Defining the vision

Let me share my vision

These are early days, but I already have my own vision of what Sellaband could be in future given the right amount of time and effort. I think Sellaband can be bigger than you imagine!

I'd like to think that every artist who records on here will have such a great memory of doing so, that they'll want to keep coming back again and again. If you are an artist who wants to control their own destiny, this could well be the place for you.

Because why stop at recording music? How about playing it as well?

I see so many artists with fans asking "When are you going to come and play in my country?". Imagine an established Sellaband artist with a list of venues for their tour. Countries they don't think they have the money to visit at that time but where they have fans. Could you prove them wrong and help them raise enough money for a tour date in return for your concert tickets and that elusive backstage pass?

Things are never quite that simple, but... Do you begin to see the power yet? The possibilities?

I am only a believer, but I believe the future may hold wondrous things.

Back in the early days of Sellaband, those words used to be all that greeted someone on a visit to my profile information. And whilst the information I put there has expanded, that quote is still buried in there too. It gives just the tiniest glimpse into what I saw as a potential future that Sellaband could provide, based on what I read on the site.

It was one of those "what if" moments that turns into a "but if that happens, then.." and which basically kept going to the point of "wow, did I really just conclude that?". The future of music, defined in less time than it has taken you to read this far. What I "saw" that day is something I've never explained to anyone else, usually by using the excuse "it would take too long". In many ways it's something I thought I would never go through the process of writing down, purely because it is that big and complicated (yet at the same time so simple really), but the "How to fix Sellaband" post started by Bulletproof Messenger on the Sellaband forum has convinced me the time is now right to go through in detail and share the route I went through the day I had that vision.

Can you see what I saw? I honestly don't know. Am I going to have the time patience and commitment to get all the way through the story? I don't know that either at this point, but I do know that if I don't start I'll never get finished anyway. So let's see how far I can get, and to that end you can now expect a series of posts with titles starting "The knifelady's vision" popping up at irregular intervals in this blog over the coming weeks. Let me tell you my story, and lets see how many I can convince (including myself) that Sellaband is (still) the right place to be...

June 1st 2009 hatchet day

So much for things going quiet as it gets to Summer. It's been an extremely busy month where I've spotted an awful lot happening, so hold onto your hats, this is going to be a long post. Fingers crossed I don't forget anything - I'm half wishing I'd made a list!

Results from last month
First the obvious. Should that be a big hooray for Sellaband removing inactive artists or not? I've not quite decided. On the one hand I do want to throw a big thankyou to them out there for finally getting around to sorting the inactive artist problem, on the other I find myself considering whether a Dutch month is a different length to an English one. See, it's quite simple in the Sellaband Terms and Conditions. 6 months without logging in = deletion. Yet if you go back and look at the list of artists I flagged up in last month's blog, you'll find a grand total of one has actually been deleted, even though several have last seen dates prior to 1st December 2008 (what I would understand as 6 months ago) - in fact some are back in October 2008. So there's been a start, but I'm not convinced the problem is being taken care of, particularly as I haven't seen any further artists magically vanish from my flagged list since the original mass deletion was done. From what I can tell, it looks like the mass deletion got rid of all artists who logged in prior to October 2008. Fair enough at the time, but I've been expecting either the date discrepancy for the 6 month period to be made up (all artists with logins prior to 1st December to vanish on 6 month anniversary of new T&C), or another set of artists to disappear before I finished writing this entry (i.e. an automated monthly clearout but where a grace period exists when the 6 month deadline is up) and so far that hasn't happened. I'll be keeping an eye on this one over the next couple of months, but at the moment it feels like a job half done.

