Indie Bible - zankMusic.com

it. It’s like planting seeds.” Plant your own seeds once you have something
to pass out. It takes time, but if your music moves people, your career can
sprout by means of reviews, radio play and other exposure that builds your
foundation.
If you plant enough, you have a better chance for a lovely blooming
garden. Indie artist Canjoe John says, “The business of music requires
public awareness and major marketing in order to sell. Major labels have
major money to market with. Independents must get publicity in order to
survive. I send well-written press releases out on a regular basis. I look for
every opportunity to get in the news, T V, radio, newspapers, magazines. If
I’m in a new town, I call newsrooms to try and get a story. I’ve been very
successful at this and consider getting major free press as much an art as
performing major stages.” Exposure builds your story!
Start by creating what’s known as a one-sheet. It should be a summary
of your story on one sheet of paper. Include whatever ammo you have – a
short bio, a track listing, tour dates and past venues, radio play, short press
quotes and any other notable info. Design the info on your one-sheet in an
o rganized way. Send your one-sheet with a CD to publications for reviews,
radio for airplay, venues, potential agents, managers, distributors and
almost anyone else you want to get interested in you and your music. Call
first to see if they want a full press kit or just a one-sheet with a link to
your website.
Check out daily and weekly papers, alternative publications, trade
magazines and even papers from schools. Be creative about where you can
fit it into publications. If you have a good story or technique relating to
your guitar playing, pitch a guitar magazine. If you’ve made savvy
business moves, pitch a business magazine or the biz section of a local
p a p e r. Do research at stores with big magazine sections. Find an angle
about you or your music and look for music and general publications that
might write about it.
Create a good electronic press kit on your website that people can go
to for more info and a selection of photos (least 300dpi in quality) that they
can download without having to deal with you. Include a private page with
full songs and send media people the URL so they can hear your music.
O rganize a street team of fans who can help you create your buzz. T h e y
can make follow-up calls to press and radio stations in their regions.
Fanpower combined with your own hard work can create a buzz that will
get you to bigger publications and radio stations, which leads to better
venues. This can lead to the day you quit your day job because you’ve
created a full time income from your music!
Daylle is the best-selling author of Start & Run Your Own Record Label
and The Real Deal: How to Get Signed to a Record Label. She also
p resents music industry seminars, does phone consulting for musicians and
re c o rd labels and publishes Daylle’s News & Resources, a free industry
n e w s l e t t e r. daylle@daylle.com www. d a y l l e . c o m
HOW TO BE YOUR OWN PUBLICIST
by Ariel Hyatt, Ariel Publicity
© 2008 All Rights Reserved. Used By Permission
♦
For this article, I interviewed several entertainment writers from across the
c o u n t r y. Their comments and advice are included throughout. Writers who
will come up throughout are: Mike Roberts (The Denver We s t w o rd), Jae
Kim (The Chicago Sun Ti m e s), Silke Tudor (The SF We e k l y) .
MYTH: A Big Fat Press Kit Will Impress a Wr i t e r.
TRUTH: Writers will only become exasperated by a press kit that is not
succinct and to the point. A bio, a photo and 6-8 articles double-sided on
white paper is a good sized kit. If a writer wants to read more than that he
will contact you for further information. If you don’t have any articles,
d o n ’t worry, this will soon change.
The first step in your journey is to create a press kit, which consists of four
parts — the Bio, the Photo, the Articles and the CD.
Jae Kim: “The ultimate press kit is a very basic press kit which includes: a
CD, a photo with band members’ names labeled on it — not a fuzzy, arty
photo — a clear black and white, a bio, and press clips — 10 at most, one
or two at least. 40 are way too much.”
PART 1: The bio
Write a one-page band bio that is succinct and interesting to read. I
strongly advise avoiding vague clichés such as: melodic, brilliant
harmonies, masterful guitar playing, tight rhythm section, etc. These are
terms that can be used to describe any type of music. Try to make your
description stand out. Create an introduction that sums up your sound, style
and attitude in a few brief sentences. This way if a writer is pressed for
time, she can simply take a sentence or two from your bio and place it
directly in the newspaper. If you try to make a writer dig deeply for the
gist, that writer will most likely put your press kit aside and look to one of
the other 30 press kits that arrived that week.
TIP: Try to create a bio with the assumption that a vast majority of music
writers may never get around to listening to your CD (500 new releases
come out in the United States each week). Also, writers are usually under
tight deadlines to produce copy — so many CD’s fall by the wayside.
Q. Whose press materials stand out in your m e m o ry ?
A. Jae Kim: “Action shots of bands. Blur has had a few great photos, and
M a r i a h ’s are always very pretty. Also, Mary Cutrufello on Mercury
has a great photo — enigmatic with a mysterious quality. Her picture
was honest and intelligent, just like her music.”
A. Silke Tu d o r : “The Slow Poisoners — a local SF band who are very
devoted to their presentation. They have a distinct style and everything
leads in to something else. Photos are dangerous. If the band looks
young and they’re mugging you have a pretty safe idea of what
they’re going to sound like.”
PART 2: The photo
It is very tough to create a great band photo. In the thousands that I have
encountered only a few have had creativity and depth. I know it can seem
cheesy to arrange a photo shoot but if you take this part seriously you will
deeply benefit from it in the long run.
Create a photo that is clear, light, and attention grabbing. Five
musicians sitting on a couch is not interesting. If you have a friend who
knows how to use PhotoShop, I highly recommend you enroll him or her
to help you do some funky editing. Mike Roberts tends to gravitate
towards: “Any photos that are not four guys standing against a wall. A l s o ,
a jazz musician doesn’t always have to be holding a horn.”
MYTH: Photos Cost a Fortune to Process in 8 x10 Format.
TRUTH: Photos do not have to be expensive. There a few places to have
photos printed for a great price. My personal favorite is ABC Pictures in
Springfield, MO. They will print 500 photos (with layout and all shipping)
for $80. Click the link to check out their web site or telephone
888.526.5336. Another great resource is a company called 1-800-
POSTCARD, (www.1800postcards.com) which will print 5000 full-color,
double-sided postcards for $250. Extra postcards not used in press kits can
be sent to people on your mailing list, or you can sell them or give them
away at gigs
PART 3: The articles
Getting that first article written about you can be quite a challenge. Tw o
great places to start are your local town papers (barring you don’t live in
Manhattan or Los Angeles), and any local fanzine, available at your
favorite indie record store. Use this book as a resource for CD reviews.
Find music that is similar to your band’s type of music and then send your
C D ’s to those reviewers. As your touring and effort swell, so will the
amount of articles written about your band.
PART 4: The CD
The CD artwork, like the press kit, must be well thought out. You should
customize your press kits so that they look in sync with your CD. This way
when a writer opens up a package the press kit and the CD look like they