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Refine Your Image

The main advantage of being an indie musician is that you have a lot of freedom as an artist. You are unlikely to have a manager telling you what to do or how to create your music. It’s this feeling of liberty that allows many up-and-coming indie musicians to develop a brand for themselves.

As difficult as this may sound to hear, you are more than the lyrics you write and the instruments that you play. To really become an established artist, you need to create a unique brand or polarizing image for yourself. You must develop a sort of charming — charismatic authority.

First Impressions Matter 

If you are just getting started as an indie artist, it’s unlikely that people will first hear your music on the radio or Pandora. Rather, you will probably be seen playing at a live gig or sharing your talents via a YouTube video or Instagram post. Now, these are very visual platforms. People are going to start judging you before you can even open your mouth.

So, what do you want people to know about you?

It is through your ‘brand’ that people will see what kind of artist you are. This will be apparent in the way you dress and through the profiles you create online and build out over time. So, by constructing a cohesive image, you’ll be able to win people over from the very beginning.

Relate to Your Audience

Interest in a specific kind of music is more than just a hobby; it is an identity that people cling dearly to. This is something that’s prevalent, regardless of the genre of music you’re into. Of course, it isn’t just the lyrics that people identify with, they tend to connect to the artist’s persona as well. For instance, Bob Dylan fans tend to be more politically inclined, while AC/DC enthusiasts are more on the wild side.

Thus, by portraying some type of persona, your fans will have something they can hold onto and perhaps emulate. Now, this might sound a bit like posturing, but it isn’t. Trust me. There is nothing preventing you from portraying your own version of yourself. You simply need to do it in such a way that your current or future fans can relate to. Reveal a facet of yourself that feels authentic and genuine.

Attract Sponsors 

Let’s be honest, even as an indie musician, one of your top objectives is to make money — and at the very least, support yourself with your music. Well, guess what, sponsors are actually interested in indie musicians with a certain type of branding — and an engaged following.

This is true even for some really big corporations.

Why? Well, as mentioned before, fans tie themselves rather closely to their preferred artists. So, if they can get behind your brand and what you stand for, then you will appear more favorable to sponsors. As you can imagine, this will result in greater opportunities for you, and bring in more money as well.

Conclusion

Finally, branding is important — even if you pride yourself on being an unattached indie musician…this is in fact, a brand in and of itself. So, when promoting yourself, put forth some effort to project an image that you are comfortable with, and feel will win over your audience.

About the Author:

Natalie Landecker grew up around music and guitars her whole life, so that’s what she naturally gravitated towards as an adult. She now runs a website for likeminded people, hoping to research and discuss all aspects of music together with her following.

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“We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.” — Sagan

I want to speak to the master conspirator who forced me to choose between The National and Bon Iver. How close are the stages I wondered? I knew the sets were usually 15 minutes apart, and maybe I’d be able to catch the finale if I made a run for it, but then I wouldn’t be close to the stage. The best sonic experience is a few feet in front of the sound engineers, right? There were so many strategic decisions to make and so many people. Artists flew in just hours before for a quick sound check, waited around, performed, and then took the first plane out to their next show.

Two years ago, I stopped my thumb on my phone screen, dragged down a few centimeters and took a second look at the National’s Instagram post about a weekend of music at Funkhaus in Berlin. A university friend had recently moved there, so I instinctively messaged her asking for a place to crash. She complied. We arrived at Funkhaus thirty minutes before the doors even opened, not really knowing what to expect.

Excited and a bit unsettled, we took our wristbands and received the schedule on a sheet of paper. It was incredibly ambiguous, nothing more than times and hall numbers.

I didn’t know it yet, but this weekend would forever change the way I perceived music.

Erlend Øye‎ played his ukulele outside in between shows to a crowd of twenty people or so. He then passed his ukulele around and asked if anyone else had a song they wanted to share. We didn’t know if an event like this would ever happen again.

Luckily it did, twenty-three months later. This time around Vincent Moon captivated our minds throughout the week, sharing with us the moment songs were conceived, and how harmonies unfolded in emails to ticket holders. Audio clips of rehearsals were also sent with raw insights into pitch changes, chord additions, wrong vocal entrances — the audience was experiencing the music right alongside the artists. It was an incredible peak behind the curtain.

