James Moore's Blog, page 77

Going From PR to Marketing

Now PR doesn’t have to stop at a PR campaign, and this is where we see what separates the boys from the men. A lot of bands just shell out a thousand dollars for a solid PR campaign but never bother to evolve it beyond that. The bands who really start to see that turning into mileage are the ones who are able to turn the people who click on their page due to PR into real fans. The way to do this is to keep providing meaningful and engaging comment over an extended period of time. It’s not just about posting things like ‘Watch out for our new song dropping next week!’ and instead more about going live on Facebook, engaging directly with your fans on social media, having fun social media posts and generally just producing the sort of content that people are interested in seeing and becoming a part of. You are constructing a narrative with your band and you want your fans to be an active part of what it represents.

So I realize that sounds sort of vague and ambiguous, so I want to give you some more concrete ideas as per how to do it. First and foremost – I’m not sure the folks at Facebook realize how big a boon Facebook Live is. If you go live it sends a notification to a ton of your fans and makes it easy for them to go and watch you, ask you questions and generally interact with you and your band. It’s an awesome way to promote an evenings show and answer fans questions directly. Beyond that – it’s really fun. You get to show the people who care about you what life is like for a band traveling to Tupalo and to let fans in on inside jokes. As is stands Facebook Live is the best free way to promote your band right now. Of course this might change any day now. I’m sure that even as I type this Facebook’s marketing team is trying to figure out the best way to monetize it – but frankly, unless they charge an outrageous price it will still probably be worth it.

As per your social media posts I honestly think that in 201 the best way to communicate with a fanbase under the age of 35 is memes. I’ve added a section on memes into this book but I want to emphasize their importance. They get people looking at what you have to offer and show that your band – no matter how serious others might think they are are just fun loving guys who enjoy a good rock and roll time. Other than that – talk to fans at shows and figure out what they are interested in and give them that. At least on Facebook – while other social media sites are better for more personal things I’ve always felt that Facebook is meant to be a reflection of the fans. So if your fans are into animal rights share articles on that. If your fans are into fighting the police post from anti-cop sites. These things shouldn’t be hard to figure out – after all, odds are your fans are into the same sort of stuff that you are.

It can be hard to determine what kind of content you should be posting on each social media site. As a general rule it seems that the breakdown is as follows: Facebook is more for your general stuff and should have a ton of information about your band. Twitter is for your day to day silly thoughts and direct conversations with fans. Instagram is to showcase where you are touring through or give a visual guide as to what you are up to. It’s a great place to debut album art etc. Snapchat is for personal videos of your day to day experience and silly photos taken with the band. I’m sure there’s some new one you kids are using that I’m not even aware of yet, but those seem to be the main ones that will directly impact the future of your band right now. I know this seems like a lot, but remember, most bands you view as social media savvy only really have a mastery of one or two of these. So if you are really willing to put in the time to showcase the power of your band through all of them you have an immediate leg up.

This all ties into the much more nebulous concept of ‘constructing a narrative’ though I think you might be starting to see where this comes in. Constructing a narrative means to look at the overall brand of you band and see where it is now and where you want to take it. That is to say if, for example, you see yourself as a band of serious hard working animal rights activists then you are going to post articles on Facebook and Twitter (With your reactions) involving animal rights. You are going to upload photos to Instagram of yourselves hard at work in the studio and on the road and you are going to post videos on Snapchat showing your work ethic and sharing your thoughts about animal rights. Once you have your brand established you want to work on the narrative, that is to say – your band is trying to use music as an outlet for their political activism and people should support you because your efforts are for the animals and with their support you can tour more and share your message. It’s obviously not always that straightforward but I hope I was able to provide something of a jumping off point.

Marketing your band is a full time job and the odds are you can’t afford someone to help you market it non stop like that. However it’s really not as hard as it sounds. I know that a lot of bands whine about this sort of thing, but once you get into the habit of figuring out what your fans want to see and what kind of image you want to represent, broadcasting that to the world at large isn’t going to be that hard. Like any other skill it’s something that you can learn with a little bit of hard work and dedication. In all likelihood you probably already have someone in your band who knows how to do this kind of thing! Look at how other brands outside of music market themselves, outside of PR campaigns and try to learn from them. We all need to grow together, so why not borrow ideas from those on top?

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post Going From PR to Marketing appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

The Don’t’s of Music PR

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There are a lot of bands who get in touch with me every day. A lot. Like over a 100 most days. So why is it that I almost never cover independent bands with no representation and instead tend to go with PR companies I know and trust? Well asides from the fact that a lot of bands are awful musically I rarely even end up clicking on their Bandcamp link (If they even have the wherewithal to send a Bandcamp link) Usually I just end up deleting the emails before they even get opened. The reason for this is that these bands tend to do a lot more wrong than they do right and that makes it really hard for someone like me to want to open up their email and see what they have to offer me. This isn’t a question of elitism – this is a question of knowing how to send a professional looking email and dealing with the knowledge that 99% of bands have no clue how to do this and make their releases actually look good and make sense.

