We set AIG's logo on fire!!!

It’s Heron Demarco folks.

Some of you may be familiar with my posts in the past. There are those who agree with my points of view while there are those that don’t.

My band and I, Silent Disorder recently released our debut EP entitled Everything Burns and the concept of the album is based on the idea of letting go of old ideas and “baggage” that hinder one’s potential.

Our current economic crisis can only be blamed on two things: greed and excess.
It is greed that has decimated society’s logic, ruined families, and left a generation in tatters.

Hope and faith is about all we can hold on to during these trying times.

The vile stench of fear pollutes the streets of NY as well as the rest of the world. I have seen the faces of the jobless and war beaten. I know them, I hear their stories and only a soulless fuck couldn’t feel their pain.

With that being said, the night I discovered the good folks at AIG handed out 200 million in bonuses (of tax payers money) to their people I was infuriated, disgusted, and a little ashamed. There are families living in huts and these people still have the gall to justify their stance. Amazing!

Therefore as a stand against the greed and corruption that has set us back to an economic time unheard of since the Great Depression…

WE SET FIRE TO AIG’s LOGO..

You may view the image here:

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f116/art_and_war/cdcover_final2.jpg

..in protest against any company that puts greed before the needs of the people. (Ironically I am a part of an industry that is synonymous with that mindset.)

It was a decision my band mates and I wrestled with. We all spoke about the risks, and the potential backlash, but in the end we chose to make a statement.

We spent our life savings putting this album together. Everything we had. For we told ourselves that it was gonna be all or nothing

Feel free to download our album as well:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WXTQTQD9

I realize now more than ever what Bob Dylan meant when he said….”When you ain’t got nothing..you got nothing to lose”

So many artists, and people are afraid to take a stand. Take a risk, and shake things up.
If nothing else we did it our way.

Peace

Heron Demarco

Emcee/producer/guitarist of Silent Disorder
www.myspace.com/indisorderwetrust
http://indisorderwetrust.blogspot.com/

Digital Downloads, Industry Revolution -- Penn State Gets It!!

As I strolled ignorantly to my theater class this afternoon, completely forgetting that it had been canceled, I decided to pick up a copy of PSU’s newspaper, The Daily Collegian. And I am SO glad I did, because I came across 2 very refreshing articles:

Digital Downloads: City Lights, other music stores wary of future

Musicians Embracing Needed Revolution

To be honest, usually most of the articles that come out of our newspaper aren’t the highest caliber. But the authors of these articles really surprised me with their knowledge of the music industry! It was definitely an eye-opening experience for me because until today I had yet to meet anyone at PSU with as much interest in the music industry as me. If you get me rambling about the music industry up here in Happy Valley, I usually get incessant nodding or eyes rolling from listeners -- frankly, it seems like they would rather do a kegstand. Not that there’s anything wrong with kegstands…  Oh, college.

Anyway, I was glad to see that college students are thinking about the music industry & realizing that we are in the midst of some huge changes. 

Feel free to comment about these articles I'd love to see what you guys think about them!

Chris

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Chris Bracco is an aspiring producer/music biz entrepreneur. Chris currently attends Penn State University, working towards a major in Business Management and minor in Music Technology. He is also currently interning for Ariel Publicity & Cyber PR, doing promotion for artists they represent. He also plays guitar in & manages a funky rap/rock quintet named "A.S.B.P.K."

If you would like to learn a bit more about Chris, please visit his personal e-portfolio, his blog or his band's website:
Chris Bracco's E-Portfolio 
Tight Mix -- The Future of Music & Audio Recording
A.S.B.P.K. Music

If you would like to contact Chris, please don’t hesitate to e-mail him at cob5020@psu.edu

Artists House Music

Check out this site for interviews with the top music industry professionals, musicians, administrators, and more. Great way to learn about the industry in the present and future. I'm doing producer work for this website this summer by interviewing a classical music symphony and its administration. Great learning tool.

www.artistshousemusic.org 

Creating your Marketing Funnel

I’m an avid follower of online marketing guru Ali Brown. Ali Brown publishes the award-winning ‘Highlights on Marketing & Success’ weekly e-zine that includes marketing tips for small business owners.

