CREATE YOUR OWN WEBSITE

CREATE YOUR OWN WEBSITE
Your Own Website In 10 Easy Steps

Thursday, July 19, 2007

HOW TO CUSTOMIZE YOUR MYSPACE PAGE

An attractive and well designed MySpace page is essential if you want your page to stand out.

Ideally you should aim to have a page that makes people stop and listen to your music and read about you or your band.

As you may have noticed, there are no instructions for how to customize your MySpace page and many people opt for some of the free MySpace layouts available.

But if you want something a bit different...here's a worthwhile tutorial for indie musicians who already have a MySpace page or would like to set one up.

You'll learn how to set up a basic site, change colours and a background, manipulate text and add some graphics.

Click here for a step by step guide to customizing your MySpace profile




[Resource http://www.webreference.com/authoring/design/MySpace_Band/]
at 12:18 pm 0 comments
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Thursday, July 05, 2007

HOW TO HELP YOUR FANS HELP YOU SELL YOUR MUSIC

Do your fans love your music? Why not let them help you sell it - with a twist.

Invite your fans to sign up for a FREE account with GoodStorm then upload your music onto a nifty little widget gadget called 'MixTape'.

MixTape can then be uploaded on your fans website and/or MySpace page. Visitors can then listen to and purchase downloads generating revenue for you and your fans :-)


[Resource http://music.goodstorm.com/
at 4:01 pm 0 comments
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Friday, June 29, 2007

WANT YOUR MUSIC INDUSTRY QUESTIONS ANSWERED?

Attention Independent Musicians - I need your help!

Imagine being able to sit down with a record label manager, a promoter, venue booker, successful artist, music journalist, publicist or anyone else involved in the music industry and ask them any question you want.

Well, I'd like to make it happen. I want you to have access to as much information and resources as possible to help you and your career. I've just opened a new forum at my website http://www.theindiemusician.com/ and I'd like to invite music industry 'guests' along so you can speak to them directly.

But there's a small hitch...

No questions = No guests. That's why I'm calling for your help. Together we can create a such a forum, a place where you get a chance to uncover the secret workings of the music industry.
Most independent musicians face similar challenges, so if you've got a question, chances are many others are wondering the same thing. Don't be shy, tell me who you'd like me to invite to the forum and I'll invite them. Maybe you'd like to ask a question to other independent musician's or offer some advice of your own.

I've included some other Discussion Board topics so you can also:
  • Look for a band member
  • Post a musician available message
  • Advertise a music item you have for sale
  • Post a (music related) item wanted request
  • List your music business or service

I look forward to seeing you soon in The Indie Musician's online Forum.

[Resource http://www.theindiemusician.com/]
at 8:53 pm 0 comments
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Wednesday, June 27, 2007

SUBMIT YOUR CD FOR WORLDWIDE DISTRIBUTION

LA based indie label is calling for submissions for all genres of retail ready CD's for their distribution system.

Boosweet distributes worldwide through partnerships with international distributors.

If you're interested email info@boosweet.com with "Distribution Opportunity" in the subject heading.

[Resource http://www.boosweet.com/]
at 11:24 am 0 comments
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Friday, June 15, 2007

NEW WAYS TO DELIVER YOUR MUSIC

Here are some interesting custom USB drives from the White Stripes.


[Resource http://whitestripes.kungfunation.com/]
at 4:38 pm 0 comments
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Saturday, June 09, 2007

GIGGING IN THE UK

A nice idea and a handy way to find a venue in the UK.

At this MySpace website http://www.myspace.com/livemusicvenuesuk you will find "A place to find live music in the UK".


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at 3:17 pm 0 comments
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Friday, June 08, 2007

A UK BEACH BREAK

Plenty of touring bands are now touring in an environmentally friendly way and now it seems like music festivals may be going green. At least one UK music festival called "Beach Break Live" is aiming to have a positive impact on the local environment.

