We wanted to bring back that feeling you got when you made that perfect mixtape for that special someone. And we want to help you set the mood for date night this Valentine's day -- just click the picture. Brutis Perux has curated a very special mix that will definitely take you somewhere when you play it from beginning to end. Romance is in the air so lets listen together..
If you'd like to hear more, be sure to follow him on Spotify!
I remember Bob Lefsetz writing a blog a few years back that started with the line, "Albums are for fans, singles are for newbies. Don't make an album expecting to reach a new audience. If you want to reach a new audience, focus on the single."
What made me decide to blog about this now is the accumulation of a couple things: first and foremost it being the topic of conversation with a few artist that I am consulting. Second, seeing so many failed attempts of developing indie artist trying to sell full-length albums or kick start their full-length album production with crowd-funding but ultimately lacking the fan base to back the project. The most recent reason being the blog from disc makers titled, "Should your next music release be an EP or an album?"
What I like about this CDBaby blog post is that it not only brings home a point that I stress with many young, or relatively unknown artist; not all your music is going to be great -- especially when you're first starting out (I don't even know how we recorded our first EP in a prototype version of garage band with no mics). It's going to be a learning experience figuring out who your fan base is and how to grow it; let alone figuring out your best sound. Asking people to give up an hour of their time is not always going to be easy, nor warranted if your music is not great.
When was the last time you listened to an entire album of an artist that you weren't already a fan of? Streaming albums of up-and-coming artists will often lead to me scanning or skipping a few songs on a record and only listening to that one, maybe three, stand out song(s) that will capture my attention for a full listen. Why burden yourself to put out a full album; just because you have the material doesn't mean you have the fan base that is eager to listen. Sure, we can quote Field of Dreams, "if you build it, they will come." But learning to curate your content is a crucial step in the process. Always put your best foot forward. Pick out the top 5 songs you have and put them out in an EP, and if you are still confident in the other songs that didn't make the EP then release them in the months leading up to and following the release of the EP -- not only do you need to gain attention before the EP release, but you have to have something to follow the EP release with.
The EP is short, sweet and to the point. It can be conceptual, themed or it can be a you best singles in a concise package to showcase what you can do. Its long enough for a local publication like LA/OC Weekly to do a write-up or review, or be featured on Bandcamp or NPR's "All Songs Considered." Its also short enough that it will leave new fans wanting more. If you are creating this independently or as DIY musician, the overhead of a smaller project like an EP is much more manageable. If you decide to take the route of giving a varied amount of sounds in the project. It can serve as a great starting point to help you narrow down your sound, or figure out what style of music you stand out in.
We first put this into practice around 2009 when we released our first project for a solo artist. It was the debut EP for Akapela Jonz. There was a lot of debate between the team working on the project in regards to how long it should be, and although we had enough material for a full length album, or three, we chose to just release the EP. We felt 20 minutes of music was enough time for us to showcase who Akapela Jonz was as an artist, and 20 minutes was a reasonable amount of time to ask someone to invest in listening to an unknown artist.
For us, it was the right move. And proved true for the following releases for Tanya Thomas, Krista Mone, and Brutis Perux. The decision definitely paid dividends in helping us to set up a college tours, landing sets on the festival circuit, garnering Pandora and Spotify streams, contracting collaborations with notable non-profits, and most importantly creating a desire from the fans for more music. I know many artist have that chip on the shoulder to put out all their music, or prove they have more substance than what is currently being played on mainstream radio -- I get it. But not everyone else will. Its something to think about when only one album outside of Disney went platinum in 2014 (according to soundscan).
Circa 2007. A young Notes in his dashiki playing alongside Jerms and Will Hawkins at Crane's Hollywood Tavern. This was before we created AG One, back when I'd catch a show whenever I was back home from school. Truly rare footage of a talented young musicians.
So recently I had the honor of participating in a panel discussion for Fresh, Inc. In the video above I was lucky enough to have two of my responses featured in the promotional recap video. I want to address both of my answers -- build upon really.
We were talking about what sacrifices we have had to make as entrepreneurs -- and of course, next to time, money was one of the biggest talking points. When the topic of money comes up in this kind of setting, people who are just starting out or are unsure about pursuing this path can be easily deterred. There is a common misconception that you need to have a huge amount of money saved up, investor, or some type of funding to be able to start a business; its not true. Depending on your business plan, there are many different ways to find funding for your company. Since I didn't want to owe anyone money, nor was I fully sure how I was going to generate money with music early on I decided to use a "pay as you go" method.