First off is obviously the initial impression of your email. That is to say – if it is overly long then I’m probably just going to think you take yourself to seriously. Of course, if you send just a link with nothing else then I’m not going to click on the link. If you can’t be bothered to send me an actual bio then why should I bother to listen to your music? Even worse is a request to send me music, or asking how I want to have music sent to me. There are a ton of articles about that already, it shouldn’t be my responsibility to teach you that. I want to see something at least a little bit personalized, it’s not hard to find my first name! Music writers just want people to recognize who they are and try to make a good first impression. That’s part of why if your subject line is amateurish then I probably won’t click either. For example if your subject line is “Album for review” then I won’t click. My inbox is FULL of albums to review. If your subject line is “Review Request from Arden & The Wolves (RIYL: Pat Benatar, Vixen, Joan Jett)” then I am far more likely to click. It gives me an idea of the contents of the email, uses proper capitalization and suggests a professional message.

Formatting is key for these emails. After a brief introduction you should be leaping straight into a paragraph long bio with a link to a longer one if needed. You should also provide links to the bands main social media pages, (Especially Facebook!) and where people can go to stream your music. If you try sending downloads then you will be ignored. Sorry. Formatting isn’t just related to the basic content of your email but also how it looks. That’s why I like a service like Haulix, it makes everything look smooth and professional and I know what I’m getting into every time. If you try and send an email on your own it’s a good idea to send it to yourself first to make sure the bio didn’t format weird when you moved it from a word processor to the email. When I see an email that just looks ugly it hardly inspires me to click through. Again – amateurish presentation suggests an amateurish band and nobody has time for that, like I said, there are a hundred other bands knocking down my door.

There’s a lot of more basic stuff that you need to keep an eye out for to. You need to make sure, obviously, that your spelling is on point. Especially because a lot of blogs will just copy and paste a professional looking release. So a typo on your part could lead to typos around the internet. Beyond that you need to make sure that all your links are working and that your photos don’t take up too much space. These things all seem small and unimportant at first, but trust me, they are crucial. This is sort of like how attachments are just an awful clusterfuck that will leave you endlessly frustrated. I know I mentioned this before, but it really deserves emphasis, no one wants to download stuff from a strange email address. You need to keep things like this in mind if you don’t want to inadvertently screw over your band and what you are trying to create.

Keep in mind, not all PR companies do a great job of presentation. You might want to ask a PR company for a sample of what their standard press release/album review request looks like so that you can make sure you are buying into a company that will represent you appropriately. Legitimate PR companies will not hesitate at letting you check out what they have to offer. A lot of PR companies out there have some sloppy ass emails that look disgusting, are hard to pick through and don’t make a whole lot of sense. The worst part is that this isn’t just for bush league PR companies – I’ve seen some pretty big labels, labels that I can guarantee you have heard of, use some godawful emails full of typos. I know it’s tricky not coming off as a control freak – but sometimes you need to, especially when it comes to as something as delicate and as frustrating as PR can be. This is how your band is represented to the press – you don’t want that first crucial impression to be a negative or frustrating one.

So I think it’s clear – PR is a lot trickier than just finding a bunch of emails an sending out links to your Bandcamp. PR is about more than just relationships too – even though that is definitely a big part of it. What PR is about is fighting to create a better tomorrow by raising the beauty and elegance of your pitches, r,eleases and requests. The goal is to create a world where everything looks at least moderately professional and makes it easy for people to want to promote your band and help get people continuing to come out to shows and expanding the role of independent music in our lives. After all – if you’re not helping the scene then you’re only hurting yourself.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post The Don’t’s of Music PR appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

The Donts of Music PR

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There are a lot of bands who get in touch with me every day. A lot. Like over a 100 most days. So why is it that I almost never cover independent bands with no representation and instead tend to go with PR companies I know and trust? Well asides from the fact that a lot of bands are awful musically I rarely even end up clicking on their Bandcamp link (If they even have the wherewithal to send a Bandcamp link) Usually I just end up deleting the emails before they even get opened. The reason for this is that these bands tend to do a lot more wrong than they do right and that makes it really hard for someone like me to want to open up their email and see what they have to offer me. This isn’t a question of elitism – this is a question of knowing how to send a professional looking email and dealing with the knowledge that 99% of bands have no clue how to do this and make their releases actually look good and make sense.

First off is obviously the initial impression of your email. That is to say – if it is overly long then I’m probably just going to think you take yourself to seriously. Of course, if you send just a link with nothing else then I’m not going to click on the link. If you can’t be bothered to send me an actual bio then why should I bother to listen to your music? Even worse is a request to send me music, or asking how I want to have music sent to me. There are a ton of articles about that already, it shouldn’t be my responsibility to teach you that. I want to see something at least a little bit personalized, it’s not hard to find my first name! Music writers just want people to recognize who they are and try to make a good first impression. That’s part of why if your subject line is amateurish then I probably won’t click either. For example if your subject line is “Album for review” then I won’t click. My inbox is FULL of albums to review. If your subject line is “Review Request from Arden & The Wolves (RIYL: Pat Benatar, Vixen, Joan Jett)” then I am far more likely to click. It gives me an idea of the contents of the email, uses proper capitalization and suggests a professional message.