You'll remember in last month's post I mentioned Mysti's second profile MAYHEM as showing worrying symptoms. Well there may be an explanation for why it was (and is still) looking a bit bare. Here's what I've found out over the last month. It all starts because I finally got around to heading off to one of the live Monday webcasts, which had been alternating between just Mysti playing and Spellbox (i.e. Mysti and Mandocello). When I arrived, there was just Mysti on the guitar so I thought nothing of it as I'd got no idea whose turn it actually was that night. But on chatting to others there, I discovered that Mysti and Mando have fallen out and are no longer playing together. Mysti was due to fly out to Portugal for the Nearfield album recording just a few hours after the webcast I'd tuned into, so I didn't want to enquire at the time and I haven't had chance to discover any more since, as I believe she hasn't long come back. Long time users of the site will remember that the MAYHEM profile is the old Spellbox profile though, and that it was usually Mandocello who seemed to post from it, so I find myself wondering if this goes any way to explaining how we've landed up with a profile with no info and only the one song on it. I can only assure you that Mysti is still around and out there and hasn't vanished, and I'm pretty sure Ray Baisden will pop by my profile to let me know when her webcasts start running again if I don't spot them first if you want some extra confirmation of that.

I find it interesting that apart from the one comment left on my blog and a small comment in the "good old days" thread on the forum, nobody has mentioned Sellabration after what I wrote last month. Nobody asking on the forum, nothing from Sellaband.. hey did I see some tumbleweed just float past? Anyone who is awake out there will remember that Sellabration was announced in the Tribune on May 20th last year with the lineup announced on June 10th and tickets reservable from June 17th. Seems everyone is still too busy wondering about Arenafest to wonder about Sellaband's annual event. Given the timescales mentioned in the forum thread about Arenafest, we ought to be expecting an announcement imminently if artists are to confirm they can perform at Sellabration, or we'll be too close to that deadline as well. Hands up who remembers the special edition of the Tribune in July 2008 where JohanV gives answers to a whole series of questions including

Will Sellabration be an annual event? Can we look forward to it every year?

Time to go back and read his answer and then think about what I've previously said?

Finally, on the thankyous note, there were again a couple missing.

This month's gainers and losers
Quite a quiet month this time around. I've reclaimed one part from Marcel Luntungan as he hasn't been seen since 12th November 2008 now and Sellaband haven't deleted the profile. The part reclaimed went into Chupacabra. I get a feeling that if you're into the "fun" side of rock that the likes of Electric Eel Shock seem to thrive on, then Chupacabra ought to be an artist to consider.

I had been hoping there was going to be some more automated removal going on (as stated earlier), but it looks like next month's target list for removal unless they're seen before then, or get deleted consists of Bleeding Black, The Sundial Project and more from Marcel Luntungan.

New investments
It probably comes as no surprise that I immediately bought 5 parts in We Love The Underground on Brad's return earlier in the month. This is going to be a really tough route to 50K, if it can be managed, and probably the most important thing at the moment is to get more music up if he's to attract more believers in. I am worried however that the past history of arrivals/departures is going to put people off buying parts until a decent budget has been formed first. The more times you leave and come back, the harder it gets to convince people you are actually going to stick around and the more likely they'll wait until they consider you a "safe bet".

I've inflicted the curse of the knifelady on Michael George Band by buying the first part. Love the music, worried about the profile though as it has many of the "promo profile" signs about it. Here's hoping I can be wrong for a change and there is someone taking an interest, even if they haven't put up a main profile picture or fixed the "broken" song yet.

Alita's Curse are an interesting new signup, but don't seem to have attracted anyone in yet. Possibly not surprising, given the activity on their forum, but definitely worth a listen. I've dived in with a part, so we'll see what develops.

I've also bought a part in Nikki Murray who managed to hit my wishlist early in the month.

Watching
I got quite a shock from Talentscout's "protest song" competition. If you spotted the conversation I had with Catself, you'll know that I landed up voting for someone I wasn't expecting to. As a result, I'm now watching Laixa to try and discover if it was just a one-off, or whether I can find something in her music that I've missed before.

