Underground Trini Artiste Tips Continued

Sometime last year I had a post titled "Five Underground Artiste Tips (unfinished)". Well I wasn't lying, it really wasn't finished. And neither is this post. Being an underground artiste (currently) myself I'm still learning and as I learn stuff, I attempt to share with my colleagues so that everyone can improve. Yes, I'm either benevolent or naive like that, which ever way you want to swing it. So here goes:

1) Reverbnation - This is a bold statement but I will say it anyway. Reverbnation is the best music tool in the history of the Internet. This is by far the deepest tool I have ever encountered in terms of music promotion so if you aren't using it you are beyond sticking. Some of its features include the ability to embed playlists of music on other sites, the ability to set up a music store, weekly emails showing your progress complete with your rank in your genre worlwide and in your region. And that's just tip of the iceberg. Reverbnation also can be tied to your Facebook fan page which is where it is most effective.

2) 'Combine' your social tools - Are you on twitter, myspace, facebook, youtube and own a blog? Now you can 'combine' them. Well not really combine them but more like letting them cooperate. You can set up your twitter so that when you upload a video on youtube it automatically tweets the link. You can import myspace friends into you reverbnation via your facebook page. You can set your facebook so status updates are tweeted etc. By doing this you can promote more with fewer clicks.

3) Confidence is the key - Now this is a non-tech thing but it's a fundamental thing. I've realised over the last few months that one guaranteed thing is that everyone will not like you. But you can get people who don't like you to respect you. And people respect confidence. At some point you will find yourself in a position where the sound system is trash, the crowd is irritable and wants blood and your cd eh playing for some reason leaving you only with confidence to draw from. Make sure it's there, always.

4) Performing - Try and perform as much as possible. You will make deeper connections with fans that way plus the way things are going, it will most likely be your main source of revenue.

5) Understand the business - This is a throwback and I'll repeat it again but deeper this time. Treat yourself as a business as I said before but also become more detail-oriented and understand everything, especially copyright. Trinidad copyright law is jacked up and easy to exploit so make sure you know what's going on. You can take a read here.

6) Don't forget the love - Good music is the most important part of your music business and everything starts with a good song. Sometimes along the road to success you get tied up so much in the hustle that you forget to enjoy what you're doing. Don't forget to love what you're doing, not for an arbitrary reason like feeling warm inside but because you tend to produce superior output that way.

And that's all for now. Look out for 'Stress' video soon as it's shooting next week. And check out some music below. Face out.