Putting yourself in Someone Else’s Shoes
Bloggers and Radio Hosts are overwhelmed right now
But they love music and they love independent musicians
Give your music its best shot by making it easy and fun for someone to help you and play your music.
Listen to what the Doctor has to say …
Neil March is a busy dude …
He is an electronic musician, he runs his own label, Demerara Records and has a twice-weekly radio show Trust the Doc on Exile FM (with 10,000 listeners ), a youtube TV show. Trust the Doc TV
He is a moderator for Fresh on The Net ( I have already written about how great fresh on the net is )
He also puts on live events – and Covid permitting will be back curating his live shows soon.
Neil is a champion of emerging and unsigned artist and is a very kind and patient man.
So when I saw this tweet from him the other day …
@TrustTheDocUK “Oh man! No matter how often I post that I don’t have time to go on fishing expeditions to find your best tracks, artists still expect me to wade through Dropbox files etc. If you want me to play a track send it to me in a form I can access. I am a radio show host, not your A&R! “
I thought I had to ask him what was going on ….
what is the biggest windup you get from musicians sending you their tracks or approaching you ?
I think the biggest wind-up is probably when artists send me something. I put it in the radio show and tag them on social media platforms and don’t even get a token acknowledgement. It makes no sense. They wanted the airplay but when they get it, they think they are too cool to share the info with their followers! Go figure! The other is artists whose page names make them really hard to track down (like I had one recently that was Nameloveshoumous! Seriously? Don’t they want potential reviewers, fans etc. to find them?). I schedule posts on Facebook and Twitter and it takes an age to do so being slowed down by a wild goose change to find an artist’s page name is maddening. One more simple one. Artists who don’t add links to their Soundcloud pages. It takes seconds and it means anyone hearing you there can click straight to where they can read more about you. All our Fresh on the Net submissions come via Soundcloud links so it is always the first place we look to get info when reviewing tracks.
what could they do that would be better ?
Ideally, choose a band or artist name that won’t bring up lots of other people when you google it. Tom Robinson used the example the other day of This Elegant Gull, brainchild of 12 year old DD Shine. Google the name and the first 24 sites that appear are about them. Also they even google track titles before choosing them to make sure they are unique! But more to the point, think about why you are putting content on social media and internet. Try to make it easy as possible for people to find you and read about you whether that is shows & presenters, producers, reviews writers, fans.
Why might it be better for them in the long run ?
The music industry and media now are dominated by digital platforms so having a good social media and online footprint is fundamental for aspiring artists. It’s worth following a few simple principles. Treat your Facebook artist page like a mini website. Populate the pages – about us, events etc. And use the events page to invite up to 500 people at a time to your events. Use Twitter to participate in the highly supportive independent music community. Spread love and support for others and you will get the love back too. Use Instagram to post short video clips and pics and to feed followers soundbites of your music and activity. And when you’re moaning and talking about hating social media, remember that the more mature of us remember the days when it cost a fortune and untold hours to maintain mailouts about gigs, punt demos around labels and promoters etc. Use these free resources and reach hundreds or thousands of people at the click of a button. You will gather a following a lor quicker if you are visible online.
Where can we hear your shows ?
My live Trust The Doc Radio show is on at 5PM UK time every Saturday at exilefm.com and it is a great place to tap into a loving independent music community that gathers and tweets, messages me and one another throughout the two hours. I also have a pre-recorded one hour show called Trust The Doc Extra at 8PM on Wednesdays which, without all the shout outs and banter, means I can pack a lot of tracks into an hour. And Trust The Doc TV hits YouTube at 8PM on the first and third Tuesdays of every month. All three are dominated by new music
Any good advice?
Well, I’d just say take the time to be kind and supportive to one another. It is so hard to make a living in music and we need one another for support. And if we ever see COVID cease to control our movements, support live grassroots music because that is where it all begins for so many talented artists out there.
NEIL MARCH
F: facebook.com/demrararecords
W: demerararecords.com/