This is the blog of LiveUnsigned.com - a worldwide gig directory just for unsigned artists. Here you'll find lots of useful tips to help you prosper as an unsigned musician.
As a musician you often feel that what you are doing with your musical career doesn’t compare to what others are achieving. Other bands often seem to gain fans more quickly, get better gigs and get more attention from the press. It’s very easy to lose your motivation. One thing to bear in mind is that so much success in the music industry is down to sheer perseverance and not giving up whatever happens. Here are some ways of thinking about what success is for musicians that should help to keep you motivated:
Don’t judge your own success by the standards of others – Worrying what other bands are doing is a guaranteed way to demotivate yourself. If you see another band gaining more fans and getting better gigs don’t get depressed about it. Follow your own path and build your own audience, don’t worry what others are doing, you don’t have time to waste on that.
Be realistic – Is your ambient death/prog album really going to outsell Lady Gaga? The world would probably be a better place if it did but if the music you play is only destined for a small audience don’t be dissapointed when this is what happens. Sometimes remarkable things can happen and odd and interesting music does end up in the mainstream (see the recent case of Jon Gomm), just don’t expect it.
Make a plan – Write down some goals and put together a bit of a plan, some things you can make happen. Tick them off as you achieve them, at least this way you can see you are making progress.
Don’t do it for the money – The music industry is a poor way of earning serious money, the effort you have to put in versus the amount you make is really high in the early days and there are no guarantees you’ll make anything decent financially. If you don’t love the music you are unlikely to have the passion to put the work in to make it, it’s really hard work. People can tell if you are motivated just by cash, fans aren’t idiots.
Set small goals but make them time bound – So perhaps aim for an extra 20 Facebook fans a month or an extra 100 Twitter followers a month. Achieving small goals reguarly will keep you motivated rather than trying to change the world overnight.
What is success to some is failure to others – It’s all about context. A massive seller for an underground band would be the same as a disaster for a pop act. Selling a few thousand records can be an album of the year in some genres.
Great music, hard work and a great live show will pay off in the end, even if you sometimes feel nothing is happening. Keep going and eventually you will find your audience.
Recently we highlighted the story of Jon Gomm’s viral video hit Passionflower and the how it received over a million views thanks to Reddit and social media. Many people see viral hits as useful but can’t see that they cross over into the mainstream press and TV. It depends who is talking about your music and how influential they are. This is how Jon Gomm went from posting a video on Youtube to playing live on BBC news after the video had already gone viral online:
First Stephen Fry tweeted about the video – His tweet simply read “WOW” with a link to the video. Although we don’t know how he found the video this caused many thousands more hits to the video, which was already on well over a million hits. This then gets shared and this causes it to achieve more viral success. This is after the events in our original blog post.
The press picked up on the story – Once Mr Fry’s celebrity name became attached the story becomes “Stephen Fry tweets about Jon Gomm and it goes viral” (even thou it was already over a million views before Stephen Fry was involved!). The national press started to get interested. “A one-word tweet from author Stephen Fry has boosted the career of an aspiring singer – after it increased traffic to his latest video by one million hits.” was a typical quote from The Telegraph.
TV companies get involved – Once the story becomes about Stephen Fry discovering an obscure musician it is of interest to the television. Jon appears on BBC Breakfast TV and his video is featured on prime time TV’s The One Show as part of an interview with Stephen Fry. Here is a video of Jon on BBC Breakfast:
David Crosby gets in touch – All this brings Jon’s music to the attention of the legendary David Crosby of Crosby, Still and Nash fame. Another celebrity name attached to the story does it no harm at all and the buzz continues.
Through all this interest Jon has continued to stay 100% independent and refused all record company offers. Many people in the media seemed shocked he wasn’t interested in working with a record company. His music is selling well and his gigs are selling out. It is all without any PR company, direct to fan. It shows that if you have a story (especially one with a celebrity involved like Stephen Fry) you can get the mainstream media involved.
It is great to see Jon Gomm reaching a larger audience but all this came about because Jon’s music is genuinely great and he worked for years on the live circuit and online gradually building an audience. On this occasion he got a lucky break but the more hard work you put in playing live and making friends the more chance you have of eventually connecting with someone of influence such as Stephen Fry. It’s important to remember that the video had already gone viral before any of this happened
On the Time magazine website there is an article by an obscure indie rock band called Two Lights talking about how expensive it is to become a rock star. It is always a bad idea to complain in public. GQ called them “Hapless poster-bros for self-importance…full of whiny self-entitlement” and across the web people are ridiculing the band. There is such a thing as bad publicity. Here are some things Two Lights could do that will actually help them to build an audience:
Stop complaining and start investing your time in your music – It’s not easy to build a fan base. It’s hard work to build it up but if you put the time in and build real relationships it works. This blog is full of ideas to build your audience and many of them are free or just require some hard work.
You don’t need to be in New York (or another major city) – You can save money and make records anywhere. If you want a career in music it’s a good idea to think of ways of reducing costs and living cheaply. It can be great to hang out and meet people if you live in a big city but this is not essential, building it up online does the job just as well. Tools like Youtube, Twitter and Live Unsigned can make all the difference.
Credibility and fans don’t come from an article in Time – Currently Two Lights have less than two hundred fans on Facebook and Twitter. The article didn’t help them, it made them a laughing stock. Not all press is good, before you consider doing anything think about if it will add to your credibility or take away from it.
Don’t wait for the record company – Two Lights say they are “Waiting for that blank check!”. You can do so much yourselves now, start building an audience and let the labels come to you. Once you have sold a few thousand downloads this will start to happen and you will be in a position to negotiate a better record deal.
It’s not about the money - ”we’ll soon be earning a lot more money than even doctors and lawyers.” Don’t go into it for the money, people will see through it, you need to make music because you need to, because it’s your passion.
The music industry isn’t glamorous – “What meets me backstage is nothing like what I pictured. No fountains of champagne, no elegant lounges. It’s just as dingy as the venue itself, with a printed sign taped to the star’s dressing room door. ” It’s show business, back stage is the servants quarters, it’s not cool or exciting, it’s the staff room.
You do have to invest your own money – Until you have an audience music is an expensive hobby. You do have to pay for rehearsals and recording yourself, it’s just the way it is. If you do it because you love it you won’t mind the investment.
Make the music so good people will share it – Look at the recent success of guitar master Jon Gomm, if you make great music people will share it. Word of mouth is still the best form of advertising.
Email blasts won’t work – You’re better off investing in a PR company that wants to work with you, not someone doing a random email blast. Work with a PR firm that are enthusiastic about your music, know the niche you work in, have a proven track record for breaking new bands and have real relationships with relevant bloggers and magazines in that scene.
Make the most of every gig – Every time you are on stage (even if it is in front of 3 people) get up there and give the full show, shake hands with the audience and build relationships. You build your audience one person at a time.
Spend money in the places it will have the most impact – $100,000 spent on PR, marketing and touring will have a big impact but only if you know who your audience is. Perhaps a decent recording is a good investment, as is a decent website.
Spending money won’t get you anywhere unless the music is good and people choose to support you. If there was a formula that would make you a rock star by investing a particular amount of cash more people would do it. Focus on building your audience gradually, it takes time but it does work.
