what is yours?

Inspired by this article. I’m not a guitar player, nor musician for that matter, but I feel I can definitely apply this marketing strategy to my own everyday life and passions. Thanks Jeff! Keep Rockin!!

What a great article. Good information about the business of music, and if artists focus on laying out a path like the one author Jeff Fajans suggests in this article, they will have more goal-oriented approaches and understand how it all fits together — a holistic harmony, excuse the pun. A really nice, informative article.

[...] hear and see you. Take a look at a great blog on Sonicbids.com’s Lounge area entitled “Branding Your Band” that helps guide you through developing a brand statement. You don’t have to [...]

Someone told us we are the husband and wife Christian rap duo so we kept it. Thanks for taking the time to give this advice to me and others.

LX

Loud, droning, melodic, and dark rock and roll. I’m not an emo kid, and I’m not hard core, I just rock.

My songs are very much like short films that take the listener on an emotional/socially aware journey. I think of the various instrumentation as the characters and the scene elements with the lead vocals as the main character. Each song comes from a different place, both stylistically and topically. It all fits under an “Alternative” blanket with my look and public image reflecting that diverse, artistic, “down to earth,” humanitarian, devoted rock musician vibe. I think it’s working because it’s who I am naturally. That’s necessary for sincerity to come across.

That’s an awesome one Jeffrey. I listened to your music and it really fits your description well. I can really actually picture little short films being made from these songs. Nice name too!

To ks:

Well, unfortunately The Spirits of Music is on a hiatus right now, so I am suffering a bit of Brand identity confusion at the moment, just freelancing with other people. But anyways our brand was the following;

As you can probably tell from the name, we all felt a deep spiritual connection to music. We actually came up with the name after a pretty intense jam session. After we were done, we all knew we had been playing some pretty wicked jams, but we couldnt remember anything we did. Our drummer, Matt Martin said that it was as if “the spirits of music” possessed our bodies and used them to channel the music we were creating. Crazy sounding I know, but when we play live, it really feels this way when we get into the zone and just jam out. Our brand is based on emotion and atmospheric experimentation. Our songs morph into different areas night after night. The benefit we provide to our listeners is that what they are hearing is pure emotion and spirit, rather than a cookie cutter, stiff, over thought piece. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But we fulfill a sort of primal need that really brings music back into a pure form of expression. We are different and better than the competition because we don’t look at competition, and are not limited by being defined in specific styles. Just pure music baby!

From a personal standpoint as a guitar player, I would say most of the same is true about my approach. I know I am not the most technical player out there, but i like to think of myself as being an X factor that will take your band’s sound from good to great, regardless of style. It’s easy to enhance the vibe. All you need to do is listen for the right thing to play, or not play

Poppy sex-rock….yeaaaa

Great article…now comes the hard part )

Our teen cheekiness and beautiful faces! Used to be the fact that we were a 12/13 year old band playing gigs everyweek. But now we’re 19/20, we’ve lost that one!

Check out my “Brazilian Bluegrass.”

Brazilian Bluegrass sounds pretty cool man!

WHat do you think…Music that moves your Souls

We’re all about Love, Dinosaurs, & Flying Saucers!

This article is confirmation and it has made me answer those few questions in an honest approach. THank you for this piece of advice

I throw the kitchen sink at them. Any insight ?

Don

a Fun, World Jazz band for your next event !

Hejira – Seattle’s only ORIGINAL, World Jazz Band (using driving Middle Eastern rhythms).

We have 2 drummer/percussionists, vocalist, guitar, bass, keyboards and 2 belly dancers ! We play Middle Eastern rhythms, such as: Baladi, Cheftitelli, Ayub, Zaar, Maksum, etc. And also World beats, like; Turkish 9/8, Balkan 7/4, Persian 6/8, etc.

It’s a fun, educational and entertaining show! Listen to 2 of our new original new tunes @ http://www.sonicbids.com/hejira2

Hejira plays interesting, thoughtful, danceable music for all ages.

“It is refreshing to hear and dance with the original music of Hejira”.
Taia Chard – Dancer/Choreographer

“Hejira’s music is exotic, passionate, sonorous, even erotic. Middle Eastern with touches of jazz extempore, even a hint of rock … these guys know what they’re doing”.
9/07 http://www.thesittingduck.net

Rhonda- That might be a little to vague still. You should describe more in detail how it may move your soul, what kind of music , etc.