Formatting is key for these emails. After a brief introduction you should be leaping straight into a paragraph long bio with a link to a longer one if needed. You should also provide links to the bands main social media pages, (Especially Facebook!) and where people can go to stream your music. If you try sending downloads then you will be ignored. Sorry. Formatting isn’t just related to the basic content of your email but also how it looks. That’s why I like a service like Haulix, it makes everything look smooth and professional and I know what I’m getting into every time. If you try and send an email on your own it’s a good idea to send it to yourself first to make sure the bio didn’t format weird when you moved it from a word processor to the email. When I see an email that just looks ugly it hardly inspires me to click through. Again – amateurish presentation suggests an amateurish band and nobody has time for that, like I said, there are a hundred other bands knocking down my door.

There’s a lot of more basic stuff that you need to keep an eye out for to. You need to make sure, obviously, that your spelling is on point. Especially because a lot of blogs will just copy and paste a professional looking release. So a typo on your part could lead to typos around the internet. Beyond that you need to make sure that all your links are working and that your photos don’t take up too much space. These things all seem small and unimportant at first, but trust me, they are crucial. This is sort of like how attachments are just an awful clusterfuck that will leave you endlessly frustrated. I know I mentioned this before, but it really deserves emphasis, no one wants to download stuff from a strange email address. You need to keep things like this in mind if you don’t want to inadvertently screw over your band and what you are trying to create.

Keep in mind, not all PR companies do a great job of presentation. You might want to ask a PR company for a sample of what their standard press release/album review request looks like so that you can make sure you are buying into a company that will represent you appropriately. Legitimate PR companies will not hesitate at letting you check out what they have to offer. A lot of PR companies out there have some sloppy ass emails that look disgusting, are hard to pick through and don’t make a whole lot of sense. The worst part is that this isn’t just for bush league PR companies – I’ve seen some pretty big labels, labels that I can guarantee you have heard of, use some godawful emails full of typos. I know it’s tricky not coming off as a control freak – but sometimes you need to, especially when it comes to as something as delicate and as frustrating as PR can be. This is how your band is represented to the press – you don’t want that first crucial impression to be a negative or frustrating one.

So I think it’s clear – PR is a lot trickier than just finding a bunch of emails an sending out links to your Bandcamp. PR is about more than just relationships too – even though that is definitely a big part of it. What PR is about is fighting to create a better tomorrow by raising the beauty and elegance of your pitches, r,eleases and requests. The goal is to create a world where everything looks at least moderately professional and makes it easy for people to want to promote your band and help get people continuing to come out to shows and expanding the role of independent music in our lives. After all – if you’re not helping the scene then you’re only hurting yourself.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post The Donts of Music PR appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

The Don’ts of Music PR

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There are a lot of bands who get in touch with me every day. A lot. Like over a 100 most days. So why is it that I almost never cover independent bands with no representation and instead tend to go with PR companies I know and trust? Well asides from the fact that a lot of bands are awful musically I rarely even end up clicking on their Bandcamp link (If they even have the wherewithal to send a Bandcamp link) Usually I just end up deleting the emails before they even get opened. The reason for this is that these bands tend to do a lot more wrong than they do right and that makes it really hard for someone like me to want to open up their email and see what they have to offer me. This isn’t a question of elitism – this is a question of knowing how to send a professional looking email and dealing with the knowledge that 99% of bands have no clue how to do this and make their releases actually look good and make sense.

First off is obviously the initial impression of your email. That is to say – if it is overly long then I’m probably just going to think you take yourself to seriously. Of course, if you send just a link with nothing else then I’m not going to click on the link. If you can’t be bothered to send me an actual bio then why should I bother to listen to your music? Even worse is a request to send me music, or asking how I want to have music sent to me. There are a ton of articles about that already, it shouldn’t be my responsibility to teach you that. I want to see something at least a little bit personalized, it’s not hard to find my first name! Music writers just want people to recognize who they are and try to make a good first impression. That’s part of why if your subject line is amateurish then I probably won’t click either. For example if your subject line is “Album for review” then I won’t click. My inbox is FULL of albums to review. If your subject line is “Review Request from Arden & The Wolves (RIYL: Pat Benatar, Vixen, Joan Jett)” then I am far more likely to click. It gives me an idea of the contents of the email, uses proper capitalization and suggests a professional message.

Formatting is key for these emails. After a brief introduction you should be leaping straight into a paragraph long bio with a link to a longer one if needed. You should also provide links to the bands main social media pages, (Especially Facebook!) and where people can go to stream your music. If you try sending downloads then you will be ignored. Sorry. Formatting isn’t just related to the basic content of your email but also how it looks. That’s why I like a service like Haulix, it makes everything look smooth and professional and I know what I’m getting into every time. If you try and send an email on your own it’s a good idea to send it to yourself first to make sure the bio didn’t format weird when you moved it from a word processor to the email. When I see an email that just looks ugly it hardly inspires me to click through. Again – amateurish presentation suggests an amateurish band and nobody has time for that, like I said, there are a hundred other bands knocking down my door.

