The New Artist Lesson

I have come across some good music lately, however the bands/artists that created the music are still languishing at the bottom of the music pile. So what can bands like Burnside, Tesseract, The Night Flight Orchestra, Polution and Vaudeville do differently to get their brand and music out there.

IS THERE A MARKET FOR YOUR MUSIC?

The common misconception that most bands/artists have is that their music will succeed. The cold hard truth is that no one knows what music will succeed. That is why A&R people, have a bad strike ratio. They can find talent, however that doesn’t mean that the talent they find will succeed in the music business.

New bands need to test the market. You need to see what kind of response you get back. Find ways to measure the longevity of your song. Did fans spread it on social media? Did a torrent go up on The Pirate Bay? Does it have seeders? Does it have leachers? Are people streaming it? Are people purchasing it? Are people listening to it on YouTube?

If the song is setting the world on fire, repeat the whole process again with a new song as there is a market there for you.

If the song is not setting the world on fire, take a step back, re-evaluate, create a better song and repeat all of the above as there is no market there for you at the moment.

Burnside created a brilliant album in Evolution that consisted of 13 songs and released them all at once. They relied on an old business model that doesn’t work anymore. They needed to test the market, so that they could see if there is a market for their music. They should have released a song and measured it’s reach first. If you have an audience of less than 10,000, you should not be spending time creating a 13 song album.

The Night Flight Orchestra wrote a song called West Ruth Avenue, that in my mind rivalled Gotye’s Somebody That I Used To Know. Somebody That I Used To Know found a market, West Ruth Avenue didn’t. (Yes, I know that The Night Flight Orchestra is a side project, however it is one album that should have found a bigger audience).

TesserAct in my view released a great album in Altered State. Century Media streamed the album on their YouTube page and it had over 90,000 hits. The album comes out and it moves over 4000 units in the U.S. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? The label tested the market with the pre-release stream on YouTube. I think both artists where expecting a better turn out in sales, however this is the wrong view point to have. Fans can now stream their music.

SUPPLY vs. DEMAND

I hope that the bands I have mentioned are not focusing on the payment side of things. Remember Spotify, Pandora, iTunes are all services that you use to get your music out there. Don’t solely rely on these services as a source of revenue. It’s a diversified music game. You need to have other strategies for that. However, before you get to this stage, you need to ensure that a market exists.

Remember that you are a seller and a supplier. It’s simple economics. Supply vs Demand. At the moment, the recorded music world is over supplied. There is so much music out there, however not all of the music that is released has a demand waiting for it. Demand equals buyers. Buyers equal fans. The artists should be satisfying the needs of the fans.

BUILDING PLACES OF WORSHIP FOR YOUR FANS

It is the fans that will promote you. No one cares about the music that radio pushes. No one cares about the music that the press and mainstream media pushes. No one cares about the music if you scream until your black and blue about how great your song is.

People care and pay attention, when they see fan blogs created in your name (like the John Petrucci forums, the Mike Portnoy forums, the Dream Theater forums and so on). You need to ensure that you build a cathedral so that your fans can worship your music and spread it.

In the end, you need to have great music marketed to people that will like it and buy it. Otherwise you will remain in your local suburban market.

Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

Brent Smith (Shinedown) – What Do You Mean I Don’t Write Good Lyrics

Another week, another “What Do You Mean I Dont Write Good Lyrics” post.

This week, Brent Smith from Shinedown is under the microscope. For the first two records Leave A Whisper (2003) and Us and Them (2005) he was addicted to cocaine, OxyContin and alcohol. By the time The Sound of Madness (2008) came out, he was drinking a lot of alcohol. For some reason he reminds me of Nikki Sixx.

Burning Bright from Leave A Whisper (2003)

There’s nothing ever wrong but nothing’s ever right
Such a cruel contradiction

Such a cruel contradiction it is. We tell everyone that everything is okay, however it never is. It could be debt problems, work problems, gambling problems or something else.

Adrenaline from Amaryllis (2012)

Which way is up, when your high is low?
It’s time to find it are you ready to go?

How do we know how to go up when we have been down the whole time. When the time comes to go higher, are we ready to go? Do we want to go higher?

