As winter turned to spring I began to realize how perfect this exercise is for the indie musician. We’re bombarded every day with new tools, new platforms, new “best” practices. new opportunities and new challenges. “My 3 Words” is a great way to make sense of it all, providing a means to organize, prioritize, and focus. So, without further adieu, my 3 words for 2010 continue to be..,

Content. Network. Equity.

Content: As a musician, and the primary marketer of my band’s endeavors, content is obviously pretty important. While we did release a new EP this spring, there’s so much more that can be done. Given the “arcade” theme of the new EP, we’re busy creating 8-bit, video-game style versions of all 6 songs on the record (here’s the first), and aiming to develop simple “side-scroller”games to match. One of the artists I work with, Kurt Von Stetten, is regularly blogging demos and drawings. We also shot a video this past fall. Baby steps for sure, but content is king, and grander (and more experiential) ideas are on the horizon.

Network: All artists need to focus on the different facets of their network: nurturing fans, building connections with like-minded artists, cultivating relationships with tastemakers, and growing a distribution presence are all vital. There’s an in-person and online component to each, and you must be genuine. Having “network” as one of my 3 words serves as a constant reminder that the work starts long before, and continues long after, songs are written and recorded. It also reminds me that we should to seek to give as much as a we might receive (for instance, we often promote other bands via our social media efforts).

Equity: With apologies for the manufacturing metaphor: if content is the “input,” and network is the “machine,” then equity, ideally, is the “output.” As above, equity comes in different flavors. On one hand, making a few dollars back from all the hard work is nice. And indie artists should set basic monetary goals to gauge the resonance of their content and the effectiveness of their network. On the softer side, yet perhaps even more important, are notions of general awareness or (perhaps?) “band equity.” When talking to booking agents around Boston, do I need to constantly explain who we are? Do I need to bug DJs to give our CD a try, or do they give it a spin on their own?  Equity helps conversations start at square two rather than square zero. This type of equity matters, and will come long before the coins.

So there you have it, my 3 words for 2010. We’re underway creating new and different content and have a lot of network building to do. If we do it right, we’ll hopefully notice an uptick in equity by the end of year. We have a ways to go, as do many indie artists, but having 3 simple words to guide us makes it all a little less daunting.

What are your 3 words for the year?

Perhaps best known as a driving force behind the European Renaissance, arts patronage has played a vital role in advancing culture for centuries. And beyond the visual arts, patronage has impacted the work of some of the greatest writers, scientists, and composers we’ve ever known. Nowadays, however, there’s a lot less in the way of direct-to-artist patronage. But since I’ve only taken one art history course, I’ll stop there and leave the history lesson to others.

That said, it’s important to recognize the critical role patronage can play in contemporary culture, and it’s great to see technology providing a means for connecting people and ideas to crowd source micro “gifts” that advance creative endeavors— particularly musical ones.

As a former grant writer (among other things) for a contemporary arts center with a storied live music program, I was routinely dismayed by the difficulty of fundraising for music projects. The simple, yet no less frustrating, rationale was always this: things you can see are more tangible, thus visual art forms are better positioned for fundraising. The ephemeral nature of music typically doesn’t appeal to patrons in the same way. One can’t quite feel ownership over a commissioned piece of music in the same way you can a commissioned painting, and one is easier to display in the foyer. That was the argument anyway.

So why the current momentum in micro-financing music? What’s happening now, I think, is that (a) people still value real, honest music and are becoming increasingly bored by mainstream pop; (b) it’s getting cheaper to produce quality music projects; (c) the 20th century music funding model (i.e. the recording industry) is becoming more irrelevant by the minute; and (d) we’re talking high-volume small gifts. You don’t necessarily need one major donor when a couple hundred small-scale donors will do just fine (and can actually be easier to secure).

