard by ears.
I would say you already have a nice start by getting an internet presence, opening yourself up to the entire world through the website. And, of course, getting on the /. frontpage doesn't hurt either (except for the people who can't get in because of the /. effect).
Definitely look around for college radio stations and talk to dj's who are willing to play your music on air. Also, look for any remaining internet radio stations to play your music, since almost no independent or college radio stations can afford to play music on the internet anymore.
Also, free distribution, or even very inexpensive distribution of some songs can help give a ton of exposure. Have some samples available to download, and have CDs available to buy. People will be willing to pay to download music (a very reasonable amount, of course), so there is a potential source of revenue.
Using the internet to its potential is a very good resource. The major record companies have, of course, not embraced the internet, but instead only see it as a "pirate's" paradise. Embrace it and use it's ability to reach many people, and do not restrict the people you are trying to reach.
PS: if you go to download some stuff from a p2p that's copyrighted to a major label, don't forget your eye patch and parrot. And might as well take a picture for your day in court too (well your day in court along with the other 90 million "pirates").
A computer is a valuable tool, so use it and stop whining.
...rise and fall (not naming names) you have two choices:
1. Sell out. Write some pop songs and cut a new demo. Send that to the labels. Y'know how The Hives are all popular right now? Try to sound as much like them as possible. When the next trend comes, try to sound as much like that as possible if it doesn't work this time. If your boys are as good as you say they are, this should be no problem.
2. Keep your integrity, and hope to hell the band is eventually recognized by elitist music journalists as an influence on something, at which point you will be able to quit your day jobs for a little while and do a reunion tour.
I really wish it wasn't this way, but the music biz is all about moving product, not about music. Just because you've been able to sell a few hundred disks over your website (most probably to Tool fans who are completeists) does NOT mean you will be able to sell a damn thing at the local Sam Goody no matter how much PR the label does for you.
Sorry, duder.
Indie music is one thing I haven't seen advertized by spam.
Sure. Best thing to do would be to submit some sort of question to Slashdot that contains a link to your band's website, and be sure to couch it in enough relevancy that it'll get chosen as a story.
...
Wait a minute
My need visibility. My thoughts:
Pick your "single" and spread it as far as you can. Send CDs to every zine, magazine, web editor that you can find. Put it on the P2P nets. Get it in the hands of Kevin Smith (ala Afroman)
Get on Howard Stern (someone is going to have to show their breasts).
-DJ
Make your music available for free with mp3's and ogg vorbis. Market yourselves as defying the music industry, you'll get lot's of attention. Exposure = Good.
The probelm behind online marketing is that its cheap enough for everyone to do it. So you loose the "unique" feel of conventional advertisement.
The truth is the reason behiond the success of traditional advertisement is that its very expensive. That guarantees that the customer will remember the few brands that manage to get a goot marketing campaign.
Having said that i would recommend you to leave traditional online advertisement (websites, p2p, slashdot, etc) as secondary, and focus on untraditional and innovative advertisement. Im not telling you to hack google to show your band as the result of every query, but to be smart and careful.
For instance, you could start a "music for geeks" campaign, giving away linux CDs in your shows and showing source code behind the stage, that would get you on the news, and from there (if you are good) you are done.
The key: innovation, do something nobody has ever done.
Life isn't like a box of chocolates. It's more like a jar of jalapenos. What you do today, might burn your ass tomorrow.
Does slashdot have any suggestions for marketing?
You clearly don't need any help...
There's no short-cut to becoming a "popular" band, unless you've got an uncle in the biz or are a creation of a major label.
Load your equipement into the van and hit the road playing every town you can.
Make friends with the bands and patrons you meet.
If you're good they'll tell others.
(who can then go to your website to see when you're playing again.)
Oliver's army is here to stay Oliver's army are on their way And I would rather be anywhere else But here today
This is something bands could do for free or charge a nominal fee for access to MP3s for.
While it may feel like you're giving away the product for free, I'd be much more inclined to checking out a gig passing through town if I had already heard sample shows and knew it'd be worth my while attending.
Matt
EM
...Flash to access the site
I am currently not obliged to divulge that information as it might compromise the agents in the field
Indie was a fad for about 20 minutes in the 60s.
Try playing rock. Or rap. Our country.
Noone likes indie anymore. Trade in your sitar for an electric guitar, and your bongos for a drum set.
has a nice service called Advantage at http://www.amazon.com/advantage If you ever manage to get a lot of press for yourself, they have the ability to handle large volumes of CD sales for you. We used to see this a lot...Howard Stern mentions no-name band, no-name band is inundated with 10,000 orders, site crashes, etc. Works very well to just turn the distribution side to Amazon. Disclaimer: I don't work at Amazon, but I used to. Unfortunately, you're still in charge of getting Howard Stern to mention your band.
laugh hard, it's a long way to the bank
my friends recently signed to a major label, and are in the process of recording an album with two of the most esteemed producers in rock. but, it took them 10 years to get to the point they are at now. they spent their 1st 3 years putting out their own 7" and playing as many shows as possible, including self promoted shows at the ampitheater in our small town park. the next six years, they were supported by an independent label which fronted some cash to record and tour on, but it was hard word and perserverance that allowed them to sell the 500,000 cumilative records. then they got the attention of the big boys.
if your band is doing well on tours, and getting a worthwhile draw at shows, then time will expand your audience. most musicians never get to this point, so consider your self lucky if you do.
1. Flash/Shockwave is of the devil, don't use it on your website. ...
2. cookies are also of the devil, don't use them.
3.
4. Profit
Your new song, "Lesbian porn full britney DiVX :)" should get downloaded from Gnutella at an alarming rate....
That said, getting your band heard is all about exposure, you wanna make it national, tour. In the ~7 years I played for a living, we toured over 100 days a year every year. Eventually we got to open for bands like The Police, Adam Ant, etc... This was where we got HUGE exposure.
On a final note, I'll quote Pat MacDonald's B-Side of life:
"Once I got lucky
I had a band
We had a song it got to number three
Made lots of money
Made lots of friends
Had lots of pretty people hanging 'round me
Now all I want
Is a place to hide
To feel safe from the chaos outside
A cold refrigerator
A warm bed
A place where noone will stick a gun to my head
We had the keys to the city
But the rooms it did unlock
Were full of overpriced portraits
Engaged in cheap small talk
I buy my dinner at the 7-11
I eat it in the kitchen while I watch TV
I like my free time and I love my wife
I'm happy living on th B-Side of life."
~Jason
"Once your face is public property there's no place to hide, it's either tele-crucifixion or tele-suicide."
Try reading the Subpop Demo Tape Policy. The problem isn't with the record labels; the problem is that your band sucks.
.. and make sure you're always available for free on a p2p. Harsh reality is good songs don't cut it. Only great songs make waves.
Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.
Come up with some cool song titles and share them on a P2P network. Then put your URL in your sig and post promiscuously on slashdot.
Anything you say will be held against you.
As much as most musicians frown on this, it seemed to work for Moby. I think that his first 'big hit' was in a car commercial. I was watching an interview with him where he said that he donated all of the money from the commercial to anti-fossil fuel campaigns, but I don't think you have to do that :) I guess in a lot of ways you have to look at things like: "The only bad publicity is that which misspells our name."
Radio -- college is good, but commercial is better (although just about impossible to break into as an independent band). Labels wants to see that you have at least some sort of radio presence.
Touring -- labels want bands to tour, tour, and tour. This is probably the most effective way of building up a serious fan base. If you can go to any major city in the country and sell the place out, you're on to something. And pay particular attention to NYC and LA. As the centers of the music business, these are the best places to get noticed.
Sales History -- labels, particularly bigger ones, want sure things. Remember, an A&R guy's job is based on if he can pick the next big thing. With 9 in 10 releases never making any money, proving to a labelt that you can sell records is important. Make sure everything you sell has a barcode and is being tracked by Soundscan
A&R pay very close attention to Soundscan numbers and BDS and CMJ reports (commercial and college radio, respectively). If you're showing up on the map -- even in only one or two markets -- you'll be getting calls. Same thing goes with press. If you're getting written up in a decent regional or national music mag -- and it's a good review -- you'll get calls. This business is all about smoke and mirrors. Use that to your advantage, or hire someone that knows how. If you want to talk about this more e-mail me at jake@universalbuzz.com
Are all of your online songs titled "Rebuffering"? Thats all I was shown when I tried to listen to a few of the cuts
My brother is in a situation much like yours. He's doing the garage band thing and trying to get discovered. Using the internet is the best thing he's done to get the word out on his band. Compile buddies on AIM, ICQ, newsgroups, message boards, groups, communities, whatever. This gives him a network of people. He meets people who know people who know people, and so on. It's all very Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Through the people he's met in chat rooms, communities, mailing lists, etc. he's made contact in very high places and his former band had some success getting signed to a label and making it onto a few compilation CDs. Get yourself known to people through communities, and never underestimate a person's curiosity. Put a link to your site in your sig, tell people where to download your mp3s (yes- use mp3s to get your music out there, you're not making any money right now anyway, so it's no skin off your teeth). BUILD A GOOD WEBSITE with your mp3s readily available and easy to download. This all worked for my brother and he has an incredible network of people that he can go to for things like website work (someone built him a great site for FREE just because they've kept in contact so long), gigs, a job writing music reviews, and even money to do things like start a small label (something my brother has recently started). It's all about building a network, and eventually the right person will hear about you. REcord companies get flooded with CDs from anonymous nobody bands, so the odds that anyone important will hear you is slim by going that route. Build relationships with people and you will eventually be heard by the right people.
From the point of view of many artists and their fans, your band has already "made it". What could be better than for a band to play good music the way they want-- and without the interference of suit people.
If you are after more recognition and airplay then send more stuff to cool free-form college radio stations. They will play the music if it is good-- and not surprisingly, you end up getting gigs in those towns because a lot of the people who put on independent music shows are associated with free-form radio stations.
This is the way that many many bands got big: REM, Soundgarden, B-52's, the clash, etc...
As for "technology":
Having mp3's all over the place can only help you. That's the ultimate goal of a band, right? to make music and have people hear it. Now you have the additional luxury of the web and mp3's-- your stuff can get out and you can sell it and promo it on the web rather than being limited to some obscure stinky newsprint fanzine.
Sixteen dollars is WAY too much for a CD. Charge $10 or less. Probably many more people will buy it.
-- Aaron
I would wager money that this band won't be a huge success.
The vocals are uninspiring, the riffs unimaginative. The drumming is pretty damn good tho. If I were interviewing them I wouldn't ask who their influences are, because their music reaks of someone who spent his entire juvenile life listening to Tool almost exclusively.
Don't get me wrong, Im sure the music is great if you are at a live show jacked up on goofballs and beating the crap out of someone in the pit.
Just listening to part of 2 tracks made me want to break something (my speakers).
We've had great success, however, on our websites selling CDs and pulling in new fans,...
So what's your problem? Don't worry, be happy.
"I now inform you that you are too far from reality."
Push some of the songs via P2P. Better yet, release them under a license that ALLOWS redistribution so long as credit is given to your band. The idea is to push your band and get it greater exposure.
Give distribution rights to online radio stations, etc. Under the same terms. The idea is to make people *fascinated* by your band as well as liking the music.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Actually, 75% of the comments posted here are redundant.
Here are some ...
...
:-)
Tour, record, release, repeat
And remember not to suck.
These days the interthingy has made worldwide distribution possible for everyone who can read and use the snail-mail-system.
Offer free downloads. Try to think of CDs as a premium , like T-shirts and posters. This IS the way of the future.
Hire a good manager then an good lawyer, incorporate. Treat the band members as well as you do the song-writers. Play everywhere. Rock.
the 'slide
"Corporate rock still sucks. What are you gonna do about it?"
I was in a similar situation with my band... We were always trying different ways of marketing.
We had success with a few different methods.
1. MP3.com - we made very little money from this site, but it did help us by establishing relationships with other bands, also we were featured on tons of mp3.com listening stations and play lists. So people who were looking for other bands might run across us.
2. THE MUSICIANS ATLAS
The fucking magazine rocks! It's a list of every radio station, Bar/Club, Record Label, music distributor, etc. in the country with complete contact information.
3.We targeted college radio. I firmly believe it's the last pure source of untainted music. My philosophy was, "If you listen to top 40, then i don't want you listening to my music". Then as it turned out a lot of college DJ's also work at top 40 stations and were playing our music on both... oh well fuck it.
4. HOT CHYX
While you're playing have one of your best looking male friends go around and get hot chix to sign up... I know you think I'm cruel but I going somewhere with this... stay with me.
