The glorious, inspirational mess that is Guided By Voices
Whatever your aspirations as a musician, there are lessons to be learned from the basement-tapes legacy created by Guided By Voices. Read the post.
productivity
The hard part: Discovering your artistic voice
All work, when properly evaluated and processed, is a learning experience and just another step in the life-long journey of discovering and deepening your own artistic voice. Read the post.
Ready to launch a music project? Do these four things first!
Whatever your next music project is — be it an album, tour, video, single, or anything else — the first step is always planning. These four steps will get you off on the right foot. Read the post.
3 steps to get your songs in music libraries
For indie musicians and songwriters who don’t yet have connections in publishing and licensing, music libraries are one way you can seek music licensing opportunities. Read the post.
Finish your music projects, don’t wait for “perfect”
Whatever you’re setting out to accomplish, the best thing you can do for your career is finish your music projects and bring your ideas through to completion. Read More.
The cure for your career as a musician (even if you didn’t know you needed it)
Define who your audience is, make a relationship, and get their contact info. These direct-to-fan relationships are the cure for your career as a musician. Read More.
Will you take responsibility for your music career?
What kind of responsible are you? Will you take responsibility for your music career, or let excuses define your path? You have a choice. Read More.
15 music marketing mistakes indie artists make
Reaching fans is certainly easier in the digital age, but that doesn’t mean marketing is easy. Indie artists need to follow some basic marketing tenets if you want to make the most of your marketing efforts. Here are 15 of the biggest music marketing mistakes indie artists make. Read more.
Are you making excuses, or dealing with challenges?
A lot of folks hate it when I talk about excuses, probably because we all have some sore spot in our lives where we coulda, shoulda, woulda but made an excuse instead. So having a serious discussion about excuses causes us to relive our most catastrophic or painful failures. But you cannot succeed with excuses. Read more.
How to Stay Productive as a Music Composer
As a music composer, musician, or artist today, you’re equipped with everything you need to create music: Pro Tools (or whatever DAW), tons of plug-ins, instruments, MIDI controllers… even video tutorials that show you how to use what you have. With all this high-end technology at our finger tips, how do you avoid information overload? How can you stay productive in your music career and actually get some work done? Read more.
Building A Career in Music
The first thing that musicians should do is take an honest self-assessment. There are a lot of people that run out and say, “I need a manager. I need an agent. I need…” When you’re starting from zero with one album, there’s no business; there’s nothing to manage, and no reason for a nationwide tour. There is a lot involved between making an album and establishing a real career in music. Read more.
Make the Most of a Music Internship
Most anyone can offer a music internship, or participate in one. If you are a composer, a singer-songwriter, a member of a band, etc., and have a bunch of stuff that you keep putting off: like making posters, booking a tour, or reaching out to licensing companies, you have a lot to gain from having an intern. On the flip side, no matter how old you are or what your experience level, if you’re looking to dive deeper into the music biz, you could benefit from being an intern. Read more.
Music Career Advice from 30 Industry Experts
The blog at Venture Harbour posted advice from 30 people in the music industry for aspiring entrepreneurs. Of course, most everything included translates to building a music career and is definitely worth a read. Echoes’ Andre Calilhanna is among those polled, and his insights are to "continually re-prioritize." Read more.
Done is better than perfect for your music career
Is there a next step that you really need to take with your music career, but you keep procrastinating and putting your dream on hold because things are not perfect yet? From one music artist to another, I totally relate to wanting your work to be perfect before you get it out there. But really, procrastination is an excuse for not taking control of your music career. Don’t let this happen to you. Read more.
My Anti-Resolution to Ditch the One Big Goal
New Year’s Resolutions — they’re created with the best intentions. To do better, live better, be better. They hang over our heads, guilt us into temporary action, and for 92% of Americans, they’re a distant memory by Valentine’s Day. These resolutions tend to be vague goals with no real measurable result, like "lose weight," "fall in love," or "be a better friend," and they can get in the way of the one thing that can bring us what we want: a commitment to a purpose. Read more.