So you want to release some music...
These are just my musings about what to be aware of when you are done with recording and ready to release your music to the masses.
You have put your heart and soul into writing, performing, recording, producing, mixing and mastering your music and now you want the masses to consume it. What are you going to do?
When my clients are near the finish line with a project we’ve been working on an they are looking for direction on how to best go about releasing and promoting it, I always ask a few questions to get them to think.
Imagine that you are your own biggest fan
If you think of yourself as the target demographic for your music, i.e. you would love it and be the biggest fan if you heard it, where do YOU find new music and how do you purchase it? Do you buy vinyl? Do you buy CDs? Do you purchase downloads? Do you buy music at all? Do you listen to new music? Do you look for it or does it have to find you? If you can figure out how to get your own music into your own hands, that's a major clue about how you should go.
That thought process will help you cut to the chase. If you, yourself, don't buy physical CDs, and you're not playing 3 gigs a month where you can sell merch, don't spend the money on pressing a ton of physical CDs. If you yourself do all your music listening on Spotify and Youtube, then get your music there, but don't expect to make a lot of money off of it. I admit that it's tough out there. Honestly, I don't really know how best to promote new music now because all bets are off. It's the Wild Wild West out there, unlike the 90s when the path was well-established for indie bands and we all knew what to do.
Also, don't fall for the many services out there which will claim to promote your music but really just want your money. Look to similar artists in your boat or like-minded artists who have proven a bit of success in releasing new music. Ask them questions. We're all in this together.
More things to consider
If you haven't already, establish yourselves as songwriters with a performance rights organization like BMI, ASCAP, SESAC, etc. This is how you will get royalties if your music is played or used in any sort of media. I have been with BMI since the 90s for reasons that made sense then, but now, I think it's a level playing field and ASCAP and BMI are kind of the same. You would register yourself and everyone else who can claim songwriting credit. With registering your songs with them, there are two kinds of royalties, each with 100% to claim a share of: writer and publisher. If you had a publishing deal with a company like Warner Chappell or whatever, they would take the publishing share and you would get the writer's share. If you are self-publishing (most indie artists are), then you essentially have 200% to claim. You would fill out a song registration online for each song you write.
Copyright is also important, but less of a big deal as of late because with digital files, you can claim ownership of a song based on the date code embedded into the earliest audio file recorded of the song. A lot of people don't bother with officially copyrighting anymore, but you can do that through the Library of Congress' website. I won’t talk anyone out of it. You might as well.
ISRC codes are something that gets embedded into the audio files digitally when you master. If you are pressing CDs or uploading songs for streaming, You can embed data into the file with what is essentially a custom serial number so you can keep track of it being played. I think that's how BMI and ASCAP keep track of it as well. You would get a custom prefix for yourself from USISRC.org. It costs some money (less than $100, I think) to get your prefix, and you just add a serialized suffix to each song you put out. That prefix you paid for is yours forever and you can keep using it without paying more.
Mastering
Also, if you have taken care in recording your music and feel that it is the best audio representation of you or your band, please don’t skimp at the end by cutting corners on both mastering and artwork. Mastering is a bit of a no-brainer, as most people seem to know how it works now. It’s always worth the expense to have someone who is a professional mastering engineer at a tuned mastering facility to do your mastering. As the person who engineered and mixed your recording, sure, I can technically give you a “mastered” version of your mixes where I match levels from track to track and put the right spacing between songs and make sure to the best of my abilities that the whole project has the same sonic footprint across the board, but anyone who is mastering your project in your typical recording studio setup or worse, someone with a laptop in their bedroom, we are all just guessing as to what it REALLY sounds like in the real world. A real mastering job involves someone whose ears are tuned to JUST master. They aren’t mixing or balancing instruments. They are listening in a broader way than a mix engineer does and they have different skills that a mix engineer doesn’t. They are also mastering in a room specifically tuned so that when you sit in the “sweet spot”, what you hear is as true, frequency-wise, as you can possibly be. Someone mastering in headphones or in a bedroom on a laptop with $300 speakers is more likely doing more harm than good. Take it seriously. If you don’t understand what mastering is, ask.
Artwork
Finally, and this is kind of a personal pet peeve…. Artwork. If you are making a physical CD and are using one of the many duplication houses out there, such as Disc Makers, they usually expect you to provide them with finished, print-ready artwork. Much like the recording process, many people think just because you have the software, you can do it just as well as the professionals. Just because YOU can’t tell the difference between “good” CD artwork and “bad” doesn’t give you the excuse to not care or put effort into it. Personally, it bums me out when I know that I put my own heart and soul into producing a project for an artist and we’re all really proud with the outcome and then I see the finished CD and it’s terrible…. It’s like when you feel like you have to sneeze and it’s building and building and oh my god here is comes and then….. nothing. At the end of the day, your great music won’t even be taken seriously by some people because they will judge you on your weak artwork and just assume that if you don’t take the artwork seriously, you probably don’t take your music seriously. People don’t have time to waste and they will make quick decisions, especially if they are inundated with demo CDs to listen to.
It’s not that your artwork has to be the work of DaVinci or Hipgnosis or Vaughn Oliver (look them up), but there are some basic standard rules of graphic design that you kind of have to follow. If you don’t know them, you won’t do them and you will regret it later. Simple things like forgetting to put any kind of contact information on your CD sleeve. Not everyone wants to HAVE TO Google you. Put your email or website or any kind of contact information. This is crucial for an independent artist. Also, put proper credits on the CD sleeve. If a lot of people contributed to making the CD, mention them and give them credit. Put a copyright date on the sleeve and the disc artwork. Don’t use fifty different fonts! Don’t use point sizes so small that they won’t print. Don’t put a dark-colored logo or artist name over a dark background. Because it looks okay on your computer screen doesn’t mean it will translate to print, so print out high quality proofs. Use high resolution image files. Don’t just copy uncredited images from the internet at 72dpi and expect them to not look pixelated when printed. Understand that if you want the artwork to have a color or an image that takes up the whole area from edge to edge, you need to do what it called a “full bleed” where your design should actually EXCEED the dimensions of the edges by an 1/8th inch or so. Follow standards by looking at commercial CDs so you can know things like which direction the spine text should go (it should go from top to bottom like a book spine). Put a bar code on if you can get one. Never use Comic Sans typeface. I can’t repeat that enough. Never use Comic Sans typeface.