3: Lead A Scene

Position yourself as a leader. Put something together that doesn’t exist and get others involved.

- Derek Sivers

Comments

[Barthol]

Is this the whole "article"?

It's a great idea and I have experimented with it for around five years in different mediums (music, fashion, writing). The thing is that although it's glossy and seems logical, it might turn out to be really hard to do. A scene or a subculture consists of more than music, it's fashion, beliefs, places and what not. Getting people involved in that takes far more energy and time than getting them to listen to your music once or multiple times. This is even more true if your listeners are adults and not teens.

One of my favorite examples of this approach is Die Antwoord who introduced a new kind of aesthetics with their video for "Beat boy" and other tracks. The case is that they rather exported the exotic feel of their country to a western audience. They didn't create it, they just exported it. Exotic works well in music, as can be seen from the current Angola techno, kuduro influence on the global dance music. So maybe what you're doing every day could be a scene somewhere else. Internet is a great channel for broadcasting it.

All in all whenever you have the possibility to lead and (further) develop a scene, do it! But it might not be worth your time to start constructing your own scene and recruiting followers. Would you want to join a scene every time you like a band? Then again Kerli and Lady Gaga seem to have achieved success through exactly that.

Barthol from fluon.blogspot.com