Scales and practicing are definitely needed, but I was way too anal about it, and I feel a little too regimented.  And the net result was that when I went to music school I needed to unlearn stuff so as not to sound stiff.  I guess we got to remember that I grew up in the eighties when “shredding” was king.   Maybe I could have used my practice time as a kid better. 

But if you are starting out, or learning to practice, and don’t really have a plan for practice and want to get better, then here are some thoughts…

PLAYING SONGS NOT BY ROTE

One of the things that I could have done more of was playing songs.  It’s probably been this way all throughout history, where you learn a song you want to play and then you learn to play it.  Rather than spending all your time preparing your technique to learn a song.  Of course, some songs are going to be too hard to play at first, but finding a simple song that you like to strum to, and then practicing it, gives you a sense of accomplishment once you succeed.  It’s much more satisfying than learning to play a scale at 160 bpm.

Here’s a link to guitar tablature on line:

http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/

Or you can just type in guitar tablature into google and go to town.

The trick with learning to play songs is that in order to get better at playing music, you should learn it exactly as it was played.  And try to land every strum, rhythm, beat, note exactly.  The reason is not to be anal, but to train your ears to listen intently to the music.  And listening is something that takes a long time to master, but it will put you on the right path to playing with other people.

THE PLAN

Playing songs doesn’t mean that that’s all that there is.  It is only a part of it, but it’s also important to do the other stuff to get better.  Basically, you need to train your fingers to have some technique.  Then you got to train your brain by learning music theory.  And of course, there is the songs, and playing and listening skills.  ETC.

SONGS-for listening skills, for the fun on playing music.

TECHNIQUE- scales, learning chords, right hand picking excercises.

THEORY- learning how chords, and notes, and reading music and all of that stuff is put together.

Of course, I’ve known people that didn’t have good technique, and didn’t know a damn thing about theory, but when they played, you couldn’t help but listen because it was so beautiful.

So, I guess there’s that.

I have been playing in the New York City scene for a decade or so, and I have noticed some issues to consider for this particular music scene and I feel that some bands could improve their chances of highlighting their art if they rehearsed in a way to consider some of the factors in playing a live show.  Here are some thoughts on the preparing for the gig.  Please post comments below if there are other strategies that you have encountered.

THE MUSIC

The main event.  People come out to hear your music, so be sure that the music is rehearsed and tight.  Be sure that the accents in the music are together and that the music has dynamics.  Or if it doesn’t have dynamics, be sure that that is on purpose.  The tighter the songs, the better the feel, and hopefully the music will have attitude and energy and you’ll be able to connect with your audience.

In rehearsing the music, I’ve found it helpful not to play a song the whole way through at first, but only rehearsing a “trouble spot” first.  I believe it keeps band members from falling into the rut of just playing the songs by rote during rehearsals and more into crafting the songs.  When you rehearse parts of your song, instead of just getting together and playing, you get band members to start listening more to each other, and that is really important.

SOUND BALANCE

One of my pet peeves about seeing live music is that the balance is never right.  In fact, you’d be lucky to find a sound person at a club who will actually do very much besides turn the PA on.  One of the problems is that less experienced bands play with too loud of a “stage volume”, thereby tying the hands of the sound person who will just try to cut down on the feedback.  If you are at a club with a good sound system, have a chat with the sound person and try to keep your stage volume low enough so that it doesn’t blast.  Sound issues are always difficult, but allowing the sound person to balance your sound for the room is better than the band members trying to do it with their amps.  Inevitably they’ll compete with each other and it’ll be messy.

THE PATTER

Patter are the little remarks of the show that keep things moving, or introduce the band, or keep the audience otherwise occupied while your band is switching instruments, tuning, or just transitioning from one song to the next.  It may be more involved where there is a direct connection with the audience, or as simple as “the next song is….”.  Either way, it is important to think about it at least once and maybe more, because there is often times when there is a lull in the proceedings.   Your guitarists strings may break, or your sound person might be getting feedback, or your drummer starts to OD.

Now, your performance may not need patter at all.  But it is a good idea to have something to say in your back pocket in case something goes wrong, and you are staring at an audience waiting for music that you are temporarily unable to perform for them.  I find that if you are playing at a bar, drunken audiences always appreciate a dumb joke.  Tell the dumb joke, and before the boos, and hisses get too bad, count off the next song.

