Tag Archives | Pay What You Want

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 [...]

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 [...]

13 September 2011

Why aren’t fans buying your music?

In the last 5 years it has become really easy to get your music available for sale online via sites like Bandcamp, iTunes, CD Baby and Reverbnation. You no longer need to press up lots of CDs and get a distribution deal or try to get record shops to order your album. The problem with [...]

08 September 2011

20 ways to get more gigs for your band (part 2)

In part 2 of this post we’ll look at building your local community, borrowing ideas from others and how to stand out amongst all the other bands. Stand out – Look at a band like Cardiacs. They are an amazing live act, very theatrical with make up, costumes and confetti bombs. Initially people hated them [...]

23 August 2011

10 lessons DIY musicians can learn from Radiohead

Being an innovator in the music industry is never easy, but Radiohead have managed it both musically and in terms of their engagement with fans and labels. When the band started in the mid 80′s there was no Youtube, no Live Unsigned to post gigs on and no Twitter. Now you can do most of the [...]

21 July 2011

9 things bands do that waste time

DIY musicians rarely find themselves with any spare time, they need to focus on the important things that will build you an audience. Important tasks like listing your gigs on Live Unsigned, talking to fans, sending messages to your mailing list, dealing with the industry and booking gigs are more than enough to keep you [...]

10 December 2010

Squats – great places to play as an unsigned band

Live Unsigned’s resident reviewer Oli Arditi will be contributing to the blog over the next few weeks taking a special look at squat scenes as a hub for some of the most interesting musicians and event organisers – an area of special interest to us at Live Unsigned. The first post in the series gives [...]

20 October 2010

How to use free music to grow your fanbase

One of the key things for bands in the early stages of their career is to develop an audience. Giving away some free music is a great way to connect with people and develop a relationship. For some bands giving away music that they have taken time and money to write and produce is a [...]