Managing Indie Music.
Every song conveys a message – with or without lyrics – whether you care about the message’s significance or not is a different matter. If the song sucks, it obviously doesn’t matter how incredible the video is. However, if the song is great, you wouldn’t require a costly looking video – simply something that does justice to it. The video must improve the song – not spoil it. It should tell the complete story. That story, however, shouldn’t be “a crappy local band that makes music videos because they read on a blog that it’s the in-thing.” You know what I mean!
What I am trying to say here is, just like the video and song should complement each other, so should the lyrics and music. Listening to a song carefully and concentrating on its lyrics unleashes emotional energy. An indie artist has the power to bring out a specific kind of mood in its listeners. In moments of grief, the music we want to listen to is more slow with meaningful lyrics. At the same time, some individuals want to listen to peppy numbers when they are feeling low, in order to feel charged up. Of course, there is no way for an indie artist to know how their music will affect the listener. What you can be sure of is that you have to make the best you can, everywhere you can, anytime you can.
As discussed in my post Indie Music in 2016, the most fundamental aspect of a deal is that signing to a label really means “signing away the rights to your masters”, whereas, today, it means getting access to power and money. Unfortunately, the downside and the meaning of not owning your own masters doesn’t sink in for artists until much later in their careers. It is after about a decade of being in the industry that they realise, they don’t own anything – neither the music that they made, nor the lyrics they wrote. Even if it is only to know how to delegate copyrighting your music to someone else, grasp the basics of these principles. A musician’s most important asset is copyright. It can help you get exposure, turn around your career and make you money, if you understand its concept.
alternative music, independent artists, independent music, indie artists, indie bands, Indie Music, indie music blog, indie rock, Indie Rock Bands, INDIE SONGS, new indie music, piracy, RIAA, what is indie music, music copyright
Originally, I had set out to write about all possible ways that indie musicians and artists could look at as alternative means to manage their songs and generate revenue, but this subject turned out to be vast, so I decided to write a few posts only on managing music. Here, I am going to lay out the essential concepts of managing the music that you create.
When you record a song or write lyrics, your work automatically becomes copyrighted. Copyright is a form of intellectual property. The one who creates, becomes the copyright owner. This right is automatically split equally if there are multiple creators; though owners are free to deviate from this equal share through mutual agreement. Copyright ownership rights are meant to give control over who can perform publicly, reproduce, create derivatives of and distribute work. Ownership rights can be fully transferred and assigned to others. Licenses of your music can also be granted to others. This is done typically in exchange for payments commonly referred to as royalties.
This may sound basic, but we’ve all fallen in love with an idea that isn’t marketable and realized only too late that we should have tested it at a much earlier stage. Not everything that appeals to an artist appeals to general So learn, and make sure you have something really amazing and original.
Once you have a solid song, you will of course need to test it with your group or friends. And just like when you were developing your song, you’ll want to test it thoroughly and get lots of feedback before you start contacting investors. Your friends and folks also form a part of the viewers and listeners. Take their feedback seriously and improvise.
I know from experience and I have written this in a lot of my previous posts, no matter howmuch you do, you will still have more to do. Reading blog posts, keeping an eye on what others are doing, learning trends, listening to podcasts, everything takes time, and a day does not have enough hours, so if you try to do it all by yourself, it will only take you so far. You need more. You need accountability and direction from someone who has been where you are trying to go.
I will soon come back with a post about some new tricks for indie artists to help boost their career in the industry. So keep coming back!
If you need help in creating and maintaining a website, HyperEffects can help you connect with your target audience efficiently. HyperEffects is one stop for your website, marketing and cyber development requirements. It helps you to create a website to display your talent or sell your indie music or indie art.
