An Exploration into How to Succeed as an Emerging Artist in the Modern Music Industry
Introduction:
As an artist, I am always looking to find what I should be doing to get my name into the right places and expand as an artist. What do I need to do to succeed in becoming a well known artist? The music industry is always changing and the answer to this question has always been incredibly vague, I intend to change this. Some say that the key to success is in the skill of the artist themselves, and that if you have the right skill, and you continue to practise everyday, you will be found eventually. Others say that to succeed in the music industry at all, you just need to be incredibly lucky or privileged. I have my own opinion on this subject, and this essay is my exploration into it. This research is being done to help me finalise my final project and help me to understand what I need to do to successfully use it to help me progress as a musician and artist.
Secondary Research:
D4’s music marketing website provides a list of fifteen useful tips for succeeding as an artist in the modern music industry. They state that it is most important to focus on your direct fan base relationship, it is a lot of work, and you need to be, not only creative, but business wise. All fifteen tips were incredibly relevant, but the general idea that the writer is trying to convey is that, using the internet to its fullest capabilities to network and market yourself, whilst strongly establishing your identity as an artist, is incredibly important to success.
Skepsis is one of, if not the, most influential artist in my genre today. Skepsis was involved in an interview that was posted to YouTube by The Bass Institute, in which he speaks about what process he went through to get to where he was at the time. He talks about how he experimented with all sorts of different sounds and genres until he found a style that he thought was unique to him. He also talks about how he persevered and continued to post his music and how doing this led to him eventually deciding to focus entirely on releasing music.
My final source of secondary research comes in the form of a book. ‘Beyond Talent: Creating a Successful Career in Music’ (Beeching, 2005) is a book that is direct research into exactly the question I am asking. She goes into detail on all the different aspects of the music industry that emerging artists must be aware of.
Primary Research:
DivKid is a producer who has had success in many different arcs of his music career. He has worked with major labels, such as Sony and Warner, and travelled the world during his career. I messaged him online and asked for his advice on what I should be doing to progress myself as an artist and why. He told me that I shouldn’t worry about whether or not people are listening, but to just work on my music, release it, and get it across social media as much as possible, networking with other producers and working with them to expand each other’s fan bases, whilst always looking for more places that I can share my music. He also told me that I should learn to start DJing and playing live, getting my name out as a DJ as well as an artist, playing my own songs alongside bigger tracks to help to get them known.
Personal Findings:
After exploring my different sources of information, several things stood out very clearly to me. The first being that two of the sources mentioned marketing and networking. ‘Treat your music career as a business. Build a marketing strategy,’ (Nguyen, 2018). It is possible that D4 Marketing is pushing the marketing and networking side of their tips to sell their own product. However, DivKid, who is a successful producer in his own right, also told me to market and network myself, not to get people listening to and buying my music, but rather to try and get my name better established throughout the music industry and my genre, as well as gaining a larger fan base.
Secondly, I noticed that each of these sources didn’t put musical skill as a priority, but rather something you should focus on honing on the side of the other things mentioned. Now whilst these sources state that being musically adept isn’t as important as any of the other things that they spoke about, I personally believe otherwise. Without the proper ability to create and use music to your own will, how could you create a high quality product to sell and market to your target audience. If I heard a song that wasn’t perfected rhythmically, melodically, harmonically, etc. I wouldn’t take any interest in following the artist who composed and released the song in the first place. Would anyone?
Also, the whole arguement behind Beeching’s book is that, talent isn’t all you need to succeed, it’s in the title. She says that it’s actually the balancing of four different aspects, ‘Attitude, Sales Skills, Support System and Strategy’ (Beeching, 2005). She claims understanding these four things and using them correctly, can help to push and guide you in the right direction to succeed as an artist.
Finally, the most important thing that I found during my research was that all the sources I looked into had one thing in common. They all stated that, to be successful, you must create a strong and unique identity as a musician, alongside knowing your own sound and style. This is important to any artist because, if you dont stand out amongst every other artist, nobody will notice you. DivKid simply stated ‘Realise that no one is really going to care. You and thousands of others just within a 30 mile radius of us are doing the same things.’ (DivKid, 2019). Although this sounds rather harsh, it’s true, if an artist wants any form of recognition, they need to stand out from everyone else. Skepsis, when talking about his own journey before becoming a successful artist, spoke about how he explored different genres until he found his own style, and how he had no success when he was trying to sound like other people. ‘I was making literally everything, albeit, not very successfully’ (Skepsis, 2016).
Analysis:
In my own opinion, I believe that having a strong and well established persona and identity as an artist that sets you apart from the rest of the people in the music industry is vital for any success. It is one thing to be able to market yourself and network with other musicians, but it is another to stand out amongst the thousands of other people in the same position as you who are able to market and network at your level, if not more. Every successful artist in any of the creative industries is unique and has their own style and identity, this is what draws people to what they create. If I can establish my own style and identity that is unique, and I can market and network myself to a high enough standard, then I will have a higher chance of succeeding in becoming more well known as an artist, and finally getting a foothold in the modern music industry. Each and every research source I selected to use in this essay spoke about how creating a strong and unique persona as an artist is a key to success. D4 Marketing and DivKid both stated this, whilst Skepsis, spoke about how he tried every different genre imaginable until he found his own style to follow and work with, and how once he found his style, he began to become more well known amongst his peers and his fan base began to grow exponentially. However, the modern music industry is always changing and evolving, and the truth is that there no key to success. The true way to succeed in any industry is to put the effort in. Hard work and learning the industry is the best way to have any form of success, having a strong identity and networking and marketing skills are just good attributes to have that may help along the way, all of which are things that are attained through hard work. This is what Beeching is referring to when she speaks about a ‘Winning Attitude’ (Beeching, 2005).
Conclusion:
After my research and analysis into this subject, I have found that, to succeed in growing as an artist and gaining a bigger base, the most important attribute to have is a strong identity and unique style as an artist, although it definitely doesn’t hurt to have good marketing and networking skills. However, all of these attributes mean nothing unless you put the effort in, and if you believe that you don’t have these attributes, you can gain them by putting your time and effort into learning how to have these attributes. There is no key to success. If you want to succeed, you have to make yourself succeed. I want my final project to allow me to finally get a foothold into the music industry, and turn my, up until now, casual releases of music, into music that is of a professional releasing standard, alongside using modern and professional techniques to network and market myself in a way that will still allow me to portray myself in the way I want. The research I have conducted has shown me how important it is to understand how to present, network and market yourself, and allowed me gain some great insight into how I can achieve my goals as a musician and artist. However, I still need to do more research into what else I can do to grow as an artist, whilst this essay has helped me to understand the importance of identity and online presence, I still need to know more about the other processes I need to become more involved in to have a chance of having any success in my career at all.