So having a tour that was almost exclusively house concerts this year was a blast.  There’s nothing like getting to play to groups of under 40 each night, the connection you can achieve with your audience is astounding.  There’s a real conversational banter that opens up between you and your audience and it makes me realise how much I always hated playing club dates…and why I was always happier playing places like the Yellow Door and Ginglik.  Aside from that, getting to stay somewhere cool each night, rather than some overpriced rat trap with someone else’s hair on the sheets was amazing.  Aside from that, people letting me use their kitchens….personal tours of new cities….and just an all round feeling of welcoming into new/old groups of friends was stunning.  
Thanks to everyone! Here’s some great pics from the shows!

There are way more photos to post and lots more here if you’re interested.

USB Sticks

Fecking Airlines

Continuing Saga of Sonicbids

So here’s my original list of unresolved issues and Lou’s answers (quoting his emails with permission) to what is going on with them…

Music ¬ The Sound of Independents and The Indie Music Fund have placed you on Standby. You can view the messages they have sent you in the My Submissions tab of your Submit to Gigs section. Both appear to have you on Standby for this long duration because they wish to keep you on file: The Sound of Independents is waiting for the appropriate program to put you on, and the Indie Music Fund is still generating funds to reach their first milestone. Sonicbids assists you in getting your EPK to the promoter, as well as ensuring that they view and consider your EPK but once there is a notification, it is up to the artist and promoter to begin correspondence (kinda like buyers and sellers on eBay).

He then provided me with email adresses for them.

We talked with the New Music Showcase Television Show (Season 3) promoter yesterday, and they should be updating the status for submissions that are past their status notification due date in the next week or so.

We have not contacted the promoter for GuitarTam Music just yet, because they have status notifications set to get back to artists within 60 days of their submission (this would be July 5 for you). You can see the status notification date by clicking the “Status” button next to your submission under the “My Submissions” tab in the Promoter Drop Box. That being said, I noticed this promoter commented on your blog post.

Considering that GuitarTam was the one company I didn’t take a swipe at in my original post, I can safely say I won’t be hearing positive news about my submissions there. Here’s an excerpt of her comment to me…“Additionally artists that make multiple submissions of the same type of song does themself a dis-service you would be much better served to select two very different styles. I don’t need to hear the 300th singer songwriter submission that has hit my box for the day. I’m sure your turn of lyric is fantastic, but what sets it apart from the other 299 I JUST HEARD…. nothing then skip on to the next one.” Nice. You can read her comment on the first sonicbids post.

So there you go. I really do think that sonicbids is trying to do right by everyone. I also think (speaking for myself here) that a lot of us don’t have time to go chasing up promoters when they don’t respond (she says writing a 2000 word blog). I was on tour 7 months out of last year, I barely had time to answer emails and quickly update my sites. I think that’s what I believed I was paying sonicbids to do. The responses that I received from promoters within sonicbids were little more than form letters. None of them had my name on them. If I had gotten a personal email from the promoter telling me they were keeping me on standby to consider me for future shows then none of this would have been an issue. In turn I would have known I could contact the promoter directly.

Moving on….Amy from Clatter (they’re amazing…go have a listen!) posted a very open and honest response in the original post:

ClatterAmy said:

That’s funny, I’ve been thinking a lot about SonicBids lately. We recently received an e-mail from them saying the status of one of our submissions had been updated. We were declined for something we submitted to in July…2003!!

We actually canceled our SonicBids account last year. After spending over $300 in submissions alone (talk about feeling embarrassed!) it finally dawned on us that it was nigh on impossible to be selected out of the gazillion bands who were submitting entries. Now, this isn’t necessarily the fault of SonicBids; it’s hard to vie for a slot in a large festival or conference no matter how you submit your material. But when we saw that random clubs, including one in our hometown, had listings where you could pay $5-10 to be considered for a show, that just seemed weird. That smacks more of pay-to-play, but what’s worse is there’s no guarantee you’ll even get a show.

What has been irking me this week is that there are a couple of opportunities we’d like to be considered for but the only submission path is through SonicBids. I’ve written to ask if there are other options but have gotten no response. I suppose festivals, clubs, tours, etc. get enough entries through SonicBids to keep them plenty busy so missing out on a few outsiders isn’t any big deal to them, but I find it frustrating.

Well, like everything else in the music business, this is fluid and before long another paradigm shift will push musicians and industry folk into a completely different mode of communication. But I still can’t help but feel a little duped.

ClatterAmy said..

Hey Lo,

Thanks for forwarding the message from the Sonicbids Artist Relations manager. For those who are following this thread, the Sonicbids folk do a good job of making sure any complaints or concerns do not go unanswered, including mine. Their diligence is commendable, and practically unheard of in the music industry (and the world at large, I’m afraid!).

We can’t wait to come back to the UK! We’ll count on you being there!