A new British student festival is aiming to do more than become carbon neutral. Beach Break Live, a three day event in Cornwall taking place from June 11-14, has taken a number of steps to have an environmentally and socially positive impact. The micro festival (just 3,000 visitors) has organized cheap bus travel for students from their universities, keeping road transit and parking to a minimum. Beach Break Live takes place during a mid-week outside the peak holiday season, which means it's providing the local economy with a boost during downtime. Furthermore, most food and drink will be sourced locally: beef and lamb from neighbourhood farms, beer from Skinner's, a Cornwall brewery, bottled water from a Cornish spring, seafood from Cornish waters, and even toilet paper from a nearby paper recycling plant.

Read more aboutBeach Break Live here.

[Resource http://www.springwise.com/weekly/2007-06-07.htm]
at 1:07 pm 0 comments
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Thursday, June 07, 2007

MICROSOFT IGNITION

Microsoft is introducing an initiative on Monday to promote emerging music acts.

Called Ignition, the program is designed to expose new artists and their music to consumers for an entire month by featuring exclusive content through Microsoft's multiple services—including MSN, Xbox Live and Zune.

The first participating act is U.K. band Maximo Park (Warp Records/Caroline Distribution). Microsoft is providing the group's first single as a free exclusive download via the Zune Marketplace, making the music video available as a free download from the Xbox Live Marketplace and streaming the video on MSN.

Read more here.

[Resource http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2140851,00.asp]
at 9:43 am 1 comments
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Wednesday, June 06, 2007

LAST FM BOUGHT BY CBS

Is Last.fm worth$280 million? US television network CBS seem to think so. They've also put their money where their mouth is and bought it.

Here's a brief description of what they've purchased:

"Over 15 million users frequent the Last.fm site, which was founded five years ago and allows users to connect with listeners who share similar music tastes. Users can also create their own radio stations and watch music video clips."

Click here to read the article.


[Resource http://www.spannerworks.com/seotoolkit/search-marketing-news/article/view/social-music-site-lastfm-bought-by-cbs/551/]
at 10:07 am 0 comments
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Tuesday, June 05, 2007

SHARE YOUR MUSIC VIDEO

Here's a list of the top 10 sites to share your music videos.

Google Video - This easy-to-use video sharing site, because it's owned by Google, is recommended to help get traffic via search traffic on Google.com. It is simple, well organized, and has a huge database of various videos from different categories like comedy, animation, music videos, TV shows, and sports. Look to these different niches and upload your video with related keywords to attract traffic.

YouTube - Also owned by Google, YouTube is the most popular video sharing website in the world. Its colossal database attracts millions of visitors everyday and sharing videos, either via email or web site, is easy. If you upload your content to only one web site, it should be YouTube. Videos may be rated and comments on videos are encouraged. While you're there, visit Music Business Video for helpful videos for upcoming musicians, bands, and songwriters.

MySpace - As a musician, you're probably already using MySpace to promote yourself. Videos uploaded to MySpace may be shared and posted to MySpace profiles other than your own, so take advantage of this by uploading your content and letting your circle of friends know. The majority of bands and musicians on MySpace are not using video, so take advantage of this by claiming your place on personal pages now.

Blip - A great site for video bloggers, users can set up your own "blog" quickly and drive traffic to it by posting videos from several different categories. Because of this, your video needs to be here.

AOL Video - The video section from aol.com contains a large variety of videos from both commercial and non-commercial providers. Very easy to use, due to the simplicity of its design and strong search options, AOL Video easily allows users to find the latest news about their your favorite musicians and bands.

Revver - A video-sharing platform built and committed to the artist, Revver has the best sound and video quality of any video sharing site on this list.

Vimeo - Another free and easy service for sharing videos with friends and family. Recently launched, this website unfortunately does not bring anything new to the table. Still, as part of a complete promotion, it's a good idea that you post your video here.

MetaCafe - Metacafe is another popular media and video sharing community. Unlike other major video-sharing platforms, Metacafe offers a desktop application, mainly targeted at users who are downloading several videos per week.

Daily Motion - Nothing special here, but worth noting. The videos are sorted in groups, which make it easy to browse and find what you are looking for. Simple by design, Daily Motion contains a numerous variety of videos, from music videos, to non-entertainment topics such as science & technology.

