Schemes Exploiting Indie Artists

Schemes Exploiting Indie Artists.

I am sure this article is going to make a lot of people angry. If you’re one of the indie artists, indie bands or indie musicians trying to make a career in the industry, you’re going to love this. If you’re someone trying to find a quick buck opportunity, you’re going to hate me.

Existence of Schemes

Why do schemes work? Let’s examine. To manage the non-creative side of their career, indie artists hire managers and lawyers, as the artists are generally not good at business matters. To have this kind of resources available, however, is not very realistic for most independent artists. This gives schemers the confidence to exploit indie bands and indie musicians for their own profits. Indie artists easily fall into these traps because the strategically built upon foundations of these schemes tap into the emotions of anyone who wants to be a star. The false promises made by these schemers are deceptive and by the time you realise this, it is often too late.

Unsigned Indie Artists

Most unsigned indie artists don’t realize that nothing is free in this world. Every service has a cost associated with it. There are no shortcuts to fame and fortune. Also, when the artists believing that their talent is at a higher level than what it actually is, it becomes easier for the schemers to dig into it and cheat them. The moment you start thinking that the other person wants to invest his time and energy in you, because you are extremely talented, you become easily manipulated and deceived. Do not make critical decisions based on your emotions. Consider the facts and use logical reasoning.

Pay to Perform

Whenever you are chosen to perform before the celebrity judges, remember that these judges do not have any real decision making power. They are paid to sit there and watch you. Your registration fee pays for their salary. Facebook targeted advertising allows the marketing companies to geo-target your location and interests and the companies start finding indie artists to come and register with them. The only way to grab the attention of real decision makers is to create great music. As I have mentioned in my bog Raising Money for Your Indie Music, it is important to create music that is marketable to the general public, because if you don’t have something that interests the listeners on a basic level, it doesn’t matter how good your development process goes. While this may sound basic, haven’t all of us fallen in love with an idea that isn’t marketable and realized only too late that we should have tested it at a much earlier stage. Not everything that appeals to an artist appeals to general public. So learn, and make sure you have something really amazing and original.

The most disgusting part of these scams is that you are never told up-front that there are submission fees and costs associated with performing. Initially it sounds real exciting and like this is going to be the turning point in your career. The truth is that these showcases are packed with performance schedule of 20+ artists. This means more submission fees. While you might think it is alright, you don’t mind, remember that this means you could end up going on stage to perform at 2am when the audience has already left!

Opening for a Major Artist

This scheme has been in the market for a long time now. I have also written a few blogs on this scheme in the past. The danger with this one is that it appears to be legitimate because you’re really getting the opportunity to open for a major artist. The only problem here is that you straight up pay them a fee of anywhere between $1,000 – $3,000, in exchange for stage time as an opener for a major artist. Unfortunately, there are some problems with this too. Ideally, you should get paid to be an opener for a touring artist. However, sometimes, we get so excited about the prospect of sharing a stage with famous artists that we do not even care about paying to get tis. Please understand that most of the fans and audience is there to see the main artist, not you. Moreover, chances are that they will be too drunk to even remember your name the next morning.

Sometimes you also end up getting less stage time than is promised or are asked to perform when it is too early and the full audience hasn’t even arrived. It gets frustrating to pay that kind of money to perform for a near-empty room. Like me, you can also help budding indie artists be warned about such schemers by sharing experiences like these on social media or displaying warnings on your website. If you need help with creating and maintaining a website, there are companies like HyperEffects that can help you connect with your target audience efficiently. Hyper Effects is one stop for your website, marketing and cyber development requirements. It helps you to create a website to display your talent or sell your indie music or indie art.

There are some more schemes that have conveniently existed in the music industry and exploited the artists for years. I am going to write about some more in my next blog. Please share your experiences in the comments section and I will add them in my future posts.