Cry For Help from The Sounds Of Madness (2008)

‘Cause when you lie like the devil himself
No angels gonna hear your Cry for help!

I have been friends with quite a few people like that. All they do is lie. With each lie, they dig their hole deeper. Then one day no one is going to give a shit about them anymore. The song Enemies from Amaryllis (2012) also has a similar lyrical theme. “You started something that you just couldn’t stop, You turned the ones that you love into the angriest mob, And their one last wish is that you pay for it, And there’s no way you’re getting out of this.”

Bully from Amaryllis (2012)

Seems I’ve crossed the line again
For being nothing more than who I am

This is how the metal / rock community was treated in the Eighties. Employers bullied us, teachers bullied, the police bullied us.

Atmosphere from Us and Them (2005)

Once I met a leader
Born from genocide
Once I knew a preacher
To his faith, he said goodbye

The lyrics are great in this song. It’s just about how messed up our world has become. A leader born from genocide, what a brilliant line. It brings up so many different meanings.

Second Chance from The Sound of Madness (2008)

Sometimes goodbye is a second chance

I have always seen goodbye as one door closing and a million other doors opening.

Sound of Madness from The Sound of Madness (2008)

Somehow I’m still here, to explain,
That the darkest hour never comes in the night

The darkest hour comes when you least expect it and it is never at night.

Call Me from The Sound of Madness (2008)

I kept my whole life in suitcase,
Never really stayed in one place
Maybe that’s the way it should be,
You know I live my life like a gypsy

When I first heard this song, I immediately thought of Tracy Chapman, as the vocal delivery is very similar. Are we ever settled in life? We always want something more, something different, something else.

Heroes from Us and Them (2005)

All my heroes have now become ghosts
Sold their sorrow to the ones who paid the most

We all die in the end. What legacy will we leave behind?

My Name (Wearing Me Out) from Amaryllis (2012)

My name is revenge and I’m here to save my name

Enough said.

A to Z of Making It, Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

The Evolution of Burnside

I’m listening to an album from a band called Burnside. The album is called Evolution and it was released in December, 2012. I really like it and I recommend it.

I need to know more. So I go straight to Google. I type in Burnside.

I get all these results about Uniting Care, the city of Burnside, the Burnside Public School and all these other results that do not deal with music. Not a good start.

So I change the search words to “Burnside Band” and the website, http://www.burnsideband.com is the first one that comes up. That is better. However I would have expected the Facebook and Twitter accounts to come up as well.

So I change the search words to be, “Burnside Band Facebook” and it comes up, however it is not the first one. Anyway, I go onto the Facebook page, and I see that they have an album launch happening soon. I am confused. The album came out in December 2012. An album launch six months later is a bit weird.

This is why the idea of the album fails in this day and age, especially if you are a band starting off. Evolution is a great album, one of the best I have heard in the last few years, and it is in my top 10 of releases for 2012. So how does a band, that recorded a great album get it out to the people, without disappearing.

The answer is the fans. The fans need to be sharing the songs on their Facebook accounts, on their twitter accounts or blogs. Once upon a time there was an old way. Bands and new music where broken by radio and the press. Theses outlets are obsolete today. The fans are the new way. They are the new press. They are the new radio.

Burnside have over 7000 likes on Facebook. It’s time to mobilise these fans. The fans need to share. The band needs to record themselves playing some of the songs acoustically and put them on YouTube and then get fans to share those YouTube clips. It’s not about the sales anymore, it’s about remaining relevant and in the public eye. That is the battle.

Burnside are from an area called Penrith, Australia, which is about 70 minutes away from where I live. This is typical of Australia, where talented bands fail to escape the local area. I only live 90 minutes away and I have never heard of them. They formed in 2009, however the members Grant O’Hara (Vocals, Guitar, Bass), Sheldon Wharton (Vocals, Guitar, Bass) and David Rice (Guitar, Bass) have been in other bands prior.