Fundraisers will tell you there’s a significant difference in tactics required to secure 200 $25 gifts as opposed to 2 $2,500 gifts. The latter is about cultivating dialogue and stewarding potential (major) donors looking to advance a personal vision. The former is more “transactional,” requires little cultivation, and is more easily scaled. Sure, donors at both levels want a “return,” but the expectations of a transactional donor are much more manageable– making web-based, crowd-sourced, micro-funding a great fit for musicians looking to execute small- to medium-scale projects.

The well known success story of Jill Sobule illustrates this perfectly. Through a special website, Sobule offered “returns” to her patrons that –to varying degrees– allowed people “ways-in” to her project (in much the same way a museum membership program works). It wasn’t about “guilt” or “charity” (as some micro-funding critics have said). For higher-end patrons it was about realizing a dream (I got to sing on Jill’s album!!), while at the smaller gift level being part of something unique and special was enough.

So, my $.02 for musicians out there thinking of trying out a micro-funding platform? If you’re known like Jill Sobule and have a strong fan base (i.e., a strong brand), you can probably raise money for run-of-the-mill projects like CD/vinyl pressing by coming up with “returns” that make it exciting enough for patrons to step up. If you’re not well known, consider something new. What kind of project could you put together that people might find interesting who don’t even know your music? How might you build a compelling art project “around” your music? And how can you frame the project so that it provides ways in for friends and strangers alike?

Either way, let’s try and NOT use these new platforms for business as usual. The truly exciting opportunity they provide is the ability to garner support to try something new, as well as connecting with like-minded people who value the role of music in contemporary culture.

I have a Kickstarter invite burning a whole in my pocket, but I’m taking the time to try and plan a project that people can be a part of–  something with different “ways in” for people of varying means. Who knows if it will be a success, but it’s great to have new avenues for pushing the envelope.

Some sites to check out:

http://www.kickstarter.com/
http://www.sellaband.com/
http://www.thehectorfund.com/
http://www.society6.com/
http://microfundo.mymondomix.com/

And all the while I’ve been hard at work on the new Longwalls EP; recording, mixing, and wondering… wondering what the hell we were doing! Everything I was reading and hearing was having a real-time impact on what I thought about promotion, distribution, making “records,” managing a little label, and being in a band. It got pretty overwhelming at times and a fair amount of sleep was lost. But as I get ready to finally unplug for a week, I realize all the thinking has lead to a bit of clarity. Some things I’m thinking about heading into a new decade of music making…

ROI is the new DIY
As the great management consultant Peter Drucker famously noted, “The purpose of a business is to create and keep a customer.” I’ve been thinking a lot about this idea, and how it pertains to musicians working today. The DIY music culture, born largely out of the late 70s punk movement, is a quaint memory–and little else. Going DIY isn’t really a choice anymore, and it‘s not an end in and of itself. DIY––with help from like-minded allies––is table stakes, a necessary means to (ideally) a sustainable and profitable endeavor. As Andrew Dubber has commented, recording a song doesn’t necessarily mean there’s “ready-to-go” demand for that song. Businesses can’t get away with this line of thinking, yet many musicians expect to. So given that we all do probably deserve a bit more compensation than we get, how can we make the most of evolving DIY tools and ethos to create enterprises around our music that are valued, sustainable, and profitable? It’s certainly something to strive for.

Bands are brands
Not a new concept, but it seems increasingly relevant. Those managing a band’s efforts should view their role, in part, as brand manager. In my day job as a brand strategist with (mostly) nonprofit clients, I’m often in the position of asking pointed questions like “who are you, for whom, and why should people give a damn?” Often, I’ll get responses along the lines of “well, we do x, y, and, z.” To which I counter, “So?” The exercise is ultimately about connecting “whats” to “so whats,” and if I can help an arts organization answer these questions and communicate from more of a constituent/value point of view, the more likely they’ll be able to raise funds and deliver on their mission. It should be the same for musicians. Who are you? For whom? And why should people give a damn? And guess what? The answer can go far beyond the music…

Music is only the beginning
CD or not CD isn’t really the question. Instead, I’ll spend a lot of time in the new year thinking about how to build value around––and beyond––music. Recording and distributing music via MP3s, CDs, vinyl, (whatever) shouldn’t be the endpoint of a musician’s creative contribution. That thinking needs to be deprogrammed. Playing live is of course a big part of this, but what else can one do? I’ve been thinking a lot about Suzanne Lainson’s writings on audience participation concepts. How can a community be built around music? And with the perceived value of physically packaged music decreasing (save perhaps for vinyl)  I’ve been contemplating the notion of “experience” as “packaging.” What can one “wrap” around their music beyond paper, plastic, and cellophane? What’s the greatest thing one’s music can be the center of?