THE SHOW

Open up.  Rock out!

I have met many musicians who were otherwise very good performers, thoughtful songwriters, and great band leaders who none the less really weren’t that great at tuning their guitars. I guess that it is no surprise since most people first learn how to tune their guitars in the comfort and quiet of their own home, but once they are thrown into a live playing situation, then all kinds of other issues with sound sometimes get in the way of setting up a good sounding instrument. If this is your first time tuning a guitar or have been doing it a while, we’ll go over some things to keep in mind for tuning your guitar.

TUNING YOUR GUITAR… with a guitar tuner

The easiest way to tune a guitar, and probably the most common among people just starting out is to buy a guitar tuner and plug it in and follow the blinking lights to perfect in-tune-ness. If you have an electric guitar, or using the tuners built in mic if you have an acoustic guitar.

1. Turn on your tuner, and plug it into your electric guitar and turn up the volume knobs on the guitar itself. … Or hold the built in mic near the soundhole of your acoustic guitar.
2. Pluck any string with a sense of authority to ensure a strong signal for the tuner to pick up. (However don’t pluck too hard where the string itself vibrates too much and distorts or sounds bad.
3. ***IMPORTANT TIP*** Grab a hold of the tuning pegs with your other hand and *DETUNE* the string slightly. In other words, make the string “looser”, or make the note go “flat”. Then slowly turn the tuning peg to tighten the string until the tuner reads in tune. The reason for this is because you want to avoid the string “slipping out of tune” through vibration of playing the instrument…
4. Skip around to the other strings and repeat this process. You will most likely need to re-do strings you have already tuned, but as you tighten and change the tension on each string, you change the tension on the guitar neck itself, and that slightly changes the tension on each string, which makes it necessary to re-do tunings on each string. When you are doing the fine tuning, it isn’t necessary to “DETUNE” as much. But I always do anyways.
5. Sturm a chord and write a song, you’re done.

I’m not sure of the actual physics of why you need to detune a string to keep it in solid tune, but I imagine that since the string is under tension, if you unwind the tuning peg to loosen the string, the guitar string itself could bind at different points around the tuning peg itself,(or the nut, or the bridge), and later slip causing the string to loosen further and send you out of tune once you start playing. If anyone has a more scientific explanation, please leave a comment below.

But there are other issues to take into account that affect the tuning of the guitar that are important to how it sounds.

STRING TENSION

Depending on how new the guitar strings are, you might want to break them in before you stat tuning. You’ll need to stretch them out a little just to get them more flexible. Again, the idea is that you’d want to stretch out the strings so they are less likely to bind while you are tuning them. Same goes for strings that are too old which are too stretchy and won’t be able to hold a tuning.

FRET INTONATION

You can do everything right, but once you start playing a chord it all sounds out of whack. That might be an issue and a problem with intonation. That is, you can spend your time tuning the “open” strings, but once you put your finger on a fret, if the intonation is off, then you have to take a step back and set up the guitar better.

Here is a good link on the web to learn more about How to Tune your guitar.

http://www.howtotuneaguitar.org/

And if you click on each of the letters on the “tuner widget” below, you can hear what it is supposed to sound like….

Ba Rock Obama Fundraiser in Greenpoint NYC

A few weeks ago, my band AM, played this fundraiser for Barack Obama’s campaign. It was basically a hipster neighborhood event in Williamsburg/Greenpoint in NYC where they got a bunch of bars together to host a bunch of indie bands. One ticket got you a bracelet that allowed you to go to any bar that was hosting this thing and see all the music that was being made. It was called Ba-Rock Brooklyn.

So, it was pretty cool to meet all the bands there that night, and to my surprise (since I am a pessimist when it comes to people showing up at shows), there were a lot of people out that night and everyone raised $2500 for Barack. Not bad for a neighborhood thing.

I realized that part of the success of these kinds of nights is the “Music scene” aspect of it all. It works better to ask your audience to go to an event where they will be able to hear lots of different musics than just hear your band. So, the draw is “Come see a night of local indie music”, rather than “Come see my band”. A slightly different pitch. But to me anyways, it feels as though having people gather has a couple of effects. First it was a great way to meet other bands in the scene, and musicians have to stick together. It’s a band thing anyways. One day you’re playing with this band, the next time with another. And sharing tips and experiences with each other can only help in figuring out how to navigate the whole indie music thing. In addition, sharing audiences is good because well, it’s always the more the merrier anyways, and it winds up being a better for your audience as well.

