Several months ago, when I was writing Squeezing The Show, I asked Seth Godin if he had any advice on how to go about finding a publisher for the book. I figured the publishing business was very similar to the record business but when he guided me toward two posts he has written on the topic I realized that they are nearly exactly the same business. Seth’s two posts sound so similar to the advice I would give a young musician that I’m just going to send you directly onto his words. As you read his words replace the word:

• “book(s)” with “album(s)”
• “publisher” with “record label”
• “editor” with “producer”
• “author(s)” with “musician(s)”
• “published” with “released”
• “write(ing)” with “record(ing)”

Article 1: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/08/advice_for_auth.html

Article 2: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2005/07/advise_for_auth.html

Here’s some more information from Billboard to help put things in context. In 2009:

97, 751 albums were released
Of those only 2050 sold more than 5000 units
Of those 12 sold more than 1 million units

I know these numbers seemed stacked against you… yet every year there are hot new artists that come around and establish enduring, successful careers.  It doesn’t take a massive album or radio play to make a sustainable and successful career.  In fact, as Seth Godin says, if you can establish a solid and successful career then you won’t need them and then you will be exactly the type of artist a label will want to work with.  When in doubt on your career path, go back and read Seth’s advice again.  Own your career.  You can do it.

P.S.  If that doesn’t work for you, join my Advisor program and I’ll help you figure it out.

Be advised: professional artists are business owners. This is a key message of our company, this blog, and everything that we seek to do through the educational side of our business. If you are an artist and you desire to or already do make a living from your art then you must recognize you are in business… you are a business owner.

I read dozens of new business books each year. Very few of them speak to the music business owner, yet most of the lessons of how to run a business apply directly to running a music business. You have fans (customers) who buy your products (music and merchandise) and in order to be successful you need to grow your fan (customer) base and keep your current base happy. True, this isn’t the sexy approach to the music business and it wasn’t the reason you got involved in being a musician. Yet it is possibly the most powerful lesson I could share with you.

This is why I am launching a new service called The Farm Team and will be open to only 20 bands/artists who do not currently have managers but are very serious about growing their business.

As many of you know I am a life/business coach – a service I provide for anyone even if they aren’t in the music business. The difference with The Farm Team is that I will be serving partly as a coach and partly as a mentor and the service is specifically for musicians. My interest is to help these 20 select artists grow their business to their definition of success through weekly one-on-one calls with me. If you feel that this would be appropriate for you or your band, you can read more about it and apply for the program here: http://thefarmteam.com

Regardless of whether you choose to apply for this group, I’d like to leave you with the simple message again. As soon as you choose to make a living performing your art, you have assumed the role of business owner. Embrace and appreciate this role – it will serve you well.

Of course, I don’t know the future of radio… but when asked today I realized I had a few thoughts to share.

1.  The Internet may rule – I imagine that the internet will eventually find it’s way into all of the places where we currently favor terrestrial radio (namely the car being the last hold out).  Once that happens terrestrial radio will face some significant competition, most likely threatening its survival.

2.  Community advantage – The advantage that terrestrial radio has is that it is community-based.  As you may have picked up from previous blog posts, I’m a big fan of strengthening community simply by reaching out and getting involved with what’s going on around you.  Local radio stations can speak to communities in much the same way that local friends can.  They share your home town, they know the nuances and the secrets for the community, they can talk about news pertinent to your town, and be a real contributor to the local experience by playing music for that place.  Think of local radio like the local farmers.  Think of how much you appreciate the local farmer at the farmer’s market vs. the big factory farm.

I grew up outside of Philadelphia in the 80s/90s and the classic rock stations were my favorite.  Those stations and most specifically, the DJs of those stations, were local heros… and famous to me.  There was John Debella on one station and Pierre Robert on another.  I’m not sure it will be like that again, but in Charlottesville we have several stations that are very active in the community and they matter.

3.  Radio as filter – In the case of a DJ in a local community you trust them to “show” you new music.  By listening to them you are implicitly giving them control to introduce you to new music.  The DJ or station become a filter for you.  This is still an important role.

4.  User control – In some cases though, you will find times when you don’t want someone to show you something new.  You want control over your listening experience.  In that case you’ll choose to plug in your iPod and listen to your music.

5.  Reach or Accessibility – There are some places where terrestrial radio just doesn’t reach, or more importantly if it does reach there the options may be limited.  In small town America this can be the case.  I recall going to a hunting cabin in the back woods of Pennsylvania when I was a kid.  There may have been one radio station.  Last year I was on the big island of Hawaii and radio options were limited.  Guess what?  The house had a WiFi connection.  I pulled up Pandora on my iPod and chose what station I wanted to listen to.  It was a defining moment for me in thinking that radio as we know it may be going away.