Get as many hot chix to sign your mailing list as possible. Also hang out at crappy bars around closing time and pass out flyers to hot chyx... and talk to them. Most girls under the age of 24 are really impressed that you are in a band... even if you're ugly... even if your band sucks. So we need to take advantage of their weaning vulnerability. Also if you have AOL (I hate aol but AIM is ok by me) talk to girls on there and get them bring there friends to your shows. The more hot chyx you can get the better. Because where there are hot chyx, other are sure to follow... plus if you're in the band you might score.
5. E-mail list. - take a clipboard to live shows. Here is the trick. While you're playing have one of your friends go around and get people to sign up. Don't just leave it at the door. Also sign up on other bands e-mail lists. Some people are not very tech-savvy. So you might get an e-mail from a similar band and they might forget to bcc(blind carbon copy) the e-mail, thus revealing the entire list. Just copy and paste this list into yours...
ok here is where ethics play a part. You are putting someone on an e-mail list that did not ask to be on it. This is spam. This is my justification: You are not selling bullshit. You are promoting something that has an artistic value...and these people are already interested in that type of music anyway... and always include a way to opt-out of the list. If someone asked to be taken off... please do so.
We started doing this and before long we had about 2000 people on our list... Besides out friends we would usually get about a 5-10% response (i.e. you send an e-mail about an upcoming show and 10% show up--- 10% of 2000 is 200 people... not bad for an unsigned local band).
6. Trade links with major label bands. Most major label bands have websites run by normal guys like you and me. hook it up.
That's it for now. I have tons of other tricks. But have to go eat a pork chop.
liff... I would like to hear your band. maybe posting on slashdot is another way to get some exposer... eh
On the internet it's much easier to distribute your music, so there are going to be a LOT more bands using it. In some ways, it will be even more difficult to get your band exposed in this new model.
:o)
My advice is to throw away any rock star visions and concentrate on making music. Be happy playing music for whatever audience you do have. It's really about having fun making music and expressing yourself. You say you have great audience response, good album reviews, and you're happy with the album. Sounds pretty good to me.
I tend to think it takes either a stunningly brilliant musical innovator, selling your soul, or dumb luck to hit the big time. It sounds like there are plenty of people like Tallman. But listening to an MP3, I can tell that while it sounds good, it's not stunningly innovative. However, you've sure had some good luck by being posted on Slashdot!
To answer the posted question: I've joined online art and music communities with people that do similar music to my own. And my friend sends free CDs and tapes to his friends in various cities and has them leave them at record stores for people to take. I guess what really sums it up is: that I think it's a lot more fun and rewarding if you forget about the business and making money, and just make the music you enjoy making.
-Paul
I can't see flash. I can't see your website. I like indie music. I don't use P2P networks, so I'll never hear you.
That'd be a first good step: make yourself accessible first, all purty-like second. Even a link that said, "crappy, text only version of the website here" would be fine.
The previous poster who mentioned student run radio is correct: there are a lot of college radios stations (some web enabled some not) and most of them have indie kids running the rigs. If your stuff is good, getting the sounds to them is a excellent first step.
In most larger cities there are also radio stations that bill themselves as playing "alternative" music, and they often play some indie music late at night. Worth a shot.
Good luck. Good music is tough to find, help give us more!
How do you get airplay? How do you get reviewed in the paper? How do you get on the news? You have to work the media according to their little rat-brain ruleset... Try reading 'Feeding the Media Beast' - it's a great primer to how the press operate, acquire and follow stories, and eventually put you online, in print, tv, radio, etc... Since you can't make it in the front door with the music industry, you need to use one of the side doors... Primarily the internet. BUT, in order to let people know your site exists, on a mass scale, you STILL need publicity. So, focus on how you can distinguish yourself from other bands, what is the interesting story that they could make into a bland 10pm news filler item, etc... Once you get that, make it as simple to 'get' as possible, and then just beat the media with it until you're bigger than U2...
Even Elvis and the Beatles didn't make it on their MUSIC, after all... It was the media that got them into homes across the world, which then led to everyone picking up their records.
http://www.shonenjump.com The world's most popular manga, now in English!
then you can't do it.
Period.
To make it big you need radio air-play on radio stations with significant audience share. And you can't do that off of an indie label for a whole host of reasons.
If you mean "make a living at this stuff" then you do what indie bands have always done -- play the college towns, play the music fests, play the local events, and continue to put on live show after live show where you sweat your heart and soul out for the dozen folks that will stay after and buy your disks for you. And keep doing that for 250+ shows a year and you can make enough money to keep doing that . . . till you burn out.
Which is about the life cycle of most bands - and that's not a bad thing either. 'Cause it means that the people who stay in are the ones that have a real passion for what they're doing.
But you won't ever make enough to retire on from an indie lable, and if you're at all worried about how you'll ever have a family, go on vacation, etc., etc., etc., you'll either get out of the biz by the time you're 25 or 26, or you'll get picked up by a major label (even then you'll still probably not make it, but maybe you can cut down to 150 live shows and see the occassional big bucks from being an opening act for a big name).
One critial factor you must realise is that most online marketing is very hit-and-miss. Banners are a definite no-no and I hope haven't even come across as an option. The purely best way to get any form of promotion online is to get featured on web sites.
Beginning with your question on Slashdot was an excellent way to initialize your marketing, but it cannot stop there. Marketing is about consistancy and recognition, one post one time isn't going to do very much for you in the long run. Attempt (if you are winning) to get featured on many popular indie band web sites and even offer a low bit rate mp3 of your music online. The group American Hi-Fi got their start on MP3.com and they are quite well recognised now.
Think of your target audience. What web sites are they likely to visit? You can look at your friends or even yourself, as long as your subject is into your brand of music. Then try to get features on those web sites. How? Try to do something out of the ordinary, maybe some accomplishment that hasn't been really done before and write to the webmasters about it. They are constantly on the prowl for a good story.
Head to your local radio stations and submit your songs for review - this is probably the single best way to get some exposure. If your songs are as good as you say they are, they might just be accepted onto the radio. After the song gains popularity, start to offer interviews on the radio and tell your story how the band got together, where you get your inspiration from, etc. This assists in growing fan dedication; they begin to feel a personal connection with your group.
Look at your list of events your city is holding. Are they outdoors? Is there a good likelihood of your target audience making an appearence at the event? Contact your city hall and volunteer to play your music live at the event. Follow up by (anonymously) suggesting to your local newspaper to do a story on your band.
What you must recognise is that this exposure isn't going to put you in the races towards MTVdom, that requires a boatload of cash and/or the right (expensive) connections. Hopefully, however, with this exposure you are indeed seen by a rep or figure of authority to put your band in a broader range of exposure.
Hope this helps. Best of luck!
To make a pun demonstrates the highest understanding of a language
i recently got 5 or 6 spams from some local bay area band. not sure if they were spamming bay area peeps only (wonder how they got that list) or in general and the bay area connection was just coincidence...
the spam itself was a nice looking message, and they're prolly a good band. but i reported them to their isp anyway...
in this age of communication i'm just not getting through
hey, here in seattle (and on the web) we have kexp (yes, that's the 'exp' in paul allen's experience music project). you can check them out at http://www.kexp.org. They are a great radio station -- completely user powered and dont care about advertisers, but rather the requests of their members. I believe on their website is info on getting played. it is a great radio station regardless, and hopefully will stay around for a while (i'm giving my money to them to ensure it). it is a lovely break from the overproduced crap you here on most stations these days. --sara
-------------------------------------------------
Lars on drums / Jeff cranks a riff / shoulda split / when they lost Cliff / (Burma Shave)
Michael Loves Me!
1) Send out demos to every radio station you know. There actually ARE local stations in existence.
2) If you appeal to a college crowd, send demos to the National Association of Campus Activities (NACA). They have regional conventions that showcase talent. Colleges send delegates to these conventions to check out the talent for hiring purposes. If you can get into this, you can start building up more of a following with lots of college gigs.
3) If you have a good following already, book a venue and invite the followers. Then send out invitations to every local record company related person you can find so they can see you perform life and see the type of response you create. People who sign bands want to see that the group can create revenue. If you can show them in person that people love you ("Uh, sure, we've got a following."), then they're more likely to get past their own inhibitions.
You gotta just hit the streets like mad, man. You don't have to be a pretty boy to make it in this world. You just have to show results. And to a record company, results means money. They don't care how they get it, just that they do.
If none of this works, then make your own damn independent label, get some venture capital and market yourselves that way.
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
...on what you mean by "success". If you mean making good music and getting fans and playing shows then you're there. However, if you mean that you want to be the next Tool or *insert big name band here* then you either have to sell out, put in a ton of years in the hope that a non-evil record company signs you and can promote you, or just try it all from scratch with your own promotion and record company (see NOFX, MC Hammer (pre-Capital records, yadda yadda)). But yeah, I'm not in the business, so take this with a grain of salt, its just how I perceive it happening, I could be way off.
Flames Away!
"But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong" - Dennis Miller
the easiest way to get any sort of record contract, or anything from anyone is to tour. tour like you have never toured before. an amazing live set will help sell your cd's a lot better than a nice web site. on top of that, most label executives like music completely different from the stuff their label puts out. this means that they use crowd reaction to guage a band's talent a lot of times. i think the numbers are to the tune of 95% of bands are signed in this way, the other 5% send in a demo. you will want to try to be part of the 95%. once you get to be able to fill small clubs in nearly any city in the states, you will be able to take your pick of any independant label you want. chances are you will likely have one before that point.
in spite of what you may think, signing to a smaller label doesn't mean you will still have to work a day job to keep things together, i'm constantly surprised to hear that smaller (indie if you will) bands often make as much as the smaller big label bands (ie, the ones that haven't put out an album that sold 3 zillion copies).
by the way, yes, i do run a record company, so i do understand a thing or two.
flesh eating ants records
Step #1. Keep your website online by not having it Slashdotted to death
Step #2 - ????
Step #3 - PROFIT!!
Hehe, yes, mod me up to +5 Funny baby. This has got YEARS of fun left in it.
You may want to check out Live365 and set up an inexpensive stream of the band's music. I've seen other bands there that stream all their music in the hopes that awareness will lead to more CD sales. Good luck.
I saw this very thing happening last weekend. I was leaving a fairly large stadium concert (it was actually the Amphitheatre in Toronto) and at the main exit just off the Amphitheatre property a guy was handing out free CD's. They were all homemade, and each one had about 5 tracks on it.
OK, to be fair I didn't actually take one, but my friend did. If your band is as good as you say, a 5 song sampler might encourage people to buy a full-length album. Or at the very least it might lead them to your website.
Is that a real poncho? I mean, is that a Mexican poncho or is that a Sears poncho?
setting up an account on mp3.com couldn't hurt. other than p2p networks it's where most people (Meaning, "I") go for random new music downloads. Legal, too. :)
Triv
Get yourself listed on AudioGalaxy (http://www.audiogalaxy.com). They were neutered by the RIAA, but still list indie bands.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
I just downloaded the track "Stumblepit." The first thing I noticed is that there is no way to track the song back to the band. The file is merely called "stumblepit.mp3"; there is no tag info with the band's name or URL. How is Joe Sixpack going to find your website and buy your CD after downloading it off Kazaa without this information?
First, allow and encourage taping and trading. Try setting up a "-tapers" mailing list. Second, there are companies out there that have experience marketing indie bands. My favorite indie band (jump, little children) uses Wiley Music (http://www.wileymusic.com/) for online and street marketing. Wiley helps put the fans to work for you. They'll have periodic contests like "whoever promotes the new dvd the best gets a private screening with the band," then everyone sends in "reports" as to what they've done (handed out or posted flyers, requested songs on the radio, etc). also, jump, little childre just put out a dvd that i think hoopla pr helped put out (http://www.hooplapr.com) the dvd is really cool. you can order it from http://www.jumplittlechildren.com. hah! there's my shameless plug too.
got biv?
...is to cop what the flaming lips (and countless other bands) did. Become a one-hit wonder with a crappy, catchy, easily accessible hit -- then turn into the "next radiohead" with your next album. Once you have your foot in the door, the great reviews of your amazing album will pour in (and most everyone will forget about your crappy single way back when) and you'll be set for life.
'When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.' -HST
Two words my friend: American Idol
I am not a number! I am a man! And don't you
Please don't be arrogant and silly enough to think that your precious songs are so valuable that you can't post them in their entirety and in good quality. So many bands seem to be afraid of giving something away, so they put up crappy rips of 30 secs of two of their songs. The crappy quality makes most people never want to hear your band again and no one wants to listen to part of a song repeatedly. If you put up several songs in their full glory, people might actually listen to them enough to get hooked and want more.
