At Musformation we have decided to follow Twitters lead and suggest
you a Twitter feed we find to be totally awesome every week. We figure
it is time to show people by example who is using Twitter right and
good the awesome resources it holds.Mark Mulligan is a research director at Forrester Research, which puts out many of the studies that us music industry wonks quote all day long. He also consistently tweets interesting music business info and wise opinions. He is another tweeeter that should be followed.
- Tu Phace signs to Epic Records
- Boyce Avenue sign to UNI Republic
- Emphatic signs to Atlantic Records
- Greg MacPherson Signs to Smallman
- Polyvinyl signs Love Is All
- Faith Hill Signs With Red Light
- The Undeserving sign to Warner Bros.
- Black Label Society Signs Deal With E1 Music
- The Forecast has signed with Eyeball Records.
- The Casting Out sign to Eyeball Records
- Silverstein have left Victory Records
- Gallows Dropped From Warner Brothers
- Secretly Canadian Signs JJ
- Weezer and Geffen Records have parted ways
"If it hadn't been for Cottoned-Eyed Joe" no one would have even heard of this band, but Swedish band the Rednex have actually sold 10 million records (yes, most of them due to the 1994 hit single "Cotton Eyed Joe"). That makes it all the more astonishing that the band has declared they are leaving the traditional music industry and are putting their new single "Devil's On The Loose" out on Pirate Bay (don't all go out to download it at once). In a statement, the band has declared that it is pointless to argue over file-sharing because the battle has long ago been lost. The band goes on to say that although Pirate Bay has been vilified, they are quite the opposite, helping spread music and innovation. Hypebot has the full story here.
In what can become an amazing tool for deciphering the hype about the live show of a band and seeing real reactions, Music Scout has launched a location-aware App for the Android and iPhone. This could become one of the most promising ways to determine which bands are really good and which are just being overblown by hype and marketing dollars. Another welcome change of destroying the gatekeepers and brining up music that is actually good! The Android App is available now and the iPhone App is coming soon.
If you spend any time on the road selling merch you start to see the pattern that if you combine a great design with a medium people don't usually see and great price you cal sell a ton of merch. One of the things I see that works for bands is selling magnets. Not only are they a great advertisement for your band, they also are a magnet for people to buy on the cheap. I have friends who still have magnets on their fridge that we bought at shows in the 90's, which serve as a reminder of that band and make me remember to listen to them. Fans can put these on their fridge, car or any other metal surface, serving as an advertisement for your band and a way to get some extra bucks.
Online radio continues to grow and grow and grow, this means some of the smaller guys are becoming very important to promoting your music despite not having the numbers of the big guns, they are still boasting impressive audiences. GrooveShark is one of those online radio sites that is exactly that, a place where you should have your music uploaded. With a great artist dashboard and extensive analytics it can help generate valuable marketing data. Like Jango and Last.FM they also offer a pay-to-play program where you can get airplay when people listen to similar artists.
Previewing 30 second clips inside iTunes has always been annoying and one of the reasons sites like LaLa and Google's Music Box have been great for checking out new artists. Today, iTunes took one more step to making discovering new music less annoying by allowing the web version of their service to stream these preview clips. See for yourself.
MusicGlue is a site we can't believe we didn't see earlier! Offering a wide variety of services, most notably a widget to collect fans emails in exchange for their email addresses. The site offers both a free and a paid model that obviously offers more features. Their website lists their features as:
- Commercialise music on P2P networks
- Commercialise music on Social Networking websites
- Control wholesale and retail prices
- Create 'product offerings' that include multiple tracks, encouraging consumers to purchase albums or EPs.
- Create elaborate viral campaigns that bring the fan back to the band every time
- Gain invaluable information on fans, including email addresses, listening habits and location (city & country)
- Bring fans closer to the artist, with personalized messages and branding on all web pages. Furthermore send out automated emails reminding fans of release dates
- Load up unlimited tracks
- Design your own flash music player, that can be added to your website, MySpace or any other social networking page
- Switch off certain countries, depending on your licensing situation
- View 'real time' reports of sales, with total financial transparency.