Throughout the weekend, groups of a few hundred people would rush into small recording studios and pile around heaps of guitars, trumpets, saxophones, violins, amps, microphones, and a grand piano. Even when artists would wade through the crowd, it was difficult to know who you were watching unless you were a dedicated fan. Kyle Resnick may be on the trumpet, Ben Lanz on the trombone, and Zach Condon holding down the vocals — you never really knew — but then there would be a departure from Beirut with a vocal accompaniment from Laura Jansen, percussion by Tatu Rönkkö, David Chalmin chiming in on his guitar, and the orchestral collective — stargaze — adding undertones of classical music that would morph the sonic vibrations into a celestial body of harmonic bliss.

We made friends with a neurosurgeon while sunbathing in between sets. “Who did you see?” we kept asking other people we met, until we eventually realized we didn’t even know the answer ourselves.

Walking out of those studios trying to conceptualize what we had just experienced, made us realize just how lucky we were to be in a room with such special artists who typically tour solo. It heightened the experience, especially having no prior expectations.

I started to wonder if the security and barriers between fans and artists at typical festivals was what actually caused irrational hyper-fandom. Everyone here seemed to respect the artists who were unimaginably accessible and vulnerable.

“I’m going to perform a song for the first time that I wrote this week. That’s really scary if you don’t know.” Feist said to the attentive audience who didn’t dare to take out their phones and interrupt such an intimate moment. Except me, for I had to steal just a few seconds to remind myself that I was in music heaven.

The last set we saw was an artist who told a story about Feist who hosted a workshop on songwriting. “You’ve already written this song five years ago; you just have to remember it” she said. Before he began playing this song, another artist said he would join him on piano. They shook hands, meeting for the first time and composed something brand new right before our eyes.

PEOPLE was born out of Michelberger’s Funkhaus event in Berlin back in 2016 and has evolved from there. It was co-founded by Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon and the National’s Aaron and Bryce Dessner. Keep up with the festival on Instagram.

Here is a checklist I go through upon each and every album we release here on Santa Rosa Records. I hope this may be of help to some of you indie artists out there — wherever you are.

Distrokid is a great distribution service, as is The Orchard. Honestly, it really all depends on you, and what you want from your distribution service. Or, perhaps get signed to an indie label so that you can focus more of your time and energy on what matters most — your music!

• Once you’ve submitted your album to the plethora of digital platforms via a distribution service or indie label, the work begins!

• Submit to Spotify and Filtr playlists. We’ve not had a lot of success getting added to Spotify’s curated playlists, but have had a ton of success getting added to personal playlists, from fans to bloggers. Reach out, you may be surprised.

• Submit album for release on Soundcloud, Bandcamp, YouTube, and Discogs.

• Plan live release show — or perhaps go live on YouTube or Instagram on the day of release. Just do something. A social media post at the very least.

• The days following the release — periodically send indie music blogs and radio stations your favorite couple tracks off the album. Personally, I wouldn’t try to email more than 25 at a time — your chances of getting flagged greatly increase if you try and mass email many more than this. Also, remember to utilize the BBC for mass mailing blogs and radio. Keep it classy my friends.

• SubmitHub is a pretty nifty music blog submission service — we’ve been pretty happy with the platform so far. They make the whole music blog submission process pretty easy — although not always painless.

• Post about album on your website (if you have one) and all of your social media platforms — for weeks. No, make that months — or until your next release.

• Releasing your album physically can also stimulate sales and help solidify reputation. People crave the nostalgia of cassette tapes and vinyl records. In fact, both mediums have been increasing in popularity in recent years. You can’t go wrong with either IMHO. However, I’d steer clear of CDs for the time being. They seem to have really stagnated among listeners as of late.

• Promoting your music on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Spotify is never a bad idea. You just need to have the cash. We usually spend around $25-$50 per release on promoted posts, and have driven some decent traffic as a result. But again, the quality of the post and your targeted audience is very important. Spend wisely.

• Post your favorite tracks to applicable subreddits. The Reddit community is very active and growing at a rapid pace. They’re THE forum of the internet. Remember to format your posts correctly. Note that highly upvoted and posts with lots of comments really help drive listeners to your tracks’ YouTube, Soundcloud or Spotify.

