February 12, 2013 When you hear, “It’s all who you know,” it sounds so intimidating - like you need to be a former roommate of Mark Zuckerburg, cousins with Richard Branson, and dating Taylor Swift.
But simply contacting a stranger can lead to a worldwide network of connections.
November 28, 2011 I feel like I know almost nothing about business, because the only business I’ve ever done is the co-op / sharing model.
It goes like this:
1. You already have something that people want.
It might be something you own, something you’ve learned how to do, or access to valuable resources, space, or people.
2. Find a way to share it with everyone who needs it.
Share because it’s what you do for friends, because it’s the right thing to do, because it makes the world a better place, and because it’ll make you deeply happy.
November 11, 2010 In May 2003, Apple invited me to their headquarters to discuss getting CD Baby’s catalog into the iTunes Music Store.
iTunes had just launched two weeks before, with only some music from the major labels. Many of us in the music biz were not sure this idea was going to work. Especially those who had seen companies like eMusic do this exact same model for years without big success.
I flew to Cupertino thinking I’d be meeting with one of their marketing or tech people. When I arrived, I found out that about a hundred people from small record labels and distributors had also been invited.
We all went into a little presentation room, not knowing what to expect.
Then out comes Steve Jobs. Whoa! Wow.
He was in full persuasive presentation mode. Trying to convince all of us to give Apple our entire catalog of music. Talking about iTunes success so far, and all the reasons we should work with them.
Independent, iTunes June 15, 2010 Since 14, I was determined to be a great singer. But my pitch was bad, my tone was bad, and everyone said I was just not a singer.
At 17, I started taking voice lessons, and practicing two hours every night. I’d go into a soundproof room for two hours of long-tones, scales, arpeggios, and practicing specific song phrases over and over.
At 18, I started touring, doing two to four shows a week, always as the lead singer. Often they were outdoor shows, sometimes with no PA system at all, so I really had to learn how to project to be heard.
At 19, I was still practicing two hours a night, but still having a problem with pitch. People kept telling me I was just not a singer - that I should give it up, and find a real singer.
Then I heard a man giving a demonstration of Indian vocal music, and his pitch was so perfect, I went rushing up to him afterwards to ask how he did it.
I said, “How are you able to hit the notes so perfectly dead-on? Are you just natually good at this?”
He said, “No! When I first started singing, not only was I not within an inch of the note - I wasn’t within a football field of the note! I was horrible!”
“So how did you do it?”
He jabbed a finger in my chest, and looked me in the eye. “Practice. Thousands of hours of practice, and eventually I got it. I can show you how.”
May 25, 2010 Enough people have asked how I became Ryuichi Sakamoto’s guitarist, so I thought I should write down the story, in case it’s useful to anyone.
In 1991 I was 22 years old, and had moved to New York City to be a professional musician. I had a little home studio, and was doing some random gigs around town.
My roommate, Hoover Li, was an assistant engineer at a huge recording studio in midtown. Ryuichi Sakamoto was there recording his new album (Heartbeat).
Ryuichi mentioned to Hoover that he was looking for a guitarist for his next tour of Japan. Manu Katché on drums, Victor Bailey on bass. But no guitarist chosen yet. OMFG!
Hoover said, “My roommate is a great guitarist.”
February 26, 2010 Have you had some success at a music conference?
Could you distill a lesson from that success that you could share as advice to other musicians in under 2 minutes?
I’m doing the opening keynote-style one-hour talk at the South by Southwest Music Conference in three weeks, and I’d like to include you, if so.
January 25, 2010 Reading Seth Godin’s new book called Linchpin, I had some lingering questions on behalf of all the musicians I know.
So I asked him. Here are my questions and his answers:
You say, “the winners are the artists who give gifts”, but many artists I know are feeling like the losers. How would you explain your philosophy of the linchpin economy to a musician who’s making great music, giving it away online, but getting only apathy in return?
December 9, 2009 Here’s a business idea, inspired by an email from Stephen Brown today.
Put the street musician / busking process online. (“Busker” = “a person who entertains people for money in public places, while asking for money.”)
A website where videos of street musicians are collected all in one place, each with a PayPal link so anyone watching can give some money directly to that musician.
See a great musician playing on the street in Cuba, Argentina, Egypt, India, or anywhere else? Make the best recording you can with a video camera.
October 13, 2009 I thought I would never sell my company. I started it as a hobby in 1997. When NPR did a story about me in 2004, I said I’d stick it out until the end, and I meant it.
In 2007 I did a ground-up rewrite of the the website from scratch. And man, it was beautiful code. My proudest achievement of my life so far is that backend software. Wonderfully organized, extensible, and efficient: the culmination of everything I’d learned about programming in 10 years.
October 7, 2009 Gary Jules was a musician in Los Angeles who wished there was a Hollywood venue more friendly to musicians. A place where people would come to listen, not talk over the music. A place to play, not showcase.
Because there were no venues like that, he decided to make a new one.
He noticed a little coffee shop on Cahuenga. A perfect middle-of-Hollywood location, but had no music.
He asked if he could play there on Tuesday nights, and bring his own crowd and sound system. They let him.
September 28, 2009 A friend of mine was asked by a musician to help him do a huge mail-out of CDs.
The musician had pressed up 10,000 copies of his CD in anticipation of 10,000 orders that were sure to come through that week.
He had bought a quarter-page advertisement in the back of a magazine with a circulation of one million people.
He kept saying, “If only one percent of the people reading this magazine buy my CD… that’ll be 10,000 copies! And that’s only one percent!”
September 21, 2009 If you are a performing musician that sells CDs at your shows, please consider this:
Terry McBride of Nettwerk told this story at a recent conference:
A band he was managing was doing the usual thing of selling CDs for $15. They’d mention it once or twice from the stage, and sell about $300 per night on average.
He asked them to try a completely different approach:
September 5, 2009 When I would speak on panels at music conferences, I’d always find it funny how all of the panelists’ opinions were completely tainted by their own self-interest.
Someone would always ask us, “What’s the future of the music business?”
The guy whose company sells MP3s would say, “MP3s are the future. No DRM. Unencumbered. The public has spoken and they want MP3s.”
The guy whose company sells subscriptions would say, “Subscription services are the future. Anything, anytime, anywhere. No need to keep a huge music collection.”
August 30, 2009 Watch this video of Elizabeth Gilbert’s amazing 18-minute talk on creativity. Her speech was the hit of the TED Conference.
Absolutely amazing speech. Emotional, universal, insightful, educational, and funny.
She comes across so nonchalant, light, and conversational. Effortless.
When the conference was over, she asked me to walk with her back to her hotel, so we had a good 15 minutes to chat.