I'm stubborn. Also, I was reluctant into picking up the towel -- which I'll explain in another blog post. Starting out we didn't have very much -- money nor equipment. In 2002 I bought the first generation powerbook, and given a free copy of garage band (before it came standard on all computers). I had a strat and an acoustic guitar, and Cliff had a bass. We hadn't even gotten our first midi keyboard yet -- recorded everything strait into the laptop. Our friend Sua Malo can attest to how we got around the fact that we didn't have a mic but still were able to record vocals -- they sounded mickey mouse; but we could do it!
All this to say we chose not to get ahead of ourselves. When we decided to create AG One, Cliff and I brought together all the equipment that we had acquired over the past 4 years. We knew what key pieces we needed to invest in, made a list and then hit the pawn shops and scoured craigslist (that's actually a more recent tactic, craigslist wasn't as big back then -- but ebay was!). So we kept a budget, and saved to purchases hardware we needed as we could afford it. That way we wouldn't have to worry about debt and any money we made would be strait profit rather than going to pay off credit cards.
So if you're just starting out, and are intimidated by how expensive it can by to build a moderate home studio...don't get ahead of yourself; and don't spend outside of your means. Big budgets are the only way to go, and baby steps are okay. If you have the confidence in your ability to run up a huge tab before you event start selling hits because you know you can make that money back -- well stick to your guns. I admire that faith; its not impossible.
Perspective is so crucial; if this is what you really want to do then don't get so caught up in the negativity of the sacrifice; the most important thing you can ever do is invest in yourself.
World...this is Krista Mone. and we were more than happy to work with her on her solo debut...which is set to be released in February 2012.
Its been a while since we've had a friday night adventure, but last friday was definitely an amazing night! I love when people who were in attendence post up videos of the team! Check out a little snippet of Akapela Jonz and Nick E. Nice's set from Laced! WITH a special Guest appearance fromTanya Thomas!
Official laced video coming soon! Shout out to Almighty Brothers Next Door!
this flip is so hot.
I've been reading "Guerrilla Marketing" by Jay Conrad Levinson, and one of the major themes he talks about is commitment to your marketing campaign. You can have the greatest marketing campaign idea, but if you aren't committed to seeing the campaign through to the success you know it will reach, then you aren't ready for that success.
Last year we came up with a campaign for Akaplea Jonz -- "Will you be my fan?" It was so simple, but the potential was huge. People go a round-about way to earn fans, or prove why they believe they deserve your support. No one was asking people strait up what the fan wanted or if they even wanted to support you. We were developing this idea as a new relationship between artist and fan, a "fanship." No entitlement; a mutually beneficial relationship based on giving the fans what they want: good music, in exchange for what we needed: support [you may have thought I was going to say money for financial sustainability, but that is all part of my master plan].
Visually the campaign was set up much like a note you sent to your crush in elementary school asking to check the box if they liked you or not. We wanted to ask people if they would want to be a fan of Akapela Jonz. We even had a script written up by Jared San Antonio to go along the same idea that the famous viral old spice commercial had to display how Akapela Jonz was the better choice...["look at your rapper, look at me, look at your rapper, back at me....sadly, your rapper, is not me...but he could be LIKE me if...] lol still cracks me up. We never filmed it though. I wish we would have.
So here is where we went wrong.
We let it run for about 5 months, and started planning ways to build on it and add to it -- develop it. It ran all the way through turning into his mixtape. But once his EP was release the campaigned stopped. We didn't keep it going. Part of it was we didn't feel that it was getting the results that weexpected wanted -- so we let it go.
Last week Akapela Jonz rocked at the Playground Festival in Irvine, Ca. There were thousands of people there, many who had never heard of him. You can imagine how practical this campaign was for a bunch of strangers. We were completely out of the "Wake Up and Dream" stickers and I JUST so happened to find a small stack of those stickers you see below. So in the guerrilla mindset that we had we used those stickers to present to people walking by and ask if they would be a fan of Akapela Jonz, BUT they had to wait to make their decision until after they saw his set. The results were amazing!
Finally I made the connection with what I had read. We abandoned the campaign too early. It never had enough time to truly reach people. It was so short lived that the staff had even forgotten about it all together. So last week we made the decision to revive the "Will you be my fan" campaign. I really feel the potential for this is huge, but its going to take time. This time around we have to commit fully to its success. If you have been to my facebook recently, you'll see how committed I am.
