Zson

Hey Randy, Thanks for the feedback! Finding a way to get heard, yeah its a tough wall. Getting heard is what making music is all about for me. I don't know if it's going to be one person. I think every artist has to overcome that wall with a lot of hard work Peace, James

Mission 2.5, Good God! What have they done to the Internet! I'm concerned about the current goals. As I look into creating a website I begin to think that its worth a more careful review before signing up to a service . Well, I should really say that its a bit too fast for me without a better review of what I'll get for my money and which registrar will provide a good home. Domain name registrars concerns I don't know a lot about using the different packages. I do know the if you read the service agreements you'll find very bad business practices. They are really really bad, Namecheap makes you agree to waive your right to a full refund within 3 days if you want to cancel your service with them......but it's a condition set up by the (ICANN)....so you begin to see why I am feeling a bit worried. Other things to look out for.... whois - edit fees and locks Every time you register a domain name, the details of that domain registration must be published in a publicly accessible database called Whois. One of the functions a registrar is supposed to be providing to you is the ability to change those whois records. Some registrars (especially the bargain basement outfits) register your domain for a dirt-cheap price and then ding you with an "administration fee" when you want to edit your Whois record. Some others may also "lockdown" your domain for 60 days everytime you make an edit to your record, preventing you from moving the name out to another registrar. These hosting registrar providers are not your friends, Some sites will make more money by treating you badly. I know of and had some very bad experiences with them. Go Daddy .....ouch.....they wouldn't let me run a website with dreamweaver. At that time they refused to allow me to connect and manage the files the way I wanted to and the way the software was designed to. Disaster, killed my project before it even got started. The Band Name / Brand I don't know how it is for others but this is a bit complex for me. I write my music, I create the demos. I want to market and sell my music. So far so good yeah? But, If you have been reading all this you'll already know .... ....I have a cover band. They are learning some of the material and we do plan to perform and record it. I expect the band version of the music to be much better than my demo work. i.e. Lead breaks, Harmonies, Drums, those aspects should transform the material to a high professional level. If not it would not be worth my time to work with them, and I can say easily that these guys are very good musicians. So I'm not worried long term but I am concerened for the short term. Some of the basics are just not ready. Use the Cover Band ?: The Beat 64, a Beatles Tribute Band, I don't want to place my original music under that name, nor do I want to create a website for them at this time. Original Music Brand Name :Well, I am using Zson as a temp name thingy. So, yes I could create a website for that and I think I should. BUT, I've not had time to go over that much detail with the band. All they know right now is that I don't want to continue to use our current name. Even I don't know what brand to go with as yet. I've been working for the last 6 months on getting the music written. I also have to get my personal work going and provide high end service there. I am also doing other organizing projects, plus learning how to play, sing and record and master my own material, and finish the other 19 rough songs, etc ..... So the goals that I see for myself might look like this: 1. Research a good domain name registrar --------------Good should have the following Easy to use Clear documentation, i.e. no hidden fees Meets Tech spec requirements Good Customer Support, check reviews and user reviews. 2. Band Brand and Product- Are you Ready Review Is the name working? Do you have product? Will you have content? I've got a couple of domain name registrars in mind to check out. If we as a group can take a few of them and read through them and give each a report card review we could nail down a good place to host from. My quick review shows these guys to be my personal pick so far. http://www.gandi.net/whowe/ Others to check http://www.name.com/ http://www.1and1.com/ https://iwantmyname.com/ https://www.hover.com/ I don't like Go Daddy, nor Namecheap too much tiny text....it would take a full day to read it. Yes I DO read it. Now, I may be missing the big picture. If we were doing an exercise without the real world contracts and commitments I'd not be as concerned. My most important goal is to increase traffic to the music. I want to learn how to do so. I just don't want to create a band with a website and a contract without having more concrete under my feet. So I may be missing what we are doing and making assumptions, if so, I am sorry. I really want to go forward with small solid steps. I hope to god I make some sense here. Once more I've written a small essay....sorry about that I suppose I'm trying to give you a good look inside my thinking. I most likely am just making this too difficult. I have a good brain but it gets me in trouble too. Know this, I will go forward at a pace that I am happy with. I keep telling myself that.....don't stop, it's easy, don't stop, its easy. Phrew....... James

