Tag Archives | Live Unsigned

23 May 2013

Is DIY the only way for your band?

You often hear experts online saying how great things are now for musicians, how there are so many tools online to build your fanbase and get your music out there. However, not all artists are good at social networking. Some people don’t have the people skills or the time to do all the thousands of [...]

05 July 2012

Why do people go to gigs by unsigned and obscure bands?

Who are those people who go to see bands at “unsigned nights”? It is very rarely someone who happens to be passing by a venue and just pops in (especially if there is an admission fee). So who will be at your first few gigs? Friends and family of your band members – Phone them, [...]

12 June 2012

How do you plan the perfect CD release gig?

If you’ve spent months writing and recording your new CD (let alone doing all the artwork and other stuff) you’ll want the CD release gig to be perfect. It needs to be an event that people will get excited about, something special and remarkable. How do you do that? Here are some ideas: List it [...]

18 May 2012

How did Amanda Palmer raise over half a million dollars from her fans in under a week?

Well known social media user and musician Amanda Palmer recently started a campaign using Kickstarter.

09 April 2012

How do you get influential people interested in your music?

When you see bands with thousands of Facebook likes or Twitter followers it can seem really intimidating and it is easy to feel that as a new artist you will never be able to build that kind of audience. Building a fan base takes time and most people with lots of fans and followers don’t [...]

10 March 2012

How do musicians really earn a living?

It used to be relatively simple to work out how successful musicians got paid, you signed to a record label, put out an album and toured in support of it. If you made a profit after paying back your advance and all associated costs you got paid. This is called recouping (most bands failed to [...]

02 March 2012

How can your band benefit from piracy?

Many musicians are looking to stop piracy but some bands are finding ways to use free music, illegal downloading and so called “piracy” to grow their audience. In a recent interview on Forbes.com Joy Williams from successful indie band The Civil Wars said: “Sure, piracy has its drawbacks, but it also has positives, we’ve had [...]

04 February 2012

How much does it cost to “make it” in music?

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 [...]

02 November 2011

Do you still need to sell CDs when everything is digital?

Ten years ago it used to be easy to know how to sell your music, you printed CDs then hoped you would sell them at gigs or if possible you would get a distributer. Now most people consume music digitally via the web, often illegally. So do you need to sell CDs or any physical [...]

11 October 2011

Using Ticket Tailor to sell tickets for your gigs

Often on the blog we talk about putting on your own gigs and how to make things happen for yourself. One of the things you will want to do when organising your own events is to sell tickets via the web. Ticket Tailor is a company that allows you to sell tickets for your events [...]