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-- If you're a new/unknown artist: Trent Reznor's advice...

If you're a new/unknown artist: Trent Reznor's advice...

This was something he went ahead and posted on the official nin forums (somewhere amongst all the psychotic drama that involves his presence over there), and I felt it concerned some themes and topics broad enough to warrant posting here (as opposed to the producers forum).

Something of a long read, but interesting insights nonetheless:

http://forum.nin.com/bb/read.php?30,767183

quote:

(disclaimer) This was written on a bumpy Euro-bus ride across the wilderness - may ramble a bit but I think the point gets across. TR I posted a message on Twitter yesterday stating I thought The Beastie Boys and TopSpin Media "got it right" regarding how to sell music in this day and age. Here's a link to their store: illcommunication.beastieboys.com Shortly thereafter, I got some responses from people stating the usual "yeah, if you're an established artist - what if you're just trying to get heard?" argument. In an interview I did recently this topic came up and I'll reiterate what I said here. If you are an unknown / lesser-known artist trying to get noticed / established: * Establish your goals. What are you trying to do / accomplish? If you are looking for mainstream super-success (think Lady GaGa, Coldplay, U2, Justin Timberlake) - your best bet in my opinion is to look at major labels and prepare to share all revenue streams / creative control / music ownership. To reach that kind of critical mass these days your need old-school marketing muscle and that only comes from major labels. Good luck with that one. If you're forging your own path, read on. * Forget thinking you are going to make any real money from record sales. Make your record cheaply (but great) and GIVE IT AWAY. As an artist you want as many people as possible to hear your work. Word of mouth is the only true marketing that matters. To clarify: Parter with a TopSpin or similar or build your own website, but what you NEED to do is this - give your music away as high-quality DRM-free MP3s. Collect people's email info in exchange (which means having the infrastructure to do so) and start building your database of potential customers. Then, offer a variety of premium packages for sale and make them limited editions / scarce goods. Base the price and amount available on what you think you can sell. Make the packages special - make them by hand, sign them, make them unique, make them something YOU would want to have as a fan. Make a premium download available that includes high-resolution versions (for sale at a reasonable price) and include the download as something immediately available with any physical purchase. Sell T-shirts. Sell buttons, posters... whatever. Don't have a TopSpin as a partner? Use Amazon for your transactions and fulfillment. www.amazon.com Use TuneCore to get your music everywhere tunecore.com Have a realistic idea of what you can expect to make from these and budget your recording appropriately. The point is this: music IS free whether you want to believe that or not. Every piece of music you can think of is available free right now a click away. This is a fact - it sucks as the musician BUT THAT'S THE WAY IT IS (for now). So... have the public get what they want FROM YOU instead of a torrent site and garner good will in the process (plus build your database). The Beastie Boys' site offers everything you could possibly want in the formats you would want it in - available right from them, right now. The prices they are charging are more than you should be charging - they are established and you are not. Think this through. The database you are amassing should not be abused, but used to inform people that are interested in what you do when you have something going on - like a few shows, or a tour, or a new record, or a webcast, etc. Have your MySpace page, but get a site outside MySpace - it's dying and reads as cheap / generic. Remove all Flash from your website. Remove all stupid intros and load-times. MAKE IT SIMPLE TO NAVIGATE AND EASY TO FIND AND HEAR MUSIC (but don't autoplay). Constantly update your site with content - pictures, blogs, whatever. Give people a reason to return to your site all the time. Put up a bulletin board and start a community. Engage your fans (with caution!) Make cheap videos. Film yourself talking. Play shows. Make interesting things. Get a Twitter account. Be interesting. Be real. Submit your music to blogs that may be interested. NEVER CHASE TRENDS. Utilize the multitude of tools available to you for very little cost of any - Flickr / YouTube / Vimeo / SoundCloud / Twitter etc. If you don't know anything about new media or how people communicate these days, none of this will work. The role of an independent musician these days requires a mastery of first hand use of these tools. If you don't get it - find someone who does to do this for you. If you are waiting around for the phone to ring or that A & R guy to show up at your gig - good luck, you're going to be waiting a while. Hope this helps, and I'll scour responses for intelligent comments I can respond to. TR TopSpin Media info: topspinmedia.com

theres a video of him talking about this somewhere

Nail, head, etc.

quote:

Have your MySpace page, but get a site outside MySpace - it's dying and reads as cheap / generic. Remove all Flash from your website. Remove all stupid intros and load-times. MAKE IT SIMPLE TO NAVIGATE AND EASY TO FIND AND HEAR MUSIC (but don't autoplay).

