ArtistForce, the web-based relationship management platform and marketplace for live entertainment, has introduced a free version of its service. The free edition provides artists with up to five different industry resources per month and will make it possible for them to receive messages, negotiate booking inquiries, and use the ArtistForce widget, without paying any fees. Entertainment buyers will enjoy free and unlimited access to review talent, negotiate performance offers, manage event expenses, generate documents, and manage contacts.
ArtistForce is offering a cash prize of $10,000 to the artist who books the most paid shows using any free or paid version of ArtistForce between October 9, 2009 and February 14, 2010. The cash prize will be presented in Austin during the company’s participation in SXSW 2010, where the winning artist will also be given the opportunity to perform live at an ArtistForce sponsored event.
Bruce Houghton, founder of Skyline Music, an artist booking agency, and author of leading Music Industry blog, Hypebot, makes his voice heard on the CD Baby DIY Musician Podcast. Listen to it here.
Sonicbids, the leading online event submission platform, has released a series of plugins for its 14,000+ promoters to better gauge the online presence and reach of the artists they may wish to book through the site. Now, when an artist submits his EPK (Electronic Press Kit) for an event through Sonicbids, the event’s promoter will have access to third-party, public data from Last.fm, Twitter and Google. As such, in addition to reviewing the artist’s content on Sonicbids, a snapshot of number of plays, listeners, mentions, links and posts across other networks should support and streamline the promoter’s selection process.
Sonicbids is home to 150,000 artists and bands, offering an event marketplace for artists to find gigs, and for promoters to secure talent. The site caters to every imaginable music industry sector, with a strong focus on live performances at leading music festivals and conferences, including SXSW, CMJ, Popkomm, Midem, and MusicExpo.
I’ve been following Bandcamp for a little while now (see earlier post) and I noticed today that the company made some revisions to its home page. Most notably, Bandcamp created a “features” page which lists the entire suite of tools and services. I was also delighted to learn that Bandcamp now provides Creative Commons licensing designations:
Under the Creative Commons licensing designations, artists who make their music public, in this case via Bandcamp, are providing limited rights to other artists and music fans who wish to remix, share, or use the music in a variety of ways without having to formally ask permission.
Anyone who has randomly surfed through YouTube has eventually landed on a video of a teen guitar virtuoso with millions of accrued views. Search a little further and a vast world of amateur instructional guitar ‘how-to’ clips will reveal themselves with tantamount popularity. Guitar is a massive interest category on YouTube and, with it, a traditionally unrepresented musical niche has emerged to the fore: Guitar Virtuosos. Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Nuno Bettencourt, and alike, were popular long before YouTube unveiled itself as the premier video portal, however, a new breed of guitarists have caught the attention of the dotcom generation with unique styles that, until now, experienced only nook-and-cranny exposure.
Enter CandyRat Records, the most visible alternative acoustic guitar label on YouTube – or anywhere, for that matter. The boutique-sized label, founded by Rob Poland, has capitulated extraordinary guitarists through a series of low-budget video clips of their music, the most successful of which include some form of tapping, odd tuning, or any other unconventional manner of playing their instrument. Although CandyRat represents a whole slew of talented guitarists and singer/songwriters, the company’s most notorious roster of YouTube maestros includes the likes of Erik Mongrain, Antoine Dufour, and, of course, Andy McKee, who has garnered just under 20 million views for his video performance of “Drifting“, an original composition, and over 8 million views for an innovative version of “Africa” by Toto. And then there’s Don Ross.
Don Ross was Rob Poland’s first signing, even though Don remained contractually independent. In 2005, Don released an album through CandyRat which marked the label’s investiture as an acoustic aficionado. In a recent communication with Jill Katona of Paperwork Media, Don’s booking agent and Andy McKee’s former rep, I learned that it was Don who brought Andy to Poland’s attention, who later signed him and released two of his CDs under CandyRat. Old friends, Don Ross and Andy McKee collaborated for the label and enjoyed mutual exposure online. However, it was McKee’s video performance of “Drifting” that truly put CandyRat on the map and significant offshoot traffic in Don’s direction, as well as the other artists on the label’s growing roster.
