RE: Mindseye - Tides [Beat Battle League | S2:R6: Tropical Paradise]
Yeah, I never was able to get a distribution deal for the stuff I put on vinyl/CD's ... the joke is: "Million seller? well I have a million in my cellar" ;-) There's a whole class of entrepreneurial musicians like myself or perhaps unlike myself having a 'million cellar' but cannot laugh at themselves.
I'll tell you, from the first moment you hold a child of your own, at that point nothing else matters. The greatest joy is to hear them laugh and sing. The happiest moment of your life (as far as I can tell) is when they get out of diapers and develop a personality on their own before they go off to school. Deeply rewarding if you have a spouse that pulls her share of the burden. You learn a lot about how your spouse was raised when you have kids of your own. (my congratulations or warning or both to you in there somewhere).
Ultimately you'll still savor many moments, just not as self-centered as before. Somewhat strange re-adjusting back to having more time for self-guided interests afterwards ...
That does sound frustrating, to have so much work lying around but not enough people to pay attention to it. I guess with streaming services now dominating the market, there are some new ways to get your music to the people. Even though probably not so much in the physical form anymore.
Yeah having a child is a totally new adventure. Nothing can quite prepare you for what's to come, that's for sure! That's an interesting point you make, learning about your spouse in that sense, I never quite thought about that. The not being as self-centered can probably be a bit of a struggle in the sense of not having the time to do all that you might want to do for yourself (produce music..?), but then I'm sure it is all worth it in the end...
Yeah, basically, the old independent label business model was, press a minimum lot of 1000 discs, and you basically give away a few hundred to mostly college and public radio stations unless you have tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to spill in 'marketing' to get your disc in the rotation at a commercial station ... Besides radio stations, there were editor/reviewers at fanzines, booking agents, distributors, other industry 'influencers' ... In other words, a lot of cash (for an independent) and time just dumped down a blind alley.
Come to think of it I did get an independent distributor who specialized in no wave/edgy stuff, but that whole thing wasn't sustainable, obviously. Electronica was still kind of special, Jazz and progressive rock were already dying (audiences being dumbed-down for new wave commercial stuff) and rock was starting to get formulaic, the creative impetus was draining fast in the 1980's, like some dead language, it was 'buried' in the well-defined and narrow 'Classic Rock' bin.
So indeed, the streaming mp3 / music video way to publication is a lot better (especially with crypto/blockchain tech!!) for the musician than trying to sell 'units'. Little to nothing invested in the front end, and more direct control into, and results from promotional work (building an audience social media, these days...) So while industry executives are bemoaning the death of the industry, we independents should well focus on the unprecedented opportunities this new landscape offers... Coincidentally someone on waxidermy.com bbs reviewed my vinyl just recently so I sold 30 discs for the first time in thirty years! Can hardly give away my much higher quality mp3's, but just the latest vinyl fetish sells units! :-D
Oh yeah, becoming a Dad is an incredible experience... Taking in the pure love a child has for his/her parents is incomprehensible until it happens. Producing music is so demanding of one's time, and it gets so low priority, the day job and the whole existence, unless fully understanding that basically no progress could be made on one's music career, could become so stressing, making one neurotic!
Wow yeah, that does sound like an expensive way of doing things. But I suppose back then that was the only way to maybe get a foot in the door and get your music out there. So did you ever have any tracks/albums that were kind of catching on? And what kind of genre(s) were you mainly aiming for then?
Yeah I spend quite a bit of time promoting my tracks online and also doing the whole playlisting thing on Spotify etc, which I must say does seem to be going quite well at the moment. Still, money-wise my streaming income is very low compared to what I can potentially make by just releasing one track through DSound and/or DTube, so Steemit is a welcome addition for me for sure! It's awesome you managed to sell those vinyls though, congrats! Haha yeah it's totally hip again to own vinyls nowadays, I might have to consider putting some of my tracks on vinyl as well! Even though that of course is also a bit of an investment again...
Yeah, at the moment I'd say I would be lucky if I even get to release only a handful of tracks this year. That's fine though, being a parent is way too fulfilling to not spend most of my time on. And I might consider officially releasing some of my older tracks in the meantime because well...why not?? I suppose on the whole, I'm still adjusting life as a parent...and I'm sure I will be for some time (maybe the adjustment just never stops!). So I don't have high expectations when it comes to a music career. Still, it's great to have as a hobby...and hopefully I can convey my enthusiasm for making music to the little one!
Yeah, back then it seemed pretty limited, unless one was lucky to be 'on the scene', or shop their tape to the right label at the right time, and even then, it seemed those two routes would still have required you to have a strong local following ('business due diligence' was a part of the Artists & Repertoire division's job description since the birth of record labels) ... That's what's so cool about the present situation. Nowadays it doesn't matter where one lives, the scene is a virtual community online, like here, steemit!
As far as building a following, some things never change. To make a sizable income online one still needs a big audience. I recently saw someone claiming to be 'a pro' who really was just good at working his patreon donation youtube links on his two thousand marks, eh, fans I mean...
