Re: How to reach public?
Posted: Sun Jul 09, 2017 6:22 pm
If you ever find out, let me know!
This is one of those things that is funny because it's true! Maybe not a cat video, but the idea does make sense as a way to get your music out there: attach it to a clip that will be widely shared on social media.Drumfix wrote:Put a funny video with some cats on YouTube and use your songs as background music.
Hi Dave,davephillips wrote:Live shows ? (gasp!)
Real management is another option.
Interesting analysis. You're right, the CD is deader than dead, along with possibly the entire model of saleable music recorded to portable dedicated media. My only student who brings in a CD is a bassist working from a book/disc combination. Otherwise it's all on the mobile, via the net. There's very little music I can't get off the Internet, for free via YouTube or for $$$ via the paid services, and its ubiquity more or less guarantees that I'll be able to download what I want pretty much any time.GMaq wrote:Live shows are of course as always a great way for people to hear you play your music, what has changed (especially with people under 40) is that people aren't terribly interested in hard-copies of music (ie CD's). We play plenty of shows, good vibes, good response, encores, the whole shot. People come up on breaks or after and are very receptive, but when you try to hand them a CD (even for free) they look at it like "what on earth am I supposed to do with this?!"davephillips wrote:Live shows ? (gasp!)
Real management is another option.
Earlier this year one of my students had the highly enjoyable experience of hanging out with Rob Mounsey and Steve Khan for a day in NYC. The student is heading to Belmont University next year to pursue a degree program in songwriting and the music business (Belmont is in Nashville), and he was able to wrangle a mentoring session with Rob (he's a friend of my student's father), who asked his friend Steve to drop by. (Btw, it's understandable if you don't know these guys. FYI, Rob is a Grammy-award winning keyboardist best known for his work with Madonna, Paul Simon, and Steely Dan. Steve Khan has a long and distinguished career that includes session work with Steely Dan - IIRC he's the lead player on "Peg" - and a stint as Billy Joel's guitarist. So, hard-core industry pros.) My student learned a lot that day, especially how very difficult it can be to get in and stay in the music business. But as I continually advise all my students, what is difficult is by definition not impossible. As a musician you'll have to work as hard as anyone else in a demanding profession, and these days the ante has risen dramatically from when I started out. A college education is almost indispensable now, as is facility in networking (real and virtual). Little wonder that Steve Khan called Rob later to find out if Rob thought Steve's advice to the kid was sound advice. These guys know the business, they cared about the kid's choices, and they gave him the straight shots.For live bands the best you can hope is to direct the audience to your Facebook page and and have them give you some likes, most promoters and entertainment agents today (if they'll give you 4 seconds at all) simply look at your Facebook page and likes, if they deem you have a reasonable amount of likes, you're hired, most don't even get as far as viewing your Soundcloud/Youtube/Bandcamp/Spotify at all.
Well, knowing the business a little, I'd say "And so ?". Personally I'd expect to send about 20 or 30 messages. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, so squeak up ! And learn to make an impressive FB page. My point is, if you want to hook up with an agency you need to have what they're looking for. And then flood them with it.My son recently attended a seminar on submitting your band to large summer music Festivals etc. the consensus (from the booking agents) was that your first 2 emails would get ignored, after that if you were annoyingly persistent enough you may get noticed, but then if the Facebook page wasn't impressive enough... too bad.
Yeh, that's how it was when I left LA in the late 80s, I can't imagine that that situation would change, not with the million and one bands trying to make it out there. And I can't blame the venues, they're just taking advantage of an overcrowded field. singforme's message is especially relevant in that respect, i.e. you may be considerably better off cultivating a local reputation in a smaller but far less crowded field.In Canada large cities like Toronto basically have bands lined up begging to get into a 5 band showcase in the shittiest dives on a Monday night to play for 1/2 an hour for no money.