| *Must Read* : Sex, Hip Hop, Drugs, Blogging - not in that order | |
Sex, Drugs and Updating Your Blog
Any independent artist worth their internet connection should take a few minutes and read this New York Times article [registration required]
One of my favorite parts of the article was how one of the main musicians profiled arranges his tour dates now:
When he performs, he upends the traditional logic of touring. Normally, a new Brooklyn-based artist like him would trek around the Northeast in grim circles, visiting and revisiting cities like Boston and New York and Chicago in order to slowly build an audience — playing for 3 people the first time, then 10, then (if he got lucky) 50. But Coulton realized he could simply poll his existing online audience members, find out where they lived and stage a tactical strike on any town with more than 100 fans, the point at which he’d be likely to make $1,000 for a concert. It is a flash-mob approach to touring: he parachutes into out-of-the-way towns like Ardmore, Pa., where he recently played to a sold-out club of 140.
Using website stats, your newsletter sign ups [you get their zip/postal codes, or at least city right?], MySpace friends and any other info you can gleam the location of fans from should be used to help by pass the towns/areas that are certain to be dead for ones that may be home to actual fans.
The article includes numerous other examples of artists connecting in a true grassroots manner with fans thanks to the internet and doing so to a degree that can sustain them. With the available access to fans however comes the expected access to the artist, and a number of examples are provided showing “when fans attack” essentially. The biggest concern some artists may have though with maintaining all these new relationships with fans - is well maintaining them and not feeling like they just took a customer care position at a call center:
It is the central paradox of online networking: if you’re really good at it, your audience quickly grows so big that you can no longer network with them. The Internet makes fame more quickly achievable — and more quickly unmanageable….Virtually everyone bemoaned the relentless and often boring slog of keyboarding. It is, of course, precisely the sort of administrative toil that people join rock bands to avoid.
Mind you working for yourself and promoting your own music [hell any music] far beats working in a call center. Trust me [5 past call center jobs here! woo!]
Via Michael Geist
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Music Execs Silent As Rap Debate Rages [AP]
The article details the current furor taking place over the language used in much hip hop today and asks why as the title states, music execs are mum on the issue. My guess:
The outcry could have an effect on sales. If it raises consciousness among people who have historically bought this music and thought it was OK, well, that’s lost sales. Executives’ bonuses are tied to sales and they don’t want to destroy this market.
But the article has other possibilities as well. And again provides an interesting glimpse of where the hip hop scene is right now, one example - Master P, founder of No Limit Records, starting a new label for “street music without offensive lyrics.”.
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