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Maybe the future of radio is that we’ll have the best of all worlds – community-based internet radio stations, accessible everywhere through WiFi, and free to program any music they wish, thus acting as a true filter for its listeners.

Thoughts?

I read a book called The Talent Code this weekend and I now recommend it to you.  Many of the ideas are directly applicable to the being a musician or a business owner.  Below I will paraphrase some ideas from the book as they apply to our industry:

1.  Talent is nurtured – it takes time and consistent effort.  According to some of the greatest coaches in sports, it is rare that a genius with innate skills and abilities comes along.  Most stars are people who practice consistently and wisely to get where they are.  The book discusses the science of myelin, which is a tissue that wraps around your neurons each time you practice a skill.  It is this insulation that helps you improve a skill and it takes both time and repetition to grow the myelin.  Additionally, myelin is always breaking down and growing anew so if you don’t practice a skill for a while you “get rusty” because your myelin has broken down a bit.  A mantra often repeated in the book is:  Skill is insulation that wraps neural circuits and grows according to certain signals.

2.  Surround yourself with other driven people who you admire.  Though the book didn’t say this outright, I’m combining with an idea I talk about in coaching and one I’ve read from other successful people: The people you hang out with are a reflection of you.  In many talent hotbeds (like the Seattle grunge era or the rock scene in 1960s San Francisco) the author found that the athletes or musicians were surrounded by other artists honing and producing their craft.  This served as a positive feedback loop in the person’s mind.  One artist sees another doing great work and thus it makes it much more real for that person.

3.  Playing an instrument requires skill, so does running your business. As you know, it wasn’t easy to start playing an instrument.  It took lots of hard work to get to the point where you are now.  Business is a whole new set of skills.  You’ve got to experience what it means to run a business much like when you first picked up an instrument.  This is a reality.  If you want to succeed as an artist business, you must not shy away from the practice required to build your business myelin.  It may be hard when you first start out but it gets easier with time, just like learning your instrument.

4.  Imagine your future. This isn’t just some empty self-help advice, it’s real advice that has been studied.  The book points out a study of new music students that were asked how long they planned to play their instrument.  The students that imagined playing the instrument forever were the most successful group by far… and the ones who imagined this and practiced the most each day were the best of those students.

For every new coaching client I take on I ask them what their big vision is – where they imagine their career going.  Most artists tell me they can’t see that far into the future, but I think most people have just been trained not to shoot for the stars.  Take a moment to list 30 things you’d like to be or do in your life.  What does the future look like?  If you don’t define it, no one else will.  If you do define it and believe it, you’ll step up to the challenge of making it real.

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There were many other great topics discussed in the book like what makes a great coach, the concept of deep practice, how to ignite someone’s drive to learn, and the different types of neural circuits.  Too much to go into unfortunately, but if you’ve got the time, check it out and let me know what you think: ben@theartistfarm.com

Here is a beautiful 4-minute clip of Bobby McFerrin talking about Yo-Yo Ma going to an African village to experience and learn about their music.  I would have trouble describing these ideas any better so please watch the video.  It will be worth it.

Imagine the world where we always feel the music inside – that feeling that we have at festivals or on stage, that feeling of pure beauty coursing through our veins.  Imagine being able to feel the music in the world, everywhere you look – the hum, playfulness and at times darkness of the natural world.  Imagine everyone intertwining these inspirations into their own song and feeling ok with the changing nature of that song – realizing that stability and consistency isn’t the goal.  Imagine finding the song even under what seems ugly at first – the oil spills, war and violence.  Imagine being able to see the lightness beneath it all.  Imagine that world.

The human mind conspires to make you fearful; Fearful of so many things – death, poverty, being unloved or unwanted, being alone, not mattering, not knowing or being less intelligent than others.  These fears project outwardly in how we view strangers (will they try to kill us?), how we interact with loved ones (I fear I’m not loved so I yell and use harmful words), in how we interact at work (I fear looking like I don’t know the answer so I get aggressive or make something up) and so on.

A world of individuals misunderstanding every other individuals fears leads to a world rife with conflict.  If I fear all of these things and manifest the fears through action, and others have the same fears and actions then our fearful actions feed back on each other.  Our fears interact rather than our truest selves.

A new world will be born out of acknowledging our fears.  Contrary to current popular belief acknowledging fear makes us stronger and more confident (not weaker).  Better business, better government, better life will be built out of leaders who acknowledge their fears.  Like a scary vampire, fears can not live when you acknowledge and expose them to light.

Next time you feel fear creeping up acknowledge it.  Write it down and look at it.  It will seem silly.  Slowly you will find that you fear less.  Then you will find that you live more.

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Try:

Next time someone asks you a question that you don’t know the answer to, say “I don’t know.”  Then offer to look the answer up on the internet or find out and report back to them.

