Can Indie Bands Use Lady GaGa's Example For Originality & Controversy?

Indie bands and musicians - What can we learn, if anything, from the viral marketing techniques employed by the world’s biggest pop star (except Justin Bieber of course), Lady GaGa? If at this point you’re grumbling “Not my thing” or “I hate pop music” you’ve quite possibly closed some of the potential doors available to you and sorely missed out as a result. Let’s also forget the obvious point that GaGa has millions of followers anticipating her every move. I plan to use this individual simply as a conversation starter on the topics of controversy and originality, which are becoming ever-more important in today’s music industry.

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Question: Is this the best or the worst time for independent musicians?

The question: Is this the best or the worst time for independent musicians to be successful?

So here we are, in a world where the power to make, publish and become extremely successful from our own music has been stolen from the almighty gatekeepers. We no longer need third party executives to direct us, we don’t need giant media conglomerates to get our music out to a captive market. We no longer need to pay exorbitant amounts of money to people who don’t really deserve it.

Why? Because the tools, the technology and the means have been delivered right to our doorsteps. We can thank people like Sean Fanning (of Napster) for changing the way we discover music, and Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) for delivering communication to the entire world right into our hands, and for developing an even wider network of social sharing.

Now for a fraction of the cost of going to a professional recording studio, musicians can set up their own home studio and make equally stunning recordings. They can upload to a digital distributor such as CD Baby, and within 48 hours their music can be sitting alongside the major players in iTunes, etc.

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Thank you Elliott Smith

I spend a ridiculous amount of time thinking about the music industry, and particularly the new independent music industry. This is partly because I am an independent musician, and partly because I write a blog on music biz stuff. I’ve also got a natural interest in patterns and systems (and the music industry is one). I like watching things emerge, and I like the ideas that people are forced to come out with to try to make a little money in the current climate.

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The Day Steve Jobs Dissed Me In A Keynote

In May 2003, Apple invited me to their headquarters to discuss getting CD Baby’s catalog into the iTunes Music Store.

iTunes had just launched two weeks before, with only some music from the major labels. Many of us in the music biz were not sure this idea was going to work. Especially those who had seen companies like eMusic do this exact same model for years without big success.

I flew to Cupertino thinking I’d be meeting with one of their marketing or tech people. When I arrived, I found out that about a hundred people from small record labels and distributors had also been invited.

We all went into a little presentation room, not knowing what to expect.

Then out comes Steve Jobs. Whoa! Wow.

He was in full persuasive presentation mode. Trying to convince all of us to give Apple our entire catalog of music. Talking about iTunes success so far, and all the reasons we should work with them.

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