A lot can happen in a year!
Blog by Louise Dodgson under Artist Managers, Creative & Branding, Finance, Law & Music Business, Live, Media, Music Publishing, Music Training & Careers, Record Labels, Recording & Production, Selling & Distributing Your Music
As another year rolls to a close, let’s take a few minutes to have a look back at what has happened here at The Unsigned Guide over the past 12 months and recap on some of the helpful blogs we’ve published that you may have missed first time around.
At the start of 2012 we had very recently launched The Unsigned Guide as an online only music industry directory with a snazzy, new-look website and lots of cool new features to boot. We’ve had some great feedback on our online service over the course of the year, take a look at what our members have to say here.
Throughout the year we’ve also posted loads of blogs, some written by us and some contributed by experts in their field, that we hope you’ve found useful in your quest to tackle the rampant beast that is the music industry. So here are a selection of some of our most popular blogs posted in the past 12 months that you should find helpful:
Whether you’re in the market for your first instrument or you’ve bought musical gear before, there is something here for everyone to learn!
Get to grips with the essential info you need about record labels, recording contracts and setting up your own label.
Prescription PR investigate bands & artists who have used fan funding platforms to release their music and offer their thoughts & considerations about how to make it work for you.
Find out how to get the best value for your merch, why it is important to help build your brand and how to get started!
Sending your music to agents, labels, publishers, PR companies and the like? Here are our handy hints to make sure you make the best impression possible when it comes to contacting the industry.
In June we were very thrilled to be asked by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) to conduct a survey on their behalf amongst the unsigned bands & artists of the UK. The research was into the relevance of record labels in today’s industry, whether emerging artists & bands were still interested in getting a deal or not and if so, the benefits they felt a record label could offer them. The results were published in the IFPI’s Investing In Music report and make for pretty interesting reading so why not take a look.
July saw the launch of Spotlight, our monthly blog focusing on the music made by our members and highlighting the 5 best tracks sent to us. We’ve been overwhelmed with submissions over the past 6 months and have been seriously impressed with the quality of music to have graced our eardrums! Our Spotlight selections are also passed onto an elite bunch of industry professionals from all walks of the music business who have provided wonderful feedback on the music. Have a look at our latest Spotlight blog, we look forward to championing more great new music in 2013!
Onto Autumn and we launched a bevy of new features and benefits for our members that we had been working away on behind the scenes for some months. We also announced official partnerships with some marvellous music companies & organisations; Dawsons Music, Midem, The Fly, Youth Music, SoundCloud and Association of Independent Music (AIM). We’ve decided to team up with these carefully selected partners as we believe they are leaders in their field and, most importantly, have lots to offer independent and unsigned musicians, not to mention the wider music industry.
Which brings us to December and our 12 Days of Christmas competition which is running at the moment. We have loads of amazing prizes up for grabs guaranteed to tempt any aspiring musician so you’d be crazy not to get involved and enter!
So roll on 2013! A very Merry Christmas and thanks to all our members and everyone we have worked with during 2012. We look forward to seeing you all in the New Year!
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the unsigned guide, unsigned bands, unsigned artists, independent artists, emerging talent, the unsigned guide spotlight