Ignorance is bliss if you’re in bliss while ignorant.  If you live a happy and content life while not being aware of the problems around you… then yes ignorance is bliss.

If you are living in ignorance but you are miserable – you dislike your job, your marriage, and how you spend your days – but you are unaware of yourself and the fact that you can change these things… then no ignorance is not bliss.

I can’t think of anyone I’ve met who is the first type.  So it may be a fallacy.  Which means that it’s probably best to work on finding your bliss through self-awareness.

Part of living your bliss is finding and maintaining your balanced or centered self.  The process of finding your balance means keeping the things that make you feel good in your life, and eliminating the things that don’t make you feel good.  It’s not ignorance to be aware of something and then to decide that you don’t want to have it be part of your life.  That’s decision making and it’s crucial to your bliss.

So you know what, forget that old saying.  The new one is “balance is bliss.”

During the work day, my mind is moving quickly, and my legs bounce up and down as I try to deal with the external energy flow around and through me.  There are lots of things going on – and it’s all exciting.  I have observed during these moments that my mind can not readily digest information that requires patience, calm, and deep thought (it requires extra effort on my part to do this).  This has lead me to the theory of Mental Operating Frequency or MOF for short.  I’m guessing that there is some official scientific explanation for this state but I’m making up my own based on experience.

Mental Operating Frequency exists on a scale – high to low.  Our MOF can be a factor in how we interpret static information.

During work hours I have a high MOF and thus have trouble listening and appreciating slow, somber music.  However, that same piece of music could blow me away at home in the evening, on the couch, with the lights off and candles lit, and a glass of wine in my hand (when my MOF is low).  In this case, the music doesn’t change – it is static.  But my MOF changes which in turn changes how I interpret the music.

MOF doesn’t just dictate what music sounds good at certain states, it also dictates our readiness for patience.  For example, reading a user manual requires all of my focus and patience.  The manual doesn’t change though.  My ability to interpret and act on that information changes based on my MOF.  If I have a low MOF at the moment it is much easier for me than if I’m at a high MOF.

The point is, recognize when MOF may be the reason for your inability to access something and schedule or shift your activities accordingly if you can’t quickly change your state.  If you are in a high MOF state, take on your projects that require this energy level.  Don’t try to read the user manual that will require all of your focus and patience.  Instead, make the sales call.  Practice the opposite as well.  If you are in a low MOF state, write that deep blog post or the slow song.  Think of how that applies to all of your daily activities to maximize your MOF!

World 2.0 has a silent mantra running through it’s veins: “Build people up, don’t break them down.”  Beneath the blogs that you follow, the business management books that you read, and the message of the grass roots movements you will find that they all collectively share this mantra.

Building people up starts in our own minds (building ourselves up), then extends to our family and workplace.  From there it extends to how we as collectives interact outside of our human scale relationships – in big corporations, with investors, and international relations.

Breaking people down is the informal and unspoken rule of old style business.  Financial growth at all costs was the mantra even if it means usurping and depleting energy from external sources.   Verbal abuse to those below you?  Sure.  Physical abuse of overwork and poor conditions?  Yes.  People in this case are merely sources of energy to use and abuse to reach some financial goal.  I know this still exists but the goal is to end it.

In World 2.0, with our focus on building human-centric businesses we no longer see humans this way.  People are no longer pieces of meat to be abused.  A person is untapped potential waiting to be built up.  When empowered and invited into the conversation, people come alive with potential.  When you build people up you encourage them to do the same with others (and be warned: the opposite is true as well).  Building people up doesn’t only feel good, it makes economic and social sense.

Look around  - your family, your office, your community, your country.  Are you interacting with people who are in the business of building people up versus breaking them down?  Building people up starts with you.  And likewise, the cycle of breaking people down stops with you.

Get on the wagon… share your stories… be part of the conversation and make some change.

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Me?  I co-own a small music management company.  We build people up by engaging in non-violent communication, asking our employees questions about how we can run our company better, and asking them how they want to grow personally.  It’s a small, small dimple on the world’s problems.  But it’s a start.

Every morning that you wake up and send yourself out the door, you are marching toward a certain death.  This is truth.  For most of us we don’t know how long this march is going to be but we all share the same period at the end of the final sentence of life.  Facing the fact sucks.  It’s scary, no matter how old you are.  But it is fact, so rather than avoiding it in your mind, embrace it.  You’ve got a limited time here… so what are you going to do while you are here?  What would you do today if it were your last?  How would you interact with friends, family, and strangers if today were your last?  What would you say to the world if this day were your last?  What would you do today to make you feel most alive?  How would you appreciate the day differently?

With these answers, you now have a picture of how your life should be every day.  The things that you are holding back from doing, the ones that seem scary or risky, they only feel that way the first time.  Just do them once and it gets easier.  Build your life from this place and please do not delay.  The world is asking for you.