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Re: [ARSCLIST] "record" sales in the 21st century--was: interesting!



Agreed. The most successful (and satisfying) business model I see for bands is: play out a lot, sell your CDs (recorded and pressed by you) and promote your web site at the gig.

I do sound for a band whose record company once did not bring any CDs *for their CD release party*.

Marcos

Miss Q wrote:
Steven,
I think you are very much underestimating the use of MySpace as a tool for
musicians. I would take Roger's advice and immediately set up a site there
and YouTube videos if you can. As far as getting people to visit your
website or hear your music, there are many books on website design that
cover that kind of marketing. I am using the Visual Quickstart Guide to
HTML, XHTML & CSS 6th Edition by Elizabeth Castro for a class at Drexel, and
it covers how to add keywords and get your site indexed for search engines
as well as other legitimate promotional techniques.


This also brings up another interesting aspect of MySpace, which is they are
working on making it possible for artists to sell their music via the site.
Right now that seems to mostly be in trying to enforce copyright laws so
people aren't illegaly sharing music, but I think this is probably the first
step they need to take to become a viable online music marketplace.


Also, networking with like minded musicians and fans, via the internet or
your local music community, is priceless. I have worked with and befriended
many indie musicans over the years, and nothing is a better gauge of
"success" (a very relative term) than the amount of time they spend touring,
playing live, and keeping in contact with their fans. This has happened
regardless of the support of a record label or management, although those
organizations can help someone at a certain point in their career, but
they're hardly necissary to get started.


Courtney

On 2/8/07, Steven C. Barr(x) <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

see end...
----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard L. Hess" <arclists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> At 06:59 PM 2007-02-08, Steven C. Barr(x) wrote:
> >However, a future without record companies (or whatever their digital
> >equivalent will turn out to be) also seems somewhat impractical. I can
> >promote my two CD's on my web site (one of a hundred million or so
> >sites)...but that requires the potential customers to have a reason
> >to visit the site. Since the CD's are in a niche genre (blues)...what
> >I would need to do is to mail out "promo" copies to every station
> >(electromagnetic-wave radio AND net-based "radio") in hopes it will
> >be heard and folks will like the music enough to do a web search for
> >a source (or that the deejays will tell their listeners where
> >to look...?!). As it is, the now-vanishing model has "record companies"
> >mailing out promo copies...and, through a web of distributors, making
> >their "product" available in both "record stores" and
general-merchandise
> >stores/chains that sell CD's. Note that as a relative unknown, I can't
> >access this distribution web...!
> Hello, Steven,
> First of all, CD distribution may also be a thing of the past. People
> would download the tracks they want from your Web site and pay for them.
>
> What I see happening is that music again become more local and
> participatory. Fortunately, we live in the Greater Toronto Area where
> there is no lack of wonderful musicians. Are you going to Winterfolk?
> I'm not as I have a very local thing with good classical music
> happening at our local church here in Aurora.
>
> I know several really good folksingers within an hour's drive of me.
>
> While we can reach out via the Web, and we can send out promo copies,
> word of mouth and the friendly mix tape (one of the things DRM
> suppresses) go a long way to getting the word out. I can't recall
> many albums I have bought just by browsing -- and few of the browsing
> ones really satisfied.
>
> Here's an example of someone I just found while working on
> Marie-Lynn's benefit ( www.marielynnhammond.com ) which was a
> success: http://myspace.com/mariannegirard1 and she lives fifteen
> minutes from me. Due to the benefit, I got on several really good
> musician's mailing lists--in a genre that is my niche (blues isn't,
> sorry, but I don't blame you if folk isn't yours).
>
> Cheers,
>
> Richard
>
Well, I'm not going to much of anything until the beginning of next
month, when I start getting my pension cheques! I did see the benefit
event mentioned on one or two of the lists to which I subscribe.


I enjoy a lot of "folk" music...my problem is that I use that term
in its "musicological" sense, which tends to confuse most 21st
century e-mail contacts! What I do is to differ between "big-F
Folk" (meaning "folk music" in its original sense, as traditional
oral-tradition music that is part of a specified culture...) and
"small-f folk" which is the sort of acoustically-accompanied
(often self-accompanied) music that one finds in the "FOLK" bins
at music/record stores...). However, I do enjoy listening to
both forms (in most cases, anyway).

What I'm hoping to do is to take some of my coming income and get
a full-size web site...where I can put some of my work in .MP3 form.
My previous site only allowed me 5MB of content...or maybe one
song...?

But, the problem still is: once I get an adequate web site, how
do I get folks to visit thereupon? There are gazillions of web
sites...and "Googling" "blues" results in a mere 202 million
"hits!"

Next question...what happens to radio (at least musical radio)?!
There are ways in which virtually anyone can create net-based
(thus "virtual") radio stations (that term generates a mere
13 million...!)...

So, I have a sort of "catch-22" situation...folks aren't going to
buy (or even steal" my music until/unless they've heard of me...
and they won't hear of me unless/until they discover my music!

Steven C. Barr






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