Overwhelmed with the internets

OK. I have to admit it right now.
I'm really really tired. It's been a long string of 12 hour + work days plus supporting my fiancé who just finished her masters thesis.

That leaves me feeling really easily overwhelmed. And it's one of the first things I keep hearing from people who are trying to figure out this online music business: it is totally overwhelming.

There are just so many competing players out there right now, that it's really difficulty to cut through the noise and figure out what's useful, what's fluff and who the hell is paying attention to all this stuff anyway?

I've been busy promoting my new band Super Adventure Club over the last several months and through it, I've learned a great deal about what's out there.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that I've learned what really WORKS. There are a few sites that I visit regularly (even when I'm this tired) and try to keep updated, but there are a lot that feel to me like they are languishing in obscurity.

So here are my top sites of use in my state of overwhelm-edness

1. MySpace - the original social networking site still has the biggest audiences and is a place where people come to discover new music. Commenting on other bands and friends pages is a very good way to keep people remembering that you exist. And that's a very important part of being in a successful band.

2. Facebook - this is more for my personal life. I keep track of my friends and can read about them. I don't really view it as marketing and I don't promote my band here very much. But I enjoy learning what all my long lost friends from grade school are doing...

3. ReverbNation - this is a new one for me and I'm just starting to discover its usefulness. The most useful thing about it so far, is that it has an excellent mailing list collector, lots of widgets you can employ to get your music on loads of websites and they are pretty artist friendly. I'm going to explore these guys more once I quit feeling so damn tired.

4. My own websites. - theoretically this should come first. And this is me, in my tired state, admitting shortcomings of self-promotion by not updating my own site enough (and not doing it first).

My approach to web promotion is still hackneyed and haphazard. The more I learn about what's out there, I'm determined to put a plan together. I have a feeling I'm going to need some help on that from some one who is younger, more dedicated to it and has a lot more time to devote to it than I do.

Or perhaps when I get some more sleep, I'll get right on that.

The Hidden Cost of Web "Labels". What DIY leaves out.

There is a lot of talk from many new websites about how they're taking the place of the traditional label. They're splitting revenue with the artists "in a way that's a lot more friendly to the artists than the major labels ever were." It is a side dish of nice artist friendly jargon with a steaming load of hype for the main course.

For one thing, when labels were paying artists "less money" than these particular websites, they were doing many many jobs for artists that these new web "labels" simply can't and won't do. Good labels have a highly specialized in house staff to coordinate and pay for artist development, product design, marketing, promotions and distribution. These services, when paid for individually can costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. And when they are not properly coordinated, they are worth much less than what they cost.

These new web "labels," lead an artist to believe that they can do all these things themselves. They don't talk about the combined cost of all these missing services coming out of an artist's pocket, nor the extra value of having an expert coordinate it.

The new website based labels care about one thing only. Making money. This is the same as the old record labels. The difference is, the new web "labels" don't have to pay to create a product. As long as they sell lots and lots of pennies worth of music or sign up thousands of bands, they can be profitable. They don't really care if a particular artist succeeds as long as they are selling subscriptions, or google ads, or cheap downloads: anything other than a piece of art. They need "content streams" in order to survive. To them, music is essentially valueless. The only real value lies in the "consumer" who gives them the money, these consumers used to be known as the artist's audience.

Here's a not so novel concept: what if someone took the time to craft a sound and identity so that the artist could build an audience? I don't think that fits in to the business models of these web labels. That's what a good label or a manager or a producer can do. That's what an artist really needs. But there are not many companies out there trying to tie all these pieces together. It involves serious risk on one particular product. It is very dangerous from a monetary point of view.

Artists need guidance in the commercial music world. It is not an easy game to play and it is not a game that mixes well with good writing or creativity. DIY is great for getting started, when no one knows who you are. But with any level of success, coordination is important and that doesn't mix well with the continued creation of art. Don't believe the new media hype. The old labels are going to be here for a while. They might look different, but successful artists really can't live comfortably without them.

Shopping to Labels is a Waste of Time

Shopping to a Label is a Waste of Time

Enter the new catch 22...
The only way a label is going to sign you is if you can demonstrate you have your shit together enough that you don't need a label.
For all kinds of reasons, labels are starting to wise up and they want to see that you can sell albums. And they know that it’s possible for you to prove that to them now. They’re also starting to realize that if you work hard enough to prove it, you might realize you don’t need them so much.

