Without doubt, one of the silliest gigs and tours mistakes I ever made in my music industry career was when I was 19 years old. I put up some money to help tour a guy called Alex Patterson from a group from the UK called The Orb.
What a mistake that was….
As some read this headline, most artists and bands are probably wondering why the hell playing rock gigs on a Monday night would be beneficial in any way to their career?
I can hear them all saying right now, is this guy out of his mind?
Why would I or any band want to play rock gigs or any gigs for that matter on a Monday night in front of absolutely nobody? Where’s the logic in that?
It’s one thing to try and book a whole bunch of gigs, however managing your time and schedule is just as important.
Some may call it planning for the future, however in the world of live music and touring it’s known as Gig management.
Music booking agents, or otherwise in the music business as just “booking agents” are a very rare breed of people. At first glance, they can appear like your best friend but behind the scenes boy are they complicated to figure out.
I have personally spent plenty of time in offices with music booking agents, learning analyzing and listening, and have signed multiple bands that I’ve managed to multiple agents over the past 10 years, and the one thing that constant shines through is one very simple strategy to attract the ideal agent for your band.
So you’ve got your demo recorded, the studio booked and are now sitting there thinking to yourself “there are a ton of record producers out there, how do we know which is the right producer for us?”
In some sense, record producers are a dime a dozen, most people today call themselves producers of some sorts, but what does that really mean?
The music industry is riddled with so many different types of people. You’ve got agents, music producers, labels, distributors, a/r guys, publicists, street teams, engineers, managers, PR people, publicists…. The list goes on.
However, when you book your next studio session and you lay out your life savings to pay for it, you better know the answer to the following question -
Regardless of how much money you have to blow on your next recording session, let’s face it, finding a music producer who will make your songs jump out through the speakers is a must.
Ok, so you’ve probably ended up on this page because of the catchy headline. Correct?
Admit it you want to know what comes after the “until…” part in the headline…..
Well without keeping you in suspense the end of the sentence is this -
Starting any sort of new venture can be quite stressful and time consuming let alone starting an independent record label.
If your mind is made up and you are sure about going down this path, then you must firstly be congratulated. There are not to many other businesses out there that are as difficult as trying to promote other people’s art.
Below are some tips and ideas to help you through your journey. Follow these tips and you’ll be sure not to end up like these dudes in the pic!
It’s probably assumed by most people that starting your own record label firstly requires some serious money behind it? It’s probably also assumed that if your considering starting your own record label that your going to need to employ lots of people aswell?
In truth, the above two points definitely help - who doesn’t want to start a new business with a wellspring of cash. However this is definitely not the case and if you do any research into some of the major subsidiary labels today, they all started off with very little money and hardly any resources other than the founders.