Finally, be awesome
Given all of this, two thoughts keep rattling around in my head. The first is the old adage,  “The quickest way to kill a bad product is with great advertising.” The thinking being that the wonderful advertising will encourage droves of people to try the product, all whom in turn immediately find that it sucks. I also remember a panelist on a “How to Get Signed” panel (remember those?!?) back in 2001 exclaiming, “Look! You want to get signed?!? Be awesome!! The Pixies were awesome! They got signed!!” Love that. So yes, marketing, branding and business thinking all matter more than ever, but if you’re going to hold attention and sustain a presence you gotta be awesome. So much of what’s been written lately has been about music as commerce, but let’s not forget music as culture. And culture should represent our very best.

These ideas, among others for sure, will likely cause more sleepless nights in 2010. But as long as the wheels are turning I’m OK with it.

Cheers, and happy new years!

I’ve been thinking about that quote all week. I forget exactly where I heard it, but it’s been stuck in my head ever since last weekend’s Music Hack Day in Boston. The event brought hackers together from every corner of the globe to develop new music applications to advance the future of music. And amidst all the hacking, music’s future and past briefly clashed, making for some compelling moments during the Sunday afternoon panel discussions.

On the panels were purveyors of the now, including representatives from Last.fm, The Echo Nest, Music Power Network, Harmonix, and Songkick––all sharing ideas on new models for music business, discovery, taste-making, and more. And In the audience, among all the hacking hackers, was a gentleman with an impressive music business background that included radio promotion on behalf of labels to get songs on the air and CDs into shopping carts (the kind with wheels).

At one point, the gentleman in the audience commented that the proliferation of music taste-making and discovery was making it nearly impossible to break an artist BIG––like Bruce Springsteen big. It’s too fragmented in his opinion and he’d prefer a more singular pipeline of music discovery and taste-making. An hour later in the Future of Music panel he once again took the mic and asked the panel, “So, what bands have you broke?” He reiterated his earlier point that the proliferation of discovery and taste-making was undermining the infrastructure needed to break big-time artists. He told the panel, “You can’t make a Radiohead!”

You know what? He might be right.
And you know what? Fine.

And that’s the part this gentleman didn’t seem to get.

I found it a little funny that he used the words “break” and “broke” when it came to labels and artists. Yes, I know what he meant, but it’s important to note that for every platinum Bruce Springsteen record there’s a multitude of records that are under-promoted and ignored because the labels are focused on their shrinking portfolio of million sellers. This leads to artists more or less dead on the vine, trapped in contracts owing money as well as music the label has little interest in promoting. So yeah, nothing breaks a band quite like the traditional “Big 6″ (5, 4, 3, 2..) record label pipeline. Steve Albini’s classic The Problem with Music rant addresses this much better than I can. If you haven’t read it, do so. Some of the details are a bit dated but the math is still enough to make one’s head spin.

Regarding the “you can’t make a Radiohead” comment: Last.fm, The Echo Nest, Harmonix––these companies aren’t really in the business of promoting platinum sales of music encoded onto shiny plastic disks. They’re about building connections among fans and artists. And if an artist blows up huge? Great!! Sure they want to support artists, but I don’t think it’s their mission to make artists (and thereby labels) rich beyond their wildest dreams. And here’s the thing: I think most artists are just fine with this. In my opinion I think the majority of artists would rather have significant control over a medium-sized pie than have zero control of a (potentially) huge pie. Sure, some will gamble and shoot for the stars, more power to them. But if there’s ever going to be a music “middle class,” its backbone will be made up of artists managing sustainable, medium-scale careers. In sum, it’s wrong to criticize these new music businesses for not doing what labels can do when more and more artists simply don’t want what labels can do.