Don Ross and Andy McKee’s styles are comparable. The two masters of their trade govern the art of percussive, finger-picking, neck-hammering guitar techniques which make their solo guitar compositions sound as if there are multiple instruments omnipresent. Considering Don Ross’ lengthy tenure as an acoustic guitar performer, I can only assume that he is one of the pioneers of this style – he has certainly become renowned for it.
Don is currently on tour with Brooke Miller, a 2007 finalist in We Are Listening’s Breaking the Band, and their aggregate talent should make for an excellent series of live show.
South by South West in Austin, Texas, is one of the largest music events in the world – and a truly fun weekend for fans and musicians alike. For artists, access to Austin’s best venues is a career development must and Tinderbox Music, in association with RedGorilla, provides the means to get new acts on stage at a set-up cost that’s lower than the spectator entry fee into SXSW. RedGorilla caters to the Austin venues that are not included in the SXSW line-up, mainly due to festival logistics issues. Each year, these venues open their doors for artists to enjoy the SXSW reception and provide attending music fans with a free alternative. Last year, RedGorilla hosted 300 acts at eight different venues. In 2009, showcases will take place from Wednesday, March 18th, to Saturday, March 21st, on Austin’s 6th Street, right in the heart of the action. Tinderbox Music has a number of slots open for interested parties. RedGorilla is an unsanctioned event and not a part of SXSW.
For booking details, contact:
Jon Delange
jon[at]tinderboxmusic.com
(612) 375 1113
In the point of view of the booking agent, you – the artist – must be in place in your career that you can attract enough paying gig-goers to your show, do so frequently, and with consistent growth to justify the booking agent’s efforts in exchange for his 10% (sometimes 15%) cut. Unfortunately, most developing artists, even those with a small but loyal following, are not attractive enough for the reputable booking agents to pursue. Much like talent scouts, booking agents will sometimes take a chance on an act that they believe will develop successfully and provide a handsome financial return in the future, but this is a relationship that is both difficult to pursue and cultivate and its terms will be strongly in the favor of the booking agent.
If you’re not a savvy manager yourself, find an artist manager before looking for a booking agent. Keeping in mind that your manager sees a cut of everything you do whereas the booking agent only sees a cut of your live performances, statistically, a manager should be easier to sign with because he is spreading his risk on all of your musical assets. Your manager should already have music industry connections and a way in to discuss tour scheduling opportunities face to face with an established booking agent, rather than making cold calls yourself. However, if this is not the case, at least the booking agent can see that you were talented enough to attract an artist manager in the first place and, therefore, worth attending your next show.
The multi-national booking and management agencies such as The Agency Group and William Morris Agency prefer to see that you have financial backing, usually in the form of a label contract. This, if nothing else, ensures that the label can afford to finance your tour and even take a loss for the privilege of ‘breaking’ you.
Whatever the arrangement may be, everyone involved wants to make money. As such, it’s your responsibility (or, better yet, your manager’s responsibility) to show that you are a great investment.
Online music will arguably be the fastest moving and consistently evolving industries in 2007. Previously undiscovered artists will come to the fore via high-traffic tastemaker blogs such as Stereogum, innovative retail platforms such as Amie St. and the ease and availability of content distribution. The traditionally reluctant giants of music, such as Universal and EMI, have already embraced the idea of becoming more than a ‘record company’ by providing their large catalogues to a variety of digital platforms and, I expect, will re-brand themselves as leading digital purveyors rather than the illegal file-sharing ‘arm of the law’.
With the much anticipated advertising-driven download services such as SpiralFrog, Napster and eMusic lending themselves to mobile networks such as Cingular and TicketMaster’s $13.5m investment in iLike (founders of Garageband), the music space will become, quite literally, universal. More artists are likely to show up on the radar due to, say, an unexpected public vote on a music community such as PureVolume or a great show at a festival sponsored by the renowned artist service, Sonicbids. By the end of the year, I believe that the increase of independent music communities and number of online artist profiles will pave the way to greater choice, more accurate recommendations to consumers and more alternatives to expose previously unheard-of music.
And while all of these multi-million dollar start-ups promise more exposure and business for unsigned artists and a better experience for music lovers, as musicians, we can still depend on good ‘ol fashioned live venues – another sector on the up & up. T-shirt anyone?
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