The last thing I have to talk about is the disappearing comments that Lou made on another site claiming that sonicbids were not being investigated by the FTC. He saw a mention of this on either mine or Steve’s twitter and emailed to say thanks for the heads up…that they were erased due to an overzealous spam filter. I’ve never known spam filters that target already approved and moderated comments, but I am only relaying what I have been told. The comments are now back along with an explanation.
Here’s details if you want to follow up on the sonicbids site as detailed in Lou’s email,

We’re working on a number new features that will fix most of the submission problems we’ve been hearing about. I recently announced one of the new features we’re building to improve the submission review process here:

http://lounge.sonicbids.com/200/

We’re also in the process of checking in with existing promoters to help resolve any open submissions that are overdue for a status update, like yours was. In your post, a good place to direct your readers where they can track our progress on implementing features that resolve existing issues is the new Builder’s Blog we put up (http://lounge.sonicbids.com/category/authors/builders-blog/). It’s one thing to express our good intentions. We know that delivering on them is all that matters. We’re investing a lot of time, energy and money in the service right now, and this is where the improvements will be announced on an ongoing basis.

I still have the same issues I had with sonicbids when I began posting about this but they are trying hard to fix the problems. They are listening folks, so if you have something to say please say it.

I have been weeding out things in my musical life lately that just don’t work for me. My electronic press kit with Sonicbids was one of these things. I’ve been with them for about 3 years, 2 of those at $5.95 and 1 year @ 10.95 for a supersonic account (wow do I feel stupid). So that’s a little over $275. That’s no small change to a person who does music for a living. I even had sonicbids set up as my website for about 6 months. This got me up to #3 on the most viewed sonicbids EPK’s on their website, just under John Gorka. Still in 3 years, I didn’t get even one tiny piece of work from them. Perhaps I should first explain how sonicbids works, for those of you who may not know.

As an artist, you pay a certain fee to sonicbids each month to set up an Electronic Press Kit. I remember the days of printing out photos and press and endless hole punching getting together press kits to send out. It was hell and very costly to do, so when I started with sonicbids I thought it was a genius idea. Then sonicbids brings in promoters (who are not charged for membership but are charged a one time $50 fee from the money they collect from their listings) The promoters can list opportunities, they might be music showcases like SXSW, or perhaps the chance to be a part of a monthly podcast. I know some great promoters who have used sonicbids….including Dave Cool who did the documentary “What Is Indie???”. I think sonicbids worked very well for him and he was able to get some great indie artists for the film.

Here’s my problem with this model. Sonicbids seems to make a lot of money for itself, but as an artist, you are totally screwed. Not looking so good for a business that is supposed to be a service for musicians. In my opinion, sonicbids EPKs do less for you than a good website and some widgets from reverbnation would. In turn, you pay a fee to have an epk, you pay a fee to apply for opportunities, and sonicbids gets paid AGAIN from the promoters themselves. They boast getting artists 36,000 gigs since September of 2007, Don’t you think these numbers seem a bit low? When over 35,000 artists sold a CD on CDbaby just in July of 2007, and over 21,000 received a PAYMENT that month. I can’t believe it took me so long to realise I was being cheated.

So over the course of my time there I applied for 10 opportunities. That’s not very many really…but then I was not a very heavy sonicbids user. Out of those 10 opportunities which cost me $119 to apply for….I was not selected for 5. Now here’s the part that really chaps my ass and is the reason I’m taking the time to write this blog. I am still on standby (waiting to hear) for 3 opportunities, two of which are over a year old, and there’s been no status update on 2 other things I applied for.

Here’s what they are and the dates I applied.

On standby

Music, the sound of independents. (Radio Show)- Applied May 17th, 2007

Indie Music Fund-Applied May 25th, 2007

Waiting for update

New Music Showcase Television Show-Season 3-Applied December 4th, 2007

GuitarTam Music, Placement in Film, Television and New Media (Afraid of the Dark)-Applied May 5th, 2008

GuitarTam Music, Placement in Film, Television and New Media ( Wake Up and Lose You) May 5th, 2008

The last two things I can still give the benefit of the doubt as they’re more recent. But don’t you think I should have heard something by now from the other three?? A bit dubious eh? And doesn’t sonicbids have someone to chase up these people who have created opportunities and then not updated? It’s like a contest that no one ever wins. I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t feel cheated.

I must also add here that I do know people who have gotten work through sonicbids. My buddy Rob Szabo was a winner in the Mountain Stage New Song Contest the same year as Ingrid Michaelson. I’ve known dozens of people who got a showcases at SXSW. But don’t you think they could have done this without paying $6-11/month to sonicbids? I say yes. Spend your money on something that will help drive your career. Chase up your own opportunities. Get your stuff up on cdbaby. Get a reverbnation account. Perhaps it won’t take me so long next time to get a clue. [edit...if you want to know more including reading an email detailing the service and fees from Panos Panay..the owner of Sonicbids...click here.]