If you think you are ready – are you absolutely sure?
You usually only get ONE shot and the last thing you or the person that is working with you or for you wants to do is to “Waste a Pitch”. Trust me on this one, as you cannot burn a bridge by wasting somebody’s time. They’ll never give you the time of day again!
You have to be ready and I mean on ALL FRONTS! You can’t just have a great record in the can. You have to have 3 or more in the can and the fan base that comes from touring and touring to bring with you as a negotiation point. If you only have two good songs on that one record that could be singles, who would want to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on the outside chance they may recoup their investment on two songs? Of course that’s if you are a band that writes your own music. If you are solo artist that can adapt to many different song styles, etc – then that’s a different story. But that doesn’t mean that a solo artist that can nail parts on a record can bring it live and be able to WORK with a professional touring band – it takes time to get tight!
Having played in tons of bands through the years and many of which were revolving bands as it was hard to keep a full band together. Something always comes up and you either have to cancel the gig or get somebody to fill in and about the only type of musician that can really do that is a drummer. Otherwise, it can take months to get really tight and you can't do it in rehearsal you have to do it LIVE! And no matter what you’re trying to do you’ve got to be able to BRING IT LIVE day in and day out – no off days!
You’ve got to stay in shape and get your rest – it’s not a party!
If you get signed you can expect a typical day on the road to be like this: wake up early and do a radio interview during drive time then hit a morning talk show, then back to another radio station for an online interview, then an in store at a local CD store, then lunch with whomever the players are in THAT CITY (radio, TV, promoters, club owners, you name it) and then back to another radio station and hopefully another in store and then sound check – then meet and greets before the show and then the show, then more meet and greets – (and these meet and greets better last a long time or you don’t have any fans) and then back on the bus and head to the next town…in short very long hard days!
And all the while you’re on the bus – you need to working on your next record! Tons of pressure for you to TOP your last one!
So before you waste your ONE PITCH you better have all the pistons firing and you’d better have something to OFFER the label other than your unbridled talent. Otherwise, you’ll end with a really BAD deal IF you even get one and then if you don’t have a HIT, you’ll get dropped and the chances of getting a SECOND deal or 1/100th or less than the first one – you rarely get a second chance to make a first impression so you’d better have it all together and get it right the first time! Lastly, be ready to play ball the way the label wants you to – if you’re not willing to compromise, then don’t even think about a major label – do it all yourself. And the best way to do that is to TOUR, TOUR, TOUR and put out singles or make records and bundle them with a T-Shirt and give away your music – people don’t want to buy many CD’s anymore…but you can record you live shows and sell that to those who can’t make it. Just remember, music has been devalued. Clubs don’t pay what they used to and people are spending their money on other things these days! But if you really want to do this for a living – you can do it – and with all the technology you have such a social networking, etc- and IF your music is REALLY good – the fans will KNOW it and will come back for more! But you had to build that fan base on fan at a time and one show at a time – after a few years of doing that, then you will know if your music is good enough as the number of people at your shows will TELL you the real value of your music! As touring is the ONLY way to make any REAL MONEY!
SM @ MSO
