Write down your set list.
Look at it.
That is what you have.
Is it any good?
»» Keep in mind that there may be a difference between the parts you simply don’t like and the parts that aren’t very good. i.e. You don’t like playing the hit but it’s one of the best parts of the show.
The British Invasion. Laurel Canyon. The Sunset Strip. Seattle Grunge.
Scenes come and go. They are a hurricane of energy…incredibly powerful and then their own energy fizzles them out.
But a music scene is a wonderful timestamp of artists connecting with the culture around them in a way that spins up a magnetic energy.
There’s no guide on how to build a scene but I have watched a lot of music documentaries…and at the core of all big music scenes were four or five (and then nine or ten) bands and artists who supported each other, played shows together, wrote songs together, lived together, hung out a lot, shared music, tried to beat each others songs and generally enjoyed one another.
Even if you don’t end up birthing the next big scene, it sounds like a pretty good way to go about your career.
A handful of years ago Puff Daddy or P Diddy or Diddy came out with an album. The first single didn’t catch on and around that time I saw an interviewer ask him how the album was doing.
He said they decided to take the slow build approach but that this would be his biggest album yet.
Two things…
-An artist doesn’t typically go on a multi city media blitz to make everyone aware that they’re employing a slow build approach.
-The album has yet to blow up as of 2021.
I don’t think Puffy was taking the slow build approach. The first single failed to meet his expectations and so it looks better if he claims he didn’t have huge expectations to begin with.
It’s hard to measure a slow build.
It’s hard to create a firestorm.
Whatever you actual plan is for your single or album or video, be clear about it. Decide what success looks like and move in that direction. And if it doesn’t work, don't lie to us don't lie to yourself. Simply try again.
All new Hum Love playlist on Spotify and Apple.
This one is a little different. Although if you’ve been following along you’ll see the through line.
Powerpop. The lost genre. Not lost in the sense that it doesn’t know where it’s going…
Lost as in, it waits to be discovered. It’s never fully come to the forefront. It’s come close a couple times but never has garnered the mass appeal that its brilliance deserves.
The powerpop that was happening in the mid 90’s into the early 2000’s was a huge deal to me as a kid. And there’s a lot of good stuff from back then that I wanted to include on this playlist that hasn’t made it onto streaming services (The Semantics, Jon Brion, Arch Stanton, Heavy Sleeper).
But here’s a taste. If you know the genre you know there’s so much more good stuff. If you’re new to powerpop here’s a solid start.
My formative elementary years were spent at a camp and conference center in the middle of Minnesota. Lots of outdoor activities. One of which was campfires.
My brothers and I made lots of fires, kept fires going, we were around lots of them, campfire donuts, smores, entire meals made over the campfire.
So now, years later, when I’m doing a fire in our backyard two things come to mind…
-I know how to build a fire. I know you can’t just throw logs on top of newspaper and expect results. But rather, there is a process. Simple but important.
-Perhaps more importantly, once the fire is going, there’s an intuitive sense of how to make very slight adjustments that cause meaningful results…how to move stuff around to get more flames or less flames while keeping it hot. The adjustments are hard to explain but easy to see once you can see them.
With most of the things we do, it’s partly built on learned process and partly built on developing intuition and artistic skill.
It’s those insightful slight adjustments that make all the difference.