I will start off by saying that this is 100% my opinion on the 2010 GRAMMYs last night. If you disagree with anything I say, please feel free to share in the comments below. I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Rather than do a “play by play analysis” of what went on at the GRAMMYs last night, since I’m sure you can find that elsewhere on the Internets, I thought I’d go through and list the good, the bad and, of course, the ugly:
The Good:
Stephen Colbert.
Lady Gaga and Elton John performing together with dirt (or something) smeared all over their faces.
Slash coming out on stage to play his solo from “November Rain.”
Beyonce performing a cover of Alanis Morissette’s “You Oughtta Know.” I thought she did the song justice and it was definitely better than her own song about being a boy.
Kings of Leon finally getting some cred., even though many will say they “sold out.” Pish posh.
The Bad:
Stephen Colbert. No, seriously. What was up with his lame jokes?
Miley Cyrus … even if it was for 3 minutes.
Taylor Swift winning album of the year. Putting aside the fact that I’m not particularly keen on teeny bopper music, I just truly TRULY cannot wrap my mind around the fact that she won. Did a bunch of 35-50 year old men and women sit in a conference room and suddenly decide that “You Belong With Me” really hit home? That finally someone understands them? Someone please explain …
The Ugly:
Some random dude repeatedly telling us that Lady Gaga is “a monster.” It just became really awkward at some point.
Slash playing his solo for “November Rain” during a performance of “Blame It.” Who comes up with these ideas and how?
Every lame ass joke that someone said last night including the whole dialogue between John Legend and Carlos Santana.
I wasn’t sure where to fit this in exactly, but I still felt that I had to say: when did Pink join Cirque du Soleil?!
Although we don’t condone recording a video of yourself while driving, it seems as though Will Duke from SoundOps is a master at it. Watch him rant about why he thinks Audiolife is great and be sure to check out SoundOps for your music mastering needs! Thanks Will … you rock! Drive safely …
Of course it is. Ask yourself that question one more time. What important word sticks out the most?
Business.
That’s right kids – it’s a business. If you want to succeed and make a living creating and performing music for the rest of your life, you have to start a business. And it has to make profit if you expect it to work.
Many inspiring musicians never think of the business side of things; they expect their music to be enough work, that some label will come along and do all the hard work for them.
Unfortunately for them, the days of a label signing a band because they wrote a hit song are long gone. Why? It’s just not a smart investment.
Marketing has taken on a whole ‘nother meaning in this technology and “always on” age. Marketing is not just neatly packaged ads and campaigns that you push out to the public. Marketing is now a communication channel between you and the public – whether your fans, potential fans, passers by, people looking in Twitter Search, Google searches, YouTube videos, comments and any other interaction point that there is.
The goal here is to create value at all of these interaction points.
Last Thursday, I went to an Atmosphere show in Orlando, FL – a long way from his hometown in Minneapolis, MN. Upon first glance it would appear that 1,000 kids paid $15 to see a white rapper from the burbs. Taking a closer look you will see the real value of what was happening here.
Pre-Pre-Show
As with all Atmosphere tours, he has released a new EP for concert go-ers to get excited about. This time he made it a free 7-song download available at their in-house record shop, 5th Element Online. To help their overall marketing efforts, they made you sign-up for a free account to be notified of new releases and tour info in exchange for the EP.
Greetings from Los Angeles. Over the last 15+ years I have spent a great amount of time marketing artists from the Record Company side as well as the Artist Management side. The goals of my posts are simple: help you position yourself, your band, etc. for success. It is up to you to make the best music possible. So lets dive in shall we?
MYSPACE
I’m sure you have heard it a million times: build a MySpace page. Yes, you should have a presence on MySpace, but more importantly, you should have your own website. The web is fickle, remember Friendster? MySpace is going through some changes at the moment and if you haven’t heard, Facebook just took over as the #1 Social Networking Platform. It is great to have tons of friends and plays, but if those “friends” don’t support you by coming to your shows, buying merchandise, CDs, etc what are they good for then?
