That's A Lot Of Chicken

When you order the salad with chicken you’re hoping for a lot of chicken. The lettuce and tomatoes are necessary for making it a salad, and the dressing and cheese certainly add to the flavor.

So when you open the to-go box and there’s a lot of chicken you’re happy and it’s worth remembering for next time.

But what about the restaurant selling the salad?

The chicken is by far the most expensive thing on the salad. So if they put on a little less chicken, but charge the same price, they make a lot more money.

You see the tension. More chicken is more happy customers. Less chicken is more money (at least in the short term)…But at what point will it go from a great salad to a mediocre salad in the minds of your customers? And when it does will it be too late?

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Turn Up The Heart

I went to Bruno Mars last night. His show is top of the top. The elite tier.

The stadium might not be available to you. The fire and giant screens might not be possible in the venues you play. And you might not yet have the budget for confetti cannons.

But his level of intentionality is available to you. You can decide to build a show with purpose. To have an arc and a narrative. To make catchy transitions. To change the chords in the second verse. To add a smile at just the right moment. Extend a musical section. Turn up the drama. Turn up the heart.

If you want to be a stadium act some day it helps to start preparing like one.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Motion Detectors

When they sense motion, the light comes on. You could be walking or waving or jumping. It treats all motion equally and gives the same result across the board.

But in real life…

We can recall stories where increased motion gave us minimal results or didn’t matter at all, and times where more motion equalled greater gains.

In real life all motion is not equal.

Any motion can trip the detector but not all motion makes a difference.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Suno Tension

In all the controversy about making, writing, producing songs with Suno, there’s an interesting type of tension that makes it worth experimenting with.

When you upload your acoustic/vocal demo, it’s just that, a demo.

Suno can turn it into any style or genre you want.

80’s new wave…that sounds pretty awesome.

Acoustic campfire vibes...there we go, that feels pretty good

Make more of a dance hit…boom, dance hit

But with more guitars...woah that sounds cool too

With a prompt you can make your song sound pretty decent in any genre. And it’s really fun to play around with it.

But then comes the tension…what do you want? You can have any style so what style are you going to roll with and put your name on?

That’s the hard part. With unlimited options it’s still scary to choose.

Suno will either scatter your vision or demand that you find it. You choose.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Pop Shivers

New Hum Love playlist on Spotify and Apple

Even though pop music uses many similar chords and structures, sometimes it still gives pop shivers…when moving to a certain chord hits just right, with just the right voicing, with just the right chord preceding it, with just the right melody over it.

The truth is it’s probably a chord progression we’ve all heard thousands of times before. But sometimes it’s special.

»» Always feel free to check out the Hum Love Archive on Spotify and Apple too.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple

Law Of Small Numbers

When you only have three fans you need 100% of your fans to bring a friend just to have six people at the next show. And that’s a huge accomplishment but it’s still only six people in the room. It still doesn’t feel great and there’s no money in a six person draw.

That’s why building a fan base is hard. The law of small numbers.

The more fans you have there can be major growth even while it’s a smaller percentage telling their friends. (i.e. If you have five hundred fans and only twenty percent bring a friend next time, that’s six hundred people. That’s a jump.)

So yes. The beginning is the hardest part.

Hum Love on Spotify and Apple