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1.  Be open to fortuitous error. More often than not, the really big meeting that may have instigated your convention attendance won’t even be where your future lies.  It will be the person you bump into by the escalator or who strikes up a conversation after spilling beer on your shoes at a gig that can change your life and help your career.  You are surrounded by talented people with shared interests, don’t presume anything about anyone and be OPEN.

2.  Have a business card. It may seem old school, but after a good conversation, being able to hand a simple, tangible artifact representing yourself is helpful to people.  Make sure it looks good and that you like it.

3.  Don’t eat alone. You are surrounded by so many people with common interests and goals.   The time for quiet reflection is  when you get home.  Right now, dive into the stream of humanity.  Make yourself known (nicely), and learn about people.

4.  Pace yourself (especially drinking.)  ‘Nuff said.

5.  Don’t be shy. Insecure?  So is everyone else in music.  Fuhgeddaboutit.  This is your opportunity to make an impression.  When you meet someone, find something that interests you about them, ask questions ,and learn about what they do.   You’d be surprised how often their pursuits might benefit from your talents or vice versa (see Point 1.)    You don’t want to miss out.

6.  Follow-up. Within a week after the convention, when  you have had a good conversation with someone and exchanged information, follow up with a short e-mail reminding them of where you met (remember, like yourself, they have probably met more people than they can specifically remember and things start to blur.)  Let them know you enjoyed meeting them and ask them to keep you in mind if they need assistance with anything.   Put your contact info by your signature so they can easily cut and paste it into their own contact list.

7.  Learning one ‘big idea’ per day is a very successful convention. If you are in a meeting where you are learning something important to you, stay until you’re satisfied.   You seldom get anywhere by rushing around and cramming too many meetings into an hour.  You won’t absorb it all.

8.  You never learn by talking. Listen.

9.  That said, talk when you have something to say and then allow the other person to respond.  If you find yourself talking for more than 30 seconds at a stretch, you aren’t talking, you’re pitching/self-promoting.  The pitch can come at a later date.   Right now, engage and enjoy.

10.  Make sure your digital identifier website/myspace/blog is functioning well before the convention. When you meet people and give them your card assume they will check out your site to learn more about you and your work.  Remember, your site is representing you.   Is it readily understandable for the user?  Do all your song links work?  Make sure you have tested everything.

11.  Hit the Salt Lick.    Great barbecue and vibe about 30 miles outside Austin.  Yum.

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Metal giant Motorhead’s singer/bass player/road warrior was once asked about his kind offstage demeanor by a surprised journalist.   He responded that while growing up,  his mother often told him, “Good manners are free.  Everyone should have them.”

You will run across all different kinds of people in a variety of potentially stressful situations throughout your career.  There is no shortage of attitudes in the music business.  Being a decent person to deal with will help you on your way up and build lifelong fans along the way.  Much of this is common sense, for example, by being nice to the person helping you during your soundcheck you are far more likely to get an attentive, better mix.  Treat them poorly and you may suddenly lose a monitor.

In the unstable world of pop culture, good relationships can cushion career falls on the way down too.

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You’ve been working for years creating music, writing songs, playing your music live, hoping to reach people in some way with what you’re doing.   Finally, someone has expressed interest in your music.  In fact, they want to “work” with you.

This can be extremely flattering and there is no reason not to feel good about generating interest from people.  Enjoy the moment and be gracious, but be non-committal. Someone who truly wants to get involved with your career over the long haul won’t pressure you.  They should respect your need to take time and think things over.

Avoid the temptation to work with someone just because you feel it legitimizes you in a “hey I just signed with a manager/record label/agent!” sort of way. Whether it is a potential agent, record label, manager, lawyer, producer, etc.,  determine if the interested party can serve a genuine purpose in building your career.  Do you need them?  What do they bring to the table? If it is career expertise, then find out whom they have worked with.   If it’s money, then find out how they envision investing it in your career. Perhaps the amount they want to spend is encouraging but they are asking for control over your decision-making. Maybe the amount isn’t enough to be helpful.   Always ascertain what is expected in return before you agree to anything.  And remember, in business nothing is free.

These days, provided you have a strong work ethic and a fair degree of discipline, you don’t need support staff, business people etc. in order to get your career started.  That can come later if and when you need help.  By the way, you will know when you need the help – there will simply be too much for you and your band to do all by yourselves.  In short, if you have to ask yourself whether you need a manager/agent/label/lawyer etc. or not, you aren’t yet at the point where you need them.

The longer you build your own career yourself, the more you will understand the business aspects of getting your music heard.   Ultimately this will lead to smarter deal making when the right time comes because you will truly understand what the other party can (or cannot) do for you.

Knowledge is power, especially in the music business.  Learn all you can.

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Know yourself and be honest about what you want. Nick Hornby, British novelist and author of High Fidelity, a must-have novel for the obsessive music junkie, recently recounted to Rolling Stone’s Jonathan Ringen (RS October 29, 2009 p 17) his conversation with Bruce Springsteen about stagecraft. “Bruce said one incredibly simple thing: ‘It just helps to remember that every part of the show is a show.’”

