FastForward: Benefit Concerts

Submitted by JoeDai!

	Table of contents: Benefit Concerts IMWS Midwest Studio Profile All Things IMWS Song of the Year Contest FFWD Archive: Distribution 10-Day Turn Time Get a FREE Catalog
Benefit concerts have been organized as a means of raising money and awareness for those in need since the 1700s. In more recent years, Live 8, Live Aid, Farm Aid, and Katrina relief concerts have benefited huge numbers of people and have put causes like famine in Africa, the plight of the American family farmer, and third world debt relief in the spotlight. Producing any sort of live event takes operational knowledge and organizational skills, not to mention a lot of time and dedication. Fortunately, there are plenty of successful benefits produced to model yours after. "The event wouldn't be what it is without those live bands on the beach," says Jesse Gray, who helps coordinate the music events for the Brendan Borek High Tides Memorial Fund. "It would still be a great vehicle for raising money and awareness, but the music adds an energy and a life to the event that only a live performance can bring. Especially combined with the beach environment." Read the full article here IMWS Studio Profile: Midwest 2006 Chicago Recording Company Take one look at Chicago Recording Company's catalog of clients and you know it's home to a lot of hit records. Billy Corgan, Cheap Trick, Ice Cube, Kanye West, Pearl Jam… the list is insane. Ask Chris Shepard, CRC's General Manager, what makes the studio home to so many top-notch music icons, and he doesn't hesitate. "It's easy," he says, "it's our staff." Click here to learn more IMWS Sponsors Dewey Beach Music Conference www.dbmc06.com September 28 - October 1, 2006 Ruddertowne Complex 113 Dickinson St. Dewey Beach, DE 19971 NEMO www.nemoboston.com September 28-30, 2006 Boston Center for the Arts 539 Tremont St. Boston, MA 02116 Songwriting Competition Now Accepting Entries Song of the Year is an international songwriting competition with over $100,000 of cash and prizes. Fifty top songwriters each month get their songs sent out to record labels, music publishers, and more. The judging panel consist of many Grammy award winners including Norah Jones, Sheila E., and more. Enter your song or lyrics today at www.entermysong.com
We've taken the liberty to send this to you at peterjoe@gvsu.edu because you volunteered this address to us. If you have received this message in error, we apologize. To be removed from this mailing list, click here. This is an automated mailing. Responding to this email will result in an error. Please direct any questions or comments to questions@discmakers.com.
7905 N. Rte 130, Pennsauken, NJ 08110 © 2006 Disc Makers, 1-866-249-2373, www.discmakers.com

Best way to boost your CD sales is to make it easy for people to buy

It sounds obvious, but I've found in all my years of running CD Baby,
that the best-selling artists are the ones who made it EASY for their
fans to buy!

The "navigation" bar of your website should have a link to buy your
music. If you have a MySpace page, there should be an easy link for
people who are listening to BUY it. Emails to your fans should
include links to buy your CD.

(And don't just bury it in small print at the bottom of your
listening-page!)

I've always tried to make this very easy, to give you a nice short
simple URL for each CD, and tools like a shopping cart you can put on
your website.

I hope this helps!

--
Derek Sivers, CD Baby, HostBaby
http://cdbaby.org <-- opportunities here, always
http://hostbaby.com <-- web hosting for musicians

(submitted by Joedai Warriors)

Two useful books : Indie Bible and How to Be Your Own Booking Agent

HOW TO BE YOUR OWN BOOKING AGENT
Whether you're out gigging all summer, or just wish you were, I
highly recommend this book called "How To Be Your Own Booking Agent -
the Musician's & Performing Artist's Guide To Successful Touring".

START HERE : http://www.performingbiz.com/cdbaby.html
Instead of just one person's opinion, this book is filled with the
author's interviews and shared wisdom from tons of industry experts.

The very people you would dream of having as your booking agent are
telling you exactly how to do it yourself.

Example topics : Contracts, Managing the Road, Conferences, Trade
Shows and Industry Events, Funding Sources, Effective Telephone
Techniques, How to Make Cold Calls, Creating An Effective Promotional
Package, Crossing Borders, Marketing Your Act, Accessing the Media:
Print, Radio, Television and The Internet, When to Quit Your Day Job,
Hiring Help and Ethics and Attitudes.

It includes worksheets and forms that you can immediately copy and
use, saving you time and confusion from having to come up with those
on your own.

It's an incredibly fact-filled 492 page book. It will take you
MONTHS to go through it, and if you do, you will be a great booking
agent, which is a very rare thing among independent musicians.

INDIE BIBLE
If you don't already have the Indie Bible, you should.

It's a directory of over 9000 places where you can promote your
music, including 4200 publications that will review it and 3400 radio
stations and shows that will play it.

Most musicians I know have it. Even if you don't go through all 9000
listings, it's incredibly helpful if you want to quickly contact blues
magazines in Florida, or jazz radio stations in England. (Yes it's an
international directory, not just USA/Canada.)

Read more about it, here : http://www.indiebible.com/cdbaby/

(submitted by Joedai Warriors)

TalentFunding.com

By way of Joedai:

I have something very useful for you to check out...I wanted to let
you know about the music funding site that we just
completed...TalentFunding.com.

It's set up so you can contact potential sponsors for your music.
Here are some articles about it:

http://www.TalentFunding.com/MusicArticles/List.aspx

The Door-to-Door Sales Experiment

A little background

1. I've got a lot of Trouble With Monday (TWM) CD's in my front room
2. In TWM, each band member gets so many CD's to sell on their own and keep the profits.
3. My 12 year-old daughter was complaining about not having any money.

Solution: door-to-door sales!

I couldn't talk Caitlin into doing it so I said "I'll try it!". Caitlin said "I'm going with you!" So Caitlin and I got the portable CD player ( or "boombox" as they used to be called ), bought some "C" batteries for it and took a box of TWM CD's.

We choose a newer suburban neighborhood to start. It was about 7:30 pm on a Thursday evening.

We talked to 5 people.

1. "Come back later"
2. Sale!
3. "No, thanks"
   
4. "Not interested, but it sounds good"
5. "Come back tomorrow"

If we could keep this up, then every 5 people we talk to, 1 would buy a CD! That's 20% and pretty good from my knowledge of sales.

I wasn't too pushy. I don't want to cause more harm than good afterall. Of the 5 houses, 3 seemed fascinated by the fact that people right here in Lafayette were making original music.

However, Caitlin had had enough after 5 houses.

We'll probably try this again. But I just wonder if there's some kind of door-to-door permit we need to get. Also, I'd go out on a Saturday probably when people are at home and outside.

Can You See Me Now?

Jaded Era's transformation from invisible indie to hit songwriters
August 2006

Jaded Era must be getting used to attention. Just last year, Cleveland Scene Magazine voted the group "Cleveland's Best Rock Band" for the third year in a row, they opened for Bon Jovi (to add to their list of notable stage shares), and they performed as a finalist in Disc Makers' Midwest IMWS showcase in Chicago. Now their song "Invisible," written and released by the band in 2002, is chart-topper Ashlee Simpson's current single.

http://www.discmakers.com/music/ffwd/2006/jadedera.asp