Musicadium Blog

Musicadium interviews one of our first signed up artists, death metal Melbourne band, Vahrzaw.

Q. What styles and influences are on your latest album?
Scott[S]: Well, there’s the obvious black and death metal style with a few thrash riffs. As far as influences go, mine would be the early 90s death metal and 2nd wave of black metal, primarily the Norwegian scene. The newer metal is far too generic to influence me and is somewhat soulless.
George[G]: Styles – Black Metal, Death Metal, and Thrash. Influences – See our MySpace page.

Q. What did you think of the last Harry Potter book?
G: Harry Who? I don’t read kids books.

(more…)

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1. Stick around after every show and mingle with your fans.
   Get them talking about their favourite music, their favourite songs of yours, their favourite venues and their favourite record stores. All this information is invaluable in shaping you as a band and understanding how to
   access your fanbase.
2. Give your true fans free demos, cheap merchandise, free entry, and their names on the door and exclusive updates.
   Make them feel a part of something. Make them feel a part of your band.
3. Keep it personal.
   When fans email or MySpace you, write a personal reply. Whenever possible, keep it personal. Avoid blanket mail outs at all costs. That just makes true fans feel like strangers. Send 50 personalised messages to 50 people. I promise you that works better than sending 1 impersonal message to 1000 people.

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True fans is what every band needs. 

You will know that previously on the Musicadium Blog we have alluded to the fact that the first goal for any independent band should be attracting 100 true fans to your show every time you play.

But what is a true fan?

First, a true fan will come and see you play live.  Regardless of taxis, public transport, 3am lockouts, expensive drinks and temperamental bar staff, a true fan will always come and see you live (and often be willing to pay for the experience).

Second, a true fan will buy your album, your EP, your single or your merch.  A true fan is a fan willing to part with their hard-earned for a creation of yours.

Third, a true fan will tell their friends how good you are.  This is the number one most important factor in generating a buzz.  Have true fans telling friends who become true fans who tell friends and so on. 

So then, what are you doing to generate true fans?

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What is iTunes Plus? iTunes Plus is higher quality DRM-Free tracks that is now available on all the iTunes stores worldwide.

Apple® has launched iTunes® Plus, DRM-free music tracks featuring high quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings—for just $US1.29 per song. (more…)

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Your first gig, when it happens, will be at a great venue.  There will be a cover charge.  You will do reasonable press beforehand.  You will have a VIP list and a guest list. You will have some combination of local journalists, local managers and local booking agents present and you will be hoping like hell it’s a flawless performance.

For all these reasons, you should never make your first gig your first gig.  If it is, chances are you will suck.  And all those people who you need to convince about how good your music is will be let down.

So while you’re getting started, don’t be shy to play any and every gig that comes your way.  Be it a BBQ, a lawn bowls day, a crowded train station or the opening of a barn door on a windy day – make the most of the opportunity to develop your live show.

That way, when that first gig does roll around, it will be flawless.

(c) 2008 marklobo.com “Mr Rascal”

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1. To get on iTunes etc. you need to use a digital distributor. It is way too time consuming to do this yourself. And you need to have high level technical skills to do it. If words like FTP and XML make good sense to you, maybe you have a shot, but trust me, you need help. Better to spend hours jamming than writing code to upload an album.
2. There are four ways digital distributors make money.
   1 - Upload/Joining Fee: Be careful of joining fees. These can range really widely and this is the most obvious thing you should know before you go any further with a distributor.
   2 - Renewal Fee: There will usually be a renewal fee to have your albums online. Check whether this fee increases per album…
   3 - Royalties: Most distributors take big royalty cuts - make sure you know how much they are taking from you.
   4 - Contracts lengths and lock-ins: Make sure you know how long you are locked in for. You don’t want to find out you have to be with a distributor for five years without being able to get out of it. This is critical!
3. Musicadium is based in Brisbane and what we do is dead simple. We help you to make the most of the digital music revolution:
   1 - $39 upload fee per release. This is a one off fee for worldwide distribution.
   2 - $20 per year (one-off fee) to cover the transaction costs of paying you royalties. This does not change, regardless whether you have 1 or 100 albums online.
   3 - Musicadium gives you 100% of your royalties. We believe we had no part in the creation of the music so we do not deserve 10% of the royalties you reap for your creativity. We distribute. We ask for payment for that. You write the music. You should receive all the royalties for that.
   4 - We do not lock you in to contracts. Leave as you please (we’ve never had this happen), but you are free to go elsewhere if you feel you can find better.

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Musicadium takes some time out to have a chat with Musicadium Gold Coast based singer-songwriter Casey Barnes.

Q. What styles and influences are on your latest album?
Its a real mix this album I guess… some more up tempo rock tracks, but also some laid back ballads as well… I’m pretty confident that this is the strongest album I’ve done to date.

Q. What inspires you? What makes you wake up and think “wow that really matters?” what makes you want to write songs that make people sit down and think?
I just think it’s such a great job to be able to wake up and share music with people on a day to day basis…whether is be 5 people in a lounge room or 8000 in a concert. I hope when they listen to my stuff it puts a smile on their face… I don’t know how to explain it but music just seems to connect on so many levels no matter what mood you’re in. That’s probably one of the main things I love about it! (more…)

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1. There’s a big difference between having a long list of email addresses and having a long list of true fans. A true fan is a fan who will pay to watch you play, buy your album and tell their friends about you. Make true fans, not a list of email addresses. And you know the best way to make a true fan? Play great live gigs and then go and meet the people you are playing for. Make them feel a part of something. For all the digital music revolution talk, your live gig is still the most important things for your band to create true fans.
2. You don’t need to get signed to be successful. There are thousands of bands making a living from music right now who exist outside the realms of the major labels. You can be one of those bands. You just need three things – great songs, a great live show and true fans. Keep it simple and you’ll go a long way.
3. Despite what you’ve heard, all the old rules of music still apply. You still need a great sound, a great dynamic in the band, a great live show and great fans. The delivery channels have changed but the hunger for great music has not.

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1. Digital Distribution is cheaper and easier than physical distribution. It will cost you more than a thousand dollars to manufacture and produce just a few hundred CDs that you distribute locally. Compare that to
   the cost of unlimited, worldwide, digital distribution which is generally under 100 dollars.
2. Just because your music is distributed worldwide, doesn’t mean it will be bought worldwide. It may well be cost effective to distribute worldwide through digital stores like iTunes and eMusic but what’s the point
   of having your music for sale in Japan or Russia if no-one there knows you.
3. If you’re going to distribute digitally, then promote digitally. Digital distribution is a very smart move. But it’s not enough just to distribute digitally, you need to promote digitally. You need a MySpace, you need to start talking to your fans, you need an email list of people you can tell about your upcoming shows and releases. You need to connect with the fans of your favourite bands, you need to discuss your music on forums, promote it on Facebook, write to people about it who love music. To make the most of digital you need as many people writing and talking about you as possible.

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In the music industry, royalties are par for the course.  Royalties mean the musical pie is shared by all.  There are many scenarios where royalty sharing makes good, equitable, incentivised sense.

Digital distribution is not one of these. 

Digital distribution in the strict sense is a once-off transaction.  Much like post office sends your parcels in return for your postage costs, digital distributors send your digital files away for an upload fee.

Why then would it be necessary for the distributor to then take an ongoing percentage of the artist’s revenue?  Whether it’s 9%, 15% or 30%, the digital distributor sits back skimming the cream off your musical milk, unendingly.  And for what?  Nothing more than a simple, initial transaction.

That’s why Musicadium returns 100% of royalties to our artists.

Simple really.

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