It amazes me that so many apparently don't understand this.

He speaks the truth.

Selling music when you're unknown is kinda daft in current market conditions. You have to get your name out there first.

quote:

Originally posted by SMC It amazes me that so many apparently don't understand this. He speaks the truth.

I know. These days I automatically ignore anyone who only offers a MyShit link when promoting themselves.

I think this poses some interesting questions if you think about how these suggestions relate to dance music.

If your bread-and-butter is dance/club/festival music, the largest target demographic for you is probably DJs. They are your initial purchaser and, then, promoter.

An EDM DJ will look in different places for music than a typical music consumer (e.g. Beatport over iTunes, decks.de over Best Buy, etc.), so getting your music heard works a little differently in the dance music world. And, with electronic music being such a "DIY" culture (especially these days), I'd be willing to bet that there are a lot of DJs that will hardly give unestablished artists giving away free tracks much of a chance.

I can admit to sometimes being guilty of this myself. You find a good couple of artists or labels, and they act as an initial "quality" or "style" filter for you... providing a base for you to start your search for tunes. I try not to get stuck in this way of thinking, but it's really easy to do.

My thinking is, you almost have to sell tracks to DJs, rather than give them to them.

Thoughts?

i think the biggest promo for any EDM producer is to have DJs that have established themselves in that particular genre play your track. if you got a deep house track being hammered by Ben Watt, Luke Fair @ every gig, it's bound to get noticed and in turn sell. (Armin & Paul in case of trance, but you get my point).

i think the recognition happens before the selling and not vice versa... unless i'm reading your (david.michael's) post wrong.

quote:

Originally posted by denys envy i think the biggest promo for any EDM producer is to have DJs that have established themselves in that particular genre play your track. if you got a deep house track being hammered by Ben Watt, Luke Fair @ every gig, it's bound to get noticed and in turn sell. (Armin & Paul in case of trance, but you get my point). i think the recognition happens before the selling and not vice versa... unless i'm reading you (david.michael's) post wrong.

Nope, you read it right... and agreed 100%. I was just pointing out that I feel it's a little different in "our" case than a typical singer/songwriter/band.

quote:

Originally posted by david.michael Nope, you read it right... and agreed 100%. I was just pointing out that I feel it's a little different in "our" case than a typical singer/songwriter/band.

at the same time i don't think much, if any money, is made from selling tracks (beatport or otherwise). i think there's more to be made in gigs and festivals, etc. ... which is probably not that much anyway.

i guarantee, apart from the top 2% of DJs - maybe 200 or so (and even that is probably a generous estimate) - most never make a complete living off of it and do some shit on the side.

i think recently even Max Graham started his own part/accessories and refurbished macbook Apple Store.

so yes, it's way different in "our" case.

edit: the fun comes from being able to travel the world and play music for peeps. hear your tracks being played by other DJs in your genre, creatively collaborate with other producers. meet new people... etc. etc.

those peeps that think they can make a fortune by being a great producer and dj are completely ignorant to the facts.

quote:

Originally posted by david.michael I think this poses some interesting questions if you think about how these suggestions relate to dance music. If your bread-and-butter is dance/club/festival music, the largest target demographic for you is probably DJs. They are your initial purchaser and, then, promoter. An EDM DJ will look in different places for music than a typical music consumer (e.g. Beatport over iTunes, decks.de over Best Buy, etc.), so getting your music heard works a little differently in the dance music world. And, with electronic music being such a "DIY" culture (especially these days), I'd be willing to bet that there are a lot of DJs that will hardly give unestablished artists giving away free tracks much of a chance. I can admit to sometimes being guilty of this myself. You find a good couple of artists or labels, and they act as an initial "quality" or "style" filter for you... providing a base for you to start your search for tunes. I try not to get stuck in this way of thinking, but it's really easy to do. My thinking is, you almost have to sell tracks to DJs, rather than give them to them. Thoughts?

that all really depends on what your ultimate goal is. if you just want to make money selling your productions, then maybe...but you'll soon find out even #1 tunes on beatport are only selling about 1000 downloads. add the cost of a A or B list remixer in the package and you've made exactly no money. most DJs still get all their music via promo pools, rapidshare/zippyshare links, and iChat convos. These DJs are also not going to be buying tickets to your show, much less dancing at it. Success in EDM is all about creating a fanbase. Where are the fans? Youtube. Think about it, whenever you hear about a new band/producer/song or want to hear a song etc, where do you usually go or what do you usually get sent a link to? Youtube. Youtube is on-demand MTV for our generation. People who DJ MIGHT be more likely to go check something like Beatport, but the size of this market is quite small in comparison.

i could go on about this for days but haven't had my coffee yet.

and yes Trent Reznor is the man.

quote:

Originally posted by Blake_Jarrell most DJs still get all their music via promo pools, rapidshare/zippyshare links, and iChat convos. These DJs are also not going to be buying tickets to your show, much less dancing at it.