The cleanup of artists was a cue for me to go and take a look and see if anything was going to surface from the mire. And of course I wasn't disappointed in that regard. One of the first artists I removed parts from despite being very keen on their music is Winter Circle and the last seen date is, incredibly, 5th May 2009 despite the fact the page hasn't been updated since the day they signed up way back in 2006. It's a bit hard to believe there's no new material in the best part of 3 years, but I'll be watching to see if some does surface despite the odds seemingly being against it. It's also one of several profiles I've encountered where there seems to be someone still watching but the information on the profile hasn't been touched for a very long time. Looks like fuel for the argument some had about artists just turning up every few months without being really interested. I'll be re-visiting the murk more thoroughly as part of the "knifelady's return" (more on this later) to see whether I can find anything hidden down there

Reah Valente was going to make it onto my blog anyway this month, but it seems like there's been one of the fastest turn-arounds I've seen of any artist on this site so far. Just one week after joining it looks like the "clean out the profile" job has happened, which is a shame as I thought there was some potential there.

I've seen Boom Goes The Dynamite lurking around the forum again recently. For those who are unaware, this is the sideproject band that Scott from Bulletproof Messenger is in. They've only ever had the one track up despite a second being promised. Shame really as one track is always a promising start but never going to be enough to really tempt people in, even if they do love the main project. Wakey, wakey pick up the ball - a bit of action along with the BPM name could have had a lot more interest than just the $10 that's happened!

I have a soft spot for the underdog and Badboss has my attention as a result. I don't like rap or hip-hop as regulars will know, but I'm a firm believer that things like that shouldn't stop me from mentioning artists that I see out there trying to get attention for their music. He's got a hard job getting spotted in the mass due to the lack of regularly active believers who are into rap, but he mentions his music as a mixture of rap and pop, so is worth a visit if you want to try something a little different to your normal rap music. He seems to have gone a bit quiet towards the end of May though, so unlike the persistence M Harris is showing under equally difficult conditions, I am already wondering if he's thinking of giving it up as a bad job.

Kirt appears to be discontinuing Knaeckebroedt as he is asking people to transfer parts to his Kirt profile.

It also looks like Blair is quietly disappearing. The Average Person is one of those projects which is just so unusual, it's hard to see how it can succeed until there are several hundred thousand using the site on a regular basis. I believe he does have 5000 believers out there in the world somewhere, I'm just not sure they're going to turn up here any time soon. If you're into the really eclectic, this one is well worth a listen so I'd go catch it before you're too late.

Video of the month
My choice of video this month was also influenced by the conversation I had with Catself about our differing tastes in rock. She seems to think she listens to a more eclectic style of rock than me, but I'm not entirely sure that's the case, even though I do generally lean towards the mainstream. I've decided to bring you one of the more unusual artists in my collection as a result, and I'm willing to bet you've never heard of this one before. Iconcrash is an artist I originally came across when I was on my original voyage of discovery of Finnish music. Not quite rock, not quite electronic, not quite gothic, not quite industrial, quite an unusual mix in fact if you go through the material they have available. Every song I hear makes me think of a different artist and that makes it interesting in itself. It's grown from being a one-man project into a full blown band in the past 4 years and the second album is due to be released soon. The video I've chosen actually sounds more mainstream than the material from the first album, so I shall be interested to hear what the rest of the second album sounds like when it comes out. Enjoy "Strange, Strange Dark Star" playing on my profile now and check out the player on their website if you want to discover some of the more unusual.

Sixpack stories
Not that much to report this time around. Despite being one of the artists I was missing a thankyou from, I still voted for Headblow in both weeks they were up for the Sixpack. That's how much I like the music, but I am seriously thinking of implementing a new rule which states "If you're up for the Sixpack and I've owned a part for more than a week, then I'm not voting for you until that thankyou has come in". This is hardly the first time something like this has happened - maybe I ought to make it one of the last. What do you think? Should it be entirely about the music when I'm voting in the Sixpack, or should I take other things into account too?

I enjoyed watching the week that Resistor made artist of the week because it was one of the closest Sixpack weeks (if not the closest) I've seen. As I've said before, they're not my style, but I like the fact they've brought a number of people with them who seem to be very enthusiastic about them judging by the number of believers that stopped by my profile asking if I'd vote for them.

Nikki Murray got my vote in his second week and recently I've been voting for Exoluta.