The marketing funnel in small businesses is a very old principle. It’s been around for years. Your Marketing Funnel is a simple way of looking at how your products and service offerings are structured, and how you can sell at a wide array of price points. So lets put this in the perspective of an artist and how you can construct your levels of your marketing funnel.

Click to read more ...

The Secret To Making Money Playing Live Music

The simple secret to making money playing live music is:

1. Create exciting market worthy music products, both recorded and live
2. Expose your music through every possible avenue at your disposal, both terrestrial and digital
3. Focus more of your time on selling live music interactions to your fans than to night clubs.

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A Widgets Primer & Useful Ones for Musicians

I recently had to write a position paper for my internship over at Ariel Publicity & Cyber PR. Just figured I’d post it here! I hope you find it to be a great read about widgets for musicians.

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Small is the new big

It’s no longer cool to be on a label.

When I put out my first CD in 1994, you had to be signed to be taken seriously. So I created my own label, 11th Records. I even went so far as to sign another band to my roster. Loosely translated, I sold a friend’s CDs on my web site. My letters went out on business letterhead, and I made phone calls as the label owner, doing my best to hide my embarrassment when forced to confess that I was also the artist. I had one web site for the label, and another for the band. Both were written in the third person. To the outside world, I was a mystery man hiding behind a corporate apparatus.

Click to read more ...

Could SURRGE be a successful model for the future?

SURRGE, still in its beta form, is a music discovery site with a cash reward. You sign up, find music, recommend it, and if someone buys music you refer, you get paid. You can use the $$ to buy more music on the site or have it transferred to your bank account.

How successful will the site be remains to be seen, but could this model be a game changer? Could the motivation of cash generate a reliable new network of filters that effectively pull good music to the surface?

A quick scan of the hip hop most popular shows a mix of fairly underground artists and a few unknowns (at least to me). Lil’ Wayne is not on there. Neither is T.I..

The idea of rewards-for-refers is not brand new. Amie St has been doing this for years…but you get credit. Not cash.

One of the most challenging parts of reinventing the music industry is effectively leveling the playing field so that more great acts get heard more often and actually have a profitable career. One of most successful ways for this to happen is effective filters.

Could we see a new career spring up of people who get paid directly through each single recommendation?

Definitely a site/model to watch.

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Alex Beguin is a writer and lyricist. He is working on helping emerging artists organize, grow and connect. He writes for Adesso Means Now

The Future of the Music Biz?

Hi it's Dan Freeman from Comandante Zero.  A couple of months ago as we were looking to finance our record, I did a bunch of research into the current state of the industry and tried to figure out where it was going.  I put together this piece for our blog and Ariel Hyatt suggested that I share it here.  So here it is. Btw, if anyone wants to read more about this topic, I included a whole bunch of links at the bottom of the post.  Enjoy.

The business model of the major labels (I refer to the 4 who are still standing - Warner Music Group, EMI, Sony and the Universal Music Group) essentially dates back to the mid-20th century. The record labels had full control over physical distribution, meaning that they sold records the way Proctor and Gamble sells shampoo: a record would be recorded, mastered and then physically distributed to stores around the world. Essentially the only way for an artist (say the Beatles) to have their album sold at your local record store was to enter into a recording contract with one of these major labels. The labels would take on the job of fronting the money for the living costs of the band while they made this record, the recording/studio costs of the record, the mastering costs of the record, the artwork design, the promotional costs of the record - including getting it to radio stations (and in some cases using payola to get them to play it) and finally the costs of physically shipping the records to stores around the world so that the consumer could buy them.

While the record company did a tremendous amount for the artist - it came at an often terrible price.

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3 Steps to Creating Online Attention Grabbers!

Featuring Online Marketing Maven: Theda Sandiford. Theda discusses the first step in getting bloggers attention: Creating a buzz and the benefit of continuously creating original content!

From our last interview with Martin from Allhiphop.com he pointed a key factor in getting bloggers attention is having a BUZZ.

“Consider us a record label in the fact that we want up and coming artists to have a buzz before we invest our bandwidth on them. Are you getting spins in your town and surrounding markets? If I were to call some DJ’s in your area, would they know about you? Maybe you have a cosign from an already established artist that would peak my interest in hearing your stuff out? Have you been covered in other press outlets? Do you have a reputable publicist that I have dealt with in the past that would make your introduction a safer bet? Point blank you just can’t come to me saying my music is hot. My music is hot too, and I don’t even Rap!”

