Updates and cool finds

It's funny that no matter how hard I try to 'relax' I always find myself working. Maybe the key is that I find so much of my work enjoyable and more often than not >>relaxing!

So while waiting for a few fiddle tracks for Uncle Gerry's last songs, we're busy working with Josh on the new Rave On website, fighting with the neck on the new Tele, cooking for friends, writing, working on the Christmas album, cleaning up the yard, some amps and generally keeping very busy.

With more time to read and work on gear etc we have made some new finds this week, both are awesome people. The first one is Lana, my cool new friend in Stockholm who shares my love of all things Odd Molly, and the second is Krishna Jain and his blog site:

http://guitargarage.blogspot.com.

We highly recommend Krishna and his site, if you need any tips on repairing vintage guitars. He has been great and wrote back to us right away > which gets high points in my book.


Insert Rant here:
(****Note here to anyone who owns a business or is starting a business where you will be interacting with people - it's super easy to set up an email responder - something like 'I have received your email but am swamped I'll get back to you as soon as possible' ...you see, easy like that...people will appreciate it, trust me on that.)
Rant over...


Oh, and a quick word about the new website; watch for gear talk, we'll cover it all from tubes, strings to repairs p/ups, amps and frets ~ we're all about the search for tone. The blog will be moved there, there will be an artist's page, and well you can see from the small picture above a bit about what we'll have going on. We want it to be an interactive and groovy site, so if you have ideas or suggestions, we're happy to hear what they are!

OK going to take pie out of oven and get on Christmas work.

This is such a great post from Derek Sivers....

...that I posted it here in its' entirety. He talks about the emotional connection with the fans, and I want to go one step further and say, this is not only a template for marketing, but basically for living life...it's all about emotional connection, and it's not a difficult thing to learn or do, but it is one of the most important things you can ever do - so take it a step further.


Emphasize meaning over price = More paid sales
2009-09-21
If you are a performing musician that sells CDs at your shows, please consider this:
Terry McBride of Nettwerk told this story at a recent conference:
A band he was managing (Griffin House) was doing the usual thing of selling CDs for $15. They'd mention it once or twice from the stage, and sell about $300 per night on average.
He asked them to try a completely different approach:
Say to the audience, “It's really important to us that you have our CD. We worked so hard on it and are so proud of it, that we want you to have it, no matter what. Pay what you want, but even if you have no money, please take one tonight.”
Mention this again before the end of the show, adding, “Please, nobody leave here tonight without getting a copy of our CD. We've shared this great show together so it would mean a lot to us if you'd take one.”
It changes the request from a commercial pitch to an emotional connection. (Replace market mindset with social mindset!) Allowing them to get a CD for no money just reinforces that.
Terry said that the band did this for a while, and soon they were selling about $1200 per night on average, even including those people who took it for free! I think the average selling price was about $10.
But the important part came next:
Because every person left each show with a CD, they were more likely to remember who they saw, tell friends about it, listen to it later, and become an even bigger fan afterwards.
Then, when the band came back to a town where they had insisted that everyone take a CD, attendance at those shows doubled! The people that took a CD became long-term fans and brought their friends to future shows.
Want to try it? Document specifics.
So far this is just rough word-of-mouth from Terry, but it seems like it'd work. Anyone want to try it? If so, I'd like to tell your tale here in a future article.
So please log some specifics, before and after.
BEFORE: How many CDs did you sell at your last 5-10 shows? Average the number and price to come up with an average per-night total and average per-CD price.
AFTER: What were those same numbers for the next 5-10 shows using this method?
Also, please note any specific things you did or said that worked exceptionally well, and perhaps any interesting responses you heard back from the audience.
If you're able to note attendance at the same venue for a concert where you did this, then at that same venue afterwards, that's a nice bonus.
Save these specific numbers, and either post them as a comment below, or email me at derek@sivers.org. Be able to give the venue info, too, because if this goes exceptionally well I'll be contacting the venue for their verification and perspective.


http://sivers.org/livecd

Imagination

You don't need loads of fancy instruments to make a great song; Ennio Morricone's early themes are some great examples.

He is one of our heroes. What an amazing talent.

Mary Travers taught me how to sing

......and she taught me how to stand up for what I believe in, and how to never give up and how to have a voice in the world. She was one of my heroes and role models....Sadly, sadly missed.

Some of you may know I am stubborn; you can thank Mary for that.

An interesting concept...

Alex Highton sent me the link to this site:

http://www.musicglue.com/

It looks interesting. I spoke with the Director Mark Meharry and he said he has over 1000 bands worldwide and 70 Canadian bands already hooked up.

Asked Derek S if he had heard of it, but he hadn't, though he agreed it was interesting. They are just in their Beta stage, and Mark said they had some big stuff coming up next year.

Alex is on board, I may check it out and put something up....anyone keen? Happy to hear how it works for you, and if you're one of my guys, let me know if you want to try it out and I'll set up a commercial account.

Nothing like some Larry Carlton to end a long day...

Say goodbye Dick's

The changing face of Vancouver - goodbye to Richards on Richards.

100 Free & Affordable High & Low Tech Music Promotion Tips

I came across this list on a new blog site I found today (prosoul.com). Looked interesting.

http://www.prosoul.com/blog/

Fall has come to Vancouver, I think I missed the summer, but I love autumn!

I'm lost in Christmas world this week...

....lost in new websites and Holiday music and art, so am borrowing Brian's post today about making youtube videos.

Melissa has just started her own youtube channel, and we've had great hits, she's even had some of her band members help out!

(www.youtube.com/Themelissaendean).....it's really easy to do and helps people stay involved with your project, whatever it is.

People want to know, they want to see, and they want to feel a part of what you're doing, and if it becomes viral, you're golden!


http://www.thornybleeder.com/index_files/how_to_make_successful_youtube_videos.html#unique-entry-id-245


Ok yes and boycott shark fin soup, and anywhere that serves it please! (sharkwater.com)

Christmas site

Well it's September 1st Eve and I am finally getting around to Christmas. I feel like I have been away from my Christmas self, but I'm back 100% now and working with Johnny on the new site, getting the music organized, and tonight will try and get the cover art started.

This is going to be an amazing year - Volume 4 - I feel so grateful to be surrounded by all of this talent!

Once again we are welcoming back some old friends, Adrienne Pierce, The Roasted Chestnut Orchestra, and fingers crossed for Richard Klein and Melissa Endean! And we are welcoming many more new friends, Gillian Hobbs, Hilary Grist, Jim Houston and Olga Osipova to name just a few.

And as usual we have our extra special out-of-town guests dropping in, Alex Highton all the way from the UK and extra, extra, super amazing, special guest Tess Dunn from Santa Cruz - how lucky are we!?

So here I go, getting down to it, I am tardy, but all of the musicians have been on time - thank you all - it's going to be brilliant;-)