I dig what you wrote and posted here, gave me the push to work on mine

I hear your pain brother

Mission 2, Do I have the courage? I am going to talk a bit about the first online meeting we had today. This morning marked the first online meeting for the Music Promo Workshop, hosted by John Moxey, it was full of information and good solid knowledge. I am very happy I got up early to be there. We had the meeting this morning, sort of, it was 8 am my time and 1 pm John's time, EST and BST . [ USA-Eastern Standard time, British Standard Time ] I almost missed it since I was sure it was going to start at 9 am for me. I woke up early since I wanted a nice cup of coffee before the meeting but before I could get out the door, 'Ding Ding', My computer chimed at me for attention and holy shit, the meeting had started. Damn! I grabbed my headset mic, plugged in my headphones and joined in. It was a bit strange at first, hearing John speak, he has a bit of an accent and a few times I just lost track of what was said. My ears soon got up to speed and after a while I total forgot about the accent and just tried to keep up. John can talk pretty damn fast. I have to say It felt pretty cool to be hooked into this international conference. Talking to the world is a very good feeling. The meeting had started and kept going and going. I did begin to feel seriously coffee deprived but I couldn't just leave, John talked so quickly and I didn't want to miss one word. Ha! I had no coffee and the meeting went 120 minutes easy. John ended up talking until his voice got sore. So no coffee but lots of great information, Thanks John! Our next goal: Create a Personal Artist Website Undercover Operation: Create Pen Names and Join Fan websites of artist you like or are in the style you want to be in. This is not, as John said, to be sneaky or bad. Its a way to learn how the big music fan sites are inter-connected. What do they have on their site?, what are the fans saying and doing, etc. In other words its a place to learn. Sorta like music, I often use other music to inspire me and help me grow and be a better song writer. I think I'll look into joining Wezer and Foo Fighters. I'm not sure I'll stick to that but its a place to start. I'll let you know how it works out . -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Do I have the chops? I have a lot of worries about the songs I write, Are they good enough, or in other words, do I have the chops? A bit of my music background I started guitar when I was 10, but quickly gave up on it...too damn hard to play a big guitar with little fingers!. I then went back to it at 16 and have played on and off ever since. I'm not a great player so I have to work hard to be ok. I mostly play rhythm guitar with a few solos here and there. I played in various bands in college and try to make some things happen but I have to say I hit one wall too many and gave up on music. I still played, but only for fun. I did a lot of professional artwork, in the game industry mostly. I just keep that going and let the music slide. Though it always had a place to hideout in my heart. Then, about 3 years ago I met the bass player for our band. He was a guy living in the same apartment complex as me. He had gone to every building in our huge complex, something like 100 buildings, and posted a little note on inside of each buildings main door. The note said, Wow! I was stunned. I hadn't even thought about playing for years! Somehow that note made want to do it. I was very nervous but called. We set up a time for the next Sunday to hang out and jam. I had no amp nor electric guitar so the day before the session I went out and bought both amp and guitar. The jam session was great, or at least he was. I really sucked at playing the guitar that day. However the singing was fab. He has an awesome voice and range. The blend of us singing in the harmonies gave me chills. I'd never met anyone who could sing like that with me before. We decided to form a band together. I suggested doing a Beatle Cover Band, he was very easy going about my idea and just said 'cool, lets do it.' We got my nephew to play the drums. He was a guy who'd only played in his room before. No lessons, no other bands. Just his room. He came over to play and holy mother of drummers was he good. Unreal! That was a win. Andy, Bass guitar, said we needed a lead guitar and vocalist. I said sure, lets do an Ad. Andy didn't think we'd get much of a response. I just said lets trust our luck, its been good so far..... ....and so I put an Ad on Craigslist for a vocalist and Lead guitarist. We got a lot of very weird guys to tryout. Some close but no cigar guys too. When Nathan Fox showed up with a 12 string Rickenbacker, Beatle boots and able to sing harmony and play a wicked lead....well!, we knew we had a very special thing going on. It's been a real joy to work with these musicians. I love singing with them and we have so much fun together. Its been amazing to me how important they've become. If you want to check out what we look like and sound like you can find the band here You can see and here the band here http://www.reverbnation.com/thebeat64 and Here https://www.facebook.com/thebeat64 We've done a few good shows and a lot of small ones. For the last year or so I'm been writing original songs. I tried not to. I wrote a bunch and then put them away so that I could focus on the Beatle material. I didn't want to be distracted. I'd put in 3 hours, every day, of practice on the guitar for the covers. I'd sing myself horse trying to learn the good tone and notes needed to create my part in the harmonies. [i sing mostly the John Lennon parts.] At first it was really really hard. I couldn't hear the notes I needed to sing. I'd practice endlessly so I could learn just my part by sheer repetition. It was tiresome, it was gruesome, it was really hard on my voice....... but I never gave up. I guess the love of the music and how it made me feel kept me going. I can say this now since looking back is 20 20 vision, yet it still falls short of what I felt and why I did it. I don't think I'll ever be able to explain it any better. Then it got a bit easier...... I started to be able hear my notes I needed to sing... . Then it got a lot easier. Then we dropped our tuning down a half step to make the high end range less straining. That was like a magic wand and all the strain went out of the vocals and they just flowed. So, we learned three hours worth of Beatle songs. Phrew...... *cheers for us etc etc.* Then the writing bug returned. I started new songs. I started learning how to record them and make demos. The songs started to get better. Its still a struggel but with each song I create a demo for I learn more about how to do the next one better. If you like you can hear my demos here https://soundcloud.com/jameszarubin So, do I have the chops? I can't truly answer that. I think I've written well but I've not gotten them out to enough people to know for sure. I know I've not written the songs that make you stop and go "oh shit, who the hell is that band!" And that will be the song with the chops. I don't want to stop till I get there. Wish me luck and grant me grace. Peace and music, James