But for those who still want to get on a record label, here’s what a label wants you to do
1-get fans to come to your show
2-sell downloads and generate buzz online and in the media
3-play shows and prove your self in markets outside of your hometown.
4-make money

If you can do all of those things, then labels will come calling.
Of course, if you can do all of those things, you’ll notice that you’re probably doing better financially than you would have had you been signed to a label. And then you’ll be asking yourself the same question a lot of music writers are asking right now… what good are labels anyway?

The dream of many realistic aspiring artists now is simply to have somebody give them enough money to fund some elements of the recording, duplication, promotion and touring so they can quit their day job and make music full time. It seems reasonable enough. They’re not looking for millions of dollars, they just want someone to help them out.

But anyone that is going to shell out money to help an artist has to believe there will be some sort of return. So the question the struggling artist needs to ask is, “how do I make money off the music I’ve got?” or “how do I get more people to come to my shows?” or “how can I get more people to talk about me on the internet?” and so on… these are the questions labels ask about their own artists when they promote. As an artist, why not ask (and answer) these questions yourself?

The bottom line: expect that no label is going to write a check to pay for you to make your album, much less press it or promote it. You need to prove that it will make money by doing all these things yourself.

The New Music Business (same as the old one?)

I'm in New York right now getting ready to catch some shows for the CMJ music marathon. I always enjoy attending music conferences because it gives me a chance to get a sense of what's going on in the world of commercial music and how deals are happening.

I was speaking to a friend of mine who is a lawyer at a major entertainment firm here in New York. He was telling me about an act of his who is more successful than any other that is currently represented at the firm (which includes many Grammy winning and multi-platinum selling artists). The funny thing is, that this artist hasn't even toured outside of the southeast US. He is not signed to a label. He has just slowly built his following town by town.

He started by building his hometown market: a small Southern college town. He did this for a few months and eventually began selling out the largest venue in town. From there, he started playing in a few nearby towns. Word spread from there and he began getting bookings in towns farther and farther out. He is now selling out the House of Blues in Chicago and Minneapolis, grosses 100,000 a month in tour revenue. He makes over 20,000 a month on iTunes downloads. He has made over 1.4 million dollars in the last 8 months.

He has been approached by major labels, but has turned them down. Obviously, he is living the new music business dream. So my question was, how did he do this?

The answer is actually quite simple. He plays music that appeals to a very specific and easily defined audience. In addition to that, this audience has a tendency to tell their freinds in neighboring towns to come and check him out. And most importantly, he worked on one market, made it successful, and used that success to make the next place successful. He had word of mouth from nearby and trusted sources, and he appealed to people in a way that made them talk about him. He also plays music that is easy to sing along with, often talk about getting drunk and other topics that appeal to people who are hanging out at a bar.

Build up a local following
Make yourself into an act that people will talk about
Play songs that people will want to hear in a live setting and come back to see again
Keep building on that and then play in the next nearby town.
Have your fans tell their friends to come see you in that nearby town.
Repeat the last two steps.

This is pretty much how the music business has worked for the last 50 years.

The Value of Downloaded Music

Nobody ever seems to mention that people are spending less on downloaded music because it doesn't sound as good as other formats. When CD's arrived on the scene, people spent more money on them because they sounded better than cassettes (and vinyl, if you believed the marketing hype at the time).

MP3's on the other hand sound pretty lame when you actually do an A/B comparison to a CD or vinyl.

Also, when you download an album, you don't get any artwork or lyrical sheets. Sure you can get a digital booklet, but it's definitely not the same. Shouldn't you, as the consumer, get paid for using your own ink, paper and time to print the stuff out?

I think if labels or bands started releasing mp3's that actually sound better than CD's, there might be an uptick in spending on downloads. But compressed digital music, while more accessible and portable, is not higher in quality. Therefore people are spending less on downloads than they did on CD's. And thus the music industry is in the midst of a much publicized downturn.

The laws of economics continue to work. People will pay more for higher quality products. An mp3 is a sonically inferior product. Thus people don't want to pay that much for it.
Either release something that sounds better, or expect to earn less.