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Looper's Delight
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hi loopers, at long last i am at home! i've essentially been away since september (i say essentially because i flew home for a week in there to vote). i did a 6 week european tour with amanda palmer (highlight: imogen heap's roast chicken, edinburgh punk rock breakfast), some time with a ballet in valencia (highlight: the fish market, chocolate and churros), a north american tour again with amanda (highlight: group cooking at neil gaiman's), and then spent the holidays with family on the east coast (highlight: blizzard). throughout all of this the ableton/sooperlooper combo has worked amazingly, as has the modified FCB pedal made by bob charest. i have one last performance of the year...at SFO. dec 31st from 11am to 2pm. pre-security on the mezzanine of terminal 1. "cello for airports" i'm calling it. i see a HECK OF A LOT of emails here in my loopers box! in skimming the latest discussion started by George (re: putting out CDs) i thought i'd chime in. my opinion: put out a CD! "album" = a collection of related recordings; a snapshot of where one is, right now, as an artist. i guess you can put out a CD and not have to call it an album but it seems like the 2 are used interchangeably. creating a single recording, from start to finish, is a fulfilling artistic endeavor in and of itself. that's the primary thing. and whether those recordings exist as physical cds or mp3s, doesn't matter (just a difference in format and delivery). a CD happens to be convenient way to hold together a collection of recordings, and the metadata of a CD allows digital instances of recordings to be conveniently grouped. some people seem to cherish the physical packaging of a CD, others could care less. promo: i don't believe amateur promo works only because its never worked for me (which isn't to say it doesn't work). no publication or record label has ever responded to anything i have ever sent them. i think this is because everyone is already swamped by beautifully put together promo kits. what i think works: you need people to be recommending you and your work. you need to become omnipresent. how? well, if you're young and hot, you might become omnipresent overnight on the internet. for the rest of us it takes years of long and maddeningly slow growth, and it requires being bloody minded, stubborn and undaunted by constant rejection. then, record labels will write to you with offers...and you can ignore them and carry on (DON'T DO IT) printing: think about your work and what it means and if you're artistic, design your own packaging. if you're not, hire a graphic designer. i favor digipaks over icky jewel cases. i would rather have homemade packaging than a jewel case. discmakers and oasis have always worked for me. thoughts on selling music: i would make recordings even if i didn't make a cent off them but it just so happens that selling physical cds (off my website and at shows) and mp3s (on itunes) has been steady and lucrative my entire career. however, i realize that might be because i didn't get started at this until AFTER filesharing (2002). so as a result, i've never personally experienced the sales decline lamented in the press. (i've worked with many bands who started in the 90's who have experienced the decline though - i.e. rasputina). if my career had started earlier maybe i would have experienced more physical sales and then watched them decline when filesharing came around. but then again, if my career had started earlier the internet would not have been around and i wouldn't be in the position i am now (i.e. without a label and happy about it). other observations: it doesn't hurt to think about who might like your music and then figure out where those people are and how to reach them. in my experience, different audiences are more or less likely to buy a recording (either physical or digital). for example, roughly speaking NPR listeners buy my music. students find it for free (seems logical...i didn't buy music either until i was in my 20s, because i was broke. i was always copying cd collections of wealthier friends). if your targeted audience doesn't think music is worth buying (and demographics favors them) then you need a few strategies to get them out to your shows where they will buy your merch. i am an optimist and take comfort in the fact that america is really big. even if you sell recordings to a miniscule fraction of the national populace, you can do pretty darn well if you stay independent. if you sign to a label, things might be great for a little while, but then the problems will begin... sorry to be so long winded, zoe