I learned more practical immediately useful info from his weekend seminar than I had in years. Check out this informative interview.
PK: Doing the seminar is very educational, but we only reach so many people. So we've created a small, growing magazine called "Basements to Backstage". It's free to anyone who wants it, just call us at 1-800-448-3621. It contains all kinds of articles about the music business. It lists success stories, tips, and other things going on.
DS: The key to your teaching is that first, you seem to take in every bit of information about the music business and its current happenings. And second, you take what's happened, and break it down into a system that's easily explainable. Do you have a method to your information gathering?
PK: Absolutely. Some people refer to me as an information junkie. We have files in my office that contain thousands of clippings, articles or even videos, on all the different subjects musicians need to know about. In addition I have a library of over 500 music business books, probably every music business book that's ever been printed. I take in all of that information, plus all of the real life experience that I've had, and the experiences that are fed back to me from the students. A lot of students are looking out for me and feeding me, say, an article from the LA Times that I might have missed. All that information comes into me.
Then when I teach someone a tool or piece of information, I have evidence that this method has worked. Feeding in information, digesting it, pre-testing it, then talking about how to do that.
DS: Could you give a preview of a couple new important things in the next "Doing Music and Nothing Else" seminar tour?
PK: We'll talk about the tricks on how to bring your money way up in the signing. There are a couple of tricks on how to position yourself to get more money for the advance.
Another new segment is independent distribution. People know how to record and press a CD, but the big question is "What do I do with it?" We've got a LOT of material on that.
DS: Instead of general concepts like "don't send unsolicited material" - you always give tell exactly what to do starting tomorrow. Phone numbers to call, who to talk to, what to say, to take control of your career. You describe the ultimate grassroots plan: how to get the best band set up, record and press your own CD, promote it and get it onto radio, book a profitable tour, and that kind of stuff. But do you advocate this as "PLAN B" after trying to get a major label deal, or do you advise people to ignore the majors and only do it themselves?
PK: At one point in the seminar, I show the statistics of how many people have taken those deals that were offered to them by the majors early in their career. Then we look at the "Dead Career" list - the list of every single act signed to every major label that year. People are shocked how many they've never even heard of. Then I say, "Do you want to be a statistic on this Dead Career list?" Because in the last 20 years, 97% of the acts who take the deal that way end up on this 'Where are they Now?' list in two years!
On the other hand, when you do things yourself and stay in control of your career, your chances of real success are phenomenal. I actually have some A&R executives that are upset at me for making it tougher for them to negotiate deals with these artists that have heard the news.
DS: A friend of mine that runs Nightmare Records has an easy 5-step path to grassroots success: [1] - Book a show on the road. [2] - Find out what the hip local record store is, and get your record into their store on consignment. [3] - Find out what the hip local entertainment paper is and take out an ad, announcing your concert and that your record is available at that store. [4] - Contact the local college radio, do interviews, hype the gig. Set all of this up ahead of time, so that when you get there, [5] - you do the meet & greet with the record store, the radio station, the local paper, you do the show, and you move on. What do you think?
PK: That's called "Getting in the Van and Touring". Henry Rollins wrote a great book called, "Get in the Van." It's about his six years on the road of doing just that, and how incredibly unsuccessful it was.
Unless you have a very large sum of money, AND someone working a home office for promotion, publicity, etc. AND a front person that runs to each town a few days ahead of the band to set things up, you can really get into a cycle where you get so deeply intwined in going from town to town that you're not really making any headroom. You're making too small an impact in too many towns.
I teach people to concentrate their efforts within a 50-mile radius. Sure, do a mini-tour once or twice a year, 100 to 200 miles away, to the next nearest city, and do all that stuff you mentioned. But only once or twice a year, so you can organize it, do it right, deepen relationships, and afford to do it again. If you reach your sales goal for your first record, say 2000 units sold within the 50 mile radius, then for your next record, set a new goal of 5000 units sold within a 100 mile radius. Keep enlarging the radius if you reach your sales goal. But if you're not reaching your sales goal, then something's wrong. Either people don't like the music, or you're not good at marketing. If you enlarge it before you fix it, it's only going to cost you more money, and not give you more success.
DS: A famous record producer friend of mine is really critical of your plan. He said, "That's how to do things the hard way." - that it's a plan that so many people follow, you won't stand out.
PK: What you're calling "Your Plan" isn't really my plan. I mean, I'd love to take credit for it, but all I'm really doing is observing what has worked over & over. I'm simply exposing the details of it. It's not my idea. Yes it is more work. Yes it takes longer. But don't you want a long long career?
You can "stand out" quite cheaply. You can do a cassette release of six songs, recorded on your own, then go do six gigs to a good-size crowd. If you don't sell 50 to 100 tapes, then you have found that people just don't like your music yet. You can now do a shorter sales cycle. Actually pre-test the pre-testing. Instead of going through the process of a long-drawn process of a whole year, a whole marketing plan, and a $10,000 investment, you can do this little cycle that only involves a home recording, 100 cassettes, and $200. See if there's a market for your music! If people react, then you take the music to the next step.
Approaching it in this "pre-test" way, you'll know quickly if your music is going to sell. That's the question that everyone wants the answer to.