Lior,

On behalf of the band I just wanted to thank you again — and emphatically — for everything that We Are Listening and Tinderbox have done for us.

As I mentioned to Jon, the band has been extremely excited about all of the success at radio and the licensing potential from the 10 show agreements Jon was able to secure for us.

We can’t thank everyone at Tinderbox enough for all of the great work and results they’ve achieved for Honor By August and, as Jon has been quick to point out, we have you to thank for making it all possible.

We hope to be able to maintain a relationship with you both moving forward and hope to be able to share success stories that we can attribute to your work and investment in the band.

As I said to Jon, if there’s anything we can do, like provide a quote or blurb from the band, please let us know and we’d of course be happy to provide anything that might be helpful. We’ve already raved about this experience to many of the bands we cross paths with on the road and will certainly continue to do so.

Cheers and thanks again,

Evan,
Honor By August

Give it up for Laurell…

Jon, who continues to mentor the band to this day, helped them achieve national awareness, first at radio and then with television networks by scoring placements in their original programming.  Annually, they have preformed during Austin’s SXSW event.

Eventually, the group emerged as America’s favorite in the FreeCreditScore.com band search which began with a shortlist of more than 100 hopefuls showcasing nationwide.

Now, The Victorious Secrets, the band’s new alias, are engaged in a $30 million advertising campaign.

As the new face of FreeCreditScore.com, they will be featured in a series of television commercials slated to debut during the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards next month.  They will also receive a $10,000 check, a Gibson Guitar prize package and Pearl drum kits, and a studio session with the music industry’s best of breed.  They will also walk the red carpet at the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards and have the opportunity to perform on the 2010 VMA Tour.

Here are The Victorious Secrets, in all their glory:

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Lior,

I just wanted to drop you a quick line to let you know how much the Breaking the Band contest has helped us out.

Tinderbox has been very very helpful and has exposed our music to a much larger audience than we could have hoped for.  Our disc has been getting airplay at CMJ charted stations across the country since April.  We even charted in the top 10 slots at several stations! Our web traffic and album sales have definitely increased since we started working with Tinderbox and we’ve connected with many people we wouldn’t have reached if not for Breaking the Band and Tinderbox Music.

Jon has found 8 shows on networks like MTV, E! and even Oxygen that are interested in using our work in their series.  That’s still a work in progress but chances are pretty good we’ll land some television placements, reach more potential fans and maybe even make some dough for our next album.

I’ve been very impressed with the staff at Tinderbox and their results.  I can’t thank We Are Listening enough for providing us the opportunity!

I hope all is well and you are enjoying the summer thus far!

Best wishes,

Mark Towne
Booking / Drums
Vices I Admire

And I’d be lying if I told you every music licensing opportunity pays big bucks.

But I can tell you that the music licensing business is the most lucrative and accessible business for independent artists.  Songwriters and performing artists make more money by licensing their songs than performing live, signing a record deal and getting commercial radio airplay combined.

Music Supervisors spend all of their time searching for great music to place in film, television shows and advertisements.  They have big budgets, and are always willing to open their wallets for fresh material.

These are the people you want to get your music to, hard and fast.

Best of all, unlike record labels and publishers, Music Supervisors love to receive unsolicited submissions from artists.  They even advertise for it.

But you need to know where to look.

Fortunately, a bright young mind (and good friend of mine) decided to create a marketplace for Music Supervisors.  It’s a single hot spot where industry leaders come together to advertise their projects and access independent music from artists just like you.

That place is called YouLicense.

$20,000 Licensing Fee For Clean Energy Campaign

$14,000 Licensing Fee For European Food Manufacturer Campaign

$12,000 Licensing Fee For International Travel Agency Campaign

Music Licensing Explained
Licensing music for TV and film is the process of music procurement for motion picture, usually handled by a Music Supervisor working on behalf of the television network, film production company, or advertising agency. The project’s Music Supervisor is responsible for identifying the most appropriate music for the motion picture and liaising with the copyright owner/administrator of the recording and publishing of the music, which may not necessarily be the same person: signed artists’ publishing (the music’s intellectual property rights) are usually managed by a publishing company or publishing rights division within a label, and the recording (or “Master”) is usually managed by a record company or master rights division within a label.  Learn more…

MTV is leveraging its massively successful Rock Band game to independent artists by introducing Rock Band Network, Rock Band’s own music catalogue and store which budding and established musicians can submit their material for review by Rock Band’s music supervisors.  Artists will have total control over the music they submit, from mixing and editing for game related uses to pricing individual tracks for retail.  It’s a potentially incredible opportunity to publish and market your music to a very large, loyal and highly-targeted music-loving demographic.

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JamLegend is the web-based answer to Guitar Hero and Rock Band, providing a free and social gaming experience that allows users to ‘play along’ with great tracks using  their computer key board (which doubles as a guitar if you hold it upright and use the ‘Enter’ key as the plectrum).  It’s a fun way to listen to and discover new music, play along with favourite tracks, and compete against like-minded music lovers.  JamLegend relies on user-generated music from independent artists.  Considering the scope and scale of the video gaming industry, it appears that JamLegend has created are very viable and powerful opportunity for artists and music promoters to garner additional exposure.  Here is how to submit your tunes.

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TheMusicSnob recently published a post which frowns upon PumpAudio’s changes to its standard licensing agreement, specifically the shift in the 50/50 split to 65/35 in favour of PumpAudio.  The post also highlights the practice of ‘Re-Title Publishing’ (also known as ‘Derivative Publishing’) where the song title is registered under an alternate title (e.g. Fields of Gold -> Gold Fields) on the cue sheet so that PumpAudio can collect a portion of the royalties.
 
PumpAudio was one of the first pre-cleared searchable music libraries that considered submissions from independent artists.  The company was acquired by Getty Images in 2007 for $42 million along with a catalogue of 20,000 independent artists.   Although the recent shift from 50/50 to 65/35 is bad news for the artist, it is a reflection of deflated upfront synchronization license fees in an increasingly competitive media landscape and down economy.

Re-Title Publishing is an accepted industry practice and serves two principle purposes:  It allows the broker to collect backend royalties in addition to frontend fees and protects the songwriter by ensuring that the broker only collects monies for the commercial use(s) he procures.  To combat any public confusion that this may cause and benefit the songwriter’s marketing efforts, many films and TV shows offer a “gratis” cue where the original song title is used as opposed to the derivative title in the screen credit roll or music soundtrack release.

Music licensing, a seemingly clandestine industry bisect, is a lucrative business for songwriters and PumpAudio was pivotal to lowering the barrier of entry for upstart and unsigned artists.  YouLicense followed suit with an ‘open’ music licensing marketplace and transparent business model.

Details on licensing music for TV and film.

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The Free Music Archive provides a curatorial approach to promoting and discovering music, and allows for the free, legal streaming and downloading of its library’s tracks.  Much like an opinion blog, the Free Music Archive acts as a tastemaker with the aid of user generated and suggested content which must first be approved by the site’s curators.  Every track on the site is handpicked and pre-cleared for personal use.  Users with uploading or editing privileges must be invited.  Initial funding for the Free Music Archive came from the New York State Music Fund, a program of the Rockefeller Philanthrophy Advisors.