Category: Music

Special Like Everyone Else

This from ‘The Death of the Artist,’ (via @SorayaRoberts)

Anyone can easily market their own music, books, or films online, drum up a thousand true fans, and enjoy a decent living. We see proof of this, time and again, in profiles of bold creators who got tired of waiting to be chosen, took to the web, and saw their work go viral.

The artists tell another tale. Yes, you can produce and post your work more easily, but so can everyone else.

William Deresiewicz

From the early 2000s until now, there has been no shortage of music, which is why there is no shortcut to getting your stuff out there. Unfortunately everything is stacked against the artist – rent, time, space, COVID-19. For every Marc Rebillet, there’s probably 1,000 artists who got two plays on YouTube today.

This is not some moral failing of the artist with two plays. The entire system is broken, art is de-valued, and oh yeah, almost 250,000 Americans are dead from a runaway virus.

Making Sharable Clips with TikTok Videos

Using TikTok videos to promote your thing across social media can be tough given the format of the video. The Toktok video is great for sharing as an IG or FB story, but what about everywhere else?

For this clip, I took the raw TikTok video, and put it in the middle of a 1280×720 video (I use ScreenFlow), then took the client’s existing Instagram Story assets and put them on either side.

The result is a shareable video clip that shows off a cool make-up sequence, and reinforces the brand and the actual release we’re trying to promote.

Another Bandcamp Roulette

Made another Bandcamp Roulette. Still messing up (note the right side screen clip doesn’t take up its full space), but that’s how we learn, right? Also need to figure out an audio ducking solution. Right now all the audio gets recorded into ScreenFlow, while the video of me is recorded using an iPhone. Separating those two channels of audio is easy, but its getting them in sync in post production that’s the hard part.

Evening Tunes – Dengue Dengue Dengue

Completely random Bandcamp find – open the app, electronic, go down the rabbit hole, click on something with some interesting artwork, and wow… this is seriously good evening jams.

No algorithm, trust your gut, trust your eye.

Part of How I Make My Videos

My first Bandcamp Roulette in awhile. My roomie watched the series for the first time recently, and said she thought it was great, and of course that was the kick in the pants I needed to make a new episode. OUTSIDE VALIDATION. I need to remember to make these things for me, and to keep discovering fun new music.

Still trying to fine tune my process. I used to sync iPhone video (w/ audio) with screen capture of the Bandcamp slider for the first part of the video, then make another video using the same set up, but screen capturing a different section of the Bandcamp website. As you can imagine that got a bit tedious, more moving parts, more room for error.

Now I just capture the full Bandcamp website and zoom in on relevant sections during post production. More editing, but I like being able to shoot it all in one take, which I think keeps thing more spontaneous.

My video editor of choice is Telestream’s Screen Flow, which I’ve been using since my Skull Toaster days, as you can see in this post from 2018:

At the time iMovie just wasn’t working for me, and though I’ve used Final Cut Pro before, it seemed like overkill for what I was trying to do (as you can see above). I stumbled upon Screen Flow from a software bundle pack and I’ve been using it ever since. There’s a learning curve for sure, but once you figure it out you’ll be making videos in no time.

BANDCAMP FINDS: Amby Downs, Red Fang, BLAKMOTH

Nearly halfway through August already. Unreal how somehow this year is flying. Got some noisy, dark electronic stuff here this week, with of course some up-beat metal going on with Red Fang.

BANDCAMP FIND: Phoxjaw, fernab comp

Busy week, so didn’t get to spend much time on Bandcamp this week as I liked. A colleague turned me onto Phoxjaw, though. A bit of swanky rock, dripping with sass from the UK. Sign me up.

For those times you need some music running in the background while slamming through some work that you’d rather not have on your plate, but it’s gotta get done? Yeah, this is a nice compilation in any capacity.

Bandcamp Finds: Maggot Heart, Wilma Laverne Miner, Ropes of Night

Another week, another few albums of note, starting with Maggot Heart.

I’ve come back to ‘Used To’ from Wilma Laverne Miner, which came out earlier this year. Without road trips and new experiences because of the COVID-19 pandemic, this has been pretty much the last album that’s become an “album in time” for me.

The album art work grabbed me, and then I clicked play. Not usually into this darker, moody stuff, but I like this from Ropes of Night, which came out a few months ago.

Bandcamp Finds: An Albatross, Noveller

A slow week of Bandcamp digging. The weather has been brutal, so I’ve been doing my work first thing in the AM and doing my best to get outside.

I’ve known Ed Guida since the 90s, when he used to play in Bedford, and I played in a ska band called the Unmarked Cars. Oh, what a wild time that is. Now, 20 years later, we reconnected via Instagram (of course) and our love of running (he’s a big inspiration for me). So now that An Albatross has a new album out, holy shit, I had to devour it in a heart beat.

Noveller is Sarah Lipstate, creating some great cinematic sonic landscapes.