Everyone knows that everything has changed in the music industry for the artist. Aside from American Idol, there is no interest from companies to find new talent to support & invest in.
Gone is the artist development, along with the dream of the big record signing contract.
So obviously that leaves it all up to the artist to do the work. And yes, it is a ton of work. The next time you see an indie artist doing well, realize that they are working their butt off, & they’re good buisness managers.
So, I’ve been thinking lately… Since it’s so easy to get music in abundance today, how can I stand out and be heard?…
I’m starting to think that we need to feel less intitled, as artists.
We need to give more, if we expect to get more. Free downloads. Play at a new venue for free. Give out little free incentives, in order to get people to hear you & understand you. Of course, we still need to make a living, but that will come when the bigger numbers of people listen, like, & connect with us.
This is the year I start to GIVE more.
I hope yall will take.
any thoughts? What would you want from a new artist that would get your attention, and your interest?
This kid rocks. My little 10 year old buddy Brett, is one of my few guitar students, and I’ve always told him that I’d drive down from Long Beach just to teach him if he was my only student. Here he is playing my song “Throwing Stones”. And believe it or not… it was his idea to learn the tune.
I didn’t make him do it. But that is a good idea… hmmm…
Anybody want to take some guitar lessons?
As I look around these days, it always fascinates me when I see high school and middle school kids rockin their iPhones while sitting at Starbucks sipping their lattes.
Obviously the development of the smart phone is still relatively recent, but that kind of on-demand information has now become so important to our daily lives. I mean, it’s crazy to think that we couldn’t look up directions anytime we needed them right from our cell phones at one time. And that was only a few years back!
But the coffee thing trips me out too. When I was a kid in school, the whole coffee shop thing wasn’t nearly as popular as it is now. I see kids at Starbucks doing homework on laptops while drinking coffee. I didn’t start drinking coffee till years after I graduated, and only out of necessity because going to work in the morning, I felt like a zombie every day until 10:00am.
Maybe I was just a late bloomer when it comes to the coffee thing.
But man! I might have done well in school if I had a cup of joe everyday!
And if there were Facebook, Myspace & Twitter when I was in high school, I may have been even cooler!
Sooooo… I’ve been working very hard to finish my upcoming album. It is currently untitled, unfinished, (more than half way finished) and unbelievably exciting. Full band productions, loud guitars, quiet guitars, drums, basses, lots of keys, harmonies…
all my favorite flavors.
During the process, I’ve been trying to stick to the idea and vision of waiting for all the songs to be finished before I release anything, but I’m now thinking that I may put out an e.p. pretty soon here with 4-6 finished tracks from the upcoming album.
It’s been a while since I released any new music. In 2008 I released the e.p. “Now Is All”, and the SLEEPLESS ME e.p. “2″