Their bio has them comparing themselves to Birds of Tokyo. Why? They are way better than Birds of Tokyo. Silverchair is also mentioned. Evolution is an album that Silverchair wished they could make. Foo Fighters is another reference. Foo Fighters are renowned for releasing albums with four to five great songs and the remainder is seen as pure filler. Evolution is an album that has no filler.

Be sure to check out Remember When. If you like Everything from Lifehouse, you would like this song.

The combination of The Battle moving into With A Gun is brilliant. The strings over the distorted guitars sounds grand.

Lost The Will is modern rock in the vein of Shinedown.

Will I Find You There reminds me of The Calling. The Last Time is the best song that Daughtry hasn’t written.

What You’ve Become merges brilliant piano playing with distorted guitars. Its melodic and haunting at the same time.

Through My Veins, has that AC/DC, Long Way To The Top vibe.

Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

Imagine Dragons – It’s Time and Demons

It’s Time and Demons are two songs that are just stuck in my head. They are catchy as hell. They have enough of the rock in them to get my attention and keep it. The vocals are unique enough to have me interested. This is why I love music. A great song can come from left field. The rookie that no one gives a chance, has come to play.

Yes, I am a bit behind in hearing their music as some of the songs on the album are from 2010 EP releases, however good music will always come to the top. It is the signal in the noise. Once you find it, you latch on to it and ride it to the top.

The fans of the band have made this happen. The actual album is still moving 30,000 units each week in the U.S., however that pales in comparison to the digital sales of It’s Time and Radioactive. Both songs are numbering in the millions for downloads.

YouTube lists Radioactive with 36,671,318 views and It’s Time with 30,431,235 views. How come the RIAA isn’t complaining about piracy here.

Spotify lists Radioactive with 93,914,273 streams and It’s Time with 46,974,864 views.

The other songs are doing high numbers as well. This is the key today, to keep people coming back, over and over again. Imagine Dragons are doing that. Spotify is proof of that.

Music

The Secret Weapon Behind Five Finger Death Punch

Producers and Engineers are the unsung heroes behind the greatest albums.

The unsung hero for Five Finger Death Punch, is Kevin Churko. Five Finger Death Punch, have used Churko on War Is The Answer and American Capitalist. Now they are using him again on The Wrong Side of Heaven and the Righteous Side of Hell, Volume 1 and 2 releases.

If you see any photos of him, you would think he is Rob Zombie’s long-lost twin.

Apart from Five Finger Death Punch, Churko has been Ozzy’s go to producer and co-writer for Black Rain and Scream, along with the remixes on the Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman albums.

In This Moment is another band that have used Churko. The best In This Moment albums like The Dream, A Star Cross Wasteland and Blood had Churko as Producer. For Blood, Churko was also a contributor as the band was down to a three-piece. He helped them get the songs out.

I even look for Churko projects that I haven’t heard before, so that I can check out the band.

One thing is certain, when Five Finger Death Punch and Kevin Churko get together, expect magic to happen. Really looking forward to the new pair of releases.

A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Derivative Works, Music, Stupidity

Why do creators still follow the old way?

I just listened to the new Megadeth album. Apart from the opener, Kingmaker and the cover, Cold Sweat from Thin Lizzy, I don’t really like it. For me to say that, is a big thing. If anything, you can call me a Mustaine Fanboy. I still cop flack for liking Risk.

The idea of the album has evolved since Megadeth released Killing Is My Business in 1985. In this day and age, the fans want more. Our time is valuable. TV shows like Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead can take us away from listening to music. Gaming can also limit our time. We live in a world of choice. If something is not good enough, we just move on. It could be another band, a movie, a TV show, a game, a book, a magazine, a holiday and so on.

I still purchased the physical CD of Super Collider, so that I can have it as part of my Megadeth collection, however I cannot recommend it. I wish I could. What disappoint’s me is that Chris Broderick is still utilised purely for his lead breaks. Is that all he is capable off? I don’t think so, however that is how it remains in Megadeth. Dave Mustaine is the riff meister. He is the songwriter, however in this case, I believe that the songwriter of the band has gone missing. It’s not a bad album and it’s not a good album.

Going back to the meaning of the post. Why did Megadeth and Dave Mustaine follow the old way? He could have recorded and released more frequently and still toured behind Gigantour?

