Bruce Tang

I got approached by a music PR firm. She gave me the whole spiel, went over their services - youtube ads, playlisting, press, tik tok, etc. It was super informative and I was intrigued but then she sent me the price list for their services and I was a bit blown away. I mean I don't know what I was expecting but ~ $700 to run youtube ads and that was on the low end of their services. They are a legit PR firm and their reviews are stellar so I'm not doubting them but I was just taken aback. Like I could technically afford it but I don't see myself getting a huge ROI on it. I guess it depends what your goals are in the music game. I am well past the "this is my dream to make it big" phase of my music aspirations. I just want as many people as possible to hear my music. I just really struggle with how to get my music out there and heard so even with the hefty price tag I thought about it. I don't mind investing in it a little but I don't think I'm going to shell out that much. I guess you gotta pay to play. Has anyone else had experience using a PR firm? I've tried some submit it yourself sites like submithub and groover but it's so hit and miss and doesn't seem to really get you any active listeners.

Jimmy Page was my guitar hero for a long time. Zeppelin were the first band where I really wanted to learn every guitar riff on every song on every album. I loved that they could create something like The Rain Song and then be completely heavy with something like Immigrant Song. I love band that have range like that. They are few and far between these days. Zeppelin was way before my time but I did get to see Jimmy Page tour with the Black Crowes. Chris Robinson was a perfect Plant stand-in and did his own thing with the vocals. Was very cool.

Been recording, and mixing my own stuff for quite a while with increasingly better results each album. Part of that is just experience and getting better and part of it is the huge technological leap that recording gear has taken in the last 20 years that makes it easier to get the sounds you want. Accumulating nicer equipment over the years helps too. I'm happy with my current setup and my last album I'm actually pretty happy with how it sounds. It's not pro level by any means and I'm sure a mastering engineer would rip it apart but for my purposes it works. I've learned a lot by watching pros on youtube also. I started on a bulky Tascam 8 track. It was really cumbersome to record and edit mixes with that. I switched to Pro Tools until they changed to a subscription model and now its Logic Pro. With a DAW there are a million different plugins at my fingertips. I really only scratch the surface of what you can do with a DAW because my music is usually pretty straight on - guitars, piano, drums, bass, vocals. I LOVE recording. It's "where the magic happens" a lot for me. It's an extension of the songwriting process as I don't usually fully work out all the parts of my songs until I record. Mixing, however, is super tedious to me. It feels like work and it's a lot of just check the boxes of getting EQ, compression, reverb, etc. right. I know some people enjoy that process and can get creative with it but I think that heavily depends on the type of music you're making. I can see something like EDM or hip hop being more enjoyable to mix. The sheer amount of time it takes to mix even one song can be discouraging to the normal indie musician. I have other sh!t to do but if I want the song to sound right it's like 2 hours just to get everything set up decently. Not easy to balance other life priorities when you're trying to create art. All that being said I don't have any desire to outsource the mixing/mastering. I'm not looking to really make money off my music so I can't afford to fund that and it takes away from the DIY spirit that I enjoy about creating everything myself (even if it sounds like sh!t sometimes).

Welcome @Abas Hamzi Today. Very cool stuff. Some of it reminded me of the Flaming Lips. All the layering and orchestration is great

@VIG this is f*cking cool. I love AIC. Most underrated band of the "grunge" era. Layne Staley is, of course, untouchable but you seemed to hit all the notes, especially the falsetto at the end of the chorus going into the solo. Backing track sounds solid too. So many great singers came out of that time in music and so many of them are also ridiculously hard to cover. I've tried to do some Soundgarden stuff and I just can't hit those Cornell notes without sounding like a dying cat. You can definitely pull of that gritty rock voice

Hey John, I just released my third album last week. I don't really have any concrete plans right now. Probably just writing more, maybe recording some new stuff by the end of the year. I have such large gaps in between my albums. I'm trying to be a little more prolific. I'll probably do some solo acoustic youtube videos of some of my songs. I thought about doing some open mics but I don't know. I've done them in the past and didn't really enjoy them much. It's kind of hard getting into the moment when people are talking and drinking as you try and sing your heart out😆 How about yourself?

Hello. I'm a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist. I record and release all of my music myself. I've been at this for a while with no real aspirations beyond having as many people hear my music as possible. I tend to write mostly alternative folk type of stuff and piano ballads. I never really know what genre my music would fall in. Excited to eventually post it here.