You should actually consider posting an entire album. If people can download a whole record and burn a cd, they're that much more likely to listen to it a lot. (Be sure to check your ISP's fees in case you start getting a lot of dwnlds. You might want to put your songs on some of the online services and p2p's mentioned in other posts.) You can still try to sell packaged cds, just bear in mind that if you get any following your music will get traded; plan on making your money from live shows and merch.
And really, you should think about your desire to sign to a major label. Why? So you can be a big rock star? Even if you do manage to polish the right knob, the vast majority of bands who sign to majors get dropped after one record or even worse, get stuck in a long contract with a label that doesn't want to put their stuff out.
And ultimately, hopefully, this era of artificial superstars is coming to an end. Think about it: the megastars are just created by the music industry and millions of willing suckers. Assuming that the RIAA doesn't manage to destroy the internet, their world is coming to an end. But don't cry for them... revel in the dawn of a new era, when musicans won't have to win the lottery to get their music heard. Just say no to major labels...
There was a Riches To Rags on VH-1 the other night, and the band TLC made millions... but their take home pay worked out to $50k/year after they pay the studio back for recording time, studio time, marketing, etc.
It's amazing what the big labels can get away with.
give away your music encoded in Og/mp3 format.
get popular
then make your money doing shows and selling cd's at gigs.
(basically sacrifice up front creating a fan base, release your mp3's under a gnu style license, then make your money on the road and selling promotional crap...which you will still own all the rights too)
My #1 suggestion:
get radio play on this station KCRW.
It is probably the best NPR station in the coutry, and they make it a point to have ecclectic programming, with music all night long.
I've heard many bands on this station, that a year or two later became huge stars (i.e. Moby). A couple weeks ago they had a live set/interview with Red Hot Chile Peppers, and past interviews/sets include Yo Yo Ma, Dandy Warhols, Beck, REM, Semisonic, Coldplay, etc. etc.
They are a Los Angeles station (guess where most record companies are?) and a favored station of the LA 'in' crowd.
If this band is as good as you say it is, and if they get radio play on KCRW, they will get noticed.
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
You want to embrace technology, so do so!
Besides, the money is made from shows!
You want to push your music further out? Marketing is only one of your problems. From your writing and the audio samples on your website, you have a way to go yet.
First off you can quit painting yourself as some romantic "indie" band against the big evil goliaths that are trying to destroy music. Any group of thirteen-year old kids with a banjo and a couple buckets can call themselves "indies." Throw in a few grand of their own money for a record and they (like you) haven't accomplished anything yet. Furthermore, I wouldn't assume excited crowds will equal record sales. People have much lower expectations of live music than they do of recorded music. This isn't to say you should ignore what success you've had; just don't get your hopes up yet. Drop the music snobbery, and quit feeling sorry for yourselves.
And you might want to take a hard listen to your band's sound. I planned on checking out a few of the tracks, but after the first one I didn't need to. Everything I heard was derivative. Yeah, this "life sucks, authority sucks, government sucks, people are greedy liars, lets go kill ourselves" stuff is cute to high school students, but it's been done and done better. Don't complain you can't get attention if all you want to do is rehash this week's anti-popular trend in music.
Your problem isn't big evil record companies or clueless consumers. Your band is getting blended in with a sea of other similar groups desperately trying to get noticed. As it stands, this band will not get noticed. The few bands that do will find some way to differentiate themselves from groups like yours.
"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh." -Voltaire
There are millions of places looking for someone to enertain them. Nursing homes will gladdly pay you a small sum of money to play. Eleimentry schools, weddings, concerts in the park... Find them, and play.
Every town I know of has some sort of celebration in summer, where they have a parade, carnivel, dinner, communitry awards, contests, games, dance, etc. Find them, and convince they leaders that they need your band to give enertainment. (It might be free, or low profit in itself, but you should have someone selling CDs the entire concert)
If you are truely talented you should have no problem coming up with songs that a nursing home would enjoy over lunch. (note that I didn't say you would like it, at least it is good practice, but you can often come to love creating in a different style)
don't forget your hometown. people will put up with talentless idiots because they are local over slightly talented out of town bands. (Unless the out of town band is heavially promoted) You will likely make the most money by staying close to home.
Do you like other styles of music? There is a small folk music crowd in most towns. If you enjoy that, enough to release a true folk CD, you can get current fans to try something new, and folk fans to try you and perhaps buy your non-folk efforts. Warning though, don't do this unless you understand the style, there are too many bands who call themselves folk music who are not as it is.
Most of all, have fun. Even the most talented musician is not good enough to make someone enjoy music when the feeling is not there. You know this already, but eventially you will have a bad night, and need to find some way to get it back.
- Give away your music. Metallica* did this and it made them stars without radio play. Make CDs and tapes and give them away. Why have only partial MP3s on your site? You need to post the whole song, and f@ck the Real format. That only serves to piss those of us who are willing to support a non-signed band off. That's label b@llsh1t.
* make sure not to screw your fans later, like Metallica.
- Virtual Press Kit. - You need your website, sure. But you also need a press kit that can be obtained online. If I were booking clubs, I'd spend about 10 seconds straining my eyes at your dark and forboding web design and give up. Club bookers care not about your mystique, but about your draw, who you've opened for, what large venues you've played at, ect.
- Expect to make no money with this album. - I'm sure you paid the dude from Tool quite a bit to produce your album. But if you expect to make it without a label, you can not just try to emulate the music industry tactics without the large financial backing. The best thing you could do would be to give away your music, or at least 4 tracks. Make the CDs enhanced - the same fans that visit your website, will make good use of these.
- Gorilla marketing - You need a street team to pass out flyers and generally spread the word around. If possible, have your web guy create a free web based email system and give it away to your fans. At the bottom of every email that goes out through this is your blurb. Think Hotmail. Think Yahoo. Think free advertising.
- Hop onto the Genre Bandwagon - In my experience, other bands in the same genre will help to promote each other. Don't be pricks as bad advertising is worse than none at all when folks are paying money to help support you and not the record industry. Links from these guys sites, their message boards, their liner notes are invaluable.
- MP3.com, Garageband.com, ect - Though you are offering your music from your site, you might be better served by posting it to the above sites. Regardless of other factors, they are a 3rd party that keeps track of listeners for you. This is hard core information that can be used as leverage to get signed by a GOOD label who isn't JUST out to make money off of you.
A friend and I have created a system for the web in which bands within the same genre can share an online radio station. It gets linked from each bands website and listeners vote on songs which determine upcomming playlists. We also developed a system in which visitors who want your music are dynamically sent to different music online sources (MP3.com, ect) as to spread the love around. We have the perfect setup for indie community / band websites.
I have made websites for bands for 3 years now in the Boston area, in all genres including hard core. I have managed bands, made press kits, been involved in producing, booking clubs and festivals, ect. Feel free to contact me as I have more info than I could possibly write here.
~
The most depressing thing was that I had done bunch of indie albums (some where I engineered/recorded/produced, others where I played as well), so I knew how much it really cost to manufacture a CD (less than $2 CND per CD including a jacket, shrinkwrap, etc.). So when you see the CDs selling for $20+ in the stores you would think the artist must be making a couple bucks per CD. Unfortunately, most small artists who manage to get a distribution deal get less than $0.50 or even nothing if the record company hasn't re-cooped their costs (ie. coke and hookers). This after having made far to many compromises in their music because their assigned 'producer' thinks their way won't sell.
So because of this, I became totally depressed/demotivated and got a day job. I've still been recording artists I like to work with (I've got several $k in recording gear at home), and I've been putting money aside to build a studio/label which we hope to be opening for business within the next month or so. Luckily, I've managed to partner with two other musicians (one being my wife) who have had similar depressing experiences with the industry. We've decided that we want to work with a different economic model. Here is part of what we want to do:
This economic model won't make us rich, but I have no desire to be rich (otherwise I wouldn't be working for a university). I want to do work that I enjoy and hopefully get a fair wage for it. I think that if enough people did this, it could really change the industry. Maybe I'm a naive dreamer, but I'd rather fail at doing this than be a successful part of the RIAA machine.
Make sure you post a link to your website in ID3 tags of MP3s/OGGs you distribute. That or make sure a search for your band's name turns up your website on google--provide sales through your site and I think your albums will sell (provided you don't suck).
"I may be quite wrong." - Socrates
One of the big problems with bands today is their dull performance -- no creativity, no humor, no novelty. So give the audience a reason to keep looking at you on stage, and give the casual page-viewing-person a reason to download your music.
I looked on your site, and it was flash-ridden scene from "Quake." It had pop-ups, too -- wow, *extreme*. If your web page isn't interesting, odds are your lyrics and songs are pretty dull too. (Alt-metal, I presume?)
(If this just seems like a knee-jerk reaction, get used to it. It's how web browsing works. I'm sure to get modded down for this.) Getting your page slashdotted is a good idea, though, and some banner ads might work (as the text ads work on k5.) But put out something interesting and novel, or you'll be correctly ignored.
"Whatever happened to fair use?"
-- Duff-Man
No, seriously. Create ebay auctions for shows. Figure out a way for individual would-be ticket buyers to bid individually, but be combined into a consolidated bid for their city. Then try (with the help of ebay) to get the media to pick the story up as news.
...have a self financed music video made.
Seriously, why limit yourself to online only stuff.
Once you have a video you can send it to MTV, MTV2, (Where it will most likely be ignored...) stream it on the web, get it played at college TV stations and of course public access.
Don't forget your local news people...they can take a video you make and air a clip as part of a local interest piece.
Expect to spend at least $1000 USD for a basic video that meets US broadcast regulations. It is important that your end result meet broadcast standards, other wise you cut off distribution paths and will end up reshooting. If whoever you get to do the shoot can't tell you what both a waveform monitor and a vectorscope are and why you use them, then get someone else.
Don't expect miracles, a number of the videos you see on TV today are in the million dollar budget range...
What kind of video should you do ? I'd go for a performance video, AKA the "band shows up at yet another club and plays to a screaming wildly excited crowd" sort. Use the club's existing lighting set up and you'll get that grainy documentary look. You'll probably need a couple extra lights for some crowd scenes, many clubs have almost no lighting for the crowd.
The reason this sort of video is so cliche is that it is cheap to make and still manages to look acceptable. Also, if you have time, energy and possibly money invested in an interesting stage performance, that all gets shown off, spicing up the video for no real additional cost.
If you can, buddy up to some club owners and shoot mid day. Invite YOUR friends and fans. You want this sort of crowd as opposed to what you'll get at random some Friday night...it would suck to be booed off stage on your own video cause the crowd thought you were a rap group but you do rock music or whatever.
Without getting into the stratosphere price wise what are your options on this type of shoot ? Mostly its the addition of more cameras. This is difficult enough to manage and can easily send the budget too high if you get carried away. If the budget is there you could try integrating CG elements if they fit your band's style.
A good recent example is Janet Jackson's Live in Hawaii HBO special. ( I think that is on DVD now.) Now this is a whole concert, but you can break it easily into songs, all of which are suitable as music videos.
So, in yet another bit of self promotion...I make films and videos. Anybody need one in the Washington DC area ? Drop me a line.
Don't post innacurate information
If you do, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.
When I was a kid (35 years ago) we would go to dozens of concerts every year. I saw Pink Floyd, The Doors, Emerson Lake & Palmer, Led Zep, Jimi Hendrix and many more. Janis Joplin played at out highschool my final year.
If you really want to be in the music business rather than just be a musician, you have to play in front of people - lots of people.
Sorry but unless you sell your heart and soul to the satanic music mills, assuming they want it, you are going to have to work like the rest of us.
Good Luck
Brian
I'm trying to do the same with my own music, my focus is first on getting exposure, later worry about revenue. I've had a fair amount of success getting the exposure via internet radio stations and featuring some of my music at www.mp3.com/dead_cybernetic -- I guess if I get good enough hits it should at least get my foot in some door, right?
One thing I do recommend you DO NOT do is to fall into the temptation of e-mail spamming, it may get you a few initial hits but in the end it will bite you in the ass.
Anyway, aside from that, I think that making your music accessible and a relaxed licensing agreement for maybe one album's worth is a good route to take... Maybe you won't earn much with that album in terms of cash-- but the exposure has got to be worth it anyway (especially if you have more than one album's worth of music to offer.)