For example, he could have recorded and released Kingmaker one month and then released Cold Sweat from Thin Lizzy the next month. During that two month period, the band could have fine tuned the other songs, written better ones or just kept them as the same, if the initial songs connected with the fans.

There is no need to follow the “spend six months creating and recording an album”, release it, watch it fade away from the minds of people’s within weeks and then go on tour of the world and hope that the tour will rekindle sales.

Don’t get me wrong, the above format still works for great albums. Five Finger Death Punch released American Capitalist in October 2011, and it is still selling. They got five singles out of it. The fans spread it via social media. They have a new album coming out in July and then another album scheduled for either a November 2013 or February 2014 release. I really liked how Coheed and Cambria did the same thing with The Afterman releases and Stone Sour did the same with House of Gold and Bones. The bands need to be here today, everyday. If you are gone tomorrow, in this day and age, its game over.

Megadeth in this case didn’t have enough material for a great album, and that is all we have time for these days. I still love the band, I will still purchase tickets to Gigantour if they bring it to Australia and I will be hoping that Megadeth return to writing great songs.

Keeping with the creators following the old way theme, there is an interview doing the rounds at Loudwire, with Shinedown singer Brent Smith. Basically, back in April, Shinedown allowed their Facebook fans to vote on which songs the band should cover. So after the results came in, the band went away and filmed themselves playing the cover songs. They have no plans to sell the songs. All they want to do is release the video’s of them performing the cover songs on YouTube, so that they releasing content each week. However, they cannot release the songs due to licensing issues.

The licensing part of music, is the old way of thinking. This the way it works in two sentences. The creators write the songs and then sell the songs for a fee to a publisher. The publisher then licences the songs to advertising, TV shows and collects monies for them. In my view, Publishers should be all shot and buried.

If anything, Shinedown will bring more attention to the original versions of the songs they cover. I know that I am keen to hear them do Nothing Else Matters from Metallica.

Shinedown is trying to do things the new way, releasing content more frequently. Amaryllis came out in March, 2012. It’s still in the minds of the public. As at last week, it was sitting at 410,000 sold in the U.S. alone. Now they are going to be involved with the Carnival of Madness Tour. In between they also released the Warner Sound’s Live Room Sessions EP and Brent Smith has been very vocal about getting fans to speak up and stand up for rock music via social media and the hashtag (#theriseofrockandroll). They also have the covers YouTube clips up their sleeve.

The game is changing every day. The old wayers’ need to get in bed with the new wayers’ and start thinking differently. It’s not all about the initial pay-day on release day. It’s about staying in the minds of the public and the fans.

Music, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

Adrenaline Mob and Mike Portnoy – Is He Serious?

Article

Is he serious?

From where I sit, this was a major misstep. Mike Portnoy isn’t a star in the sense of commanding multiple projects and making each one thrive on name alone. He’s a drummer. That’s it. Talented, relentless, precise, but a drummer first, not a solo brand.

It looks like the Portnoy philosophy goes something like this: start a band, convince yourself you’re the main songwriter, the driving force, maybe even a god in the room, and then spin up another band, and another, and another. When one starts to gain traction, walk away, schedules conflict, priorities shift. It’s a pattern. It’s ambitious, but it’s also scattershot. It’s not a strategy built to last.

Adrenaline Mob had legs. That band could have grown into something bigger. Flying Colors? Already stale. Winery Dogs? Lacks direction. Transatlantic? A cult following, yes, but niche, not career-sustaining.

Look at the chatter online. Facebook, YouTube, blogs, Twitter, the fans are speaking. And fans are everything now. They amplify a release, they create buzz, they breathe life into a project. When they start to shrug, disengage, move on, that’s when it all dies.

Portnoy’s peak came with Petrucci. That was the alignment that created Dream Theater’s defining moments. And walking away from that partnership was a gamble. He may not have meant to squander it, but when the chemistry that made the magic was gone, the results were inevitable. Because the truth is simple: the music isn’t about one drummer, it’s about the sum of the parts, and some parts carry more weight than others.

Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

The KISS that rocks

Revenge made Kiss relevant again. 1982’s Creatures of The Night and 1983’s Lick It Up, re-established Kiss as a force to be reckoned with in the Eighties.

MTV was the outlet, and every time Lick it Up came on, it made me stop and watch. This was all about the music. The band had removed their make-up and they needed to make a statement. Lick It Up was that statement. That crunchy and distorted guitar from Vinnie Vincent is what makes the song roll. Of course, it wouldn’t be long before Vincent was shifted. It’s like Gene Simmons can’t handle having talented people around me for a long period of time. Gene likes to rewrite history that Vinnie Vincent’s contribution to KISS was as a salary paid employee, however the music doesn’t lie.

Life’s such a treat and it’s time you taste it
There ain’t a reason on earth to waste it

We all know what Paul is saying in the lyrics to the women in the world. Make sure that no mess is left ladies.

By the time the keyboard heavy Crazy Nights (1987) and the pop metal Hot In The Shade (1989) came out, fans started to accuse the band of following whatever MTV trend was popular at the time.

Crazy Crazy Nights to me was so hooky and it was as good as anything else that was in the Charts at that time. I personally love the song, and this is in the era, post the Slippery When Wet explosion. It just reminds me of good times and crazy days, sort of like how Tesla’s Lazy Days and Crazy Nights song does. Listening to the Crazy Crazy Nights song today (I did an Eighties’ CD for my wife and this song was one of the songs I put on it) it just reminds me of how busy my life has come to be, where most of the time I am running on empty or caffeine. It would good to be able to kick back and relax.

They try to tell us we don’t belong,
That’s alright, we’re millions strong
This is my music, it makes me proud,
These are my people and this is my crowd

A song for the rock show, making the people believe that they belong here. Crazy Crazy Nights was co-written by Paul Stanley and Adam Mitchell who he used on the Creatures of the Night album as well. Going back to the well that gave birth to quality previously, is a good thing.

Going back to the Revenge album. The Nineties had a massive paradigm shift in the music business. Kiss, now had to compete with bands that released game changing albums. Nirvana released Nevermind and Pearl Jam released Ten bringing Grunge and Alternative Rock to the masses. U2 released Achtung Baby, Red Hot Chilli Peppers released Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Metallica released the Black album, The Cult release Ceremony, Guns N Roses released the Use Your Illusion I and II albums, Ozzy Osbourne released No More Tears, Skid Row released Slave To The Grind, Pantera released A Vulgar Display of Power and Van Halen released For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. The majority of the albums had a heavy rock feel and in the case of Van Halen it was return to the brown sound.

Coming into the recording process of Revenge, Kiss already had some momentum going with God Gave Rock N Roll To You, which appeared in the movie, Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey in 1991. The song is an Russ Ballard composition for the band Argent, however additional credit is given to Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley and Bob Ezrin. Argent at that time was trying to follow up their mega hit, Hold Your head Up, so when God Gave Rock And Roll To You came out, it bombed. However the song is a great song, and it is a good thing that Kiss rescued it and turned it into a hit.

For Kiss to be relevant in the Nineties, they had to do something different, so they hired a marketing consultant firm to find out what the fans wanted. The answers came back. The fans wanted more Demon, more heaviness, more rock and an album to rival 1976’s Destroyer. It was time to get the team together. Bob Ezrin who produced the epic Destroyer and the terrible Music From The Elder was hired to produce.

The biggest decision made was to use the fantastic, talented and egotistical Vinnie Vincent as a songwriter. Simmons and Stanley realised that Vincent’s contributions to the Creatures of The Night and Lick It Up albums, had produced songs that have become some of the best and well known Kiss songs in recent memory. The sinister single opener Unholy was written by Simmons and Vincent. It is heavy, it is evil and it fit perfectly in the current music climate at the time.

You send your children to war
To serve bastards and whores

It’s a tough lyric line. There is that devilish theme throughout the song.

Other classic Vincent penned songs that appear on Revenge are Heart of Chrome is written by Paul Stanley, Vinnie Vincent and Bob Ezrin, while I Just Wanna is written by Paul Stanley and Vinnie Vincent.