• A music video for a particular track, or set of tracks is also never a bad idea. Release it on YouTube — and wherever else you’re able to reach viewers. YouTube is a whole nother animal of untapped potential. I predict we have only seen the tip of this megalithic iceberg of visuals.

Closing thoughts

Collaborating with other artists is the name of the game. Not only will they add something to your project, but come release day, they will help you promote because they have skin in the game. And don’t just collaborate with one artist on an album. Collaborate with three, four, five, or more. I’ve learned this the hard way unfortunately. But it’s never too late to learn.

Note: I will update this post regularly as new technologies and modes of music promotion emerge. Let us know in the comments below if you have any other ideas!

A couple years ago, after finally releasing my experimental indie debut album, the time had come for me to do what I hated most — promote my own music.

I love making music, and I also love promoting other people’s music (that I like), but I despise promoting my own music. The whole thing feels kind of gross to me for some bizarre reason — like i sold out, or worse yet, sold my soul to the devil himself.

How could I sum up my experimental masterpiece in mere written words? How could I exploit something so personal, and dear to my heart? Would I even be able to handle rejection, or worse yet — no response at all?

I started perusing the web for music blogs who accepted submissions — and almost immediately noticed that many of these blogs were also accepting submissions via a platform called SubmitHub — and some only accepting submissions through this service.

I’m not going to lie, my shit radar immediately began to sound its alarm upon this realization. the whole idea pissed me off a bit for some weird reason. I have no idea why, it just did.

I remember thinking to myself: “Fuck these SubmitHub blogs!”

However, after emailing my album to over a hundred music blogs and college radio stations, and then spending over $200 on postage — mailing physical copies of my album to blogs and radio stations around the world, and then hearing back from only one outlet, I hit the snooze button on my shit radar and sauntered on over to submithub.com to see for myself what the commotion was all about.

My initial reaction to the submission platform was the strikingly simplistic layout reminiscent of the late 1990s, and also the pale color purple — that seemed to pervade the site. It honestly looked pretty damn legit (shiny websites with lofty claims tend to scare me off), so I said fuck it, and bought a shitload of credits to try my hand.

Honestly, at the time — the bulk discount got me.

I submitted my favorite track to around forty blogs, and to my surprise, received feedback from nearly all of them.

The responses were initially quite hard to stomach, but it was apparent they had at least listened to the track and put some thought into their critique, which made me feel a little bit better about the whole thing.

Two of the blogs accepted my track — and included it in blog posts with a slew of other artist’s tracks. At first this bummed me out a bit that they didn’t feature my track by itself, or at least with a couple other solid tracks. However, I’ve come to find that this really just depends on the blog, because since then, several blogs have featured many of Santa Rosa Records’ other tracks in a more intimate, and thought provoking way — which is much cooler of them than just stuffing a shitload of track embeds into a single blog post accompanied by a sentence or two, and calling it good. This practice should come to an end IMHO.

Subsequently following this initial semi-successful experience with SubmitHub, I decided to take a gander behind the curtain, so I signed up my very own indie music label & blog with the submission service.

We have and always will accept music submissions via email (a totally free option), just don’t expect to hear back from us. We receive over a hundred submissions every day, so it’s become nearly impossible for us to acknowledge each and every track that comes our way, that is, unless you submit your music to us via SubmitHub.

With this submission service, you’re practically guarandamnteed a response.

Why? You may ask. Well, simply because you pay us to take an extra moment of our precious time to verbalize in coherent written words what we like and don’t like about each and every track sent to us via this platform. It’s as simple as that.

If you cannot handle constructive criticism or are very easily offended, then I highly discourage you from using SubmitHub. The music blogs using this submission service will not bullshit you. The platform is not for thin-skinned individuals who deem negative feedback — indie artist abuse.

It is, however, good for you lonesome artists out there who are beginning to feel like you’re pitching your music to a brick wall. It’s sometimes good to hear back from a fellow living and breathing human being — telling you that they actually listened to your track, even if their opinion of it is not what you’d like (or were expecting) to hear.

So, if you’re looking for an easier and more efficient way to submit your tracks to music blogs — and don’t mind putting a few bucks behind this endeavor — then SubmitHub is your best bet.