I’d like to stress that I’m not aiming to bash this gentleman. He’s obviously incredibly passionate about music and cared enough to attend an event where he must have known many would see him as the “enemy.” And to his credit he even called out the record companies for being “really stupid” in the way they’ve handled their business.

My point is this: the future of music is now largely in the hands of the fans. And those fans who develop “cred” are the new taste-makers. I think this is a good thing. Fans and taste-makers have the power to help make an artist popular and can put money in their pocket, but they do not have the power to trap and bankrupt a career. An artist’s career, and the level of success they achieve, is ultimately up to how well they the artist build a sustainable business around music that creates fans.

Major labels and a single pipeline of discovery have little to no significance in this formula. But if your paycheck depends on the older model, maybe it’s just really hard for that to sink in.

Buy local!
Many make it a point to buy local produce, support local mom and pop shops, drink locally brewed beer, etc. Why? Because buying local keeps money circulating locally, keeps people in business and creates and sustains jobs, nurtures what’s unique about a community, creates more choice–something large (inter)national brands are often fighting against, and puts one a step closer to those providing the goods they consume. It’s the same with music (and all the arts for that matter). Supporting your local music scene puts money directly into the pockets of artists hustling hard to sustain (and grow) their work, amplifies what rocks about your community, creates more choice–something major record labels more or less abhor, and gets you up close and personal with the music you love. In short, supporting your local scene makes for meaningful musical experiences, and it helps make your town a cool place to be. While creative economy research is still a work in progress, one can easily point to the connection between healthy cities and vibrant arts and culture scenes. So get plugged in.

Every town has a great _____ band
I have a theory that every town has a great punk band. I’d also be willing to bet that every town has a handful of great singer-songwriter types. And any town with a few cool indie-pop/rock bands (every town?) probably has a few ex-rockers wandering into twang town, trading in post-punk riffs for acoustics and heartbreak. And all the kids are hacking away with computers and electronics. The point? If you’re mostly a fan of big-time, platinum-selling, super-star artists, consider this: there’s likely someone doing an interesting variation of that kind of music right in your backyard. And meanwhile, there are likely others making music in ways you didn’t know existed. So instead of handing over $50-$100 to sit 50 or 100 yards away in some arena with bad sound to see a band that’s going to hop on the bus and skip town as soon as the lights go up, consider instead hitting your local club for $10 to get up-close with a band just as interesting–one you can chat with over a (local?) beer after their set. This isn’t to say that one should completely eschew major label artists. There’s some truly amazing ones for sure, but at one point in time they all depended on local support. So do try to infuse your listening habits with something locally brewed.  There’s a lot to be said about digging music made by people in your community; there’s a unique common currency––and your support might help them grow into something special.

So…
Get plugged in to your local scene. Don’t just be a customer of music. Be a part of  it. Do you want to be a consumer of radio-friendly unit shifters (most awesomely ironic song title ever?) or do you want to have a more personal relationship with the music you love and help your community a bit in the process? To get started, you’ll need to suss out a few locally-sourced music blogs as your local print/web news publications are likely providing little to no local arts + music coverage. Subscribe to the blogs via a reader of some sort and learn the lay of the land–your land (p.s. if there aren’t any local music blogs, start one). Then start supporting your local scene. If you’re not sure how, Brian McTear recently wrote a nice post on the Future of Music Coalition website outlining ways in which people can support the music they love. It’s  a great read. And if you’re in a band and your scene is lacking, read Scott James’ post on Music Think Tank and start your own (another great read).

Finally, speaking of Regional Hits, if you’re in Boston next month you best catch The Figgs at T.T. The Bear’s on Friday, December 18 with The Russians and the Corin Ashley Quartet. Those are some of the finest regional hits around.