I like this. Love the Video only label Musicians Showcase, Members Only [?] Promote your music here. Be Shameless, Be Bold! You know you want to. New Music Video New Music Albums and Singles The Spoken Word and other Recordings[?] Musicians Lounge General Chat, Ask Questions, Network with other musicians. Etc. Yeah, New Band Demos could be too much. As HoboSage says its not really needed per se. I guess I was thinking of a new member song posting area, almost like an introduction but it's to introduce the new members material. You'd only post there once like your introduce yourself post.. That was my logic chain anyway. Just thinking out loud a bit. . I had thought that 'Audio" is too generic. Isn't songstuff primarily about songs? I could be missing the target a bit here. Could "The spoken word" be a label if there is a need for it? Other creative projects won't be as relevant to posting about music yet can still be posted as general chat. Plus this is a site about music so I like Music Showcase. I also find the Musicians Lounge a very cool and attractive label. Just my thoughts James

I understand.

Hey, After looking again at the current layout I revised what I wanted to see there. Here is my thinking about it and why I think the current forum listing are not creating the correct traffic. Yeah, I have wondered about that too. I'll give my first impression of the visibility, Musicians Lounge Discuss developments in the indie music scene, promote your band and your songs, network with other musicians... shameless promotion, put together a band, and DUN dun dah! - general chat. I didn't / couldn't even read the subtext. So It took a while for me to know it could also be about promoting The Current Name / Label is not a great choice. It has diluted the content with too many subjects, not a great neighborhood Here is the Kind of Labeling I think would be easier to understand. I know this kind of layout would have gotten my traffic click. Musicians Showcase, Members Only [?] Promote your music here. Be Shameless, Be Bold! You know you want to. New You Tube New Albums New Bands Showoff Demos Musicians Lounge General Chat, Ask Questions, Network with other musicians. Anyway this is just my over active mind sticking my 2 cents in. I hope it can be helpful and not just a pain in the forum. James

Self promo's are good, who else is going to do it? Good Stuff! Dig it. I'd put your album on bandcamp....why? Check it out. Its a great site for just what your doing. http://bandcamp.com/

God I'm glad I found this site.

Great Tune, Look to enter the songwriting contest. One way to get your music some attention http://www.jlsc.com/about.php Great song, post your lyrics too.

Congrats on a great release ! Yeah Working Man is my fav too, I am so glad you included that one. It really resonates somehow. I think it reminds me of my grandpa. Inflation, that guitar work is so good I missed all the words the first time I heard it. I love the art you did for the cover....really rocks.

dig it....

Nice, dig what you posted here. I'm looking to working on this project too.

I'm working on creating a blog as part of a way to help promote my music. Great music is only great IF it gets heard. I really want to work hard to create a place where my songs can reach the world. I don't know how to get there. I hope this blog will be the start of my path to reach my goals. Peace, James