Save Your Band Money

Music promotion, having a plan and knowing the business of independent music makes the difference when it comes to being successful in today's indeoendent music industry.

You may have recorded a dynamite CD that sounds great! However if no one is paying attention, radio doesn't know you exist, and the CD's are just sitting around your apartment gathering dust it doesn't matter what you sound like. If this is you, chances are you have made one of the three common mistakes that many bands/artists make when breaking into the music business.

Mistake #1 You spend every last cent you had on making a top quality CD. You hired the best engineers and studio help that you could afford. You rented the best studio and equipment you could. It sounds logical, spend the money to make the best CD you can.

Unfortunately, failing to budget for promotions, including radio promotions' is one of the biggest mistakes that talented musicians make. They see the CD as the end product when in actuality it is just one piece of the puzzle' one part of the overall roadmap to success in the independent music business. Before you hit the studio to record, you need to find someone with experience in the music business, experience helping to plan and develop your music career goals. Part of this plan will be promotion; namely a manager. Any decent independent musicians manager won't hesitate to bring the bands credit card into play as they are ultimately accountable. Financially, it's their neck on the line, not that of the independent musician.

Mistake #2 One of the most tragic mistakes that a manager can make is signing a contract that relinquishes their bands publishing rights. Before signing any contract, especially those dealing with publishing rights, ensure that your manager speaks with an entertainment/contract attorney. Mistakes at this stage in your career can carry far reaching consequences. A penny saved today on attorney fees can cost you a fortune down the road when your song hits the top of the charts and you find out you no longer 'own' it.

Mistake #3 Self Promotion. You have a great CD, you own the publishing rights now you are going to get radio to play your music. So you get a list of radio stations and their addresses and you send them a copy of your CD. You include a nice 8x10 glossy picture and a brief bio of the band. Then you wait...and wait...and wait... and you don't get played on the radio.

Don't be surprised as well over 95% of all independent releases that cross a music director's desk never get heard. There are just too many to listen to and to little time. You have to be able to get a music director's attention - right away - or risk never being reviewed for airplay. You really need to find someone that has connections within the music-radio industry. If you want to be heard. There is so much more to getting radio to play your music then sending them a CD. A good promotion company or manager has spent years cultivating a relationship with key radio personnel. These people, music directors, trust a promoter to supply them with quality music. It is this trust, this relationship, that makes a promoter so valuable to an artist and so necessary.

So if you are an artist or a group that is trying to get your career moving in the right direction in the music business, avoid these costly mistakes and you will be miles ahead of those that don't.

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Musical Options

The only 'constant' in the world is change. This is pretty hard to dispute and why anyone would bother is beyond my realm of interest. I am finding, however, that people are increasingly bemoaning commercial music as all sounding the same. To an ever-increasing extent they have a valid point and it has been the subject of many an interesting conversation in the now global music world.


With an exhaustive list of genres of music, ranging from emo to disco, country and western, blues, rock and roll, heavy and ambient to name but a few one wonders how music can begin to sound the same. The obvious answer to this is that most music lovers only regularly listen to two or perhaps three genres of music.


Prior to the advent of the phonograph and radio people would listen exclusively to live music. This could be a neighbour playing an acoustic guitar or banjo, the local choir or a few friends having a singalong. Maybe even parts of all of the above. Irrespective, they were listening to live music without all of todays' glitz such as massive P.A. systems, screaming crowds, dazzling light shows and outrageous ticket sales. These small gatherings many years ago were simply part of life and no thought was given to the intimacy and 'realness' of hearing music performed live. There was also the option of not attending such gatherings.


As time and thus technology progressed people were able to listen to music on their phonograph or radio. A phonomenal advent at the time to think that one could listen to music that was not only from a different country but was also of a genre' that they had never heard before.


It was at this point, the point where people could choose which genre' of music that they could listen to, that musical commercialism in its' earliest form arose. Radio stations, record labels and record stores popped up left, right and centre as people sought out their favourite artist. This led to great anticipation of the next song to be made available by their artist of choice.

The next thing to occur was a flood of different artists and different genres of music from all over the world. Music has always been a global affair but it took technology to unite it. Again, this was an extremely exciting, creative and productive time for world music. In the grand scheme of things, however, it wasn't too long before music became a competition with every participant racing for the golden egg; namely money.


As music became more readily accessible this competition became rather vicious with lawyers and large corporations becoming involved. Large corporations and lawyers don't belong anywhere near music but the sad fact is that they have made themselves so.


When the internet began, the floodgates were open to all and sundry as people have access to so much music and are willing to pay through the teeth for it in droves. I view this 'syndrome' as the dumb leading the dumber. I am yet to fathom the necessity of a tiny device that can store more songs than can be listened to in a lifetime.

Music marketing became so 'in your face' and one-sided that it made me feel ill. It still does. Seeing the same names, images and song titles at every turn have numbed me to it all. Although my personal preference is rock and roll, I am in no way prejudicial to these ever present 'big names.' I have gone out of my way to listen to their material objectively and to be perfectly honest I think consumers are being roped in and robbed blind.


I have noticed, however, in very recent times music sites such as Nimbit which allow the artist to set their own price for downloads are increasing in 'searchability.' Despite Googles' latest venture in making artists searchable directly from their toolbar in conjunction with iLike I doubt very much that this will benefit independent musicians. I am uncertain as to how this will affect music sales and have discussed this topic in detail elsewhere.


Only this morning I received an email from ReverbNation saying that they had finally launched their much awaited webstore. On further investigation I noted that the software they are using is identical to that of Audiolife.


With the likes of Bandcamp, Nimbit, Reverbnation and Audiolife making it possible for independent artists to make their material available for purchase with no up-front costs things are definitely looking more promising for grass roots independent musicians. Promotion and growing a loyal fanbase, leading to music sales can now be placed firmly in the hand of the artist as opposed to the invisible people who have had too much control for too long.


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