Beyond that, I am also always looking for new ways to get my music to the masses. Knowing someone is listening to my tunes is really what I care most about anyway, the money would be a nice milemarker someday though, so I could say "Yes, here is the evidence that I've finally made it."
Good luck!
This is what I learned playing in an indie band for two years:
1.) Don't expect to be a superstar overnight, or even in the near future. It takes a lot of hard work and sacrifice. We never became superstars, but had a lot of fun, and became fairly popular within certain circles.
2.) All money earned goes back to the band. I've seen a lot of bands start up and money earned from each gig goes to dinner that night. Needless to say that they didn't last very long. Remember that you are in this for the long haul. Use your money for band equipment/needs and to tour in the summer (see point number three).
3.) Grassroots tour. This is one of the most diffucult parts. Set aside two months or so in the summer to do a small tour. Call every friend/contact you might have and go call any place you can think of in each city that you want to go to that might let you in. This is where it helps to have some good contacts. We got lucky and had fans that had moved to several new places that were able to get gigs for us. This will expand your audience greatly. It's interesting how much the coolness factor of your band goes up just because of the fact that you are out of state.
4. Have good communication routes with your fans. Let them know when and where you are playing for every event. Promoters like it when you bring people to their place.
5. Be good to the people who invite you to play. Be there on time. Play the amount of time they want (whether short or long), and be curtious. You aren't a big superstar, so it doesn't do you any good to try to act like one. It's amazing how much promoters will talk with one another. If one doesn't like you, it can kill a gig somewhere else.
6. Be good to your fans. Allow them to make copies of your songs and send them around to their friends. Talk to them, and try to remember the names of some of the people that you see gig after gig. They are your biggest advertisement.
7. All the other stuff people here have said. Find every venue that you can to play. And work hard. It will pay off in the end.
I eventually had to quit because I got married, had a full time programming job, and averaged 3 gigs a week all over the state of Texas. Trying to do all of that together was too draining. Anyway I digress... The best of luck to you.
Of any bands I like, be them indie or no, I like it when bands take an active role in providing some measure of feedback to the fans. I'm not talking specifically of online chats (although those are cool), but more like just the odd entry into a diary/journal like thing, letting people know how the band's doing, little things happening in their lives, etc. This is expecially cool when bands are touring, as a kind of "postcards from the road" thing. :) Anyway, maybe that's dorky, but that's my 2c.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
I don't normally toot my own horn, but I'm going to qualify myself by saying I've had two record deals. One indie, one major. The major deal was seven figures. I've never recouped any advances and therefore I've never seen a royalty check from either deal. I was dropped from my last label and I'm not making music professionally at the moment.
People are quick to blame labels for their problems and slow to recognize their own deficiencies. The result is a bunch of musicians complaining when they should be rehersing. I'm betting that more music sucks because of this than because of the Clive Davises of the world.
The first thing you have to realize is that in this business it is very hard to make money. Most records don't recoup their expenses. There is high turnover. Typically the payoff for an album that sells well us used to offset the losses of the other 19 albums that didn't sell well. This happens at indies and majors.
The result is that labels are at least as desparate for a great band that can sell records as musicans are for more exposure.
I have never seen a band worthy of a deal of some significant size not get something.
One person posted that your money will come from touring and merchandise. This is true. But merchandise is mostly sold at shows, so the most important thing to do is make sure your live show is amazing.
Somebody recommended allowing taping at live shows, citing Phish as an example of this being effective. Well, allowing taping is incindental. While I don't like jam bands or that style of music, Phish is the best jam band with the best shows of that genre out there. Their live show is the best in that genre. If their live show sucked, nobody would want to trade phish tapes and it would be a moot point. Again, if the live show isn't tops, forget about it.
You have to get over the idea that if you put yourselves out there people will come. This has been the cause of millions of dollars getting flushed down the toilet (look at the dot-com bust). Put whatever you want on the web. If your live show is no good, you'll have no followthrough.
The best measuring stick for whether this should be marketed is attendance at your gigs. If you don't sell out shows in your hometown after playing there for one year you should look at what your'e doing. You should consistently sell more tickets at every show you play. This is what professionals look for. And remember, there are metal bands that sell out the same clubs that roots-rock bands sell out. Whatever your style is you should be at the top.
I've seen great bands play through shitty amps with terrible soundperson and be amazing. So don't blame it on the venue, soundperson, etc. If your live show sucks, chances are your drummer should be replaced. That's the foundation of what happens live.
So, in sum, if you want attention, sell out clubs. The record people will come. People often get offers after 3 gigs. Bands from the middle of nowhere are noticed when their live show creates a buzz. Record companies maintain relationships with clubs in every city so they can book their bands there when they are new, and so they can hear of anything sensational happening.
Never assume you deserve anything. The world is full of mediocre bands who assume they are owed success, and the world is better for their not being given wider exposure.
Finally, what I say in this applies 80% of the time. I know you have a list of exceptions. They are exceptions. I have seen this business from all sides.
So, unless you're selling out clubs you play in (and you don't know most of the people there) I'd say work on your live show. There's really no shortcuts and nothing makes up for a lack of talent.
Just like radio stations have famous musicians overdubbed as a song starts, like as Walk This Way starts you might hear "Hi, I'm Steven Tyler, and you're listening to Q104.3, New York's only classic rock station!", you can put out an mp3 with a quick hello mixed over the beginning of your own song.
:-) [And anyways usually the first widespread MP3 file - the one with the intro - sticks around longest; most people won't bother months later to replace it with a clean version of the song.]
If one of your favorite songs has a few seconds intro before the lyrics start, mix in your band member(s) saying "Hi we're [band's name] and this one's called [the song's name]. If you like it, feel free to pass this MP3 on to your friends. And if you really like it, consider buying our new album, [album name] at [your band's website]".
This way, you can get more exposure and name recognition than those one hit wonders, and also if anyone tried to burn it to a CD they'll still have your band/album name spoken at the beginning of the song. If you give a little for free and offer more for pay, like shareware software, people will usually appreciate and respect your terms.
And if people begin burning clean versions straight from your CD (without the intro mixed into the song), well that means you're already getting popular and selling CD's and you should be happy
$8.95/mo web hosting
That's old math notation for the analogy: "radio is to music as distributions are to software".
Here's my idea:
(1) Create some free licenses for music, analogous to the GPL/BSD/X/Artistic licenses for software. The license geeks can go crazy here, making up licenses.
(2) Create meta-guidelines, some sort of Musical Free License Guide.
(3) Here is the important part: start an Internet radio stream that plays only music that comes with a MFLG-compatible license.
Such a stream should not have any royalty costs so it ought to be easy to set up. The bands who make the music could write into their license something like "any public performance must be preceeded and followed by prominent announcement of our band name and our web site", so that people can buy the music.
If someone starts such a channel, I'll listen to it all the time, and I'll buy CD's from the bands that I like -- just like I run Free Software on all my computers, on principle.
Think about it: no RIAA, no ClearChannel, no corps, no piracy. Easy and legal copying. No more DMCA wars (although there will be huge FUD wars).
The key is to split out the jobs of making music and distributing music, just as linux distros separate out the jobs of making software and distributing software.
What do Yonder Mountain String Band, the Grateful Dead and AC/DC have in common?
They grow there fan base by allowing there fans to hear there music. Let geek music fans tape the shows and upload them onto the net. See etree.org for details.
Then make money by selling tickets to concerts and merchendising. Forget about selling CDs, thats for the likes of N'Sync.
The RIAA's fear and loathing of Napster notwithstanding, file sharing could be your best promotional tool, and a uniquely Internet-age opportunity to build a fan base without signing your interests away to the music establishment.
.wav files for download, and let people redistribute those too! (Yes, they'll burn perfect CD's with them; deal with it.) Also offer high-quality as well as low-bandwidth versions in both MP3 and Ogg Vorbis formats. (MP3 has the mindshare, but Ogg Vorbis is better.) Anyone who prefers a different encoder or bitrate can simply download the .wav file and encode it themselves.
.wav file...
Make your songs freely available. Allow fans to trade them legally. Don't give up your copyrights entirely, but noncommercial copying should be explicitly allowed and guaranteed with the proper legalese. If someone wants to redistribute your songs and charge more than a nominal copying fee, they should negotiate a license with you. If Joe Sixpack likes your stuff and wants to burn free CD's for all his pals, count your lucky stars and leave him alone. The "lost sales" are more than compensated by the promotional value, and how many of Joe's buddies would have bought your songs if they've never heard of you anyway?
This will get you more exposure and gain you new fans who never would have heard of you otherwise. Signed bands with serious financial backing can afford to purchase exposure outright. Small indie bands cannot. Don't fret over control like the RIAA does; learn to let go control and the rewards will be much greater. It's kind of a Zen thing; go with the flow... (The Grateful Dead always encouraged their fans to trade "bootleg" recordings of their concerts; did it hurt them or create legions of Deadheads? Think about it.)
Don't just make 128 Kbps MP3's available, either. Offer uncompressed CD-quality
Of course, there's a downside to this -- bandwidth costs could become significant. The best way to deal with this is to charge for downloads ($1.00 or less per song) and thereby encourage people to get it, legally, from a friend instead. This would reduce your costs (OPB -- Other People's Bandwidth!) while retaining the promotional value.
However, don't charge for the lowest-bitrate encodings! You need to make some version of each song available completely for free to seed some interest in the high-quality versions. The free version could be a 64 Kbps MP3, but it has to be available so people can hear the songs without paying any money or looking for copies elsewhere. If they like the song, they could then pay to download the high-quality
For all versions you offer for download, publish the MD5 checksums on your website so people can get a copy from a friend, yet still verify the authenticity of the file.
Also, offer a way to "buy" songs (or simply donate money) for fans who want to support you, but don't need to download another copy. And, of course, sell CD's online for those who'd rather get something more tangible and simpler than dealing with downloading the songs.
Major record labels can afford to spend millions of dollars promoting the chosen few. Since you can't afford that, leverage Napster-like services to your advantage by allowing (and encouraging) free trading of high-quality digital copies of your songs. Trust that you'll do better with a smaller piece of a larger pie than jealously guarding a little pie...
(For an perspective from a different content industry, check out the Baen Free Library for similar arguments.)
Deven
"Simple things should be simple, and complex things should be possible." - Alan Kay
Spam the fuck out of everyone.
(or atleast you will be if people like what you're giving)
:) But the most important thig was that people liked what they saw and they want more. So they have been suprisingly generous in donating money and espeacially their time and hardware for our newest project (which will also be free to download). Hopefully the new movie will be good enough to really blow people away and get us the oportunity to actually have aa budget for whatever we'll do next.
Now, this might not apply to bands that already have some exposure, but for those who are starting my advice is: Put complete songs for download, and for free. THere are just too many little band sites that offer 20 seconds from a song and try to sell you their demo. It won't work. It just makes you look greedy and people either don't bother to buy anything, or just wont put out the money for something they don't know.
Give people free stuff, if they like it they want more and if you gave it to them for free, they will like you too. When people like you, they don't want to steal from you, they want to help you. If you can hook some real fans they just might give you enough money to make a real cd to sell (for example by preorders).
This may sound naive and it might even be naive, but it comes from experience. Not from bands though, but from amateur movies. A friend of mine put his previous movies on his site to be downloaded freely and download people did. It didn't actually ssweep the nation, but got us to User Friendly
Meg Lee Chin appears to be doing this on her current tour.
314-15-9265
Try and take a look at www.newmusicreporter.com
and post on /.
There are 01 types of people in this world. Those that understand binary, and me.
1'm 50 1337!!!!!!!!!!
U ALL SUX0R I R0X0R!!!
Spend a couple bucks and put an add on kuro5hin.org, slashdot, and even google's text ads. It's cheap, but it does bring some notice.
--- My novel, The Mummy's Girl is now for sa
There are tons of sites where you can sell your CD's online. Unfortunately, most of them take part of your profit.
There are tons of indie band resource sites. Listings of sites can be found at www.bandradio.com.
hope that helps.
and i'm NOT an anonymous coward, just too lazy to join up....someone pointed me to this post to try and help the individual out!
Face it - the industry (and most people) want pretty boys, unless your music is extremely unique... And your music's not that unique.
-- This sentence is false.
No market research, just raw ownership of the airwaves and, by extension, the markets.
R.I.P. Rev 105 in Mpls. We knew not what we had.
ceci n'est pas un sig.
This is from my own personal experience, as well as the experience of many close friends. There's really only one way for a band to get the attention they deserve: to GO ON TOUR CONSTANTLY!
