Advice for the masses
12/1/2004
Jim Griffin on the pho list asked the question today, ‘What “rules of the road” from your business do you offer those traveling this information highway?”‘
My response, as an artist trying to get my groovetronica project heard:
— The internet is not a panacea. It’s getting there, though. —
1. The internet is not a replacement for capable hands, doing work.
You can’t do this on your own. Enlist the help of others who share your dream, but are interested in a different parts of it. There will always be lots and lots of work to do. It’s a competition thing – anything a machine can do for you, it can do for others, and probably is.
2. The internet is the great equalizer, but only among peers.
The competition out there isn’t just massive – it’s complete: you will soon be in competition with practically every other musician on the planet. I picked up a new piece of gear for the studio, and the manual came in a bunch of different languages, including Russian. I’d never seen a multi-lingual manual in Russian before.
Also, the vast majority of the concerns being discussed and addressed in terms of emerging media are of only peripheral relevance to you – the focus is still on the haves – current owners of the music industry Your principal concern online should be obtaining sticky listenership. Give away product – don’t try to sell stuff until you have people hooked.
However, you know both of those facts already. I’m merely restating the obvious to lead into:
3. The internet is not a replacement for personal relationships
Personal relationships are more important than ever. Why? Because of #2 (the internet is the great equalizer, among peers) and #1 (the internet is not a replacement for actual work). You are going to get ahead because someone likes you music enough to work it for you. You are going to get ahead because your music is reviewed by the right websites and people, and played by the right djs. Your chances of this happening increase considerably if know the persons doing it.
And people are also how we make sense of the web. Read the rest of this entry »
Someone started this thread on the beloved tapeop message board.
messageboard.TapeOp.com :: View topic – Is sending stuff to college radio worthwhile, or futile?
It wrings pretty true with my experiences. We sent out all those cds this year. Did we get any CMJ charting? I think we charted twice. Regardless, regular web checks showed that we were in rotation in at least ten stations, (frequently in ‘regular’, rather than ‘light’, no less. And we had people >all< over the country coming to our site. So what gives? We sent out 300+ cds. We got played in less than a dozen places. Is there something wrong with this? We don't suck that bad...
Groovetronica
7/23/2004
Ok. I had some time to get back to the Groovetronica again. It looks like I’ll be done in a month or so (after the big trip to england) There are a few more songs to finish, and a lot of mixing. Stand by, I’ll be posting some more samples as I work on it in a day or so.
There’s a chance that a 5.1 version might see the light by the end of the summer.