Wednesday, September 8, 2010

On a shoestring project part 2

My brain has been working on an overdrive for the past week. Trying to work out all the details of this project is turning out to be a massive challenge. And as always with everything I do, one idea leads to ten new ones. So week one of the project has been lots of research, and I can not emphasise enough how important this is. And for once, I am determined to do this right. So as we all know, the music business is... well... fell on its backside, climbed up again and ready fight in forms we have never seen before. It is scary time to be an executive of a big record company, but probably the most interesting time to be an independent artist in the business of music. So where will we start? Well let’s try this.
First things first. I assume you have some music you want to record. And I assume it is of a high standard. You have worked on it days and nights, you have tried it out in front of live audience and you know what works and what doesn’t. You have poured your heart and soul in to it. If the music is not good, this will not work! Do I hear bit doubt in your voice? Don't worry; it is hard to be your own critic sometimes. So invite some friends over to your house, play them the songs, and ask their opinions and observe their reactions. Then go out and play the stuff live. If it does not work live, I don't think it will work on record. “But I have no gigs...” Well that is a lame excuse. Go to your local open mic night, or singer songwriter night. As long as you get to play on front of a live audience, and again observe their reactions during the song. Talk to other musicians and ask their opinions, heck send me your rough demo that you recorded on your mobile phone, and I'll give my honest and humble opinion. But anyway, you get the point? Have your songs ready.
My second step after writing the first “On a shoestring” blog, was to start working on an image for the project. Very early, you might think, but wait and see. It is very important for me to get the social network thing going from the start; otherwise I have no hope in hell to succeed in this. So I needed some photos. And good friend of mine is a photography enthusiast and he was very happy to help. We sat down (in a pub) and made some plans, then spent good four hours taking photos. Good thing about digital, film is free. So he is still going through the photos and adjusting the ones he likes. But already he has sent me few, which I know will end up on the CD package. So the next step was to set up all the social network sites. I already had Facebook and MySpace, but they needed some tender loving care, especially the MySpace. So I selected an simple background image, that I would use as a background on all my social media sites that let you personalise your profile page, I like consistency. Uploaded some of the fresh new photos. I opened a twitter page and a YouTube page. There are lot more, but these ones I think at the moment are essential. The YouTube channel needed some content. It would have been easy to say, I'll worry about it later, but instead I set up my iPhone leaning on a book, pressed record, grabbed my acoustic guitar and just went for it. Fifteen minutes later I had three songs. Yeah the sound quality is not the best, but it is real genuine snippet of the songs in their rawest form, and I will keep posting the songs all through out the recording process to share them with all the people who are interested in hearing the organic growth progress of music. And already at the moment of writing this, I’ve had 57 channel views and 111 plays. You might say, that’s nothing, but that’s 111 people who heard my songs while I was a sleep, having dinner, watching TV (I wish! It has been a busy week...) and so on. You can hear the songs at http://www.youtube.com/jpkallio
This is where the winners of the new music business format are. The manufactured pop has become so distant to people, that if they can have that personal contact with the artist, it becomes so much more special and meaningful. Read that a gain, it might just be today’s most important lesson.
So where do we go from here? We have our social media sites up, few nice photos, which we uploaded to Facebook and MySpace. We have some video. Should we start poaching fans from other bands sites? Well... by all means, if you have that much time on your hands... but I don't personally think that will get you very far. I have tried it in the past with another project, and I can tell you, waste of time! Other people might have different experience on this, and if you do, I would like to hear about it. But my simple breakdown was after two weeks of clicking, and about 8000 fans richer, I sold two Cd’s... You have bigger chance selling double that at your local singer songwriter night after twenty minute set. And that’s where you should collect your fans. Live shows your best bet. Collect peoples Emails; tell them to add you on all the social media sites. Oh yeah, and do add all your friends, you already have that personal contact, and their friends might see your contact with them. I do believe that one dedicated fan who believes in you and is willing to do anything for you, or at least come to see you play, even if the new episode of Family Guy is on TV, is worth lot more than couple hundred more friends on MySpace.
Also I set up my own emailing list, this is probably the most powerful list of friends you can have, when you manage to build it up to hundreds or even thousands. I can recommend http://www.fanbridge.com They have basic free service. I have used them in the past and have been very happy with them. You can sign up to my list and see my profile at http://jpkallio.fanbridge.com
If you still are hoping to live the dream, and look for that mystical recording deal (where you might get 10% from a CD sold, after the expenses, that probably you will have paid by year 2027), the Email list is what the record company is interested in, not how many friends you have on MySpace. And the nature of the social media is that it changes. So if in few years time Facebook goes out of fashion, you still have their Emails.
Oh yeah, and while I am at it. You will get from time to time “Proposals” from companies offering to get you 10000000000..... dedicated fans on your MySpace, for a very attractive price. For the love of all that is good in the world, do not waste your money on this! It will not make you famous over night. There are no short cuts! Expect the one I am selling for very competitive price of... Only joking! But seriously. There are things in this business that you just must pay to get, but this is not one of them. And nine out of ten times it is a scam. The “friends” you get are profiles they have created, and will disappear in the next six months. Also they use software to do this, and if MySpace gets a sniff of it, it is you who lose your account...
So what’s next? I have started writing a business plan, and I will talk more about this next week. Also I will start rehearsing this week, even though I don't have the exact line up completed yet. But we can still get going. So more on that next week, and possibly some video as well :-) There will be updates on my Facebook, MySpace and Twitter all through out the week, so keep an eye on those. Any comments and thoughts are very welcome.

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