Don-That’s some really awesome music man! Definitely have a lot of cool things going on. In my opinion, since you include belly dancers and a wide array of sounds, you might want to emphasize the whole sensory experience that the audience gets when watching you perform. Not just a band playing music but a whole audio/visual production.

Secret B-Sides- I have no idea what that means but I definitely want to come see you play to find out now!

The industry is drowning in tight jeans and trendy haircuts. Open your ears to a refreshing sound. Real Rock by Real People.

http://www.myspace.com/run23

Oh yeah… I play a fretless Warwick. How’s that for branding myself.

Jeff??? Couldn’t disagree more about your statement, “the music business is about who you know more-so than about what you know or how good you are.” You may get some instant gratification if you know someone with the right hook-ups. But you will never reach the top if you can’t write a great song and perform it as such (e.g. Ashlee Simpson). Set the bar wherever you choose. If you want to be known as the next Ashlee, Jeff is right. You don’t have to be that good. But if you are that good and make the right connections, the skies the limit.

Great article. Def great!

Rap group – “Rapping Above The Rest”

Did you know that a person has to hear or see your brand’s name at least 11 times before it actually sticks in their heads?

X

In the genre of Celtic Folk Rock, there are a lot of musicians. Mostly older men. They are all very good musicians but, speaking in general terms, they tend to all sing the same songs the same ways sitting on a stool with their guitar.

Our band is all in their 20’s & early 30’s. We all have dramatically different upbringings and influences such as punk, bluegrass, classical, rock, pop, and all types of world music. It’s not something we thought consciously about when we started but, our group performs these traditional Irish and Celtic songs but we use the influences we grew up with to arrange them with a modern sound. Our stage show is much more energetic and captivating then most of the other bands that perform the same type of music.

When we discovered we needed a “branding” for our style of music, we toyed around with a lot of different “slogans”. We ended up with one which we used for a little while. “Celtic music with an edge.”

After a few months… it didn’t feel right. So, each member of the band emailed that slogan out to our friends and family and asked them to be brutally honest. We want to find out what came to mind when they read that slogan. The answers were devastating and yet, what we expected. “Celtic music makes me think of Enya.” We are SO not Enya. “The phrase ‘with an edge’ is so cliche now. What does it even mean anymore? What is edgy to you is cheesy to me.’”

And these were comments coming from our friends and family who had seen us perform, had heard our music, knew who we were. We knew then that people who had never seen us before (new bars & venues, people flipping through the paper trying to find something to do one a Friday night) were REALLY not getting a realistic branding of our band AND were most likely turned off.

We went back to the table and when the dust settled we came away with “Hard stompin’ Irish folk music”. We wavered about putting “rock” in there but decided that work may make people think we used electric guitars and had a “louder” sound then we do. We felt the “hard stompin’” part explained enough that we a little more rowdy then your typical folk musician.

In the past 1 1/2 years, the title has proven to be a successful positioning tool, setting us apart from the “traditional folk” musicians but indicating we are not a rock or punk band. We are comfortably inbetween.

Bands should not feel they need to brand themselves. They should use the resources of their friends, family and most importantly, THEIR FANS. That was one thing we did. We asked everyone to provide us with a one sentence description no longer then 10 words.

Passion. Elegance. Romantic Music. Experience The Extraordinary.

This is my personal brand statement that I came up with after my last marketing learning experience. The challenge is being objective and therefore would LOVE your feedback to see if you think it fits my music and vice versa.

Please go to http://www.LisaMusic.com and tell me what you think.

You can e-mail me off my website.

Run- You are right. The most important thing (in most cases) is being good and actually having talent. However, you certainly see a lot of bands out there getting a lot of exposure that many would say sucked. And you also see a lot of amazing bands that nobody knows.

Being able to position yourself so that it draws people’s attention when reading about you or seeing a flyer is a great way to draw new fans in. Actually being good will keep them.

Scott-

That’s awesome man! Couldn’t agree more. When you or your band is at a loss for how to describe yourselves, ask your fans to describe your music for you. It can often be a better, simpler, more appealing description.