Live Musician Central

  

Probably the single most important thing a live musician can do to successfully market themselves, their band and their music is to network with as many other musicians as they possibly can. I can tell you from experience that I’m able to keep playing gigs because of who I know and associate with in my musical realm. I’m not a big self-promoter but I have contacts and friends in the music world that are really good with promotion and finding gigs. Networking with these types of people have really helped me advance my career. By networking with other bands and musicians you can increase your chances of hooking up with them for all sorts of gigs and musical projects.

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   Playing a charity gig can be a fantastic way to do some good in your community and give you an excellent opportunity to do some band marketing. Every live musician is looking for as much exposure as possible to be able to market their band and music to as many people as they can reach. If your band gets the chance to play a charity benefit you should take a good look at the potential of reaching a large audience that you normally wouldn’t get to come to your regular shows.

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   One of the biggest challenges you’ll face as a band is getting people to come out and see you when you play. It’s not as big of a problem when you’re in a cover band that’s playing in clubs where there’s a regular crowd every weekend that enjoys music by live musician’s. If you’re playing original music, it can be difficult to fill up a room consistently. Whatever type of band you’re in, there are a few methods you can use to get people out to your shows.

   The first thing you need to do of course is network all of the bands friends and family. They’ll be your biggest source of quality audience because they should already like you, at least personally. In a lot of clubs you can set up a guest list to get family members in for free. It’s always nice when you can tell your family that you’ll get them in to see you for free and it’s a way to encourage them to show up knowing that they’ll be expected at the door. Read more »

   A cover song is a song that has been recorded by another artist and that your band will be playing. Some famous artists that have played cover songs are Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Van Halen, The Rolling Stones. A lot of current artists will play cover songs as well and go on to have big hits playing them. The good thing about playing cover songs is that the song has already been marketed to the masses and has been proven to be a well loved hit. So your chances of having success playing the song is very high. There are a couple ways you can approach playing a cover song.

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   One of the funnest but most difficult things you’ll have to do as a band is decide on a band name. It can be extremely frustrating deciding on a name that everyone in the band agrees on. Instead of agreeing on a name that everyone loves, it almost always comes down to a name that everyone doesn’t hate. So how can you pick a name for your band?

   The first thing you need to do is come up with a list of potential band names. How do you choose band names? There is really no rule as anything could be used as a band name. I would suggest looking at the type of music the band is playing, or the type of people in the band. Is there something that stands out about your band that you want to point out? In my band Shufflin’ Noah we had written a song called 40 Days And 40 Nights so one of the names suggested was Noah. We felt that was too generic so we decided to add the word Shufflin’ to the front of it. That was on a list that included names like Spoon Playin’ Noah, Street Rappin’ Noah as well as a bunch of others. We finally decided on Shufflin’ Noah because we wanted people to dance to our music. Read more »

   Every band has it’s own unique talent level that comes from each individual band member’s personal skill level. I’ve played with guitarists that are just amazing with Jazz music but couldn’t play even the simplest of Rock-N-Roll music. I’ve played with bass players that could hold down a perfectly steady beat, until they had to play a funk bass line and then they struggled like crazy. I’ve had the same thing happen with bands as whole that I’ve been in. I’ve been in bands that could play classic Rock-N-Roll flawlessly but couldn’t even start to play any heavy metal. I’ve seen bands that play Country like nobody’s business but can’t rock at all.

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   One of the most important pieces of marketing material you will produce for your band is your demo recording. I’ve already discussed using a live recording in your marketing kit

as opposed to a studio produced recording. Today I would like to discuss your song selection that you will be including on your demo. The songs you choose for your demo can sell your band in many different ways.

   I guess it’s a no-brainer that you will want to put your best songs on the demo recording. What determines your best songs? A combination of different things. Obviously you want the songs that you actually play the best. These would be the songs that the band knows like the back of their hand. Songs that you play perfectly every time you play them. It’s very important that you give a great consistent performance of your demo songs so when you play them in another club you will sound like your demo.    Read more »

One of the most important parts of your bands marketing strategy is your Demo CD. The Demo CD is going to be one of your biggest selling points in getting new gigs for your band. I’m going to give you a few tips for putting together a Demo CD that will help sell your band to club owners.

   I was listening to Demo CD’s one night with a club owner who was trying to sift through prospective band for his club. I remember he kept saying things like ”Studio recording”, “Studio Effects”, and “Too Produced”. And he would toss those Demo CD’s in the trash. What the guy was looking for was a live representation of how the band would sound when they played in his club.

   So the most important aspect of putting together a successful Demo CD is to make a good live recording of your band. Preferably with a lot of crowd cheering mixed in. Club owners want an accurate snapshot of how you’ll sound playing in their club. They want to hear how you talk to the crowd and how the crowd is reacting to you. So a live CD is the must for getting into clubs.

   If you do want to mix a few studio tracks on your Demo CD that’s okay, but put them at the end. Club owners really don’t care what you sound like in the studio. The best thing to do is have the live demo for the club owners and a studio demo to give to fans at your shows. The studio demos should also have some live tracks at the end because you never know when one of your fans is going to put a Demo CD in the hands of someone who can line gigs up for you.

   There are a couple ways to capture a good live CD. One is to record your show at a club that you regularly play at and hopefully you’ll catch a good night. Another way is to control things a bit more and invite a rowdy crowd of friends to a more controlled environment for recording. I’ve done both and the demo’s we’ve recorded with a crowd of friends has usually turned out better just because the band was more relaxed and interacting easier with the crowd. Remember, the club owners want to hear some stage banter.

   Finally, put your best songs on the Demo CD. Make sure they’re the songs that everybody will know and recognize. If you want to really show off your skills with a highly technical song, only put one on. Also, unless you want to play weddings, only put one slow song on the Disc.

   It’s really excellent practice to record all your live shows because you never know when you’re going to have that perfect gig. You just may get the live recording of a lifetime. So be prepared by having a recorder at the gig recording your show.

   With gas prices taking a huge chunk of change out of all of our pockets, bands are looking for ways to stay in touch with their audience. Today I’m going to talk a bit about streaming a live concert online for all your fans to enjoy.

  The easiest way that I’ve found to do this is with a great Internet streaming service called Shoutcast. It’s a music stream that you can listen to with either Winamp or iTunes. You can check it out at www.shoutcast.com and it’s very easy to set up. Here are 3 links on how to set everything up: Read more »

   Let’s face it, gas prices are taking a heavy toll on every industry in the U.S.. Musicians are no better off than any other travelling worker. I’ve been reading about a lot of music groups having to turn down gigs just because the amount of travel involved made it impossible to make any profit on a gig.

   The problem we face in terms of gas prices is all the equipment we have to haul. That makes it pretty much impossible for a band to carpool together. In my band it takes 4 vehicles to get everything to a show. Most of our gigs are within 45 miles of our house but one of our members always has to travel 100 miles or more to get to a gig. Needless to say, gas costs really add up when you’re having to travel that far.

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