I am way late with this post. All I can say is this: if you have the chance to go to Seville, grab it and run to your nearest airport. It’s one of the most amazing places on earth and the architecture and cultural scene is stunning.

WOMEX is also hands down one of the best-run music conferences there are. I met more people there from the live music sector than just about any other event I’ve ever attended and it’s packed with a who’s who of festival programmers.

The organization is top notch and the showcases extremely well produced and promoted (33 Sonicbids artists got booked to perform). Don’t confuse WOMEX with being just another earthy, touchy-feely world music event. Real business takes place at the marketplace and the truth is that the event is as musically diverse as it gets.

I also had the chance to host and attend a member dinner in Seville and I was blown away but the musical diversity that we had at the table (we had members ranging from an Iranian DJ to an Andalusian Flamenco guitarist).

Hosting and attending member dinners in cities ranging from Seattle and Toronto to Berlin, London and Seville has been an amazing experience these past few months. I am continuously amazed at the commonality of challenges that any musician faces regardless of geography or genre and by how amazingly diverse our industry is – and I am always humbled by how many different people Sonicbids touches and helps.

We are getting ready to launch our brand new gig listings in early December, one of the first projects that is a direct outcome of all the feedback and input that I got at all these dinners. Stay tuned – you’ll love all the goodies that we have in store.

Panos

P.S. The most interesting comment I got from all the member dinners in Europe is that language (i.e. site translation) is the top issue. The main need is for more local gig listings. Let me know if you agree.

I read a great story in the New York Times yesterday about how Obama’s understanding
of the Internet sealed his win in the US presidential election (”How Obama Tapped Into Social Networks’ Power, By David Carr).

Running for office is very much like being an entrepreneur or being in a band. You start out with nothing, you work relentlessly, and you tour the country and leverage all and available media to build an audience. Sad to observe, but historically, politicians have proven to be much more savvy about the uses of new media than the music business.

Franklin Roosevelt used radio to win, way before the music business learned to capitalize on it (back in the 20’s music publishers actually sued radio broadcasters); John Kennedy used television to reach a new group of voters, way before record labels learn to use MTV; Obama learned how to leverage social media, YouTube, and LinkedIn, all the while many in the music industry are still busy fighting them. Witness a pattern?

Check out this quote: “Senator Barack Obama understood that you could use the Web to lower the cost of building a political brand, create a sense of connection and engagement, and dispense with the command and control method of governing to allow people to self-organize to do the work.” Substitute the terms “political” with “music” and “governing” with “selling music” and you get the point.

I’ve been on one too many panels where people keep talking about how your team as an artist should include a lawyer, an agent, a manager, a publicist etc. You could have gotten this piece of advise in 1968 too.

My point is that to win as an artist in the modern day music business, you (or your team) will also need to understand and command all things online: blogs and social media; search engine marketing; search engine optimization; knowing how to leverage sites like LinkedIn, and YouTube, and Sonicbids and Flickr and Facebook; putting out podcasts and Twitter feeds; etc.

Here’s a quote from same article: “Any politician who fails to recognize that we are in a post-party era with a new political ecology in which connecting like minds and forming a movement is so much easier will not be around long.”

Panos