There’s a lot of more basic stuff that you need to keep an eye out for to. You need to make sure, obviously, that your spelling is on point. Especially because a lot of blogs will just copy and paste a professional looking release. So a typo on your part could lead to typos around the internet. Beyond that you need to make sure that all your links are working and that your photos don’t take up too much space. These things all seem small and unimportant at first, but trust me, they are crucial. This is sort of like how attachments are just an awful clusterfuck that will leave you endlessly frustrated. I know I mentioned this before, but it really deserves emphasis, no one wants to download stuff from a strange email address. You need to keep things like this in mind if you don’t want to inadvertently screw over your band and what you are trying to create.

Keep in mind, not all PR companies do a great job of presentation. You might want to ask a PR company for a sample of what their standard press release/album review request looks like so that you can make sure you are buying into a company that will represent you appropriately. Legitimate PR companies will not hesitate at letting you check out what they have to offer. A lot of PR companies out there have some sloppy ass emails that look disgusting, are hard to pick through and don’t make a whole lot of sense. The worst part is that this isn’t just for bush league PR companies – I’ve seen some pretty big labels, labels that I can guarantee you have heard of, use some godawful emails full of typos. I know it’s tricky not coming off as a control freak – but sometimes you need to, especially when it comes to as something as delicate and as frustrating as PR can be. This is how your band is represented to the press – you don’t want that first crucial impression to be a negative or frustrating one.

So I think it’s clear – PR is a lot trickier than just finding a bunch of emails an sending out links to your Bandcamp. PR is about more than just relationships too – even though that is definitely a big part of it. What PR is about is fighting to create a better tomorrow by raising the beauty and elegance of your pitches, r,eleases and requests. The goal is to create a world where everything looks at least moderately professional and makes it easy for people to want to promote your band and help get people continuing to come out to shows and expanding the role of independent music in our lives. After all – if you’re not helping the scene then you’re only hurting yourself.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post The Don’ts of Music PR appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

Nick Cave Tries to Deflect His Most Upfront Hurt in New Doc

 

As Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds rehearse Else Torp sings her part on the new song, “Distant Sky.” The camera zooms out the pace of rising mist through the ceiling to show the recording studio, its neighborhood, its little corner in southern England and the whole of Earth as it turns into another Sunday.

“We are a tiny blue dot in a moonbeam,” Cave narrates over himself riding in a car through London’s night streets in a scene from One More Time with Feeling, the group’s new in-studio documentary. We are particle size when seen from a distance. Insignificant, scant, a blip. We live and we die and on the world turns. Cave knows this. It’s the very principle lurking behind each lyric.

One More Time with Feeling, directed by Andrew Dominik, follows Cave, along with dark-eyed, black-whiskered instrumentalist Warren Ellis and the other Bad Seeds during the recording for their new album, Skeleton Tree. More specifically, though, it’s about Cave caught in a whirlpool of emotion as he attempts to create art in the aftermath of the tragic death of his 15-year old son, Arthur.

In July of 2015 Arthur fell 60 feet off the Ovingdean Gap cliffs overlooking the English Channel in Brighton. Reportedly, he had taken LSD with friends and separated after experiencing a bad trip. In the film the horrific event is spoken about only in background statements without context and never with detail. There is talk of something unfortunate happening, a far-off hurt, but what or to whom is unclear. Arthur’s name isn’t even mentioned until near the end when it becomes very clear what this is all about.

Arthur, the beautiful blue-eyed boy, left behind his twin brother, Earl Cave, to mourn with his parents. In One More Time we get a peek into Nick Cave, the Well Adjusted Family Man, a fairly rare sight. We see the family joking around, finding strength together. Cave speaks lovingly of his wife Susie Bick and how they worked through the tragedy together. “Happiness is our revenge,” he says about getting over the cruelty of what happened.

The result of all this becomes the nine songs on Skeleton Tree, their sixteenth album. Deliberate cameras capture the process. Some of the footage was filmed using “this ridiculous black and white 3D camera,” Cave says. It soars around the recording studio, embedded in corners of walls and falling through circular stairwells. It captures the quiet moments between creativity, focusing on plugs in walls, sounding boards, cracks in door frames and conversations in the next room.

Still from One More Time with Feeling

Throughout One More Time the film crew is often visible, becoming almost another character. Everyone is very self-aware that filming is in progress and how foolish it seems. In a sense this is a movie about making a movie about making an album. A circular track is laid out around Cave’s piano in the middle of the studio. As he plays gloomily a team of six men huddled on what looks like a toy train circles slowly around him.

To allow a camera crew to capture you unguarded is some kind of artistic bravery. Cave keeps it together, even shares a few laughs, but there’s an intense sadness hiding behind the hard outer Cave exterior. He is very open and honest detailing the difficulty of trying to make a record, trying to structure songs, while surrounded by trauma. Arthur’s death, he explains, disrupted the creative process.

Cave paces the room, dejected about his work, unsure of certain piano notes, overdubbing in doubt. So much vulnerability underneath those dark black bushy brows. He recoils, unable to make sense of the tragedy, unwilling to find within it poetic justice.