Point taken.

not sure if you need to give it away for free, you could probably sell it for 99 cents and do fine. i think people associate a price with quality, to a degree. make them think, 'wow, this is a steal', but not a literal steal.

omar s does this for example, you can buy brand new vinyl for like 7 bucks straight from him.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec omar s does this for example, you can buy brand new vinyl for like 7 bucks straight from him.

That's a pretty cool way to do it.

quote:

Originally posted by david.michael And, with electronic music being such a "DIY" culture (especially these days), I'd be willing to bet that there are a lot of DJs that will hardly give unestablished artists giving away free tracks much of a chance. I can admit to sometimes being guilty of this myself. You find a good couple of artists or labels, and they act as an initial "quality" or "style" filter for you... providing a base for you to start your search for tunes. I try not to get stuck in this way of thinking, but it's really easy to do.

Indeed, there is so much EDM out there that many listeners are apprehensive of free music. What I've tried to do to remedy this is filter the content that I post to my site. The idea is to foster trust amongst DJs by curating the releases and offering lossless-quality audio files for immediate download. I think it's been working fairly well; I know a lot of DJs that play out material from Ektoplazm.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec not sure if you need to give it away for free, you could probably sell it for 99 cents and do fine. i think people associate a price with quality, to a degree. make them think, 'wow, this is a steal', but not a literal steal.

Sure, but any barrier to entry will drastically reduce uptake and exposure. This is literally the difference between 100 and 10,000 downloads. The open question is whether those 100 downloaders might trump 10,000 other downloaders in terms of social status within the scene or something... but I don't think so. I think a lot of new producers would like to be heard.

It might be different in the mainstream trance scene, mind you. I just stick to my side of things and do it as well as I can.

Re: If you're a new/unknown artist: Trent Reznor's advice...

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Paradox Lost


Topspin? Tunecore? Amazon? How many ad's are there in that article? , I have come to realise that i probably will only make music for myself and if someone else likes it then its a bonus.
And i see lots of questions.Such as...

Why a label? , im sick of seeing ad's over the net saying check out this summers hottest act , and the short demo just turns out to be some sidechained generic rubbish, supported by god knows who.Why cant i sell it myself.

Maybe the EDM market is bloated ,, maybe im not marketed in a good way?

I put stuff on youtube , ive been a member since 2008 , and most of my video's havent gone past 200 views yet.

MyShit is a waste of space.

Why is autotuned rubbish like kanye west lapped up like free money , when really its a bag of shite.
------
But there is a pattern , i see anyways.

All the pop artists are on the radio , TV , youtube and whatever other media interface .And through out the summer are in nearly every major outdoor event there is.

All the succesfull DJ's with succesfull tunes are on heavy tours , playing in germany one night then the USA the next then back to france the night after.

These artists are pushed and pushed and pushed.
And i think to myself that if some people just think they can sit there and make tunes whilst putting them on god knows how many websites and such download sites with whatever adverts.
-----
Look back at the old days , bands travelling in a beaten up vans on minimal costs playing gigs , just to get heard.

So my personal goal is once ive got this production stuff down to a tee , then ill figure out a way to get out there thru DJ'ing.

Thats my 2 cents/coins/pence anyways.

quote:

Originally posted by basilisk The open question is whether those 100 downloaders might trump 10,000 other downloaders in terms of social status within the scene or something... but I don't think so. I think a lot of new producers would like to be heard.

whereas, i think actually those 100 matter much more, because the other 9.900 will forget about you in a week


im sure the truth is somewhere in between

I've noticed that free music has a longer shelf life purely by being free. Not everyone is going to buy a year-old CD but plenty of people would download such a thing given the extremely low barrier to entry. I also track all official Ektoplazm releases on last.fm to investigate retention (or, plainly, whether people continue to listen to the music over time) and it's been surprisingly solid. This kind of discussion needs metrics... which are sadly unavailable in most instances.

Some days I wonder if my little site transfers more psytrance than Beatport.

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