Jake Smith is a TuneCore Customer Support Representative and editor of the weekly newsletter
A few months ago, I wrote an article called "Marketing Outside The Box",
in which I discussed artists (most of whom had been on a major label at
one point) who had come up with a unique way of making their content
available. Radiohead gave away "In Rainbows" on their website and
allowed fans to pay whatever they thought was a worthy price. Jill
Sobule let fans contribute money before recording her album in exchange
for prizes of different tiers (the lowest tier guaranteed a copy of her
CD when available and a higher tier earned fans a private house
concert). Of course in discussing "outside the box" techniques, we had
to mention Nine Inch Nails:
"Nine Inch Nails (with some help from TuneCore) offered their album
Ghosts I-IV in a number of different formats, including 9 free tracks
on BitTorrent sites, all 36 tracks on Amazon, and then multiple
physical packages including a limited pressing $300 deluxe version."
Now, I would agree that the above ideas are all fun, buzz-worthy,
groundbreaking, etc., however Jill Sobule, Radiohead and Trent Reznor
were already well known artists before they made such creative leaps
from said box. If I, Jake Smith, have an upcoming release will anybody
(aside from my mother - God bless her soul) be willing to pay $300 for
a deluxe version of my album? No.
Trent Reznor wrote a post on the NIN forum today which addresses this exact issue. You can read his full article here. Highlights include:
- Set your goals: Do you want to be a megastar and share the rights to all your content with a major label, or do you want to forge your own way?
- "Make your record cheaply (but great) and GIVE IT AWAY", as your goal should be to reach as many new fans as possible.
- Sell your physical product on Amazon
- My personal favorite, "Use TuneCore to get your music everywhere".
- Follow the lead of the Beastie Boys and make your content available in as many formats as your fans could possibly want it.
Should
we take this quickie post from Trent Reznor as gospel? Definitely not,
I know plenty of TuneCore users who have done great without giving
their songs away (unless you consider MySpace streams giving the music
away) and who sell only digital files without a physical component.
However, with so many artists fighting for attention, it can't hurt to
spend some time thinking about how to make your releases unique. I
often think of two examples:
One was from an artist named Peter Mulvey who rode his bike to every gig instead of driving as a way to raise environmental awareness. He filmed a short video about the experience and got some good press as a result. The other was from a cool group I saw play in Asheville, NC called 'Hope For Agoldensummer' who constructed their own fabric covered, hand-bound, screen printed limited edition CD for sale on their website. Because these artists demonstrated a passion beyond simply songwriting and recording, I felt more connected to what they had to offer musically.
What are your guys' thoughts? Do you agree with Trent that the only way to become "Lady GaGa/U2" famous is to sign with a major label, or will artists eventually be able to reach those heights on their own? Do you think you should provide music for free as a way of reaching a larger audience, in addition to making it available for sale? As a new or developing artist, what ideas can you think of to make your release more noteworthy? Let me know!