When asked about his recent lyrical distancing from the personal narrative, he struggles to explain how incredulous it is to try and define an event in measured verse. Writing from the depth of his personal experience in this tragedy, he says, would be a disservice to Arthur.

“Time is elastic,” he says. We get further and further from a particular moment in time, but like a stretched out rubber band, we eventually snap right back.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post Nick Cave Tries to Deflect His Most Upfront Hurt in New Doc appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

Long Term Thinking In The Music Industry

The points I’m going to make in this article are going to seem super obvious to some of you and make literally no sense to others. That’s because I’m talking about putting others before yourself, and in the music industry of all places. You’re not going to read about this sort of thing going down a lot in music because when there is so little money people feel obligated to fight over scraps. I’m here to tell you you shouldn’t lower yourself to that. Don’t force people to fight over scraps for you and don’t get into a fight over scraps yourself. Moreover – and this is the real crux of this article – be willing to forgo money now in the name of establishing long term relationships. I’m not saying you should be playing for free or anything – but don’t try and squeeze people for money. It’s not going to pay off in the long run, for a few very simple, and hopefully obvious reasons.

What it boils down too is that people don’t like to deal with people who make them lose money – especially in the music industry where money is awlay tight. I know people on all sides of the industry, from venue owners and promoters to booking agents and bands and trust me – on the independent level very few people are making any real money, so even a few hundred dollars can ruin a relationship. Think about it as a long term investment when you take a pay cut on a venue. Sure it’s not great for that particular night but it means that when you come back to that city you will be greeted with open arms by that venue and know that you can continue to do cool stuff with that promoter. If you’re supposed to be making the majority of your money on tour then why would you try and hurt the people who are responsible for a good chunk of your tour income? Sure there will be other promoters, but in the long run that just makes your life harder, having to find new people because you keep screwing folks over, and people will find out about these sorts of things – trust me.

The thing is – these people have the potential to keep paying you for years down the line if you treat them right. And when things aren’t going to great and you desperately need the money then they are going to be a little more willing to have the compassion and help you out. You’re not trying to become the biggest dick swingingest master of the industry here, you’re just trying to be a cool guy trying to help people out and create a better world. If you encourage a culture of abuse and shitty people being shitty to each other then you are a part of the problem and have no right to keep asking for more money. People appreciate people who want to make this last. In an industry that has a tendency to be cannibalistic I am calling you to move above your peers and allow this whole thing to have a real future. If you keep screwing people over with unfair deals and scams then you aren’t going to win yourself a real future in this business.

And let’s be clear. If you ask for significantly more money than you could ever realistically make a promoter in that market it IS a scam. Sure there are exceptions, like jazz clubs with built in markets or special shows that the venue is fully aware won’t make it’s money back via tickets. Some venues are able to really make a ton of money off of drinks at things like that and if they are willing to work with you that’s good. I also understand that agents want to push promoters to do a good job, this totally makes sense. But don’t be willing to scam people for just a few hundred bucks when you have the potential to make literally thousands with those same people by simply maintaining the relationship for a few more years. If you’re not in this for the long run then you might as well not be in it at all because it certainly isn’t in the first few tears where you make money. The first few years are where you make you reputation and you don’t want to be the one known for scamming people.

This is an industry where a lot of scumbags have been able to engage in scummy activities for years with no real consequences. I’ve had to engage in some of them. To some degree that’s just how the industry work and that’s a brutal reality. Still – you need to focus on situations where everyone is a winner, or if they aren’t a winner then at least they can not feel awful about a show you booked with them. Being the guy who tries to make compromises isn’t always easy but it’s the guy you have to be sometimes. I know it’s not easy but you have to be willing to sit down and focus on the greater good. I know that sounds thoughtlessly utilitarian, but in the end you kind of need to make sacrifices on the behalf of some for the greater whole. Of course – a huge part of this is that everyone you work with needs to know that you are about the community and not any single band. The thing is – if someone is trying to take advantage of their community for their band then you can pretty easily see that they are a piece of garbage.

I know this sounds kind of hokey, especially when people around you are trying be cutthroat, but when I look at the people who really last it’s the ones who realize that it’s the long term that matters – not just screwing over some poor sap because it makes their lives easier right now. Sometimes you might accidentally screw someone over -that’s just how life is. People make mistakes and you need to be patient with that, but you also can’t just expect free stuff and good money to fall in your lap all the time. This is not an industry that allows for a lot of time to screw around, so instead appreciate what you earn and revel in the magic of getting to do music.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

The post Long Term Thinking In The Music Industry appeared first on Independent Music Promotions.

The Calm Before The Tour

There is a very specific type of hell you experience before hitting the road – a very specific type of hell that makes the music industry uniquely miserable. It is the hell of pre-tour anxiety. It is the hell of knowing that you have done pretty much all that you can do and for some reason you now just have to sit here and wait and desperately hope, pray even, that something works out in your favor. It’s the kind of thing that is intensely stressful for no other reason that n that you literally can’t do anything other than wait. You have to keep busy during the build up and it’s hard to find stuff to do – especially as you let your other activities wind down since, after all, you’re going on tour next week. It’s a hard thing to deal with and is the sort of thing no one who hasn’t put together a tour will ever be able to understand since it’s just a terrifying and uniquely personal experience that will leave you biting your nails in frustration and angst.

