It’s not uncommon to day to find an artist that will spend a great deal of time, energy and even money to get a placement on one of Spotify’s major playlists. The current consensus in the business is that a playlist appearance can make a career, but is that really the reality? An example that’s […]
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My guest today on my Inner Circle Podcast is one of my oldest and dearest friends – Los Angeles studio bass player Paul ILL. Through the years Paul has played with a wide variety of great artists both in the studio and on the road, including Tina Turner, Pink, Gwen Stefani and Alicia Keys, and […]
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There’s good news for Spotify on a couple of fronts, but it may not be as cheery as it looks. Spotify reported that it has grown its paid subscriber base to 87 million, and actually made $56 million in Q3 of 2018. On the surface this looks great but underneath the numbers there’s a reality […]
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When artists and bands think of “music cities” the ones that immediately come to mind are the big 5 – New York City, Los Angeles, Nashville, Seattle and Austin. There are other cities that have great scenes that don’t come immediately to mind though. Flypaper put together a list of 10 and ranked them, although […]
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What good is making a video if no one sees it? Regardless of how well-made your video is, that’s what can happen if you just post it without thinking about how to optimize it first. Here are 10 steps to optimize your video on YouTube so it has the best chance of being seen by […]
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In this era of big business its seems to be the norm when the contract terms favor the company rather than the user, even to the detriment of the user. Usually we blindly accept those terms, but if the latest SoundCloud kerfuffle proves anything, it’s that fighting back can sometimes bring about some needed change. […]
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This week I’m going to do something totally different on the podcast. I get a lot of questions about how the Inner Circle Podcast works, so I’m going to answer them all and more. No guest, no news, just pure behind-the-scenes. We’ll cover the almost accidental nature of how the podcast began, why it stays […]
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If you were to believe the music press, the only thing in music that’s hot these days is hip hop. While that may be true when it comes to the charts, rock is far from dead when it comes to the concert circuit, and in fact clobbers most other music genres in terms of ticket […]
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Getting a placement on a Spotify playlist can be career changing as suddenly millions of people can be aware of you and your music, but until now the chances of that happening were extremely slim if you weren’t on a major label. The company has been trying to democratize its service though and making its […]
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Search Engine Optimization or SEO isn’t as big as it once was in terms of one’s Internet presence, but it’s still important. Today social media has taken the spotlight off SEO, and some artists and musicians no longer even have a website (a big mistake in their strategy). That said, you still want your website […]
Continue readingTo the surprise of no one, a new study finds that the smart speaker trend is impacting music consumption in a big way. A new study by AudienceNet of people over the age of 16 looked at exactly how each age group is consuming music and by what distribution source. Those that own a smart […]
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My guest today is guitarist Michael Raphael, who started his career in the 80s hair metal band Jailhouse but turned his experience into a career first as a hit songwriter and later as a television composer. Along the way he’s worked as a songwriter/producer for Disney Records and Disney Mania, and as one of the main […]
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It seems like yesterday that many pundits were scratching their heads about how the music industry could ever reach 100 million paid streaming music subscribers, yet here we are knocking on the door of twice that and more. In fact, Futuresource Consulting  that those subscription numbers will reach 235 million by the end of the year. […]
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You can tell that the music industry is back in the money when the major record labels decide to spread some of their cash around. To that end, Warner Music announced that it has launched WMG Boost in order to invest in music-related tech startups. Although no exact figure on exactly how much money is […]
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When Spotify announced its direct upload feature last month many artists weren’t particularly wowed since they’d still have to use a distributor to have their music uploaded to the other streaming services anyway. The company has now turned that argument on its ear by making a “passive” investment in the the distribution company Distrokid, which […]
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