So now that leaves me with one question, Will you by my fan?
Akapela Jonz's debut EP, "Wake UP and Dream" has had great circulation and solid reviews. What many people don't know is that before it decided on to be an EP, it was an album. I wish I could show you the first draft of the album, too. Its not that it was bad, but it just didn't fit right. It was sample heavy, and the production didn't give a big enough potential to the vision we had for Akapela Jonz's debut.
I remember sitting in the lab during his first studio session and thinking, "Man, this guy is amazing." He had strong writing, great vocal command, and most importantly he had the drive to want to keep bettering himself. The first time I sat down with Cliff and listened to the entire project -- as it was at that point-- was about the same time I had watched a documentary on Jay-Z's first album, "Reasonable Doubt." The one thing that stood out to me on that documentary was that Jay started out with the quick flow and his rhymes had a lot of words crammed into each line -- which is the early Jay-Z that not many are familiar with. In the same light, that was the same sound we were forcing upon Akapeal Jonz because of the track selection that we provided him.
The major change that was made between the original album to the EP that you have all heard was tempo. We slowed everything down -- nothing was over 95 beats per minute. In doing that, the rhymes were no longer rushed and you could understand everything that Akapela Jonz was saying. This was the same major change that the producers spoke about when Jay went in to work on "Reasonable Doubt." We ran with the idea, "less is more." When you can use less words to be more descriptive, you allow the listener to make their connections which makes a song even more relatable to their own experiences.
So there we were, we scrapped his entire project and started fresh. It was the best creative decision we had made throughout the entire process for his project, as well as for his career. After a few months with some amazing collaborations we had about 10 or 15 songs finished. At that point we were still looking for a full length album, or at least an LP -- trying to work within those stupid iTunes loop holes so we can sell albums.
Now, when you set out to make an album (or EP, LP, etc.) you can't just take the first songs that you finish creating and slap them together and put them out -- that just doesn't make sense, unless you're making a compilation album. Even then, there was to be a central theme. Sonically, the music has to compliment each other. Thats when we decided to make the his debut an EP. Not only that, we didn't want to over saturate on the first release. Relatively unknown, people aren't as open to hearing an artist without some type of co-sign or familiarity. So we figure, a short and sweet 20 minutes will give the people enough to get an idea of who Akapela Jonz is and make them more open or receptive to his next set of releases.
Here was the hard part: which songs will be the best representation of Akapela Jonz, while still fitting in with the central theme of "Wake Up and Dream?" This is where the cutting began, and we ended with the 6 songs that you now know as the "Wake Up and Dream (EP)". What you may not know is that Summer Memories was supposed to be the outro to the project, and White Walls was supposed to be right at the heart of the project. White Walls is a show favorite, and a fan favorite. Everyone that has heard that song has said they loved it, or it was his best song -- WHY WASN'T IT ON THE ALBUM?!?!?!
Well, its simple. We know it was a dope track. It is one of my personal favorites as well...thats why we ended up releasing it this past summer. But end of the day, we all felt that it just didn't fit with the rest of the project. Not with the theme. Not with the production. It was an odd ball vibe with the EP as a whole. So we held off. Some may argue that Finale shouldn't have made the cut, or White Walls Should have replaced Finale. My response to that is at least you learn about history in school.
Last night I drove home at a decent hour (in terms of the cubicle world), with no plans for the evening. I got in the car and left my company parking lot with hopes of maybe finding a plate waiting for me at home.
I didn't really count on finding any food left over for me though because the problem is that it's very rare for me to drive straight home after work.
Typically, I'll go and have dinner with an old friend, or stop by my favorite diner for a quick bite. So to me, meals are never really something I expect to see when I get home because my family knows I won't be there in time for dinner.
But last night, I just wanted to go straight home.
It might've been that I was still exhausted from a pretty great trip to Vegas, or that I'm most likely going to be pinching pennies until my next check comes in, but regardless of my exhaustion, I had a greater sense of urgency to go straight home. I didn't expect to find any food, or see anyone moving around for that matter.
I actually didn't expect anything, to be entirely honest.
But when I arrived, I found both of my parents sitting at the dinner table, deep in conversation. They greeted me, and continued on. At first, I didn't think anything of it. But then it all started replaying in my head as I was busy trying to wash the smell of recirculated office air off of my face.