- Paypal, Credit card sales worldwide
- Quarterly accounting
Team Robespierre are a buoyant Brooklyn band that brings the party every night out. The band has been a steam engine for press and positive buzz recently so Musformation decided to catch up with them during a break from recording their new album. Known for their insane live antics and infectious sound, TR has garnered praise from Pitchfork, Spin, Village Voice and Oh My Rockness, among others. Find out what keeps this band going and what advice they can give you after the jump.
Have you ever seen those weird pieces of Blingee looking writing across some people's Twitter avatars? These are called Twibbons and you can use these to promote your music. Simply go to Twibbon and make a design that will identify you to your audience. You can make this your logo and use it to identify all the members in your group or suggest it to your fans as a way of spreading the word about your band. An easy way to spread the word about your music on Twitter.
Musicians are often stereotyped for not being the most studious types in the classroom, meaning that sometimes you might have slept right through your 1st period grammar class and could have missed a few lessons here and there. But these days you're trying to be a professional musician, so do everyone a favor and check your spelling and grammar. Have a website that makes sense and is spelled correctly. Make sure flyers are checked for mistakes. Triple check press releases and other such communications. Sounds elementary, right? It's not, we've seen countless mistakes and when someone send you somethings like that, it's often very frustrating.
Further, most interviews these days are done through email. This site (which does a lot of interviews) often gets responses with atrocious misspellings and terribly incorrect grammar. When someone is taking the time to give you and your band free promotion and you don't even take the time to at least spellcheck, you are insulting them directly - this is unforgivable. Many browsers and most text editing software are equipped with a spell checker, so you have little excuse. Don't piss off the people that are going to give you exposure. Take the time to make sure what you said makes sense and is spelled correctly. If you're not good at this, find someone who is - it takes 5 minutes and could certainly change the way someone perceives you and your band. Yeah, we know. Spelling and grammar is difficult for us as well (we make plenty of errors on this site), but when you are trying to get someone to do you a favor with press and promotion, taking the time to make sure everything is correct can take you a long way.
Congorock - Babylon from Scion A/V on Vimeo.
What we are reading on the Internet that may be of interest to you or potentially melt your brain with it's stupidity.
- R.I.P. Willie Mitchell, Architect of Memphis Sound & Al Green's Producer
- The Origin Of Spooky: The Knife to release opera based on Charles Darwin
- Mixed Emotions: Stones will NOT tour in 2010
- Theatre de Punk: Green Day's American Idiot heads to Broadway in Spring
- Gaga helps Trina plead to "Let Them Hoes Fight" - in rap form!
- Nada Surf announce new tour and interesting covers ablum
- Apple Blocks Google App From iPhone While Trying To Patent The Same Invention?
REMINDER: Each of those buttons up top will make this site show articles written only on that particular subject or you can can follow our individual RSS or Twitter feeds.
God of music industry innovation Trent Reznor has struck again! Earlier this year NIN put out 450 GB of raw video footage from a recent tour. They put this out as a gift to their fans. Their talented fans then developed and edited the raw footage into a coherent form and NIN have now put it out as a free DVD. A smart idea and a great way to win the endearment of his fans.
Sadly, we can't all be Nine Inch Nails and have such a rabid fanbase but you can take this idea and make it work for your music. If you want the world to see how awesome your live show is but don't quite have all the cameras to show it off you can enlist your fans. Tell all of your fans that you will reimburse their admission to a show if they videotape you. You can then rip it from them at the show or offer them a guest list spot to the next show if they send the footage to you via the a file sharing site. These days when everyone has a Flip or an iPhone video cameras so you could conceivably get a dozen or more great video shots to edit between in software like iMovie.