EyeSpot - Not your average video sharing website. Besides a variety of videos EyeSpot offers its users the chance to play with copyrighted media, without having to download elaborate software or learn new skills. This platform will allows you to edit, mix, and remix your favorite videos, photos or music.


These come from an article called Top 20 Video Sharing Sites for Musicians


[Resource http://www.indiemusician.com/2007/06/top_20_video_sh.html]
at 12:08 pm 2 comments
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Monday, June 04, 2007

THE FUTURE OF MUSIC JOURNALISM

"...The best music blogs offer the best of what people used to love about the music press, that tradition of irreverence and iconoclasm..."


"...Online fanzines and blogs dedicated to music are the future of rock and roll journalism..."


"...Music blogs and album reviews are the way of the future as they offer fans "the kind of irreverence and gonzo sensibility" which mainstream music journalism used to be about..."


These comments come from a recent article written by Australian music journalist Andrew Mueller who has previously written for London based music publication, Melody Maker.







[Resource http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=270724]
at 9:03 am 0 comments
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Sunday, June 03, 2007

8 TIPS FOR INDIE ARTISTS

1. You don’t need a record deal to “make it” in the music industry. The industry has changed and that is no longer the absolute measure of your success. You can define your own success.


2. As an Indie artist, you won’t have anyone telling you what to play, how to dress, how to promote your CD, which songs to sing or who to socialize with. It is all about you and your creativity!


3. Financial freedom is one of the most wonderful things about being an independent artist. You can come up with all types of music promotional ideas about how you market your music and what you do with your profits.


4. Spend the most amount of time on your first album. Take full advantage of every musician resource out there. First impressions are everything so you want this first one to be great.



Click here to read tips 5 to 8



[Resource http://music.blogonarticles.com/2007/05/31/top-eight-tips-for-indie-artists/]
at 5:17 pm 0 comments
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Saturday, June 02, 2007

FRETFEST

Attention Brisbane (Australia) singer/songwriters:

fRETfEST is an acoustic music festival promoting Brisbane singer/songwriters.

Now in its 10th year, fRETfEST has previosly given exposure to such artists as Pete Murray.



Find of the Year '07 is now on and you can enter and find out all you need to know here.



[Resource http://www.fretfest.com/]
at 10:20 am 0 comments
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Friday, June 01, 2007

GOOGLE, YOUTUBE AND EMI UNITE

All four of the world's major music companies are now official partners of YouTube.

The signing between YouTube and EMI Group allows YouTube users to watch EMI's music videos and create user generated content around the videos.

Read EMI's press release here.

[Resource http://searchengineland.com/070531-132500.php]
at 3:12 pm 0 comments
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Wednesday, May 30, 2007

THE RISE OF THE INDIE BANDS

"Spider-Man 3" will be one of the biggest movies of 2007. But the producers of the megasequel, which grossed nearly $250 million domestically in the first 10 days of its release, didn't rely on mainstream rock acts Nickelback or Evanescence to give their story its musical underpinnings.

Snow Patrol's "Signal Fire" is the soundtrack's lead single, but after that mainstream entry is a heady slate of indie rock's finest: the Walkmen, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the Oohlas, Black Mountain, Wolfmother, Rogue Wave, Coconut Records, Sounds Under Radio and the Flaming Lips. This soundtrack's mainstream nod to rock that is independent in nature furthers a trend music fans have noticed more and more the past five years.

The revolution known as indie rock - a subgenre emphasizing individual creative interests over commercial viability - has landed squarely in the mainstream. Bands that used to rock warehouse tours, playing to crowds of 20 or 30 people throughout the Midwest, are now in major films, primetime broadcast and cable television shows, and commercials for McDonald's, Dell and Nissan.

Keep reading article here.


[Resource http://origin.denverpost.com/healthcare/ci_5920752]
at 11:24 am 0 comments
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Saturday, May 26, 2007

WHO PAYS FOR THE RECORDING COSTS?