It is a shame that this song writing partnership went sour so quickly again, and they haven’t collaborated since.

Revenge is Kiss being themselves and by doing that, they made a record that satisfied the hard core fan bases and somehow also fitted in with the times,

Of course, the album is also in memory to drummer Eric Carr, who passed away due to cancer, before the recording process started. Eric Singer took his place in the band and he has been with Kiss, since then. How good was the Badlands project that Eric Singer was in, with Jake E.Lee, Ray Gillen and Greg Chaisson? However that is for another day.

Music

Dave Nadolski – Off Your Mind and more Under The Flood

All I can say, is that Dave Nadolski has some pipes on him. Very similar in style to Chris Daughtry. The song is good, however it is still in the same modern rock style that other artists do a bit better.

For those who don’t know, Dave Nadolski is the lead singer of the band Under The Flood.

Under The Flood have been doing the hard roads since forming in 2005 by bothers Matt (guitars) and Dave (vocals) Nadolski. The first album, The Witness was released in May 2008. Alive In The Fire was released in June 2010 and A Different Light in February 2012.

At the moment they are recording new music for a new release.

However, the web presence of the band, needs some major renovations. The Facebook page is far from informative, the twitter feed offers nothing really useful and the ReverbNation account is also left unattended.

They need to start promoting themselves right now, way in advance of the release of new material.

They need to start connecting with their fan base. They need to give songs away for email addresses. They need to be able to hit send and reach their fans whenever they are ready.

The Facebook presence needs to be updated with more content, so that people keep coming back. It needs to be grown. The Twitter account as well. Posting pictures without any description or story is just not good enough.

They need that one song that will connect and mobilise the fans, as their success depends upon the fans breaking the record to the masses. The days of the press breaking records are over.

Alternate Reality, Copyright, Music, Piracy, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

Fear of the New – Alternate History

The Pirate Bay celebrated their 7 year raid anniversary a few days ago, so the question needs to be asked, what can the music business learn from The Pirate Bay? The Pirate Bay has been court blocked in various countries, however, that still hasn’t stopped people in those countries from accessing the website, via proxies. On top of all that, the site has gone through numerous changes, like removing its tracker then moving to magnet links, and a few months ago the torrent site moved to the cloud. The site has also switched domain names on multiple occasions.

All of these changes make the site more resilient and it all started seven years ago, when the Pirate Bay was first raided.

So let’s think about this for a second. The Pirate Bay, is a site that wants to escape the long arm of justice and in order to do so, they keep on innovating so that they remain open.

So what has the RIAA (the music labels lobby group) done during the last 7 years on the innovation front. All I keep on reading, is that Google keeps on getting millions of take down requests from the RIAA and the labels. They still want legislation enacted that will put the internet under their control. They still want others (like ISP’s) to enforce copyright breaches. Basically, they still want others to pay for their own short comings.

Let’s see what an alternate history could have been created, if the RIAA innovated instead of legislated.

2003 – The Pirate Bay and MySpace is established. The RIAA and MPAA take the opportunity to purchase the technology and employ the creators. With integration between both technologies, both sites are relaunched as The Entertainment Portal. Users that want to upload, need to create an account, however users that want to download don’t need to be members. Downloading is all free and the The Entertainment Portal makes money from advertisements.

2004 – The Entertainment Portal want to engage more people to upload their collections, especially hard to find and long forgotten titles. They even give out awards to the people who upload the most, much in the same way they give out gold records to artists who sell.

In the meantime, The Entertainment Portal has been working on advancing the MySpace technology, so that users can also personalise it and share their own stories.

2005 – Cyber lockers start to become a threat, however The Entertainment Portal is too busy innovating to care. A video sharing technology is released. It is called YouTube. A new feature is also added where users can do status updates. Everything is rebranded to become The Portal, a one stop shop for anything to do with entertainment.

2006 – A streaming service is offered for both music and movies. Users can also stream new release movies into their homes on the same day of release. The Portal encourages users to do movie launch parties and to share it over the Portal. Users are also encouraged to create their own “hangouts”, where they can play radio DJ to other people in the hangout.

… to be continued

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