Lessons of a Producer
I started Auracane a year ago, but I’ve been making and releasing music for 10 years. I’ve learned a lot of lessons over that span, some good, mostly bad. I think I have some valuable advice for someone just getting into it or for those of you who are just plain stuck. I broke them up in major categories that I will sort by number because
Do it for the right reason. I’m starting this one off with one that will offend some people but it has to be said. Why are you making music? Over 60,000 songs are uploaded to spotify every day. What makes yours special? Did you hear that a blog gets 24/7 revenue from streaming generic study beats and you thought, “holy shit that looks easy maybe I can make money doing that”. Did you hear a song that aligned your conscious with inspiration and drew out imagination so strong you just had to create something? My question is are you doing it for the love of music, and if yes keep reading.
Stay humble. When I started my first project I just posted music everywhere, and often. I thought “my music is so good it will just take off” so I treated social media like a famous person which produced results like I was an invisible person. Your first year is all about seeing where your music fits in. Finding out who’s already there so you can learn from them and appreciate what they’ve done already; they’ve shown you who your people are, the people who will fuck with your vibe. If a person dm’s you about how much they like your music, thank every last one of them until the day comes where you get too many to keep up with. I often follow the people who have always been there supporting me because t means the world to me and I want to support them back.
Balance your effort. If you’ve made a track in 3 hours and want to send it off for release, I beg you, just listen to it again in a couple days and you will hear things you want to change. On the inverse side; if you’ve been working on 1 song for a month, please, for the love of god, release that song into the sky or burry it dead in the earth. There’s a sweet spot between lazy, and too much that you should find.
Make music when you feel like it. This one’s a stupid headline but hear me out, there’s also a balance between making it too much and not enough. If you make it too much you won’t have time to do other things you love. Doing these other things inspire your best music and you should not be ashamed to take breaks. However, if you take long breaks you will lose the second nature of it all and it will take some time to pick up where you left off.
(optional) Quit your job. I haven’t done this one yet but if I had the courage to I would. I follow a ton of artists who are making a living doing this purely because they have to. The thought of a 9-5 isn’t an option because they won’t settle for less than being a music producer full time. I admire these people the most. You can make money off music many ways, but to build an audience costs way more than you’ll make; that is unless those things aren’t mutually exclusive. Here’s the things you can do to make money from your music. You won’t make a lot of these individually (at first), but combined you could.
Live Streaming. Stream often and consistently. If you don’t do those two things you won’t have an audience because they will be forget about you. If you’re not consistent you won’t catch that person again that could only watch on Thursday from 7-8. If you take a month off that person will move on to another producer they like to watch on that time slot on Thursdays from 7-8. (you get my point) You can then record these streams and upload them to youtube. Upload on there consistently enough and you are making revenue from your twitch subscribers and ads, as well as youtube revenue for something you’ve already done. Streaming is probably the best way to build an audience right now because of how intimate it becomes for the viewer. They want to get to know you, it’s more of a human experience thank listening to a faceless producers music.
Royalties and sales. I’ll start with sales. In this fickle day of spotify stardom, the producer’s goal is to get 1 million montly listeners so they can hit that $4,000 a month mark for their spotify royalties. That’s great, but you won’t get these buying fake followers or participating in a submithub boost group. That will get you banned from bot plays, and your “recommended artists” section will be full of people who are in said support group and make music that is nothing like yours. While I do focus most of my promotion for spotify, I also put effort in showing all streaming links. People who use itunes are way more likely to buy your music which will pay you the same as 250 spotify streams (that’s for one fucking song!). I’ve seen producers like Knxwledge do it the best though. He streams almost daily and directs all his fans to bandcamp, which is the most artist friendly music platform there is, period. On the first friday of the month he puts out a beat tape that he made recently for $10 with the option to pay more (which people will). On the first friday of every month bandcamp waves all fee’s, giving the artist 100% commission from that sale. That goes back to me saying, be grateful for the people who made it in your niche genre; they are paving the way with idea’s that they often make up. Royalties pt 2: commercial/film licensing. That’s a sweet idea for the introverted producer. Make music for dope movies and video games. I get a check from $500-$2000 a year from artlist . io, a website that charges $100 upfront and users get to download unlimited songs (maybe monthly limited? idk)I have about 40 tracks, many I’ve never released because they were too cinematic. If I were to invest more time down that road, I would do the following. Invest some serious time in a website. There are sooo many people on music licensing sites that it’s going to be really hard finding you unless you produce a niche genre such as “Christmas Jazz”, or Ice Cream Truck Music”. Build a solid website with SEO that will direct someone looking for your particular music to you with a quick google search. The other thing you should do is build connections with those in the industry (should’ve been first). How, you ask? Linkedin, that wretched place. Almost every studio professional is on there and they receive soooo many music pitches a day they probably question why they’re still doing this. That goes back to humanizing the experience. Present yourself to them, not your artist self. Compliment their work, and genuinely try to get to know them. In this world, everyone is an NPC until you get to know them.
Lessons. Do you know how to play an instrument proficiently? I don’t. But a producer I follow on twitch does. Bad Snacks plays a mean violin and teaches it on the side. If I had to guess, she’s probably gotten work of Facebook, and sites like Fiverr/Upwork. You’re already great at learning the 401453290 things you need to learn to become a successful music producer/writer/composer/marketer/website developer/video editor/photoshoper, so what makes you think you can’t teach it? I’m also going to guess that this is one of her top sources of income because school ain’t cheap.
Shows. This one’s for the extroverts, but even for us introverts the thought of it can be thrilling. If you have a solid local fanbase this should be your priority #1. Ticket sales will pay the bills, and your ride or die friends will spread your music around their social media. This could absolutely replace an advertising budget if you can’t yet afford it. If you can prove to a larger venue that you can sell a serious amount of tickets they will absolutely book you.
I hope this helped even just one person. Peace