So imagine sitting there with the knowledge that you’ve just laid down a bunch of money to fund this tour, be it on merch, van repairs, van rental, whatever and now you can’t really do that much but sit around and wait for the whole adventure to start. You sit around and wonder what you’re going to do for the next few days while you wait for the rest of the music industry to catch up around you and wonder if this tour was a good idea in the first place. You have to just accept the fact that there is nothing more you can really do. The deals are in, some bad stuff will go down to be sure but unexpected good stuff will happen too. You are about to go see all of your friends, but also have to deal with scummy promoters trying to make a quick buck and awful local bands who you just don’t understand.

I’m not the only one who feels this way by the way – though it’s easy to think that you are. Like, shouldn’t you be excited that you are about to go on tour and do all of this cool stuff? Oftentimes I am excited to go out on the road. I’m excited to explore myself and America. I’m excited to see where it all is going to take me but I am also stressed and nervous. The thing is, after a certain point it’s out of your hands. You can’t really do a lot right now about how merch sales are going to be in Missoula – it’s simply beyond your control. Merch has already been ordered, you’ve already figured out how to get their early to sell the most in the smallest amount of time, you don’t have anything else you can do right now. When you’re on the road there will be stuff to fret about – reupping shirts, figuring out when things need to be expanded and getting everything done right but as for now you have none of that hands on market research, you just fret.

Everyone who goes on tour feels something like this. It’s kind of like the feeling you get before you go out on a long exquisitely planed out vacation. It took you a long time to get this far and now you need to make sure that something doesn’t screw up – but you can’t do anything about that for a long while yet. You are stuck until you are there and living in the madness, picking apart every second of this weird nightmare that is the music industry. Sometimes you just don’t have enough projects to keep you busy because everyone else is occupied with people more important than you and has other things to grind away on. That’s fine.. That doesn’t mean you are screwed or anything it just means that you need to be careful in how you budget your time that you don’t get caught up in all of the day to day madness that is going to define your life for the next month or so. No matter what you do these nerves are going to get to you so you might as well embrace what they represent – you figured everything out.

So I’m sitting here on my couch quietly freaking out. There isn’t much more that I can do today There isn’t much more that I can do at all. As a matter of fact I think I might go stir crazy. Hell I took a nap and I never take naps. Pretour anxiety is the absolute worst. When you’ve nailed down every crazy factor that could go wrong and then sit there wondering about all the stuff you have no control over you can’t do much more than say ‘fuck it’ and try to continue your day to day. Ultimately – touring is a lot of fun and it’s how a lot of us make all of our money and we need to respect that, but we also need to respect the fact that this can lead to ebbs and flows in peoples work cycles. When you have a quiet day when you are used to high power busy days then you start to feel a little weird. When things chill out and you’re used to being always on you have to step back and appreciate those moments without letting them slip between your fingers.

Waiting to go on tour is an adventure. It’s scary. It is the calm before the storm. But in the end it’s worth it. It’s a valuable period of self reflection to sit back and enjoy all that you have been given. To get a real nights sleep, in a real bed before you have to dive off into the land of no return. In other words, going on tour is possibly the best and possibly the worst experience of your life and you aren’t going to know until you get out there and are actually doing it. So sit back and enjoy the ride, you’ve worked hard to get here, so just let the vibes wash over you until you need to go once more to war.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

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Nels Cline scores your life on 2-disc Lovers

If you’ve ever seen Wilco live you’ve noticed the tall guy in nice button-down dress shirts playing the guitar stage left. That’s Nels Cline and he shreds in equal parts beauty and chaos. He’s able to make his guitar sound like the morning dew under a sky blue sky or the train skidding off its tracks below.

Cline officially joined Wilco in 2007 on Sky Blue Sky. In every album since, he’s changed the dynamic of the band. Cline adds the perfect accent to Jeff Tweedy’s songs and gives Wilco that spontaneous edge (along with percussionist Glenn Kotche) that keeps them from being Mumford and Sons or some other folky yawnsman.

In addition to Wilco, who’s newest record, Schmilco, came out this month, Cline has played on billions of records and also records under Nels Cline Trio and The Nels Cline Singers. His last solo record was Dirty Baby in 2010, but in the time since he’s appeared on seventeen albums.

Nels is a busy man and he’s got ideas that can’t be contained in one group. On Lovers, his new double-disc solo album on the Blue Note label, he pulls back the curtain on his musical mind. He leads a flock of musicians to conjure the songs in his head with help from arranger Michael Leonhart. There is no limit to the tools needed to accomplish this. On Lovers you’ll hear electric and acoustic guitars, trumpet, flugelhorn, cymbalon, contrabass, percussion, trombone, bassoon, vibraphone, marimba, harp, violin, viola, cello and others that would make this sentence too long.