.mp3s on their site these days. The web is too damn noisy to find any music worth listening to. So go to the pubs around the world where people actually made an effort to see you, and therefore with give you a real listen.
It's the plain truth. Interent marketing of music is total crap. Any joker can throw
- Lebofsky
First of all, somebody needs to seed your music on Peer to Peer. I searched high and low for Tallman, and found nothing.
Once I could actually manage a download or two from your website (thanks Slashdot), and listen to Stumblepit, I realized... Tallman sounds just like a rehashed alterna-industrial doom and gloom wail band. "Bury the needle to puncture my eye, healing the wound as a notion divides. Sacrifice virtue to compensate pride; Symptoms are buried behind all the lies."
Just like my brother-in-law's death metal band, the lyrics sound like they were written by a high schooler with a moderately advanced vocabulary and a need to feel "like, dark, man... dark. Yeah." And the music is well performed and produced, but well... formulaic.
If you can enjoy yourselves and a small fanbase doing this, have fun. Just don't expect that the real reason you're not enjoying $ucce$$ is because of the record labels. Maybe it's just because your music only appeals to a limited audience, and some of that audience may already be tired of knock-offs.
My brother-in-law and all of his band mates still have day jobs, seven years and three CDs later. They are talented musicians, but they are not ground-breaking rock stars. There's a line.
Symptoms buried behind the lies, indeed.
Get a sponsor or scrape together enough money to stamp a couple thousand CDs. At the end/beginning of the CD put a message that says "if you like this music/song call [insert number for popular local station here] and request that it be played".
Hit the streets and hand out copies of your CDs to people who you think would like your music. If someone handed me such a CD and I liked it, I would surely call the radio station... of course, if it sucked...
http://www.bigrecordpromoter.com
:)
this is still in beta evidentally, but I've been waiting for it for a bit now
Don't have your website IE specific. I have mozilla w/ popups turned off. The frontpage is a blank black page. Not a good start. Then you use VBScript.
jason
Well, I'm running a site called OpeningBands.com that seeks to assist bands in doing exactly that... We're also kind of in the process of looking for that solution ourselves... we've noticed a few things...
First of all, radio stations and big corporate beasts of that sort don't want to be bothered with anything that's not guaranteed to make them money. From what I'm learning - there's not a lot of money in radio as is, so they're always kind of "scraping by" except for the few super huge stations like KROQ etc. I don't know for sure that this is true - it's just the impression I get from people I talk to in the industry.
One key is to go to trade shows and events where A&R people will be there... the grunt folks like myself who just want to find talented bands and see if we can help them.. only.. I'm not an A&R guy so I'm not in a position to help them.. the real ones are... If you get any chance at all to impress an A&R guy, they'll do what they can to help your band out. Also, A&R guys are usually friends with other ones at other labels.. so if their bosses say no to you - sometimes a nice A&R dude will pass your stuff on to another label.
One thing independent bands don't do enough is TOUR. The problem with touring is that it's costly and you gotta risk going all over the country, playing to 50 people at a time, and coming home piss poor. But the bands who start generating a decent buzz locally HAVE to tour or they'll never get out of their hometowns. From what I gather, and this isn't my own personal statement: if you're worried about sleeping in a van - then you're probably not driven enough to make it. You're going to have to sleep in a van sometimes, and you're going to have to do the long yucky grinds..
To make it less painful, people such as myself are in the process of setting up gig swaps. I'm in Champaign Illinois - a town smack dab in the middle of Chicago, St. Louis, and Indianapolis. The music scene here is decent enough that if a band has draw here - swapping gigs with a band in one of these other cities is worth it. The idea is - a Champaign band who has draw in Champaign headlines a show here and lets a band from Chicago open up. Then they play in Chicago and the Chicago band headlines, and the Champaign band opens up. Each band gets to play to a decent sized crowd in front of new people.
Please feel free to get in touch with me to kick around ideas... you'll find my contact info on the openingbands website..... I'd love to talk with ya about ideas to help indie bands!
http://www.babysmasher.com
http://www.openingbands.com
Thank you again Simpsons.
Back with the focus group...
Man: How many of you kids would like Itchy & Scratchy to deal with
real-life problems, like the ones you face every day?
Kids: [clamoring] Oh, yeah! I would! Great idea! Yeah, that's it!
Man: And who would like to see them do just the opposite -- getting
into far-out situations involving robots and magic powers?
Kids: [clamoring] Me! Yeah! Oh, cool! Yeah, that's what I want!
Man: So, you want a realistic, down-to-earth show... that's
completely off-the-wall and swarming with magic robots?
Kids: [all agreeing, quieter this time] That's right. Oh yeah,
good.
Milhouse: And also, you should win things by watching.
-- Conflicting results, "The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show"
Myers, fed up, turns on the light in the observation booth, making
himself visible to the kids.
Myers: You kids don't know what you want! That's why you're still kids;
'cause you're stupid!
I tend to agree with individuals that have offered the "don't sell out to the big companies" philosophy. Look at the Grateful Dead. Highest grossing touring act in the history of the music business. Record companies would cringe and cuss and rant and rave over the fact that they would allow legal live taping and trading of their performances. The same model with work for you. Jerry once asked, "How is it that we have never been to ??? and haven't sold millions of albums (yet) and kids know the words to our songs??"
Think about it...
A digi-hippie
Realmrock.com
Everyone check out my band!
Hey, thats how it works, huh?
National Public Radio (NPR) / Public Radio International (PRI) stations often will feature odd music every once in awhile and sometimes I like it, some times I don't. But always it is something that I have not really heard before, I or that I have heard because of my strange music likes. I like ambient stuff, especially Tetsu Inoue, Namlook's labels and similar.
You want us to look elsewhere besides the RIAA
for reasons that there are arbitrary and steep
barriers to entry into music markets?
That just sounds like the story of the drunk who
blames his hangover on everything but the drinking.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I used to work as a wholesale music buyer, and I've played in a few indie bands (Bazooka Foe, Diana Froley) myself and released a few CDs. The web is a great way to promote your music and band. Consider the Dave Mathews band (which I'm not crazy about music-wise) - he let people make tapes from the mixing board at his shows and swap tapes. A brilliant marketing idea - the tapes spread his name and music. Landed him on a major. Letting people download and swap MP3's is excellent. I love the idea of circumventing the current-bloated-zombie music industry model and DIY-ing music and distribution ourselves. It makes it FUN again. With affordable off-the-shelf technology, a website and some marketing smarts, you can create your own label and release all the music you want. Make stickers with your URL for live shows. Distribute your songs and CDs from the web. Rock ON!
This isn't something for an individual band to do but creating a music distribution system via kiosks is certainly possible. Look at Walmart. They're distributing Lindows because they don't care about MS' threats. Similarly, indie music needs real world floor space in a setting that doesn't care about the RIAA. I suggest Starbucks. It's everywhere, it sells Internet connectivity so you just need to rent a square yard of floor space, put in an e-commerce kiosk that has a CD burner and printer in it (for CD and case jacket) and keep it stocked with consumables. This would be a great franchise operation for MP3.com or competitor. Starbucks gets to have increased traffic and steady rent payments so the Starbucks franchise owners are likely to go for it.
Sure the technical problems aren't solved but I'm sure somebody could make a quick open source project to fix all that...
In the end, you have a generalized real world kiosk that can be used as a distribution conduit for music.
Then again, it can be used for software too so you have a two-fer bonus.
Uhh, six bands that make oodles of money do it, thus if you do it you will make oodles of money.
What about the other 8,371,649 bands that do it to, but are barely keeping the tour bus running?
grip
Failure is not an option. It comes automatically enabled in every Microsoft product.
Yes, the RIAA probably has miles upon miles of vat-grown, genetically-engineered pop superstars waiting to be activated in their lair, deep within the bowls of Mount Rosen. But that doesn't mean a good band that doesn't fit the mold can't hit it big without their help.
:)
Think about it -- if you cut out the majority of the (unnecessary) expenses that go into "making" a good group, you have a chance. This means that you look for solid ways to get your music heard on the cheap: college airwaves, local radio stations, online downloads, flyers at concerts, heavy touring. Hell, Wierd Al Yankovic did it (I'm not joking) -- why not these guys?
Also, keeping your expenses in check will help as well. This means shopping around for decent prices at places to stay; shopping around for decent prices when manufacturing CDs, or purchasing gear to burn CDs and print labels. At least at first -- once they make their first billion, then maybe the Hilton might look nicer than the Super-8 $12 special.
But make no mistake -- it won't be easy. Which is the point, really -- only those bands who really love the music will make the effort, and hence reap the rewards. You _could_ always go with a label, but then you're playing according to somebody else's rules.............
If I was a metal riff-based band, I would tack my music onto the end of a Metallica track, for example.
A few years ago, I decided to have some fun, and I ripped it up on guitar, just making noise and playing insane solos. I then named them [Metallica]LarsOnGuitars.mp3 and the like, and gave them to fan pages, letting everyone think it was Lars Ulrich, Metallica's drummer.
As a result, my guitar playing probably had more instant exposure than most amateur musicians ever experience. Without the fame, however. 700 downloads in one day.
I'm trying to do the same thing with my website: BenGarvey.com
Rather than looking for very innovative ways of promoting yourself online I think a better strategy would be to work 10 times harder at it than any other band.
Play your shows and promote your website to the audience, contact online zines (Origivation is a good one for Philly area artists), cross promote with other bands/venues, and try to play gigs at venues with a decent web presence (The Grape Street Pub is a good example in Philly).
Of course, putting your music out there in high quality music formats (the low quality scheme may trick people into thinking your music is low quality) is a no brainer for indie rockers. Do it.
Above all else your goal should be to be a few people's favorite band rather than be liked by many. Word of mouth is always spread faster by hardcore fans.
Not that any of this has worked for me at all...
OddManIn: A Game of guns and game theory.
building an audience in music is like getting a fire going. once the right balance between fuel, flame and conditions are struck, then it will burn for awhile.
i don't think the band in question is expecting to be plastered all over tower records and played every second on MTV. they're looking to build a fanbase that will support their lives of making music.
how long are you content with the computer you have???? be content. pshaw...
Dear Readers, I have been in an indie band for 6 to 7 years and it has definately been the best time in my life. It is also a hard life to go without any money from the thing that you get most of your passion from. I have definately had my share of bad times dealing with business and promotion but through that mess i have learnt two main things. 1. The Internet is the most powerful (and free) tool that a band could use. 2. Money never matters its the music that should never suffer. I totally use a website that hooks up bands all over the US. http://www.byofl.org I have actually been all around the US on tour due to this website. It can help with everything. KEEP INDIE ROCK INDIE. faithfull reader jdav
A cult following isn't the answer to everything, but it's still quite a force. After my band, Victim Of Circumstance, won a local "Battle of the Bands" contest, we had some people who knew some of our songs and would come to every concert. If the crowd was a little bit shy, they'd start a moshpit for us. They'd ask us to play at their parties, schools, or churches. People are already trying to get us played on the radio, although it hasn't happened yet except on KBPS Portland (a highschool station).
Successful pop bands tap into a movement, or create one. They make people feel like they belong. There are millions of professional bands under the radar screen because they either are all about business (wedding bands, etc) or do not want the fame, and they never had to pass the "gatekeepers", as you call them. So let me ask you: Are you in it for the music, or are you just trying to become famous? The two are not mutually exclusive, but they almost are. Think of all the bands that people talk of; how many times have you heard, "They used to be cool when they were underground, but now that everyone listens to them they suck." People like feeling like they belong to a small group, too, so that has something to do with it.
If you're trying to become famous, I can't help you, as my band isn't famous. Really, Slashdot is the wrong place to learn about fame. There are famous people in nerd-dom, but the only people who know about them are other nerds. :)
If you want to learn how to get to know a lot of people and play music for them, then get a core of devoted fans and have them plug you every chance they get. Start a mailing list and talk to them directly; find out if any highschool or college fans have ins on a radio station (I can't count the number of times someone's said "Oh, my uncle works for that station"...and high-school and college radio stations are always good targets for new bands). Autograph your CDs after your concerts, and mingle with the crowd before, after, and during. Make them feel like part of the band, not just an audience, and they'll take care of you.
Get together with other bands, too. When Nirvana became big, every record executive in the country went to Seattle to get bands. They got Pearl Jam, STP, and Jane's Addiction. Bands do better, in my opinion, if they know each other and promote each other.
You only need to deal with the RIAA if you want to be famous, be on Clear Channel and MTV. If you DO want to be any of these things, it's still a good idea to take my advice. You can never have too many connections.