And I believe that that is how music scenes are made. People in the audience checking out the music, then checking each other out, and making friends, and if it works, it might grow into a scene. I guess of course, that the music has to be interesting and all that. But of course, I’m sure it is.

The music scene aspect of playing music for your friends that grow into more friends etc, is what a bunch of social networks sites try to replicate. But I feel like it’s still way different from being in a smokey room a little drunk and really getting into some music while some hotties over there are into it…and in my case, go try to meet them, get shot down… but fun nonetheless.

Whoever can replicate this in the Internet virtual world, will have taken musicianship and the music business to the next level.

Setting up a network is fast and easy.  Figuring out which features make sense for you, and moving or linking to any other content you have on the web, might take a while but is something you can do in phases and complete over time.  Here’s what to do:

1. Go to Ning.com and choose a name for your network, probably just your band’s name or your name.
2. Sign up for an account — you’ll use this login for when you make changes or want to make more social networks for your other projects.
3. Describe your network, add a tagline, keywords, etc.  Make the network public so that anyone can join and they don’t need an invite.  (You wouldn’t be that snobby would you?)
4. Add the features you want into your layout.  Be sure to click on the link that shows all the features.  For now, only drag over stuff that is relevant — you can always change it later.  For example, if you don’t have any videos leave it off until you do.
5. Choose a theme and change the colors are you see fit.
6. Once it’s launched, click on the “Manage” menu item and make sure all your settings look ok, as well as offer some basic promotions like a Facebook widget.  The “Track Statistics” link will allow you to add Google Analytics to see who’s on the site.  It’s free and could give you an idea of how many people are using this network and what parts of the world they are coming from.
7. Find the “Badges & Widget” section and customize the widgets (including your music) that will be available to your fans to put on their own blogs and profiles.

What’s Next?

Start populating your pages! Add your music and videos and start a blog.  Use the RSS feature to pull in all the other things you’re doing online.

Definitely use the “Events” feature if you have any gigs coming up.  For that matter you can add “special appearances” to that calendar, like “going to be at the coffee shop reading the newspaper on Tuesday morning” and your fans can RSVP to them.  You can even put a link to more venue info or a map.

Throw in a text box and put links to your other locations on the web, like your myspace profile or your t-shirt store.  While you’re at it, why not throw in a link to an Amazon wishlist set up for your music related stuff?  Finally, allow your users to create groups within your networks so that you can get a better idea of who your fans are and what they like to do when they aren’t listening to your music.   This is a social network you know.

Now start telling your fans, friends, family, neighbors, associates, attendants, sugardaddies, and anyone else who has an internet connection, and get them to sign up.  Encourage them to invite others they know as well as put your “badges” (widgets), including your music, on their own blogs or other social networks.

Remember to keep your content fresh by writing often, putting up pictures after a show, etc.  You want your fans to keep coming back to checkfor any new stuff and keep you in the front of their brains.  What’s nice about having your own social network though is that your fans will take up the slack when you’re too hung over to blog, and add their content about you as well.

Also check out our review of Ning.com

When you make and share music you are creating a community. It may be a big audience at a show, or a small group of friends blasting your tunes in the high school parking lot. In collecting an audience you are often bringing together people who have more in common then just an appreciation for your art, like the way they dress or the other music they listen to.

The promise behind Social Networking on the web is that it allows people to parallel   what goes on in “Meatspace” in virtual form. Ning.com is a site that helps your fans    connect with each other and keep up with your artistic endeavors.

Overview

Ning makes it super simple to create and customize a brand new social network. It allows you to go beyond the simple profile that the Facebooks and MySpaces of the world allow. Your fans can even create groups within your network that are based around, for example, where they live or who their favorite band member is. A certain rapper famously used it as a tool to keep in touch with his audience and also make some extra pennies (Free Social Media Tools Unite 50 Cent Fans).

Once it’s up and running, and you have your fan base using it, you can do things like: blast out notes to everyone on the network, keep a calendar of your upcoming shows, write blogs, and upload pictures and video. Many of the features of Ning overlap with what you’re doing on other sites. This is fine because you can just pull in feeds through RSS or widgets (they have an easy way to integrate with Flickr too) and still only update content in one place.