The result is cinematic with many arcs. It could be the soundtrack to the silent film adaptation of your life. Some of the song titles even read like scenes headers for a film: “Hairpin & Hatbox,” “The Bed We Made,” “The Night Porter/Max, Mon Amou,” “The Search For Cat.”

Lovers stretches into two records like a long day stretches into the night. The first disc opens with “Introduction/Diaphanous” a sedated jazz number with hi-hats lazily spinning against each other and Cline strumming like the morning wind. Ideal for deep morning coffee reflections.

“Glad to be Unhappy” comes next and sounds like the entrance music for a sneaky villain. Cline employs a full orchestra with French horns rising and falling. Disc One is the more calming of the two, but they pretty much go hand-in-hand. Cline’s muted guitar creates an opium buzz on “Cry, Want” while the cymbals move like sand in a breeze.

“Lady Gabor” drops into deep space, an orchestral spiral, with only the faintest glimmer of a bassline to keep you steady. If you listen hard enough you can see Sun Ra’s ghost levitate out of the frame.

Disc Two stretches out even more. With the snare-head tilted off, “Snare, Girl” begins a six-plus-minute, slow-rocking lull. A steady droning drum beat caked in fuzz keeps pace with Cline’s guitar and eventually turns into alarm. When the induced grip lets up, you fall into “So Hard It Hurts/Touching.” A room full of instruments warms up tapping without direction then dissolves into unraveling notes of feedback. Right as you’re about to crack you’re let out into an open field of oboes and clarinets. This would be the scene when you fall down the stairs drunk, bang your head and wake up four hours later drenched in confusion.

“The Search for Cat” holds all the despair and helplessness of its title’s scene. Disc Two closes out with “The Bond,” a beautiful piece of classical guitar noodling and symphonic interlacings.

Cline’s work on the guitar is some of the greatest put to record. He manages to find that sweet sixteen spot of being technically advanced with his playing, but also utterly incoherent and jarringly experimental. He could play with any group past, present, future, and fit right in. Lovers is Cline let loose on his musical playground.

 

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

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Freud, Sexual Politics, Inversions and the Music Industry

Figuring out the role of sex in music is a complicated and weird balance that we see throughout the whole thing. There is a strange balance to music as a whole, and while gender roles are important, as we discussed in a previous article, I want to talk more about the politics of gender in song. That is to say music is largely driven by the human desire for sex – or so many theories about the origins of music would suggest.  So why is it that songs like “Take It Off” by the Donnas become massive well loved hits and a track like “Peacock” from Katy Perry is cast aside as a silly pointless piece of schlock? I know I don’t normally chime in on songwriting in this blog but it will allow us to make some larger points about branding and figuring out the best way to market your music with inversions of expectations and thus finding something fundamental within the ungodly power of rock and roll.

The reason that bands like The Donnas or Pat Benatar has such universal acclaim is their mastery of their own sexualization. Why though? Because they inverted norms. It’s the same reason we see the enduring appeal of an artist like Joan Jett. She legitimately doesn’t give a damn about her bad reputation and doesn’t want to improve her station. So we find ourselves digging in. These womens ability to show that they want to take what they want rather than hope for it to come to them. The demure crap that defines a lot of the female archetype in music was destroyed by these women. They had a sort of Freudian appeal that resonates with young people of all ages, genders and creeds. They gave power to women and created something that was quite frankly – incredibly erotic. The appeal though came from their ability to take apart the traditional ideas that make so much of pop music schlocky. Throughout history it was inversions like these that fueled new ideas and which makes these artists so endlessly appealing.

I think that the role of women in music, especially rock and hard rock is perhaps the best way to pick apart the role of inversions in music. In many ways, and not to beat a dead horse, but this circles back to my passion for Kesha – her entire musical approach is based on inverting gender norms. She is the powerful dominant woman in an industry where a lot of girls, despite what they might lead you to believe, don’t have that kind of clout. You need to be able to take these predicted norms and evolve them into something different and unique. While playing up to tropes can be fun it’s hard to truly justify their usage in an increasingly competitive market. As much fun as tropey and silly music can be we, as fans, rapidly lose interest. You don’t want to be a part of a movement of ‘cool’ that makes the music industry come off as pointless. You need to continue building on inversions to build regular successes.

Ultimately – there are few groups in music as oppressed as women so when they are able to stand up and stick it totally to the man. The ones who are able to totally stick it to the man and tear gender norms apart are the ones who are going to dominate. It’s the same reason that you see people like Florida Georgia Line blowing up with their new record – an album that uses ballads and retrospective love songs about family and country living. Being able to take apart these ideas that have defined so many of our lives has made these artists great and given them enduring power. It has taken apart a lot of the heart rending torment that makes a lot of music so decadent and disgusting. I’m someone who has to listen to new music every day and I am sick and tired of so much of the common crap that makes us suffer and leaves me frustrated and tired.