Hornby went on to point out that regarding would-be novelists, “Anyone who says they’re writing for themselves is full of shit. That’s something you hear writers say a lot. I always wonder why their drafts happen to be 90,000 words long, because that’s a really strange, random length for a book, but it happens to be the length of most books…the act of writing a novel already knows and demands a readership. To forget about your readers is a mistake.”

By changing a few words, like ‘writer’ to ‘musician’, ‘book’ to ‘album’, ‘90,000 words’ to ‘45 minutes’, and ‘readers’ to ‘listeners’, you have excellent advice for your music career. You do want your music to be heard. And you should. Being honest about your desire to reach people with your music can help you deal with the public in an authentic way. It invites a real relationship with your fans, and that communication will, in turn, help you determine how to best present your music.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Mies_van_der_Rohe

Mies is widely credited with the saying, “God is in the Details.”  This notion is as applicable to your music as it is to architecture.  Paying attention to every detail can move a listener from “Hey, that song is pretty good” to “This music is incredible”— so compelling, in fact, that they are willing to spend their hard-earned cash to have your music as a part of their life.

Remember, like it or not, your music exists in a competitive environment. There are plenty of messages competing for your potential audiences’ time, attention, and money, whether it’s music from other bands, video games, movies, phone apps, etc.

So when you release your music into the world, make sure you are satisfied with every detail:  The arrangement, the recording, the mix, the mastering, the packaging, the artwork, the typeface on the artwork, the band photo, the words on your press release.  It all matters.

Eight million bands are currently on on www.myspace.com.  Last year, 105,000 full- length recordings were released in the US alone!  By ensuring that every aspect of your music and presentation is great—not merely good—you improve your chances of moving up the mountain of sound, getting your music noticed, and building a career.

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You create music, or at least you want to. It has been your passion for as long as you can remember and you can’t imagine life without it. Beyond your music’s immeasurable personal value, do you care how others respond? If so, is it possible for you to make a living from your music or at minimum generate some income?

You likely have a better chance of generating income from your musical creativity now more than ever. While much has been made of the collapse of the traditional music industry due to the digital distribution revolution, less has been said about the tremendous opportunities provided musicians and other artists by technological advances. Now you can record, mix, and master quality recordings for much less cost than a decade ago, and often using less workspace in your home or apartment than a small closet.  If you want to go from music as hobby (“I do what I do because that’s what I do and public response is irrelevant.”) to music as livelihood (“I do what I do and I’d like to make a living at it.”), start thinking about where your creative output – your music – exists relative to public interest.

For your music, you can save time, money, and frustration by being mindful of three things:

1. What is Your Music? Step outside your art and envision how others may perceive it. Ask the opinion of both people you respect and some that you don’t know well. Their perceptions may be surprising.
2. What is the Public Taste for Music? Be aware of the music that is around you beyond your own ‘comfort zone’ of taste. What are your fellow human beings responding to? Remember, you aren’t researching this to change how you create, rather you want to get a sense of whether your creativity has a potential audience.
3. How big is the Overlap of Your Music and Public Taste?

Perhaps you worry that the very act of asking yourself how your music is perceived may adversely affect your creativity and turn your unique vision into a pandering swirl of sonic mush. Eliminate this concern if it exists by considering these issues after you have created a song.  By applying such analysis with finished, or nearly finished, songs in this way you can protect your creative process.

Take a pen and paper and make a simple visual for yourself. Your estimate of the public’s taste will be a rough guess of course, but that’s fine. What is important now is the thought process.

A.     POPULAR MUSIC

The above image shows a large overlap that suggests broader  or mainstream potential for your music. If your hunch is correct you could have broad appeal and the potential income that goes with it. Keep in mind though that reaching a lot of people with your music can ultimately take a large investment of  time and money.  Still, there are ways to make this work.  We’ll address this in future postings.

B.     GENRE-SPECIFIC MUSIC

Image B show a smaller overlap representing a more genre specific or niche-oriented type of music. This smaller overlap area suggests perhaps lower income potential but you also probably won’t have a massive marketing expenditure either. You may be able to sustain a profitable career.

C.     OBSCURE MUSIC

Here we see minimal overlap. It is going to be tough to make a living doing this unless public trends change.  Still, you may be able to get some income by creatively (inexpensively) reaching those out in the world who identify with your music.  There  just may not be a big total pool of potential fans to draw from.  Ultimately,  maybe this shouldn’t matter anyway. The beauty and self-affirmation in creativity and expression for its own sake remains and you may be happier and more financially secure reaching 200 real fans versus spending too much money oversharing your music with people that won’t get it anyway. Enjoy and create!  Just don’t deplete your savings counting on monetary reward from your music.

Of possible interest: “For the Love of it: Amateurism and It’s Rivals”

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