There's no sig like this sig anywhere near this sig, so this must be the sig.
Your crappy non-cross-platform javascript/vbscript front page renders absolutely nothing in mozilla, putting you in the .1% of morons who can't build anything even remotely user friendly for non-IE users.
So what suggestions do you have for young, aspiring bands who want to make their music, and not sell their soul in the process?
Paint yourself black. Tie a big afro wig on your head. Learn how to talk in Jive. Go visit any number of record execs and get thrown out of the front door.
Now change your image! Wash off the paint, burn the fro wig and start talking like a wall street banker.
Go back to the same record execs and hey presto you gotta deal.....
Promoting an indie band is no different to promoting a website or a can of soup -- one of the most important things you have to do is attract the attention of the media.
.... (I can't remember his name ;-) to secure the millions of dollars he needs to be flown into orbit by the Russians, this group has launched its own bid to be the first band in space by using the Internet for fundraising.... etc, etc."
:-)
;-)
How do you do that?
Do something newsworthy!
Look at that boy-band dweeb who said he was going to be the first pop-star in space. He must have gotten at least five or six spots on prime-time news as a result.
Maybe, in the wake of his failure to secure the necessary funding, the band ought to stick a PayPal donation link on their site and claim that "with the help of the online community, *we* will be the first indie band in space"
I can see the media spin now:
"A previously obscure indie band is attempting to go where no band has gone before. Despite, the failure of
What the band needs is someone good at writing spin (oops, I mean PR) to knock up a piece that will capture the attention of all the tired newshounds out there looking for a good filler that can take some column-inches or that "quirky but interesting" spot on the prime-time TV news.
Through the use of similar "well targeted PR" I've been on national TV about five times and in the national press on at least the same number of occasions -- that's more than most people
Of course the fact that I have a history of working in marketing and the news-media probably makes it a little easier for me to write this type of PR, but it's not rocket science
They want to 'make it on their own'. They don't want to 'make it with massive help from RIAA and the major record labels'.
Michael Loves Me!
Well, my band, Stealing Silence isn't anywhere near where you are, but my advice is to bring a guestbook to every show and make sure that people sign up with their e-mail address. Give away free demos to those people who sign up so that they have an incentive. E-mail is a cheap and effective way to promote your upcoming shows and other band information. Also, stick around after your shows to sign autographs and meet the fans. My most memorable shows have been the ones where I got to meet the bands afterward and had them sign my CD. I know you've got to pack up your gear and everything, but give a friend a few bucks to do it for you. It'll pay off in the long run.
Also, focus on the people that you are trying to attract. If you live in a college town like we do (Austin, TX), then aim for the college radio stations. The time that you play and the days of the week that you play on also has an effect on who comes out to see you.
I know a bunch of other people have already said this, but mp3.com, garageband.com, iuma.com, and a host of other websites all allow you to put up mp3z. Take advantage of those! The internet is an invaluable marketing tool. Use it!
Sincerely,Josh Sokol
& the Rest of Stealing Silence
http://www.stealingsilence.com
I went ahead and downloaded the two full tracks that "Tallman" has to offer on their site. After listening to the bland formulaic dated head-banger crap, I think I realize why this eager to sell out band hasnt been picked up by any major studio: they suck. (IMO,YMMV)
Artists who wish to make their music/code/prose/whatever are supposed to do it because they like to. Becoming a consumerist success is NOT nirvana.
What a waste of bandwidth.
nu metal, boy bands, and the latest "new" white strokes vines garage rock can kiss my ass.
m. http://www.pataphysics-lab.com
Go there, register as a band, get music on them.
and finally send CD's to every Non profit and college radio station with a letter giving in legaleze full rights to play the music as they want and do whatever they want with the music short of selling it for profit.
If your Indie band wont let their music flow freely then they are pretty much doomed.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
'tis easy...
put all your songs online only in Ogg Vorbis format.
that'll grab somebody's attention...
it's true. the labels do rely on things they invent (so-called star power, formula bands, etc) and have to graft that to plastic and shrink wrap it in order to sell something physical and call themselves an industry.
this introduced a legal nightmare that LOTS of consumer sheep bought into and made the big 5 rich. no wonder the music on plastic from the big 5 SUCKS! the mp3 era has finally given the rest of us the clue. music should be free - musicians need to get by PLAYING their music.
that's my model....
I'm writing Street Team software for The Juliana Theory right now... What it does... Takes registrations online from hardcore fans (I'm assuming the band in question has some). It dumps the info into MySQL and then with some PHP you can do a lot with it. If you want to give flyers to all your fans in the area of your next tour, a few clicks and bam you email all the fans. Need to alert everyone in Tampa, FL to call into the radio to get some airplay? Just a few clicks and you've emailed everyone near Tampa. Want to send out links to a prerelease of your album? Send it to your street team and then word of mouth will spread it. If your band is good your street team will spread the word. It has worked out for lots of bands. I'm not done with the code yet, but if you want a copy just let me know, jonATmacmerc.com. Good luck!
advertise in my sig like PIGFACE is doing (-:
S
The Onion (http://www.theonion.com) always has a section in their AV Club called "Justify Your existence" for new/obscure bands. Give them a call or drop an email.
I agree that you must generate buzz. Do whatever it takes.
> Do any Slashdot readers have suggestions for pushing our music out further online?
Spam.
Makes whoring yourself to EMI pretty palatable, doen't it?
Don't want to sell your soul?
Well, don't sell.
Making music is not that difficult or expensive that you need to recoup costs by selling plastic discs. Put the music online for free, sell CDs at cost to those who prefer that medium, and tour for whatever price you can get (I recommend getting in contact with some colleges with a hip 'indie' concert scene, since they often can pay much more than clubs). More fans will have access to the music, and they might actually believe that you're in it for the love of making music rather than to make a buck.
I did a quick search through some of the news websites amd didnt discover anything. Im thinking the original posting was a hoax.
I work with a number of bands who have been signed to major labels - the biggest in the industry, some of whom still are; many of whom were summarily dumped due to inter-company politics, line-item accounting and circumstance. I've managed bands; I've handled promotion from all aspects and I'm here to say the major label is a thing of the past, unless: a) you look gorgeous and want to be fully exploited for a few years and then dumped and know how to save your advance checks, b) are willing to give up almost all of your publishing royalties.
The majors don't work the way they used to. They don't "develop" acts any more, unless it's part of the current fad formula and they can own the majority of you. Otherwise, any decent, hard working band should not look at a major record deal as anything more than one of those scam "mortgage your home and get some cash"-type deals because that's exactly what they are. You get signed, you get a bonus, but then the label charges you for everything they do for you (after hugely inflating the price) and in the end you don't end up with anything except your advance, which most bands blow immediately, then they're stuck trying to make a living off touring.
In the past, the major label was necessary for distribution - the Internet puts a dent in that monopoly. So it leaves little reason to sign to a major except that some still believe it gives a band some credibility, but others think exactly the opposite.
Ironically, nowadays, a label is more likely to court a band when they don't need a label: they've already proven they can sell their product and work their ass off, so it's of little risk for the label, so why even sign? One of my bands was signed to one of the biggest lables in the biz, and then they didn't spend hardly a penny to promote them, then in a merger deal with another company let them go and handed them a bill for $2,000,000.00 for expenses! The biggest phallacy in the world is that you've "made it" if you're signed. That's like saying you've found "love" the first time you're gang raped in prison. But that's just my opinion.
What does this have to do with online promotion? Everything. The Internet is the scariest thing to ever come along to the major labels and the "music mafia". Every band that fully-exploits the Net to promote themselves and distribute their music bypasses the traditional monopolies and insider deals with the mega-corporations who now own both lables and radio and put their artists exclusively in rotation. The solution is to go grass roots.. reach people online, and ultimately demand will force the big players into having to distribute and embrace those bands that don't fit their exploitive formulas.
So ROCK ON...LINE
Much of the discussions here have mentioned the Internet as a effective marketing
tool for up and coming bands.
One thing that people haven't mentioned in general is Internet Radio Stations.
Go look for stations that play a similar format to your music and send them
an email. Just go look on shoutcast.com or live365.com or audiorealm.com or
any of the others.
We run an independent internet radio station called KRMY and have received
more than a handful of submissions from bands who feel we should know about
their music. Send them a bio and a disc and let them decide if they want to
play it. Many Internet stations have a loyal and worldwide following that appreciates
the music that the operators play. Also, none of them are going to play your
tracks on the commercial viability of them, but the musical merits.
We don't play everything that gets submitted to us, but have found some REALLY
great bands that have gained regular rotation in our playlist. In turn our listenership
has discovered these bands and often times been overjoyed when they finally
get the chance to see them.
Dog
KRMY Creamy Radio
www.thecreamygoodness.com
Maybe because the band is shitty, and labels have heard it a million times over? "bad vocals and tool-esqeue bass lines? That's original, you're signed!"
Give it up, or do it yourself. Don't whine.
No, that's just the liberal-controlled media supressing any information that doesn't fit into their little anti-American worldview.
If you really want to make it. Find a big record company to promote your album, that way you can get on MTV and get lots of girls and make lots of G's. Make sure you include rap and lots of Bass and dress like a pimp. Don't support anything dealing with the internet, unlesss its approved by the RIAA. Make sure you kiss the asses of the execs of these big companies, there all gay anyways, so if you support gay rights youll really go far.
Try posting some of your music on www.enfusionx.com, it's a fairly new site and there's going to be a magazine coming out called enfusionx also that will feature new bands, etc... also try mp3.com good luck!
will buy you a cup of coffee.
As the Slashdot community appears to be a music
interested crowd, Why not to have a [indie|bizarre|non-pop|whatever] music section,
with some music reviews, article, comments, etc.
on it. It would be an interesting chance for both
bands and always-looking-for-good-music nerds.
Or maybe somebody could start a music-related site with slashcode on it. I haven't seen anything like that.
1. Fraunhofer Codec
2. MP3 files
3. P2P network
4. ??????
5. Profit
Bob
Listen to my latest album here
$50US? are there some zeroes missing here or something? Did "$50" refer to fifty US dollars per ticket?
Will I retire or break 10K?
You can follow the example of another indie duo which rose to international fame through mp3.com...PPK( regular site, mp3.com site). This is a band which come from a city (Rostov) near the Russian Siberia and met online. They started by offering their music for free on mp3.com and now you can't drive in NYC for 5 minutes without hearing their "Resurection" or other songs on the radio or in a passing car.
I'm not endorsing selling out, I'm just saying that there are no shortcuts. Keep doing what you're doing, find a manager you agree with that can do the legwork for you while you work on your "soul". Until you do a soundtrack for Disney, you're gonna have to keep pushing it. Hell, if you listen you any sort of alternative/non-top 10 FM radio, most of your favorite musicians are not in a place were they can just retire, even with a national fan base.
"We shall party like the Greeks of old! You know the ones I mean." - HedonismBot
[Sharing of live recordings] ALSO worked for Metallica until they forgot their "past" and became the RIAA's bitches.
Live Metallica was never RIAA's dog. Metallica has a history of granting royalty-free licenses to all comers for non-commercial copying and distribution of the sound of live Metallica shows. The studio recordings, on the other hand...
Will I retire or break 10K?
if you try to hijack a concert, you'll just be singing your song with N'Sync music blaring in the background and your band playing instruments that aren't even plugged in. And nobody wants that.
Not even "Weird Al" Yankovic, Bob Rivers, and the rest of the parody artists?
Will I retire or break 10K?
this a simplification of how radio works. many bands chart on the radio in the weeks proceeding their release and don't stay on the radio or sell records. get a copy of HITS and you'll see trade ads mentioning bands you'll never hear of again getting "over 50 adds this week". some songs that are added stick and wind up selling records, i.e. some songs get regular airplay even long after their records are being outsold by new records not getting airplay. clearchannel makes its money from ADVERTISING not recordsales and is geared towards that.
Their power is really more in their ability to kill something by NOT playing it. They sell listeners to the music labels and to the advertisers. They can only present the music, they can't actually make listeners like it or not get sick of it. They also don't own ALL the stations in a market, so they can lose listeners to another station, or they can lose listeners because people turn off the radio, and listeners=$. So they need to know exactly when THAT SONG gets old and needs to be taken off the "high rotation" playlist, so they can sub in a sound-alike. I'm sure they track requests too, so that they know if a song that was played a couple times can jump to the "high rotation" or disappear.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
Back around 1993, I was a guitarist in a local band put together by an older friend of mine - who was aspiring to be a musical success for at least 10 years before I met him.
