Frontmen (and women) are willing to be the center, the literal focal point, everything goes through them be it good or bad.
Frontmen are willing to receive the attention that goes along with the position.
Sure, the glory and moments of special treatment, everyone wants that. But the thankless pressure of responsibility that constantly rests on the frontman, very few want any part of that.
So chances are, if you’re constantly willing to be a frontman, you are one.
Thanks for being the guy.
p.s. If you love singing your tunes but don’t have the willingness to be a front man, you will have a very short career, or certainly an anxiety ridden one.
But you can grow your willingness…by recognizing that the responsibility is a gift, a gift to be given away in the unique style that you do.
If your announcement about the thing got more traction than the thing itself, you’re next thing better be really really good.
If the next thing doesn’t live up to the announcement, people will start to ignore the announcement and the thing all together.
Announcement/weak follow through Hall of Fame: Billy Corgan, Axl Rose, Lauryn Hill, Mariah Carey.
p.s. And don’t get fooled into the “under promise, over deliver” trap. It’s a cheap excuse to have low standards and no expectations. How about making a great announcement and still over delivering? (See: Steve Jobs’ legendary “And one more thing…”)
I was talking with a friend the other day about what new music we were listening to.
We hashed through some cool stuff that had great vibes…songs that suck you into the zone. It feels good.
But we both noticed that for all the new music we were talking about we were using words like: cool, vibe, interesting, great production, synthy, poppy.
(We weren’t saying things like: great, you need to hear this, oh man, SO good, when the chorus hits)
Over all we both felt a little under-excited about all this vibe.
These days its easy to focus on the vibe because there are so many tools, samples, plugins and patches that really help create that great vibe. And it IS a great vibe, don’t get me wrong.
It’s true, the people making records in their bedrooms are finally getting good at it. Technology (and it’s price point) finally is catching up with imagination.
Exciting.
But vibe isn’t the clincher.
Vibe, that synth pad, the stacked snare samples, the ins and outs of the chorus swells…you should do it all, but those things don’t bring the people to their knees.
The voice does.
The melody.
People want a chorus. They want it to smack them. Choruses make people believers.
Fight the urge to slave over the vibe (even while it’s fun and going through your bank of triangle samples for the last chorus feels productive). The vibe (and working on the vibe) is seductive…as well it should be.
But you/we need a vocal melody and lyric that shoots us into the stratosphere.