Sadly, we can't all be Nine Inch Nails and have such a rabid fanbase but you can take this idea and make it work for your music. If you want the world to see how awesome your live show is but don't quite have all the cameras to show it off you can enlist your fans. Tell all of your fans that you will reimburse their admission to a show if they videotape you. You can then rip it from them at the show or offer them a guest list spot to the next show if they send the footage to you via the a file sharing site. These days when everyone has a Flip or an iPhone video cameras so you could conceivably get a dozen or more great video shots to edit between in software like iMovie.
One of the things we have argued is the fact that record stores dying is probably going to be great for your music career. With that said you still my want your CD in one to be like all those "cool" kids on the major labels and large indies. If this is the case RegionalCD will service Best Buy for you and get it in local stores so you can fit in with the jocks and cheerleaders by coughing up $250. While the idea of ever seeing an artist do this makes a little vomit come into my mouth, you may find this to be a valuable move for your music. Good luck with that. (via Hypebot)
What we are reading on the Internet that may be of interest to you or potentially melt your brain with it's stupidity.
- 2ManyDJs' Radio Soulwax reborn on the web
- Drummer of 'The Band' Sues Cingular Over Commercial
- Google And Spotify Dance Over U.S. Launch
- Courtney Love plugs Holes in band's lineup
REMINDER: Each of those buttons up top will make this site show articles written only on that particular subject or you can can follow our individual RSS or Twitter feeds.
Collecta is a new search engine that will search Myspace for who is writing about your music. Despite Myspace being a whithering corpse this can be a great tool to find people who are passionate about your music who are still on Myspace and send them information on how to find you on other social networks or to get free stuff by joining your mailing list. (via Hypebot)
As we have covered in the past, Metric's Fantasies was a true success story for a band putting out their own record and achieving massive success. Their record ended up on tons of year end top ten lists (including ours) and proved that it is becoming more and more viable for a band to make more money on their own than with the help of a label. Myspace Music did a interview with the band that got into some of the details of how they achieved this success and some of the gears that put the band in motion to do so. Check it here.
Recently, everyone's favorite grunge rockers Eddie Vedder has been sued for changing the lyrics to Gordon Peterson's song "Hard Sun". While you are allowed to cover any song you want, the copyright holders do have rights to granting permission if you are going to change the lyrics of the song. This is in order protect copyright holders from the original intent of their lyrics from being distorted. While you may ask how Wierd Al can get away with what he does, it is because that falls under parody, which is also protected in copyright law. TechDirt has a great comment discussion on the finer details of this law and which laws protect what. Read it to make sure you don't get in trouble.
We have been linking you to many reasons why you should oppose the Live Nation/ Ticketmaster merger that the DOJ is considering. These thieves will not only be supressing your music career but also continuing the rape of your wallet at their concerts if this merger goes through. This is the last week to get your voice heard through the DOJ by emailing them at antitrust.complaints@usdoj.gov. Please read these articles if you want more info or email them and tell them that these companies have not shown that they act in good faith of their customers interests.
Before fully ringing in 2010, let's reflect on the lessons learned in 2009. With out a doubt '09 represented the year of the foreigner. Mainstream acceptance for international musicians peeked in the U.S for 2009, however this trend is global. So how do you penetrate a global market you may ask? First, read the post and understand the essential components involved, and second get off your ass and do it. Enjoy - READ HERE
CHEERS to 2010!
What we are reading on the Internet that may be of interest to you or potentially melt your brain with it's stupidity.
- 2009 Pitchfork Readers Poll
- Update: Andrew WK: "I'm [not] a victim of mind-control"
- Trent Reznor shares 2010 resolutions; includes new material!
- Unreleased Michael Jackson Song Hits the Web
- Fear of Sting Forces Rock Hall To Consider Rule Change
- Lhasa de Sela Dies in Montreal, Aged 37
REMINDER: Each of those buttons up top will make this site show articles written only on that particular subject or you can can follow our individual RSS or Twitter feeds.
There is a joke in the blogosphere that information now moves so fast that one day is actually a blog year. This is one of the keys to making sure any opportunities you may get to be written up in blog world will actually come into fruition. Recently, I have seen some friends lose great opportunities because they are to slow on the ball to keep up in the world of blogs. Hours can be a big deal when looking to fill content, checking your band mail at least daily and always having easy access to any files needed for your project can be the difference between opportunity becoming big leaps and bounds for your music or another failure. Get with the times and realize you need to move fast if you want to be covered in a fast moving world. 