This is not to say that truly good music can’t become huge and enduring. A lot of Led Zeppelin for example plays into traditional 70s rock tropes but it kicks ass and they remain one of the most important bands of all time. Yet even they blew peoples minds when they brought in elements of classical music to their sound. It simply was a step beyond a lot of what other people were doing at the time. The idea of classical music and folk ballads had already been introduced to rock and roll. Even today we see bands that play into a lot of traditional ideas but just do it really well and thus find success. That’s why the Foo Fighters are simultaneously one of the most popular and most reviled bands going right now. Same with Nickelback. They play into common tropes – but I don’t know if that’s actually going to give you the sort of long term success that makes music as exciting and eternally interesting.

I hope I’ve made my point without rambling too much or seeming to silly. The universal idea that I keep circling back to is that music is supposed to be built on destroying expectations. Expectations create rules and the best music from history is the music that destroyed a lot of the passion that made us get into it. It’s impossible to progress beyond the limitations that have come to define our industry without being willing to break them and it’s the people that fail to break them who end up in the same circle jerk that has led me to booking cover bands to make a dime. Everyone is uncomfortable when limitations are broken apart – that’s why The Donnas have the endring appeal. They forced you to accept the power that women can have and rode it into TV spots and thousands of sales. It’s also why some labels become butts of jokes. So come out – destroy the norms and change the world

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

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Telephones And The Music Industry

The phone. Teenagers use it for texting. Your mom uses it call you just like, all the time. Obama has one that can end the world. You know how it goes. Normal people aren’t really into that kind of thing anymore right? Don’t we have emails and texts and all that good stuff so that we don’t need to worry about phone calls anymore? Actually no. As it turns out – phone calls are one of the single most important aspects of life in the music industry and the sooner you embrace them the sooner you will see yourself going to much deserved success. No matter how hard you work or how much you fake it it’s only through phone calls that you are going to find real progress being made. It’s just how humans communicate and you can’t escape it. I’m at a point where I view it as a secret weapon – and quite frankly you should too.

The reason that my phone is my secret weapon is because it allows me to soothe over hard feelings and lets me create a personal connection with people I work with. There is so much that doesn’t get properly communicated in an email and the more you go in this industry the more you will see this. That’s just how it works. You can’t expect to keep going hard with just emails. Sure introductory emails tend to be a good way to start, but you always need to all if you really want to get anywhere. Sure some people just don’t pick up their phones but screw those people – those people are assholes. Phone calls are the single greatest way to make a connection because once you are on a call the other person has to reply or hang up. That’s simply how it goes. You can use the leverage of a phone call to your advantage time and time again.

To elaborate – the magic of the phone is that it gives you a much more human side than if you just sent a harsh email. It means that when things are going south, human you can step in, not weird email you. It’s like that statistic about how 48% of sentences ending in a period in an email are negatively perceived. I don’t know how realistic that number is, but it holds a grain of truth – your emails are easily misinterpreted and that’s only going to hurt you in the long run. You need to take the time to honor the other person and talk them down from a poor decision and work with them to reason out a better solution. Sure these sorts of things can be done via email but it often takes a lot more time and explaining that many people simply aren’t going to be interested in. So take a chance to salvage a situation and build something greater.

Beyond that – your phone is really your best networking tool. Most people probably aren’t going to go on a long story of their lives via email, but if you talk with them on the phone long enough they will get to talking .They will get to trusting you and be open to give you exciting new opportunities. That’s the sort of thing that you can’t deny yourself. You have to embrace the networking power of a phone and realize that by calling people up you are starting the same sort of dialogue you could have with someone over dinner at a festival. In fact, in some ways the phone is better because people have fewer distractions and you can really gt a chance to let people rip out and speak with you. Taking advantage of that and using that charm is going to help you out over the long run. That’s how I’ve negotiated many a record deal and booking contract. If you lose yourself in the bullshit of the bleak life of modern times and try to only use email no matter what you do fewer people will care.

Again – this is a deepset psychological thing that most of us can’t do anything to combat. It’s the sort of thing that allows you to take over the world. I’ve spent hours practicing my phone voice so that when things come down to the wire and I need to make an especially important phone call I know that I can. I know that I can find a solution that works for all of us and hints at a better tomorrow. That’s why I never hesitate to give people a buzz, they welcome it – it gives them a break from the monotony of constant emails and instead shows you a path to something more exciting and strangely peaceful. There is something relaxing about getting a chance to just straight up build a relationship in th emiddle of your workday rather than work on another frustrating proposal or skim through another list of links that someone sends you. It’s the sort of things that actual organizations are built on rather than two bit music factories that never really get anything done. The power of the phone call is indescribable.

So don’t be afraid – pick up the phone. Take advantage of peoples need to connect to other humans. I can guarantee you that if you are good enough at your phone dialogues then people are going to want to talk to you – in fact if you do it well enough people will look forward to your calls, much like they would look forward to seeing any other friend. It’s hard to make good friends over email, but if you make enough calls and charm enough on the phone then you are going to find yourself with richer music industry relationships that have the potential to pay dividends the more you grow and the further that you progress.

Independent Music Promotions’ (www.independentmusicpromotions.com) revolutionary music PR campaigns are the most effective in the industry. Submit your music to us today.

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