He had written literally hundreds of songs, and from the sound of his old cassettes, had a pretty good band together for a little while in Chicago.
Anyway, the only "marketing" we did was an investment in flyers and a couple batches of t-shirts with cool artwork on them - plus mailing tapes to any underground paper or local newspaper that would accept them for review.
The rest was just plain old "word of mouth". The most effective thing we did was playing for free at house parties. Pass the word around that there's a kegger at such-and-such a house on Sat. night - and collect "donations" for the beer at the door when people get there.
After a year or so, we developed a following of fans/groupies. Did we ever make any money from it? No, not at all... but it was a lot of fun, and I'm really glad we did it.
I think it *could* have become serious, but if you don't have money to sell yourselves (or cater to a record label who will provide that funding), you just have to do it the hard way. That is, win over fans one at a time - until you've built up a "critical mass" of fans.
Basically, I think the trick is, get a day job - but don't lose track of your long-term goals. Keep playing gigs. Above all, keep writing your own stuff and putting it out there. I see bands in this area that are musically very talented, but they keep playing everyone else's stuff. Sure, the dance party/nightclub crowds love hearing that - but in the end, the credit keeps going to the original writers of the songs, *not* to you! That's no way to become any more successful than what you earn playing those weekend nightclub gigs.
Keep on doing whatever it is that makes your fans like you. Rinse, repeat!
read this. if you still have any questions, consider a career in accounting.
http://www.rockandrollbadboy.com/survival2.html
Use cdbaby.com if you haven't. I have a friend that works there. They have a lot of crossmarketing opportunities among their different artists, but you don't give up any control.
skkkoooonnnggggkkk ptui
Ok, I know we all like the net and it really neato to download files from P2P, but lets all face it, a butt-load of people still get a lot of their music from the store, hear it on the radio (then download it), word of mouth, etc, etc. My suggestions, for what they are worth--
You say you perform live. Great! SELL CDs (if you don't already). Really, it's not hard to record and burn a master then copy 5,000 either through yourself (heh) or pay a third party to do it. Yeah, the latter option requires you to shell out some cash, but what you do sell, you pocket. I've seen street performers do this successfully.
Radio. Somehow, some way, get air time. Even if you have to buy it. I won't claim to be a marketing genius, but radio is the best way to reach a lot of people. Buy a commercial slot. Play a condensed minute-thirty version of your most popular song and where you'll be playing next. Heck, some DJs might even give you a free shot or two.
Find a way to slip it into the format of popular internet radio. Yes, I remeber what I said at the top, but that doesn't mean it isn't without use. Winamp is hella popular, as is WAR. Find the most popular channels and hook up with their directors, slip your song in with a blurb about you. A few of them are revenue starved. Pay them. They'll like you. A lot.
I know, most of my solutions revolve around fundage. I'm also assuming you have jobs other than the band. Unfortunately, it's a nessisary evil, especially if you don't want to sell out. That's the big trade-off. "The Man" provides you the capital and as such, has lots of influence over you. In your situation, it's the opposite. You don't want his influence, but you still want to reach as many ears as possible. Unless you catch some extrodinarily lucky breaks, money is part of that equation. I'd hope there are easier ways, but these are the best I can think of. Unlike a previous co-worker mine who had a band thinks, success rarily jumps out and bites you on the ass while you sit at home, unemployed and play at a bar twice a month. I wish you the best success.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Here are some specific ideas that have worked for me and my clients now and in the past... a lot of this may seem obvious, but you'd be amazed how many bands don't do this stuff:
* Collect e-mail addresses of everyone who attends your gigs or is interested in the band - be aggressive about this
* Maintain at least two mailing lists: one low traffic band-to-the-fans-type list with major announcements, and another "fan list" where fans can talk amongst themselves
* Create a database of fans by location and target them for specific promo mailings to let them know about when the band is in their region
* Add a messageboard/guestbook to your web site and monitor it - make sure it stays positive and upbeat, yet gives fans a chance to publicly post their support and honest comments
* FREELY distribute your music in good quality versions; don't worry about making money off publishing (i.e. mechanical royalties - from sales of CDs) If you believe in the band, give away your product to get the world out and the loyal fans will support you later.
* Make sure your web site has an area for press professionals with high-resolution images and other material that they can use to republish
* Contrary to what other people think, your web site can suck if the band doesn't, but I worry more about really-attractive web sites that promote crap bands - so spend more energy making sure your product is good quality (the music, the recording, the production) than some stupid flash splash page.
* Get the band involved! The artists must be active online, posting journals, receiving and responding to e-mail and generally appearing to be "accessible" to their fans.
* BUZZ - "Viral Marketing" - very important but not critical, and somewhat controversial. Using various guerilla methods of promotion (i.e. talking up the band in chat rooms as a fan, putting music in rotation in the peer-to-peer arena with titles like "Bunghole_Band-Sounds_like_Metallica.mp3"
I'd be careful about stuff though... it's better to be honest than rename your music under the guise of a major band and mislead people - call me idealistic but I think that shit comes back to you later if you practice dishonorably deceptive marketing. If you're an indie band, you're likely rebelling against that type of BS so don't do it.
* Work deals with other bands/sites catering to your demographic audience. Do link exchanges - cross-promote each other's music
* Internet radio? Bah. You'll get more people listening to you posting on IUMA.com or MP3.com, not that you want to ignore ANY opportunity to promote yourself, but most of these net radio stations are people talking to themselves - it hasn't caught on yet and every PD thinks what he likes is what the rest of the world will turn everything else off to hear.
* Not necessarily net-related but: Get on CMJ - College Music Journal is "da shit" when it comes to getting music to PDs (Program Directors at radio stations). I believe CMJ is responsible for breaking more new acts than all the cocaine ever sniffed by a radio station employee.
* BE OPEN-MINDED - None of this works if you are unwilling to be receptive to constructive criticism. Don't think that your band is the best - always try to improve and remember that if you spend time promoting shit as if it is caviar, word will spread a lot faster that you're peddling shit than you can ever convince people its caviar. So take every criticism you receive seriously - but also note where people are coming from - some players will put you down because you are a threat, but others may be sincere in telling you you aren't ready for what you're trying to break into. And be patient about that.. if your band isn't ready, don't chase CMJ and blow the one chance you might have of them giving you a listen.
Learn to translate "fan language." When someone comes up to you after a gig and says, "The bass playing was awesome", that means, "The band sucked except for the bass player" - work on your weaknesses much more than you celebrate your strengths and your band will basically market itself - you just provide the tools.
yeah, his music is one step removed from musak. Any more and it'll be in elevators for old people everywhere. (if it's not already).
Did you know Ogg Vorbis is the cure to cancer as well?! Sigh... Anything having to do with Ogg is getting to be like one of those 'beowolf cluster' jokes.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
We have a couple of MP3s available on the site.
Oddly, the web stats show that we are getting thousands of downloads of these songs each month, most of which are from Italy. Yes I find this strange. It must be kind of like how David Hasslehoff is popular in Germany.
Amazing magic tricks
A handy tip: consider posting your MP3 files as mono. You'll have the same fidelity as Hi-Fi, but at half the file size. And there will still be a good reason for your fans to 'upgrade' to the CD.
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
I was wondering what this means:
"...it seems near-impossible to get past the 'gate-keepers' of the music industry."
How does one know when they've gotten past the 'gate-keepers'?
You forgot to mention convincing your record label to let you make a spacey 4-disc set wherein all 4 discs must played simultaneously for maximum listening pleasure. Countless other bands have done this.
Numerous scientific studies have proven focus groups ineffective at determining things like this. Reason? The people want to please the interviewers and give them answers they think they want to hear. This goes double for image-heavy industries like music. Who would want to be seen by the interviewer and the other participants as unhip? Maybe some snooty slashdot readers, yes, but not most folks. So they lie.
And we get crap.
Besides that, do you think these focus groups are shown a true range of choices? I think it's more like, "Do you prefer boy-band A, B, or C?"
Garbage in, garbage out.
And really, what choice do we have? All 250 million of us here in the States including Gramma and Grampa Beefy-Midwesterner are going to jump on the internet, spend the time finding the music we like, and download it?
Someday, maybe, but in the meanwhile, the music industry has us by the short and curlies, and they know it. Most of us will buy their crap and like it because we have no other real choice.
Which brings us around to the poor poster, who it seems has been locked out of the big-time. Kind of like the diamond industry: diamonds are in fact so damn common they have to lock most of them away and heavily control all sources to artificially prop up the price.
Talented musicians are that common, too. Human artistic talent is that common in general, and it would be recognized, utilized and appreciated more often if oligopolies like the music industry didn't have a vested interest in suppressing it.
<rant mode="capitalism" position="con">
Free market types are the worst hypocrites in the world. Leave aside the fact that the whole concept that ' the invisible hand of the market will guide us to efficiency' has been proven to be true only in very limited situations.
That's just ignorance of modern economic science. What strikes me as true hypocrisy is the fact that those who scream the loudest for 'free markets' are usually the ones doing the most to squelch any true competition in those markets by raising the barrier of entry so high that only ruling class people with interests in common can compete. Thus, ologopolies and monopolies quickly come to dominate the supposed free markets.
Which, I suppose, is what those bastards meant by a free market all along. Free for them, that is.
</rant>
That being said, turning a trick from the evil capitalist's own book and using Guerilla Marketing techniques to get your product listed in popular underground journals could work.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I thought the whole point here was to not get absorbed by one of "the big guns in the industry". (If you consider success signing to a label, then you have already surrendered.)
Keep your focus on fans -- real people who enjoy your music and are willing to come to hear you. Ask people who enjoy your music to write their own reviews and post some of these. Ask your fans to recommend songs to their friends. Make downloadable samplers easily accessible so new listeners can decide if they like it enough to buy.
I was taking one day at a time, but then several days got together and ambushed me. (from a Rhymes with Orange comic)
i went to your bands website. thinking i was gonna be able to d/l some new tunes. You guys only have 2 complete songs for d/l. if you want to promote online you've got to give it away for free. give people the music and they will pay to go see you live, and if you really impress them they wil buy a t-shirt. that's how you're going to make money.
i have a cat named george. RAWR!
The fact that after listening to your music and it sucks. No hope for you. Maybe that is why the convential method of sending a tape to a producer hasn't worked for ya.
Avantnoise seemed to be a project in the right direction, too bad it seems to be dead now.. more or less at least.
hey, anything goes after you score the first one-hit wonder.
'When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.' -HST
many people will ride whatever slogan craze is thrown at them in the name of instant gratification... just cause someone buys something, doesn't mean it's of high quality....
mcdonalds anyone?
there's a major difference between the beatles and n'sync...
and what's with the "duh"? sheesh.
m.
http://www.pataphysics-lab.com
it's pretty obvious, but I don't follow slashdot adverts. While the story has a point, it's a known issue, and bands have to rise above that. That's the way it is.
Tough.
and stick your song into the middle of any MP3 downloaded. OR... Tell their Moms.
and they will appreciate the attention.
Of course and don't treat your clients as criminals as the majors do nowadays...
A nice site and mp3 tracks with low quality for the users to do the previews they like (and copy of they like... yup you will loose some sells, but in the end you will raise public awareness for the bands and will increase the sales).
And of course... an online ordering for the albuns (if possible thru a established commerce site [if at all possible])....
Cheers...
I agree with this post the most. Getting the music out there is priority. Let tapers tape. They will do the work for you to put out the best sounding shows. Let fans trade. Whenever a band sends me a cd or asks me what they can do, my response is pretty much like this parent post. The post above this one, about making sure your website works, is crucial. A customer re-directed is customer lost. The web site must function cleanly, be easy to find tour information and band bios, and a 'Download Music' with a couple of songs in it should be clearly seen on the home page. Good luck!
I have no constructive idea BUT it has to be said:
1. Post music online at Furthurnet
2. ????
3. Profit!!!!!
I think the crux of this whole discussion is the definition of "making it" in the music business. In terms of getting major recording contracts and becoming national sensations, almost nobody every makes it. The vast majority of bands that do get recording contracts don't get rich and yet lose almost all control over their material. In light of many recent comments from outspoken musicians like Janis Ian and Cheryl Crow, the common pattern of bands that have "made it" sounds a lot like the stories of lottery winners ending up bankrupt, divorced and friendless after a few years.
What would successful bands look like if Edison had somehow invented the Internet instead of the phonograph? There would probably be no recording industry as we know it today. The market would be driven more by fan acceptance and less by hype. There would probably be even fewer mega-superstars than now, and a lot more bands making better livings than a typical band makes now. The definition of success for musicians would be a lot different.
