The Summer Crop
Planting happens in the
spring time. Harvest happens in autumn. In the summer, the
Michigan farmer shoos the crows out of the fields and lets his
crops grow. The hard work done in the summer is getting
the barn ready for the fall. "We have to put in an
additional support beam for the hayloft or it will surely
collapse under the strain of my bumper crop this year," says
the farmer to himself. A Michigan farmer always thinks
he'll get a bumper crop and always needs to "reinforce" the
barn in case one really happens. Summertime is still
"hard work time" for the Michigan farmer.
There are remarkable parallels between the Michigan
farmer and the Michigan Independent Music Producer.
Hopefully we are getting our fall release into the stores and
onto the airwaves as best we can, preparing for the huge
"Christmas Selling Season." If we want to
successfully compete with major record company releases for
the public's Christmas dollars, we get our releases out in the
summer. If they aren't quite ready to "press" yet, we
are in an intense period to finish the productions that we
will be releasing this year. The Michigan independent
music producer always thinks that a "bumper crop" (a hit) will
be the result of the efforts being put forth on this new
release.
If you want to have a
successful "local" release you have to operate on a timetable
that is dictated by by the marketplace. In 1999, record
marketing Guru, Tom Gelardi wrote an article on releasing your
local product at the right time of the year. Releasing a
great record at the wrong time is an almost certain way to
avoid success. In this issue, Tom updates his article
for the current market conditions, entitled "Timing
Your 2004 Release."
My 2004 Release
This year I'm back to
getting out a new release to the stores on an artist I'm
working with called (tentatively) Dave Newland and the Motorcity Warrentucky
Rock Band. Of course, its not quite ready to ship and I
really need to "step up" production to get this thing done.
I should have it done by now, and releasing it now, but I am
now shooting for a Labor day release date.
But with the wonders of the Internet I'm going to share with
my readers a preview of the production, along with discussions
of marketing plans and things being done "behind the scenes"
to try and make this release successful. So with this
issue, you can hear my latest creation as a producer and
you can "follow along" my harvest endeavors.
|
