Delicious is dying. And if you’re not a hardcore web citizen, you might not know the reason why so many folks have become so upset about it. In short: a beloved, free service that thousands of people used to automate…
Author
Joe Taylor Jr.
Four Rules for Artistic Success
James Danziger offers four essential rules for young photographers to “survive” in what’s becoming a challenging line of work. It strikes me that all four rules apply to emerging musicians and artist managers, too: 1. Have talent. Danziger says, “Talent…
Make Space to Leave MySpace
The alarm clock woke me up with the news that a senior News Corporation executive hinted about the possible closure of MySpace within “quarters, not years.” Even if MySpace manages to avoid a total shutdown, independent musicians should worry whenever…
Music Management Skills: Act as if you’ve already got the power to make your artist a star.
“Fake it until you make it.” That’s frequent advice in the music industry. Just look at Lady Gaga. Folks that know her well can tell you about the tipping point when she went from another New York singer/songwriter to a…
Who will your music influence?
There’s a long-running trope about the Velvet Underground that goes something like: “The Velvet Underground only sold about a thousand copies of their first record. But every single person that bought that record started a band.” It’s funny to me…
Music Management Skills: Network in person, not just online.
For most of the past few weeks, I’ve been offline more than online. And those moments I’ve been online, I’ve been working exclusively on client projects instead of mixing in networking and promotion. I’m not intentionally becoming a social media…
How Much Do Musicians Really Make from Record Deals?
After yesterday’s mailbag entry on royalties, our friend Ken Muse pointed me to a great breakdown of the current record deal math done by Cord Jefferson at The Root. By the math in the article, the average “signed” musician makes…
Mailbag: Royalties vs. Publishing
From the mailbag, Mark wants to know about different kinds of royalties: hey whats the diffrence between royalties and publishing revenue.. Cashmoneyrecords sighned a deal with Unviersal Music They keep 85% if tge royalties 50% publishing revenues and all…
Music Management Skills: Help Clients Understand Your Career Development
I wrote Music Management for the Rest of Us to help novice artist managers avoid the kinds of mistakes I made when I first started managing acts. I also wrote the book to help musicians understand that it was becoming…
Music Management Skills: Volunteering to Gain Insight
If you’re a friend, a family member, or a fan enlisted to take on management duties for a musician, reading books about the business might not be enough to get you up to speed on what you really need to…
A Coffeehouse Changes Hands
UPDATE 6/23/2016: Sad news. After a few changes of ownership and management, Steel City’s going to shut down for good. Sad club closing news to report: Steel City Coffeehouse in Phoenixville to close .https://t.co/AACSqQRGLM — wxpnfm (@wxpnfm) May 23, 2016…
Music Management Skills: Attend Conferences with a Bias for Learning, Not Promotion
I get a little worried when a new music manager writes up a goal sheet that includes “attend/work a music conference.” Music conferences are fun, raucous affairs. But many bands treat them as little more than extensions of already overheated…