When approaching a site I do agree completely too look at it as a Record Label. Bloggers are looking to feature artists that will help increase their traffic in some way so there needs to be some type of chatter happening about you online.

I was able to interview Theda Sandiford who is GREAT in creating effective social media strategies for artists. Her latest project was with Slim from 112’s solo album, Theda gives us a glimpse in her strategy to get Slim back on the blogosphere’s radar.

Click to read more ...

A new take on "pay what you want"

Josh Freese, former drummer for Nine Inch Nails has come up with an innovative take on "pay what you want". For $7, you can download his new album. For $50, you get the album and a "thank you" phone call. For $1,000 you get the album and he'll come over to do your laundry. The entire list is hilarious and worth reading, check it out here.

This was partially a publicity stunt, but the idea of having multiple price points is a good one. Businesses do this all the time -- it's called merchandising.

Instead of just selling a CD, can you throw in something unique to add value for your fans? How about an acoustic track recorded just for them, a CD-R of studio outtakes, or even a living room concert for different price points? Some "out of the box" thinking can help you create a product that is exciting for your fans, and get them even closer to your music.

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Chris Vinson is the creator of Bandzoogle.com the leading website builder for bands. Before launching Bandzoogle he worked as a web designer for a major record label, building dozens of sites for multi-platinum artists.

Pay What You Want

This post is not an opinion, but rather a call for help..

Radiohead and GirlTalk...Both highly discussed distribution models that could play a big role in future digital distribution or at least experiements in what people will pay for. Without getting into the should you or shouldn't you, I was wondering if anyone knows how to? Is the application that the websites use something that can be purchased or found online? or is it something that each of the artists developed?

I would really like to try this with my music and after hours of searching, cannot seem to find out how to do it. If anyone can shine any light I would be highly appreciative.

Ciao

Alex

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Alex is an emcee and poet who is extremly interested in new distribution and fan relationship models. He finds amusement in the theorys that the music industry and hip hop is dead and has recently moved to LA to work with those who aim to change that type of thinking.

Giving Away Your Music to create MORE Income Streams

Web 2.0 Strategy - Giving Away Your Music to create more Income Streams

A few weeks back I tweeted an article that I think ALL musicians should read. It was Andrew Dubber's : New Music Strategies - Why give music away for free?

http://newmusicstrategies.com/2008/12/31/why-give-music-away-for-free

Giving away music for free seems to be a SCARY thing in the music industry these days. Many artists are so in love with what they've created that they couldn't fathom even giving it away for free. The key to wrapping your mind around giving away music is to do it in exchange for something that can benefit you down the road i.e. bribing fans to sign up to your email list with a free mp3.

Andrew Dubber gave a GREAT reason on why giving away your music for free is not a bad thing:

- Don't try to make money from your music, make money BECAUSE of your music

After I posted that tweet I received an AWESOME email that I wanted to share just as a case study of how giving music away for free worked for an independent hip hop group.

Click to read more ...

F*ck Hip Hop?

I ask this question because it seems to be the general consensus among many people I know(including myself, but we’ll get into that in a bit). I understand the statement is rooted in frustration, disillusionment, and a dash of confusion, but I must admit their arguments are not baseless.

Whenever the topic of hip hop comes up in many circles I’m in, it’s usually met with silent grunts, frowns, angry mumbles and someone quickly changing the subject (I once had someone switch the damn topic to shitty diapers…Wow!)

I hear the same gripes time after time”….It’s repetitive…they don’t talk about anything real…the music hasn’t evolved…I’m tired of the gun talk..” The remarks can be rather brutal(and in my opinion well deserving).

If the topic survives for more than 30 seconds it usually transforms into a stroll down memory lane to revisit “the good ol’ days”. I swear when they speak I can smell the commanding scent of fresh vinyl, and used jan sport back packs filling the air as I am regaled with stories of crews long gone who “kept it real”.

If not visited with caution, nostalgia can behave like an invisible narcotic. Addictive, and as mind altering as any illegal substance picking at your spirit and leaving your mind stagnant ready to be devoured by the wolves of change.

Okay all mellow drama aside…

HIP HOP FUCKIN' SUCKS NOW!!

Click to read more ...