Good music is highly subjective, so please don’t take the feedback too personally.

I must admit though, there really is some horribly palatable music out there. So, if you’re getting absolutely lit up with harsh critical feedback, then perhaps it’s high time for you to change something up.

Merely my $0.02.

Much love. And please, stay cool all you psychedelic dreamers. Your time will come.

How to Make it in the New World of Digital Music: The Dream

Aquarium Drunkard

Based in Los Angeles, California — Aquarium Drunkard is a rather eclectic indie music blog featuring tantalizing daily music reviews, interviews, and features from all sorts of exceptional artists. They particularly dig vintage garage rock, psych-rock, folk, country, soul, funk, and r&b — among many other genres.

The Blue Walrus

The Blue Walrus is an online music publication based out of London, England. They’re obsessed with all things indie. Particularly electronic and folk music. Their vintage site design is very cool, but the fresh music they feature, is even cooler. Check these guys out for some intensely interesting music. We promise you won’t regret it.

The Monday Morning Tape

The aim of Monday Morning Tape is to encourage music recommendations and discourse. MMT gets roughly 200 submissions each week — most of them are from PR reps and other industry people. However, approx 20 each week come from some random person that says something like: “Hey man, I recorded this in my basement with some friends.  It’s our life’s work to this point and we think it turned out pretty cool.  It’d be great if you’d take a listen and maybe help spread the good word.” These are the best kind of submissions according to MMT. Take heed.

Various Small Flames

Various Small Flames believes that music and writing have the power to connect people and help them better understand themselves and each other. VSF shares radical music from independent artists, especially home recordings and DIY labels. In a previous life, this site was known as Wake the Deaf. They’re quite legit. Trust us.

Tome To The Weather Machine

Tome to the Weather Machine is an aloof music blog that was founded back in February of 2009 by Crawf and Ryan H. The blog features an eclectic array of indie pop, folk, and other alternative artists bordering on experimental brilliance. We love these guys — so be sure to give their site a visit!

Spectral Nights

Spectral Nights is a conglomeration — or rather a collective of music fans, not critics. Their site is a space for them to wax lyrical content about bands they like and gigs they’ve been to — from album reviews to new music videos, and so much more — including the occasional intimate interview, festival review, and gnarly playlist. Spectral Nights mainly digs alternative music, but also has a deep love for pop music — and will quote High Fidelity until the end of time. This site is something special.

Obscure Sound

Obscure Sound is an indie music site that was formed way back in February of 2006 out of a passionate love for finding new and emerging quality music. The site’s aim is to provide music fans with the latest and greatest music, preferably from artists nobody has ever heard of. Obscure Sound also offers streaming and/or downloadable audio content in addition to in-depth write-ups and reviews. Most of their content is one track-focused — but with an option for the listener to hear more.

Hearing Gold

Hearing Gold is an independent music blog showcasing emerging artists from around the globe. Very cool music, modern site design, and in-depth interviews here — so be sure to check them out!

Drunken Werewolf

Bristol, UK-based Drunken Werewolf supports independent and unsigned artists of all shapes, sizes and colors from around the world. DW provides daily music reviews, features, interviews and more in a sometimes heated, but always passionate manner. They’re particularly fond of new and innovative music. We implore you all to give them a gander.

God Is In The TV

God Is In The TV‘s core ethos is about giving music fans, writers, and bands an independent platform, regardless of genre, position or hype. If the name of their site is any indication of the quality of their music — well then you will not be disappointed my friend.

Kid With a Vinyl

Kid With a Vinyl is an exceptionally independent music blog devoted to covering the very best new music spanning across many genres and subgenres. KWV is a delightfully quirky indie music blog featuring in-depth write-ups of obscure music from around the planet.

The Owl Mag

The Owl Mag is a nocturnal, handcrafted music blog who has been unearthing diamonds from the rough and amassing credibility in the music world since the early days of digital music. Superb music reviews, brilliant ticket giveaways, water cooler talk, or break-time browsing — The very wise Owl Mag has it all. Some describe The Owl Mag as a bronze medal music publication and gold medal drinkers — but we think this one is a drunken dandy fit for true lovers of all things indie.

A Note to Artists & Publicists: How to Submit Music to Blogs