There are no real rules about who should pay for recording costs. If you’re an unsigned band who goes into the studio to record an album with your own money and you get signed to a record label who releases that album, then those costs stay with the band. The label does not have to pay you back the money you spent on recording the album, although that expense you have taken on can be considered when you’re negotiating an advance with the record label. If you get signed to a label on the strength of demo and the label wants you to record an album for them to release, often the label will pay for at least a portion of this recording. However, a smaller indie label that simply doesn’t have money to spend on recording costs might say, “well, you record an album, and we’ll release it,” leaving those costs up to the band.


If the label pays for the recording of an album, they have a right to withhold earnings from the band until they recoup all of the costs they have put into the album. Also, if the label pays for the recording, they generally have more of a say in how the album sounds. The extent to which the label exercises this right varies from label to label.


If you sign a multi album deal with a record label, make sure the contract clearly states who is responsible for the recording cost of each album (and if you sign a multi album deal, ideally the label will take on the bulk of the recording costs).


Suggested Reading

Send a Demo to a Label

How to Record a Demo

Create a Promo Package


[Resource http://musicians.about.com/od/beingamusician/f/recordingcosts.htm]
at 12:55 pm 0 comments
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Thursday, May 24, 2007

U2 3D

Interesting concept of a music video. Will it catch on or will it be a fad?

U2 AT THE FOREFRONT OF TECHNOLOGY


[Resource http://www.thecelebritycafe.com/features/10014.html]
at 10:03 am 0 comments
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Wednesday, May 23, 2007

FINDITT MUSIC NEWS

Music News Now Part of Finditt News Menu


Monroe, Ga. 5/21/2007 8:05 PM GMT (FINDITT - Top Story)


Musicians, record labels, recording studios, music industry executives, concert venue owners, music agents and music reps. can now place their news and press releases under the Music heading in Finditt News and TransWorldNews.com.


The new heading will be designated for those news and press releases that deal directly with the music business and the artists and musicians that make up the industry.
Independent artists can take advantage of press releases to create exposure and awareness surrounding their music. Announcing tour dates or an album release through a press release can brings attention from not only current fans but new listeners as well.


Record labels looking for global marketing of music can feature new music news from breakout artists, up and coming musicians and established musicians. Press releases announcing new albums, singles, chart positions and more can serve to educate fans and aid in promoting each artist.


Music agents and music reps. can feature news surrounding new artists that they are representing or announce musicians that they are currently looking to represent in the Finditt News music section.


To distribute your Music News through Finditt and TransWorldNews simply create your account at: http://www.transworldnews.com/

[Resource http://www.transworldnews.com/NewsStory.aspx?storyid=16520&ret=Default.aspx]
at 9:18 pm 0 comments
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WHY INDIE ARTISTS SHOULD PODCAST

Independent artists have long struggled to gain recognition and attract an audience. Without the backing of a major label it can be very difficult for independent artists to obtain radio play time, that is, until now. Podcasting a revolutionary new medium, has opened new distribution channels for independent artists. Podcasting is the process of distributing audio files using the RSS format and has become very popular with the younger generations.

With the use of technology, independent artists have a unique opportunity available, using technology they can significantly expand the exposure of their music.

Why should a musician podcast?


[Resource http://www.bestsyndication.com/?q=052107_podcasting-for-musicians-and-artists.htm]
at 11:45 am 0 comments
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Tuesday, May 22, 2007

INDIE DOWNLOAD CARDS

Many independent artists make most of their revenue at merchandise tables after they play a live show. Audiences connect with a band or song, and are most likely to pay for music during the post-gig buzz. As bands are moving from CDs to digital downloads, they need something to hook potential customers when they can, instead of asking them to download later. Which is a challenge DiscRevolt aims to solve. The start-up describes its download cards as a cross between a gift card, a backstage pass and a baseball trading card. They're designed to be collectible items, attachable to lanyards or backpacks or rear-view mirrors. The fact that artists design their own artwork, and often make cards in limited runs, adds to the appeal.

Visit DiscRevolt for more information.

[Resource http://www.springwise.com/weekly/2007-05-16.htm]
at 10:29 am
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