Most people don’t own a Beatles album
Most people don’t own a Chevy
Most people didn’t vote for Barack Obama
Most people didn’t vote
Most people haven’t heard of Kanye West
Most people don’t watch House of Cards
Most people didn’t watch the Super Bowl
You don’t need most people. You just need some. Because if you have some, you can be very successful.
And successful people know exactly who their “some” is.
Do you? Ready, set, discuss with the people around you.
The things you do every day, that’s your life. A mysterious woman once told me that, and I think you’ll find out she was right.
Noel Gallagher (from the once biggest band in the world, Oasis) is making the PR rounds again, in support of his album coming out. Every interview he’s done is worth reading. He’s great at it. He doesn’t give typical answers. He doesn’t care about making the interviewer comfortable or happy. He cares about honesty.
But in the midst of the creative cussing, stabs at other bands and general discontent with lots of other things, he drops a gem in his latest RollingStone interview.
“I write everyday.”
He slips it in there, not calling too much attention to it, but matter of fact.
Saying he writes everyday isn’t part of his marketing strategy, and it isn’t a silly call for attention. It’s just the way it is for him. Because he’s a writer.
What do you do everyday?
p.s. In case you’ve forgotten what a good looking man, singing a great melody, giving people a great experience looks like, here.
p.p.s. It’s infinitely more (and unnecessarily) difficult to do something every other day than it is to do it everyday.
It’s common to go to SXSW expecting good things, significant conversations, shows and meetings. And you should. But it’s also very common to leave SXSW feeling defeated, dehydrated and annoyed with your band mates along with the music business as a whole.
Starting with the blog post from the other day about RSVP'ing to parties at SXSW, I put this short eBook together to help you achieve more of what you want while you’re in Austin this March.
I’ve spent a lot of time at SXSW and have had countless conversations with other bands who have done the same. The lessons, tips and advice given here were paid for dearly over the years by doing things the wrong way in order to discover a better way.
I hope this helps you.
Please feel free to pass it around or email it to anyone else it would be helpful to.
Click for the free eBook: Six Things To Know Before SXSW
A person is about to enter the venue. When they walk through the entrance they are presented with two more doors. Both doors are open, but each door leads to it’s own room.
In both rooms your band is playing. Magically your band has reproduced itself and is playing in both rooms at the same time. Same songs, same lighting, same set list, at the same time.
Everything is identical except that in the room on the left there are ten people watching and in the room on the right there are a hundred people watching.
The room that our guest chooses has everything to do with what story they’re telling themselves and next to nothing about your music.
They’re going to choose a door, but which one and why?
Are the type of person who wants to be the 11th person or the 101st? Do they like to be an early adopter or one of the gang? Do they slant towards intimacy or excitement?
You have a type of fan, and it’s largely based around a common story they are telling themselves about you.
Run with this scenario, spend some time with it and figure out which room the patron would choose and get into the nitty gritty details of why.
p.s. You can substitute other things for the number of people. Maybe the two rooms have the same amount of people but different lighting, or different band attire, or even a different temperature or decibel level. Keep the rooms identical except for one thing and then dive into which room your fan would choose and why.
When we think of the most common villains in movies, the ones causing the most problems, the ones being battled against, we usually think of Godzilla, The Joker, or some type of Aliens.
But underneath so many movies, there is one common villain people are suffering under the power of…the sun. The constant ball of fire at the center of everything.
The rocket ship can’t get too close to it else the heat shield burns up, it’s making living conditions in New York city unbearable during the summer with no AC, it needs to not be so hot because our characters are in the desert and have sunburn, if the sun would come out it would be day time and the monsters would go back home.
In movies we don’t expect the sun to accommodate humans in their daily lives, or life long goals or missions. In movies, they find another way, regardless of what the sun does. It’s simply going to be there, doing its thing, and the humans have to deal with it.
The equivalent, the most common villain in your life and in mine, is fear. It’s not lack of opportunity, lack of fans, lack of songs, lack of a great manager or team…the most common villain is fear.
We are constantly battling it’s effects and we don’t even realize it. And it’s never completely going away. If it does, you need to find something new to spend your time doing. Causes facing fear everyday means you’re on the right track. You’re growing.
So the goal is to work with it, to dance with it, to use the useful parts to your advantage.
Never make decisions based out of fear; but that doesn’t mean fear won’t constantly be on the fringe, trying to impose it’s will on to you.
If you’re doing something worth while, fear is going to beat down on you, that’s partly how you know your work is worth doing.
The more meaningful your work, the more you’re going to have to face fear everyday.
Fear is the villain. You are the hero. Everyday.
If you’ve gone before, you may already know but you may have forgotten. If you haven’t gone before, you probably don’t have any clue.
For a bunch of the good parties and shows that happen at SXSW, you need to rsvp in order to get in. You’ll either be put on the list at the door or they’ll send you a confirmation email and you’ll show that at the door. Then you’ll be in. Then you will have fun getting out of your comfort zone and meeting people.
The rsvp'ing starts now! If you wait until you get down there, it’s going to be too late and plus cell service is horrible so it’s tough to do any of this work on your phone while in Austin.
Doing this work now will make your time at SXSW much better and you won’t be left on the street, literally. You want to get in to some cool parties.
Here’s some resources to get you started, but don’t stop with just these.
Eventbrite- download this free app, search SXSW at start signing up for parties. You’ll get confirm emails, reminders and a schedule within the app. This is a no brainer.
RSVPster- costs $30 and is absolutely worth it. They have curated a ton of good events, parties and shows, you simply click the ones you want them to rsvp you for and thats it. Don’t let the $30 hold you back. Don’t buy coffee this week and sign up for this instead.
Do512.com- a free Austin resource/app that helps you rsvp to some parties and is pretty up to speed throughout the festival for the most recent updates
Twitter- here’s some good ones to start following now and during SXSW
Just do this. Take a couple hours and knock it out. Do this boring stuff now so you can have more fun and opportunities later.
If you’ve been to SXSW before, hit me with some of your tips and tricks and I’ll put together a post with all of them in the next few weeks.