Here is an interview our own Dom Tucci did with Tim Wesetergen of Pandora. A great read on the qualms of loving music and running a business that involved profiting from it while maintaining sustainability. -ed.Dom: Pandora provides an extremely artist friendly service and the founders and staff really come across as true music lovers. Obviously it must have been a struggle recently during the negotiations with performance rights organization SoundExchange and others for artist royalties since if they came in too high, you wouldn't be able to operate your business. What were some of the thoughts and decisions that had to be made in that negotiation process?
While we were all
- Soundgarden officially reunited on New Years Eve
- Andrew W.K. Admits Persona Was Developed By Committee
- Avenged Sevenfold Drummer "The Rev" Found Dead
- 10 music-tech trends that will shape the next decade
- Did Apple's Lala Deal Leave A Lump Of Coal In Google's Music Onebox Stocking?
- Songbird Still Airborne, Takes On iTunes With Improved Device Syncing
- Tap Tap Revenge 3 Downloaded 300,000 Times First 24 Hours After Going Free
- Play And Share Your Music Collection In The Cloud With tunesBag
- A Look Back At Major Label Online Strategies A Decade Ago
- Do Your Rights To Listen To Legally Licensed Music Stop At The Border?
- Interscope And Best Buy Team Up To Give You A Free Twitter Application For Free (With Purchase)
- Former Musician Now Lawyer Comes To Terms With What's Happening To His Music Online
- Hey Whatever Happened To Those Andrew Cuomo-Backed, RIAA Agreements With ISPs To Kick People Off The Internet?
- What Will The Recording Industry Be Blaming For All Their Problems A Decade From Now?
- Ke$ha Sets Female Download Record
- Guitarist Rowland S. Howard Dies
- Muziic, Vevo In Deal? Not So Much
- Torrent Site isoHunt Loses Court Battle
- Guitarist Mick Cocks Dies
- Merlin Signs Up To Sky Songs
- Flying Nun Founder Regains Control Of Label
- Guitar Hero: Van Halen a big lump of coal in our stockings
- Black Eyed Peas top Spotify Top 100 chart for 2009
- Vic Chesnutt R.I.P.
- Vevo Pulls Videos From YouTube's API: Party's Over For Third Parties
- Shazam's Paid App Pays Off As It Aims For 100 Million Users
- Metallica drummer struggles with ringing in ears
- MySpace Replaces Imeem Playlists With Ads
- iTunes U breaks 100 million downloads
- MySpace Music: Imeem Playlist Transfers Still Weeks Away
- Skype, Kazaa Founders Beta-Launch Rdio Streaming App
- Rage Against the Machine beat X Factor winner in charts
- Why The Record Labels Are Still Confused: The Difference Between Transformative And Incremental Change
- Higher iTunes Prices? How Much Goes To The Artists?
Seeing as the music biz is pretty much shutdown till 2010 we will be doing very limited updates till the new year. In the meantime we will be working on some amazing new tweaks to Musformation for 2010. As always please enjoy our Table of Contents and if you want to stay in touch with us you can can follow our individual RSS or Twitter feeds. Happy Holidays!
P.S. If you see things looking funny with our web design in the next week or so please pardon our appearance, we are tweaking many things on the site before the new year.
P.S. If you see things looking funny with our web design in the next week or so please pardon our appearance, we are tweaking many things on the site before the new year.
<< 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106
>>
Most Popular Posts
Guide To Getting Your Band Somewhere
Esssential Music Business Knowledge
Esssential Songwriting Knowledge
Esssential Recording Knowledge
Recent Op-Eds
Esssential Knowledge for Vocalists
Essential Pro Tools Tips
Esssential Knowledge for Drummers
Esssential Knowledge for Guitarists
Blog Roll