They were genuinely enjoying each other's company.
I went back to the kitchen to pretend to look for food in the fridge just so I could see it again. My mom offered me a plate, opened the rice cooker (we were having Chinese fried rice for dinner), and had me serve myself. Then she went back to rekindle the conversation.
Just then I realized, I've been missing out on seeing my parents enjoy their lives together all of this time.
All of the late hours in the office, all of the dinners with friends, all of the diner runs, all of the outings...I've been out of my house so much, I haven't even noticed that I've lost my sense of family and of love.
I'm not really sure why I was so moved by this particular moment, because I've seen it before, but I guess perhaps it has a lot to do with the fact that I've been trying to make so many positive changes in my life lately in an effort to regain my sense of creativity for writing more music, and just writing, period.
I've been in a funk for quite some time and as much as I'd like to think that it has to do with all of the elements in the universe, it really just has to do with the fact that as an artist and a musician, I have to take the time to really sit and process moments in life that have meaning in order to connect with anyone that just so happens to hear anything I write or work on.
Music to me has really started to become more of a personal catharsis, and unless I decide to treasure and savor moments like last night more often, I won't write anything valuable and meaningful. I guess sometimes it pays to stay in. If anything, a home-cooked meal always tastes better than a Denny's club sandwich.
Post by: Sankeyz
I was recently asked what my thoughts are on the state of mainstream radio on my formspring. More and more, this is becoming a prominent discussion point among my peers. It was no more than a week ago that I got a call from Mr. Notes talking about his frustration with the radio and how it is all sounding the same to him. Ironically, I had just read an article by Bob Lefsetz talking about the role mainstream music is playing in today music industry. I love how he relates major labels to mass manufacturing companies, and people are interested in supporting small business because the have better quality products.
"No one has the magic keys. Top forty radio is a formula fed by a conveyor belt no different from the one at GM, but with a lot less innovation. If you're interested in making a Cruze or a Camry, sign up. But it's the aforementioned Prius which is sold out and unavailable, it's what people want, what they're willing to overpay for, even though GM killed its electric car. It takes a while for the public to catch up. The Prius was not an overnight success. Hipsters and the green signed up first, Toyota improved the product, gas prices went through the roof and voila, a mania! Manias are not manufactured, not ones that last, they're all about being in the right place at the right time, anticipating the market, not playing it safe, but being dangerous." - Bob Lefsetz
In the past year I have found myself listening more NPR, or podcasts such as Gordon Gartrell Radio. Notes hit the nail on the head when he said, "its all starting to sound the same to me." Some may say mainstream radio is playing it safe, others may argue that they are just playing the artists who have the marketing dollars behind them. Its a lot of static sound, no one that is getting air play can say they are pushing the envelope musically, really. There a few acts that are, but they aren't getting as much love as they should. People with the budgets -- that are slowly dwindling -- are taking less risks on acts that THEY can't see as being immediately profitable. Instead, they are banking on revenue from these cookie cutter sounding artists that were successful during this current trend. But once that trend is over, then what?
I miss how DJ's used to break local acts by giving them air play -- and due credit should be given to those such as DJ Roial 1, Nicky Valens, and other DJ's who still practice this. Radio used to be a balance of top 40, as well as regional artists. Now you can go from city to city across the states and just hear the same songs. That's why so many people are hitting the internet so tough and are devouring all the music -- especially the free music -- from these unsigned artists.
Internet radio has its moments. Pandora or Slacker sometimes throws me for a curve ball and hits me with something or someone I've never heard of and is really dope -- I have high hopes for spotify, once I really get it going.
Podcasts like Phonte and Zo (gordongartrellradio.com) will do mixing classic hits and new music, and it never fails, I always end up researching who just played so I can hear more from them.
But to answer the question I think people that are really looking for new music aren't listening to mainstream radio. To have your song played on mainstream radio is more of a status marker opposed to the best music really getting to most spins.
What are your thoughts? Where do you go to find your new music?
"The GRAMMY Award is synonymous with musical excellence. Winning one has nothing to do with sales, chart success, or popularity. Rather, it is the result of a rigorous voting process carried out by music industry peers. GRAMMYs are awarded annually to musicians, producers, songwriters, recording engineers, and other music professionals. To receive one is to be accorded the highest honor in the recording arts."
Just wanted to take a moment to clarify that.