When the current difficult period is over, I believe the music industry will be on a firm course toward being irrelevant. Musicians will be much more able to succeed in terms of a normal definition of success rather than a fairy-tale one. My advice is to adjust your sights and aim for that now.
the fact that you're not TEARING up the charts has nothing to do with the labels and everything to do with your sound. you are playing a style of music that had a fleeting moment of popularity over the past year or two, but is fading faster than the ska craze of the mid 90s.
my point is that it's just asinine to imply that this band is being looked over because they are not "a pretty boy band," when the band sounds like the only OTHER dominate sound on the radio for the time being - so called "nu metal" or "hardnow."
i've toured the country dozens of times, and am leaving in a few weeks for still another national tour. in almost every city i visit see fun, interesting, original, exciting new bands that will never, ever sign to a major label. most will be lucky if they scrounge up the money to press a CD that will end up in $1 bins across town in a year. the fact that your band has had even moderate success is a blessing. you should continue to work hard and earn fans, but QUIT ACTING LIKE THE WORLD OWES YOUR MEDICORE BAND SOMETHING.
I hate to invade on your delusions of grandeur, but your band isn't very good. We all can agree that mainstream music generally lacks merit. However, there are scores of lesser known bands out there with much more talent, creativity and skill than your band will ever come close to.
I don't know which is worse. Your singer's voice or the cliched lyrics he is spouting. The music itself is uninspired drugery, imitating imitators of much better bands.
I have had the Tallman album for a while now and they have become one of my favorite bands. My band, Local Porn Star, was supposed to play with them up in Toronto, but it fell through.
How about adding ID3 tags to your mp3 downloads? That way, I might be able to remember who you are after d'loading and listening to your stuff for a while. As it stands you're likely to become (to me) "that thing from /. a couple o' weeks ago", if even that. If I could just check the MP3 sample, I could tell interested friends about you. Omitting the ID3 is like not having album art.
Why is anything anything?
I agree with all the posters: Tour. Tour some more. Allow trading. Post to Furthurnet. Use college radio. Do good PR. And............
:60 second spot using desktop video editing or however you can, then buy time for as little as $5 per spot. You get to pick the cable system and even the channel/show (e.g. MTV). Some co's (e.g. Turner Networks) will even rent you the use of their 800 numbers, operators-standing-by, and credit card merchant accounts. Remember the unknown pianist who cut an album of Andrew Lloyd Webber covers, combined with "your favorite memories"? That commercial played for years.
Try selling your CD on local cable TV. Make a
Both have channels for unknowns and new music.
With nationwide listeners and quite a few of them to boot either one might help a bit.
1. Sue your mom
2. Insult women and minorities in your songs.
3. Threaten to punch Moby. Call him a "girl."
I hear that works.
This is my post. There are many others like it. If you don't like what you read here, go try one of the others.
alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.indie
People who dl music from the binary newsgroups
like to sample music in their favorite genres (with the binary mp3 newsgroups, you have to pick and choose from the music currently uploaded onto the news servers). I would recommend uploading a full cd at 128 to 160 k/s using a Lame encoder. (most people are now dling albums at 192k/s or higher from these groups, so they are selecting higher quality. Nevertheless, the currious will dl a 128k to listen to a new band, and see if they like the sound). In the header section, i would say something like "2002 advanced release, similiar to band x".
If you eventually "make it big" then people will inevitably rip and post your cd. This way, you will generate interest and curiousity, and people who really like your music will seek out albums to buy for the higher musical quality. (btw, if you encoded something in, say, 56-96k/s and posted it thinking that worse quality will really persuade people to buy your cd if they like it, you're mistaken. No one will dl it in the first place) Final recommendation would be to put your email address or your URL in the comments section of the MP3 tags when you create your files for uploading, so people can find you easily on the web. Bon chance
I'll go against the grain on the topic of fan taping. The Dead, Phish, etc, had massive followings because they played out so much. The taping was a bonus, but I doubt anyone needing a miracle would have attached a "free taping" rider to scoring tickets. Your discretion here.
Have you been in south by southwest yet?
I know you're looking for an online "silver bullet." But the music industry, assuming you wish to be part of that gleeful snakepit, doesn't seem to care much for the Internet's potential. Go figure.
Tour. Write more great songs and record them. Sell CDs and t-shirts. Your online push will come from your fanbase. Ride it like a wave, baby.
Jack
That would help... :)
-Waldo Jaquith
Others have alluded to it, but they were kind of rude and didn't get to the point. Make your website as usable as possible. Ditch the Flash stuff in favor of simple things that are guaranteed to work in every browser imaginable (including those for blind people). Make it very obvious how to buy your CDs (and DVDs of your shows, and T-shirts, and ... well you get the idea). And don't just make it obvious, make it easy. Accept credit cards, use a secure server, etc. (I assume you already are, but it never hurts to check.) Studies show that the easier it is for users to pay, the more likely they will be to do it.
And of course make everything available. Make it easy to download MP3s of your songs, as well as the lyrics, and hey, maybe even sheet music or tablature for your songs. Who knows, there may be aspiring young rockers out there who want to learn your stuff.
Use your website for a 2-way conversation with your fans. Allow them to ask you questions and tell you what they like, and keep it updated regularly, and respond to their questions. And I assume you have tour dates, etc. on the site.
I'd say it's the fear of sounding TOO much like Tool cross Staind without as charismatic of a vocalist.
The band likely may need more time to mature and find their own sound. It usually takes years to break.
Jerry the Junkie was never coherent enough to remember the lyrics to Grateful Dead songs. It must have suprised him when he sobered up long enough to notice that some fans knew the lyrics. But at least he is one junkie guitar player that makes music that captures the heroin experience perfectly- his music makes you nod off, drool, vomit, and scratch your balls.
The Grateful Dead suxor.
An interesting way to promote yourself online, which I recently witnessed at this url is make your own slick Winamp 3 skin and include one of your tracks and a link to your website if you click on one of the buttons. I am not sure what results it would deliver but it is certainly one of the more interesting ways of promoting a band.
aus.music.scrapbook
Quite simply, foster community. The web on it's own is too sterile, anonymous, bland, and impersonal. Any band can put up a web site and call themselves a cutting edge indie group. The real trick is getting your audience involved and coming back for more. Assuming your music itself doesn't suck (which I didn't judge for myself because I automatically ignore any site that breaks when Macromedia Flash is unavailable), try to make your money entirely by live concerts. If you're really that good, people will spread the word and your popularity will continue to grow. Sometimes, do free or benefit concerts to draw new crowds. Sell well-recorded CD's for $5, but encourage online trading. (In fact, don't even try to host your own downloads! Let the P2P crowd handle that.) Encourage people to tape your shows and put them online. But of course, other bands have done all these, so this is all old hat. That's where *you* have to innovate. Find new ways to be interactive with the live crowd or online fanbase. Musically, try to make each performance a little different. Maybe even invite some audience members to participate, assuming there are other musicians in the crowd. Or how about use some really wild on-stage effects, lighting, etc. Do unusual stuff that people aren't expecting. (but unlike the Doors, keep it legal :-) Ultimately, have fun and gauge the enthusiasm of the crowd so you can do better next time.
These guys give you a nice, professional front end for selling tunes, they create sampler discs, host music samples, and what's more - they'll even help you set yourselves up to take credit cards for your merchandise (and/or ticks) at your gigs.
They're 100% RIAA-free so far as I know, and there's a LOT of good stuff there.
On the down side, they're making me go broke.
Says the RIAA: When you EQ, you're stealing bass!
get a dj.
fucking loser.
Go to http:www.streetwise.com (sorry, I am still learning html, so you will have to copy paste) and submit the band for a keep it or curb it, it usually takes from one to two weeks for a vote to occur, but if you do that then you will get alot of people that will work the streets for you and eventually a band would get enough request that a record company would want a CD.
Yes. They are definately out too. :p
I don't mean that in a nasty way, but you just aren't going to take the world by storm and make money. You had better be doing it because you love it and by "it" I mean every little bit..the writing, rehearsing, recording, traveling, and business bits. Check out Robert Fripp's diary on DGM...or follow the experiences of The Rosenbergs. There is no magic bullet. Make your music and hope for the best, but dont give up on that day job.
and not sell their soul in the process?
Ok, did the poster ask for this to be put in here? Because if so I really don't think you are prepared to open up.
Then again it is probably the slashdot ideals about lonely virtue before all else coming through.
"The problem with music" by Steve Albini Go read this article and learn about the major labels before you even think of talking with them. http://www.negativland.com/albini.html
Kevin
Irrational Diversions
not famous. Geez. Go listen to their music and laugh.
Play a local bar, hand out tapes at shows, stop by your local college radio stations.
/. and hope the geeks of the world start advertising for you.
or... *GASP*
Practice, develop some talent and find a sound that catches on to the pop masses. Find that "oh so perfect" chorus to complement perfectly predictable lyrics, play such drivel everywhere until you get noticed. Get picked up by a shitty manager who can pimp you out for every dime you are worth.
I believe those are the standard steps to "making it big".
Or, you could always just make a post on
Looks like you made the right choice!
"The greatest thing that comes with age is "Sincerity". Once you can fake that, you can do anything!" -- George Burns
the real problem you are having, is that you are terrible. total derivative pseudo hardcore metal. lame. noone is ever going to sign you. my advise is: listen to some john cage. or "the boredoms", or "the happy family" or "the birthday party" or "the rolling stones" or "charles mingus" or "the swans" or "the fall" or "cephallic carnage" or "the sonic youth" or "severe torture" or "keiji hano" or "u.s. maple" or "the ex" or or or else. ap.
You can follow the same road : put *one* mp3 on your website (the one that makes the audience at your shows go ballistic). Encourage your fans to download it and share it. Give them the addresses of the labels you want to work with.
If e-mails start raining on them, they will return your calls.
http://www.somebaudy.com
Employ underpants gnomes... they got a cool head for business.
... Make music ... ?? ... Get rich!
Step 1.
Step 2.
Step 3.
Honestly, the music is not that good. It's definitely not college radio material.
If/when you put a song on P2P, put a bunch of commonly searched bands after the song name.
I.e. My Band - My Song (Like Tool, Metallica, Beenie Man, Hank Williams, Shakira, Cheb Khaled).mp3
Give people a chance of finding it.
Turning away fans or customers is bad.
It is that simple really. Why put shit on the web if you dont want people to see it?
There is nothing exoctic about expecting the site to work in text mode. It does not have to be pretty it just needs to work.
> Get yourself a Soundscan barcode
I searched the web up and down but didn't found anything, so I'm asking it here - how do I do that?
Got me 35,000 downloads.
MUSIC FOR TROLLS
You can get rid of flash on your page, for starters. Nobody wants that bloatware!!!!
A place where bands can sign up, create their own web site (band.label.com) which includes a shopping cart for their CDs, free lowish bitrate MP3s and say $0.50 for high bitrate MP3s.
The band could upload WAVs of their tracks and the label could burn CDs and print cover art as they are ordered.
Label takes a percentage of any sales for hosting and CD production. The band gets the rest.
Deleted
Have a look at http://radiopie.com/
(disclaimer: I used to work there)
bits and peace
Nicholas Daley
You might be interested to read how another independent did it the hard way -- over ten years and 12 albums -- and now has fans everywhere (and is probably a millionaire, but not overnight).
That's just about what I was looking for.
Streaming low bitrate rather than downloads and the artists website doesn't have a simple URL, but otherwise spot on.
Deleted
The websites great. Music is good, but you forgot rule number one for not being a total cheese ball. Never wear your own bands shirt, especialy when posing for a photo thats going on your website.
About NLM
NetLiveMusic.com (NLM) is the new music community for the Digital Generation. NLM's mission is to help up-and-coming bands own, promote, and distribute their own music, while at the same time allowing them to keep control over the copyrights of their music. NLM is also dedicated to bringing the independent music community the best live music and entertainment around.
For bands and artists the NLM community provides invaluable exposure and publicity unrivaled by any other venue. But most importantly NLM provides the FREEDOM that all artists deserve in constructing their own sound and image, FREEDOM and artistic control of their own work. No NLM bands or artist will ever be asked to SELL OUT. NetLiveMusic.com will enable bands and artists to build a truly loyal fan base spanning all ages and regions as far as the Net can see. Legendary bands such as The Grateful Dead, Phish, and The Dave Matthews Band have been able to build extremely large and loyal fan support of all their musical endeavors by encouraging the sharing of their live music with the public.
http://www.NetLiveMusic.com