It seems to be a general thing with me and blogs. I start, do a couple of posts, wonder why folk would be interested in what I have to say then fizzle out. However, responding to the gentle encouragement of a few folk to just get on with it I thought I'd try again and start with a bit of a general post to see how the integration between my Wordpress Blog and Hive plays out. :)
I've been thinking a lot recently about how I release, and and mulling over doing something a bit more substantial than toeing the Spotify line and chucking single tracks out as often as I can get them ready. I think that's served me well over the last couple of years, as there's well over 50 gribblytunes out in the wild (I know! How'd that happen?) but I think I'd like to move towards more considered releases.
I feel good about where I am - I have a decent body of work out there. I've made some good online chums, and also getting some good feedback from folk I respect. I'm getting involved in music collaborations and generally being able to be creative and having a good time as I do.
But I think I want to step up. I feel like I have a decent foundation under me - certainly enough to ask 'What's next?"
So I thought that's be a good hook to get me blogging. From the point where I am now, how shall I get to where I want to be? Where is that? Where does Spotify fit in? Does it? What about Bandcamp, Emanate, Audius?
What about marketing, promo, PR? What can an indie artist like me, with a full time job and some time in the evenings & weekends achieve?
And how much will it cost? Could I actually get a return on my 'investment'?
I need a plan.
It's going to be fun sussing one out...and I'll see if I can keep up a bit of an occasional diary with what I am doing and my random thoughts and wibbling along the way...
One idea may be limited pressings of your CD's. You take say 13 songs of your best sellers / listens, you cut/make 100 MP3 Cd's (you can either do this yourself or find a small company that does such things), I used to make cd's to listen to in my car on my daily commute, I had a program that I used to make them and it included a cd cover print with option I think it was called lightscribe and would also write on the cd's.
You number them sign them and sell them on the NFT site, if it is allowed. Of course you will have to mail the physical copies. You make a Hive post, a blog post in your other places, and of course you provide links to the songs.
You could get three post done for it. A pre-launch post all about the upcoming release of the very first NFT CD Limited Sale. You show what the cover will look like, what the CD will look like. You let people know what the minimum bid/price will be, (enough to cover making/handling/shipping of) the CD say all in all it cost you 2 dollars to make the CD, then 2 dollars to ship the CD, and based on selling price of CD's maybe a minimum price of 15 USD equivalent in HIVE.
To make it more special and limited you can also include for 30 Hive more you will add a personal note of thanks for the purchase thing or a message they would like from you, limited to 15 words or so.
If/when that sells out you could do a non-limited edition sale with the same CD, but only 12 songs, which would be very important to highlight in your pre-release Hive Blog.
The music industry is good at re-releasing special limited editions, and with just re-releasing songs from the past. This would be one method to not only advertise, but to offer something, to drive people to your spotify place and the other web locations you use. Introducing them to your music, and possible sells.
Thanks for taking the time to write such a comprehensive comment. Appreciate it. 👍
I think the important point you touch on here is to offer something special for listeners. I have been doing that for a while - I do hand-made limited edition CDs of the EPs I release, and will continue to do that. You can see the sort of thing I do here --> https://gribbles.bandcamp.com/merch
I also dabbled in setting up a store that allowed folk to buy stuff using crypto though @hivepay-io. It worked (folk could buy my stuff for Hive - pretty cool!), but I need to build a better store and all that - it's just my proof of concept thing at the moment.
I'm not a huge fan of NTFs. I see their use in things like the hive games I play like Rising Star, but the whole 'value through scarcity' thing just crosses over into snake-oil for me. I understand that as a tool, a mechanism, they may be useful in certain types if licensing in music - but the whole "I've just created a jpg, and I'm only going to mint 5 on the blockchain, so they're worth $100 each" does not sit well with me. 🤷♂
So I think the answer is a mix of what you say, and some other stuff as well - but the key point for me is bringing all together with a focussed approach. Up to now I've just sort of done stuff as & when with little thought to a longer term (maybe more effective) plan. That's what I've started to think about, really. I'll post more on that as I get it together 😉
oh man! good luck! that's my biggest struggle... making a plan. I'm just all over the place. I should have called myself organizedfeathers and maybe I'd be somewhere with my 20 years of music hahahaa.