The only reason I have a soundcloud account was to download someone's work with whom I was collaborating. No point in it otherwise, as you describe. Dsound and Dtube (I just so happen to be on musicoin, same but different, a step towards 'portfolio diversification'), the blockchain is where the future lies, as far as I can tell. Those vinyls I sold literally were thirty years old, I still don't have any confidence that selling 'units' could yield any return on investment, other than digital streams and downloads .
Well if you can keep everyone happy including yourself with time for your music, that's a great spot to be in! You really can't ask for much more.
Exactly! Honestly, I don't think that at the moment I have any real kind of strong local following (except for people I know personally). But I do have listeners all over the globe, and it almost seems like the more people start paying attention to my tracks generally, the more local people start finding out about me as well. So it's almost the other way around nowadays, at least for me...
Yep, I know what you mean; I've also come across people/artists that simply manage to somehow get themselves on a few big playlists and get a large amount of plays, and then appear to have a serious fanbase. But usually their social media pages are suspiciously quiet... I guess there are lots different ways now in appearing 'successful', with people simply being able to buy their plays and followers. A strange world really...
I enjoyed SoundCloud back in the day, when I was able to upload unofficial remixes that I created for fun, without me getting warnings of my account being shut down because of copyright infringement. Now I barely use it anymore. Musicoin has potential, but I feel like at the moment I don't really get plays because people want to listen. It seems to be more people fishing for me giving them plays in return. So that puts me off quite a bit. Still, I guess similar stuff happens on Dsound/Dtube...hopefully things will improve in that sense.
Keeping everyone happy is the ultimate goal! Maybe I'll just sleep a bit less and have a few more hours in the day.. ;p
That local versus international thing is something to contemplate ... I'm thinking of doing more live stuff, taking advantage of living near LA while I still do, thinking of doing something like a digital busker, beatbox(?) with solos/live playing over top through a portable sound system, something in a crowded thoroughfare, more eyeballs that way, just to test these ideas we're ruminating here ... I'm fortunate enough to have a a real short url, om92.com to easily 'drive traffic' ...
Now that you mention big playlists, I've been critically examining 'sustainability' ... advertising seems to only work when the public is, first unaware, and second, has no alternatives, not really applicable to the music industry these days... In other words, I've seen a number of artists who at first had a 'pop' event, maybe paid goog adwords (?) then settled out back down to our scale audience within a year ... Major labels do spend 100's of thousands, if not millions in advertising (actually that's the cost of training their employees/contractors in the divisions that own commercial radio station airtime in these media conglomerates), and only sign a few acts who craft tunes especially designed per marketing research to appeal to the 'intellect' of those of IQ 100 (masters of mediocrity?)
I would say what you describe as your experience on musicoin is 'musicians playing to other musicians' (for now) so yeah, everyone playing no one 'listening' Let's face it, as musicians our peak experience is playing, not listening ...
So what you see there is the reflection of how all musicians network. It's unreasonable to think any given cat would give up his bag and offer a substantial amount of his time to follow yours... I would think the idea is to associate with like-minded cats approximately going in the same direction, so that if opportunity arises one gets to jam with each other. Over time history calls that 'a school', a genre... At least that's the way I see the natural sociology of it ...
I suppose we need to entice ALL musicians to get on the blockchain Dsound/Musicoin and DTube (YouTube when adsense starts to pay, maybe but, that's already a huge following for a musician to get that) ... Drive the listening audience to the blockchain for lack of other places to get new (or any?) music for free (the genie's been let out of the bottle, no one paying for music anymore, except for the one in ten thousand who feel obligated to support a 'starving' artist) ...
Those live playing ideas sound very interesting, could definitely be some potential in that especially if you can test those different ideas properly. I'm interested in doing more live stuff too, but I haven't thought the possible formula through at all really. Just seems like it can be a lot of fun, being in a live setting.
I can very much imagine that lots of artists experience these short 'pop' events you describe, yes. Also from appearing on one of the Spotify-curated playlists for a week or two, and then disappearing again. I guess that can be both encouraging and frustrating at the same time. Major labels scare me in general really, I'd like to stay as far away from them as possible. They're definitely not in it for the music...
I must say though, that yes as a musician playing might be the main objective, but for me personally listening is also very important. I mean, I have music playing throughout the day where possible, and I follow quite a few artists very closely. But yes, associating with like-minded musicians is vital as well, and I get a lot of fulfillment out of talking to these kind of people.
It'll be very interesting to see whether any 'big' artists will start appearing on the blockchain. Because once a few start, that's probably when the genie is totally out... Then yes, the streaming services may suddenly find themselves being collectively left behind. That would be the day! I wonder if it will happen...but the potential is there, that's for sure!
I imagine there are quite a few artists who have gone 'free agent' since their days on a major label or with major distribution. Or a few reconsidering a comeback, this Steemit would certainly give and get mutual benefit from these types. What I have noticed is, after the adpocolypse on Youtube, especially a lot of alt-new heavy personalities are coming to steemit, just to escape YouTube's censorship. This seems like how the turning point of the old way passing and the new rising, this flight to steemit. We're likely ahead of the rush, a good place to be.
Depending on what kind of work I'm doing, I often can't listen to music, takes too much concentration for me! ;-)