house concerts and 21st century touring

Sunset is an angel weeping
Holding out a bloody sword
No matter how I squint I cannot
Make out what it’s pointing toward
Sometimes you feel like you live too long
Days drip slowly on the page
You catch yourself
Pacing the cage

–Bruce Cockburn

Yeah. Me neither. I should work on that.

Fran

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He was born with a midnight-black Gibson, double-neck guitar in his hand. In the afterbirth, they found a set of D’addario custom-wounds and a pack of steel fingerpics. His mother… didn’t make it.

While this intro would certainly turn off some people, if you’re the guitarist in a hard rock band, it would certainly turn off the right people. More importantly, those thirteen year-old, pimple-faced kids would be grinning with delight.

If your artist bio starts with “Jennifer first picked up the guitar at 9 years of age…”
or “Brad is a singer-songwriter from Tennessee…” - you are missing an opportunity.

People do read your biography - at least the opening line. Make them remember it. Make them want to read more. Make them want to check out a song.

I probably wrote this because of something Seth Godin said.
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• It’s the record company’s fault for not signing you.
• It’s the booking agent’s fault for not booking you.
• It’s the publicist’s fault for not getting you reviewed.
• It’s the distributor’s fault for not pushing your product.
• It’s your fan’s fault for not buying your CDs or hosting a house concert for you.

Certainly, it can’t be the music, the show, or the work ethic you bring to the table.
It’s never that.

Why the downer message? There’s a lot of self-pity in the attic. Sometimes it’s good to clean it out.

No one is failing you. In fact, the problem for most of us, is that we’re not failing. We’re just good enough to stay stuck between failure and success.

You can’t be good anymore. You have to be great - at something. Get to work.

– fran

Read more “artist tips”
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