Costs

Singing up is free and for most musicians the basics are good enough. You’ll have to put up with a not-so-easy to remember URL (your-bands-name.ning.com), some ads on the side of the page, and extra ning promotional links. For a various monthly fees you can change any of those things and clean up your network to focus on you. You can also get more storage and bandwidth if needed but you’d have to have a REALLY active networkto need it.

One thing to consider — once you have a good amount of traffic — is signing up to “Control the Ads”. It’s $20 a month but will allow you to run your own ads (e.g. Google AdSense) and potentially make money. How cool would that be?

Final Thoughts

The focus on having your own social network is getting your fans to interact with each other in the context of your music. Ning accomplishes this to an extent and hopefully will continue to provide features to bring the site beyond being a glorified profile on another social network. Right now there isn’t a whole lot for your fans to do past posting to forums, creating groups, and checking out other fans. Allowing users to share their own pics of your shows or blog about your music without having to use the forums would be nice.

Regardless, it is an easy way to make a website for your music with a lot of functionality and the social aspect can just be a bonus — or if it really catches on a great way to really expand your audience.

Check out BrokeDownVan’s social network at brokedownvan.ning.com It took about 10 minutes to set up, which you can tell by the ugliness of it.

Also check out our blog on setting up a social network with Ning.com.

As it gets harder and harder to tour for a small act, with gas prices and lodging and every other thing you need to go on tour costing all kinds of money, people are finding alternative ways to go on tour. People use myspace and facebook to connect with their fans and crash at peoples’ places. A few years ago, the band that I was playing in booked small tours where we rented a van and booked some bigger shows that paid some money, and then used that money to stay in motels and peoples’ houses. The amount of telephone planning and mapping and logistics took a good chunk of time and energy. One of the things that I’ve recently discovered, and maybe because I’m not as computer literate as my partner Craig, is using Google Maps to map and plan tours. You can create a customized map to mark each place you’ll be staying and gigs you’ll be playing and you can share it with anyone. You can create a map and have all of your band mates have access to it. You can post it somewhere (I think) and have your fan base take a look and suggest places of interest or offer places to stay. It’s a small tool, but I think that it is useful in the organizing phase of the tour, because god knows on tour, you’d probably be too drunk and high to figure it all out on paper.

Google Maps Video Tutorial – Click Here!

It’s pretty cool to drop a locator on a gig, and then see the whole thing planned out. Pretty satisfying.

Overview

Bigcartel bills itself as providing “Simple Stores for DIY Rockstars” and they do a good job at providing the basics of an Ecommerce store. When you’re ready to start selling your CDs, T-shirts, or other merchandise to your fans, you can simply sign up, create your own store, and start raking in the cash. In addition to bands, they also specialize in stores for record labels, and clothing companies.

What you’re really signing up for is an easy to use product catalog and shopping cart. It’s something that will guide your fans through your inventory (albums, songs, merch) to find what they want to buy, allow them to add or delete it from a shopping cart, and checkout. It’s up to you to do the fulfillment part of the process which includes packaging the product, shipping it, and making sure your fan is happy… including handling returns.

Once all your products are set up, and the site has been customized to include your colors, logo, etc, you’ll need to create a PayPal account. This will allow your fans to use credit/debit cards, or their own PayPal account, to put money in your pocket.

Costs

The basic account is free but you can only sell 5 things and there are some limits on how much you can tailor the site to your needs. For about $10 a month you can up it to 25 products, customize your site more (including your own domain), and use discount codes. For about $20 a month you can have 100 products and more customization.

What’s really nice about the site is that they won’t be taking a cut of what you sell. PayPal however does take a portion of the money that flows through their system, usually somewhere around 3% of the cost plus $.30 for each item. It’s not a bad price for the ability to accept credit cards, but because there is that transaction fee of thirty cents you’ll want to avoid selling really cheap items.

Final thoughts

Bigcartel is somewhat limited in that you can only customize certain parts of your site but that’s also what makes it more focused and easy to get started. The main draw-back is that they don’t have specific support for selling digital products (like your MP3s) but they’re working on it. To get around this limitation one band decided to take orders for digital versions of their songs, and then send an email to the fan with the MP3s as attachments. A little crude but it gets the job done.

All in all, this is a good service that can help an artist get paid for his or her work.