I’m not trying to bash MySpace, it is definitely a viable tool for artists, but don’t think that just because you put up a page, used an autobot to get a bunch of “friends” and “plays” that you’re on your way to success. Focus on quality and not quantity. Super serve those fans from the get go. They will tell a friend, who will tell a friend, etc. Get the picture? You can do everything in the world to get noticed, but it won’t mean a thing if you don’t establish an emotional connection with your fans. At the end of the day it’s all about your music.
I hope all of you had a great 4th of July weekend!
Audiolife was founded with the fundamental purpose of empowering artists to take control and build a successful career “independently”. All of the leading indicators in the industry show that independent music is the way of the future. For example, less than 10 years ago indie music accounted for less than 10% of sales. Today that figure is closer to 30% and some would argue that in just a few years it will be more than half. You’ve seen many success stories from artists that have chosen to release their albums independently such as Radiohead, NIN, Corey Smith, and most recently, Drake. This trend will certainly continue in the months and years ahead. Artists now understand that becoming independent means more creative control, deeper relationships with their fans, and more money.
All of this begs the question of what it truly means to be independent. There are many definitions floating around out there and I’d love to hear your opinion.
Please let us know what it means to you to be independent by writing a comment below.
I just finished reading a post on Hypebot about the new Bing search engine by Microsoft. Naturally it got me thinking about Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It’s already quite the challenge for artists (or anyone for that matter) to optimize their search engine rankings, let alone when more than one search engine exists, each with its own algorithms. If you haven’t already, I’d highly recommend typing your stage name into Google, Bing & Yahoo to see how you rank on each. The best thing you can do though is be sure to constantly update your Web sites, social networks, etc. and do all that you can to improve your rankings.
Click here for the full article on Bing and the Music Industry and be sure to watch the video on how Bing works after the jump:
It’s almost impossible to stay current with social networks. It feels like there’s a new one everyday. Luckily they’re not all relevant or of significant use. Occassionally though a new one comes along that grabs our attention. As time consuming as it can be, the more relevant social networks you’re on the better. And by relevant I mean that its users and members meet your target audience.
Earlier today I was reading about thesixtyone on the Music Think Tank blog and thought it was worthy of mention. Not only does it look like a lot of fun (you get points for listening to music!), but it seems like its another venue for artists to promote their music. Continue reading after the jump for a full review of thesixtyone and how to use it by Brian Hazard:
By now you may know that we’re all about the DIY approach to the music business. Heck, why else would we have created a portable storefront for your fans to purchase directly from you? But while we’re working hard to provide all your merch needs on-demand, there are other companies out there helping you build and manage your fanbase in order to market your music. Take, for example, Fancorps. These guys are working hard to help artists, labels, etc. with their street and viral marketing.
Last night was part 2 of the 8th season finale for American Idol. In case you missed it, we have the results here for you. Regardless of whether or not you like the show it’s probably helpful to know who won because they will likely be all over the place very soon. Plus, you can add it to your random pop culture trivia knowledge and be the next coolest kid on the block (maybe).
I will start off by saying that this is 100% my opinion on the 2010 GRAMMYs last night. If you disagree with anything I say, please feel free to share in the comments below. I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Greetings from Los Angeles. Over the last 15+ years I have spent a great amount of time marketing artists from the Record Company side as well as the Artist Management side. The goals of my posts are simple: help you position yourself, your band, etc. for success. It is up to you to make the best music possible. So lets dive in shall we?
Happy Independence Day!
I just finished reading a post on 
By now you may know that we’re all about the DIY approach to the music business. Heck, why else would we have created a portable storefront for your fans to purchase directly from you? But while we’re working hard to provide all your merch needs on-demand, there are other companies out there helping you build and manage your fanbase in order to market your music. Take, for example, 
Last night was part 2 of the 8th season finale for American Idol. In case you missed it, we have the results here for you. Regardless of whether or not you like the show it’s probably helpful to know who won because they will likely be all over the place very soon. Plus, you can add it to your random pop culture trivia knowledge and be the next coolest kid on the block (maybe).