!WINE
I hear ya!
I dunno - I'll always be amateur. Hobbyist, even. I won't be giving up the day job.
But I'm getting enough good feedback to think that I could maybe do more. And that's what I need to figure out first. What is more? What would be a reasonable thing to aim for? That might be my next diary post...
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we got a plan for all this bro... could talk it through!
...and we did 😁
Well, started to anyway. Appreciated the chat - it'll be interesting to see how it all pans out... 👍
sweet
you do it boy!
I may not be the best to advise, but it all starts with what you like to achieve. I've encountered many musicians and producers who really like to play at some event, or in some club. In general, most I encountered wanted just that. The creation of music is part of that wish. You didn't mention you want to perform, so you may not want that at all. Just using Spotify to 'sell' music, requires millions of streams to get some real revenue. Bandcamp allows you to sell your music giving you more money. But in the end, you need to increase your audience. This could be through advertising in social media channels. Start a TikTok channel (in case music fits the audience at TikTok), or YT channel to promote or grow your audience so you can monetise through in-video ads. Or in case you like to perform somewhere, you can hand out, or sell CDs with your music. The latter requires a plan to get to gigs.
All in all, I think the plan starts not with your limitations, but what you want to achieve in let's say 5 years from now or 10 years. If time and money was not a topic, what would you like to do with your musical talents? The answer to that question should be the goal to set and work backwards to how to get there.
Indeed. I'm not going from a standing start here - been releasing stuff for a couple of years and take part in a couple of (brilliant) music communities.
Whenever I've discussed this before, and we've discussed it a lot, that's exactly where I start - what does success mean to you? Without knowing that, how can you plan to get anywhere? And the answer will be different for most.
So I've been happy to release the odd track or EP as I've been going along, but more recently - mainly as I've been getting good feedback from artists I respect and opportunities to work with folk like that as well - I thought, could I take things further? Whatever that means. ;-)
I think there's loads of folk like me - amateur/hobbyist musicians of a certain age. Not necessarily interested in making it big anymore (again, whatever that means) - but my observation is that many of the tools and services are one size fits all.
I thought it'd be interesting to scribble some notes and thoughts down as I develop my thinking as I go along. It'll not be some earth shattering insights, I'm sure - plenty have gone before me.
We'll see - it's likely to be quite sporadic, as music is squeezed in when I get time. And the main point for me is to make music - so that first, planning next, blogging after that. It'll be interesting to see how it pans out...
Ok ok :) Sounds you are already at a good place. Always nice to get some good feedback from those you respect and this indeed may lead to 'wanting' more. Regarding becoming big: There is a difference between becoming big, or for instance, a wish to perform from time to time. In the electonic music business I came across quite a few DJs/artists who don't think big, but are comfortable when they can play at a friends party. Private, but also public events. Maybe playing in a side room, or being the opening DJ, or closing when this is way into the next day and no big names are required anymore for the last die hards on the dance floor. In any kinda of music you have this. Anyways. Sticking to music creation is also good. You can think of ghost producing for others. More and more artists, use ghost producers for their music. Doing this for the right artists, can make considerable money. At the same time, it'll also become a job with deadlines and all :) Another way of monetising could be to teach those who want to be taught and oay for it. A 'job' that is maybe lesser a job than ghost producing, with more freedom and felxibility therefore easier to fit into your schedule. The whole think with Spotify is, one needs to get the tracks onto popular playlist to get some solid stream counts. Looking forward what you're gonna scribble down about the paths you are exploring.
Interesting...deffo some food for thought there 👍