Return of the knifelady
Yes, I normally talk about Sellaband in this part of my blog, but I've been preparing for the "return of the knifelady" this month. What's that I hear you cry? You didn't know I'd left? Well I haven't been anywhere as such, but those who remember the early days on the site will have seen someone an awful lot more active than I am at present. Like many others on the site I've faded into the background, but nowhere near as completely as most. I'm having a bit of time off after writing this blog, but this month sees the return of the knifelady of old. I don't know whether it's going to be for a limited timespan or not at this point - I guess we just have to see what the reaction is like.

The story is quite long, but basically I pretty much gave up on fighting through the "mud" on Sellaband because the inactive artists weren't being taken care of. That's the main reason why my activity slacked off, but there are quite a large number of reasons that have influenced why I'm now going to try going back to the knifelady I used to be.

Firstly, Sellaband have made some effort with the inactive artist problem that was the main driving force behind me sliding a bit more into the background. They've made an effort, so now I should make some too.

Secondly, and more importantly, believers shouldn't be content to sit back and wait for artists to come to them. It's a two-way process. There are artists out there who genuinely love feedback, even if you do sometimes have to wander through several acres of the unresponsive to find them. And a lot of the time, they don't want to force themselves on you, but will quite happily respond if you approach them. Casee Wilson gives the artist side of the equation in her blog, but just consider - when was the last time you wandered by a forum on an artist's website and saw a question along the lines of "Do the band ever post here?". Yes, there are believers who have had their fingers burnt through an encounter where someone pretending to be the artist has been replying to them and yes there are a lot of unresponsive profiles out there, but if you, as a music fan, are looking to interact directly with an artist, Sellaband is the place to do it. You get what you give here, so if you want that interaction, sometimes you have to be prepared to go and start the process yourself.

Being a believer is genuinely hard work if you believe in more than just a couple of artists though and sometimes I do wonder to what extent artists realise this. As an artist it's quite an easy job to send out the same message you sent to those your mailing list or copy the same "hey come listen to my music" message, but it's actually a lot harder to interact meaningfully as a believer.

Dear (insert artist name),
I came across your music on (insert sitename) and I think it's great. Please can you tell me where to download a copy of your music.

P.S. I loved your video/last gig/radio interview (delete as appropriate)

Interesting that you get the "spam message" from artists, but you don't generally get that equivalent I've posted above going back the other way, isn't it? Believers have to eat/work/sleep etc. too, so to wander off onto the Internet to find out whatever else you can about an artist whose music interests you and then contact them in a way which shows them you're genuinely interested, and then repeat that 2,5,10,20 or whatever times over is a horrendously time consuming process. It's no wonder the "silent majority" exist and pass by like ghosts in the night, often without the artist realising they've been there. If you're a genuine music lover rather than someone just fixated on one artist, there seriously aren't enough hours in the day. That's also the reason why many artists seem to get disappointed after the 50K, because the reality is that of the 1% who find you on Sellaband, only about 1% will buy parts and only about 1% of those that buy parts will probably get hooked enough on your music to want/have the time to actively help you promote your music. It doesn't mean the rest stop caring - many will still ghost along behind and support you by buying the next album in the chain that comes along or maybe turning up to the odd gig, but for the majority the time just doesn't exist to support you in the way you'd really like along with every other artist they also like (who will also be feeling the same way).

I think I am in a unique position amongst believers on Sellaband, as I don't know of anyone else that something like the following has happened to on this site. One of the current 50K artists produced an album to promote them on Sellaband and help them to raise the 50K. I am thanked in the credits of that album. It doesn't sound like anything special until you understand that I don't own any parts in the artist in question because I don't like their music and I hadn't even encountered them before I went to their profile on Sellaband. It's a genuinely incredible, humbling and amazing thought to realise that you've left that much of an impression and someone thinks that much of you, even though you don't like their music (and they know that). In many ways, it's the most special album created by a Sellaband artist that I own (and quite possibly ever will own), because I know the sentiment genuinely comes from the heart. I also know that the credit in the album wouldn't have happened if I'd just ghosted round the place like I've been doing for a while now.

So whilst other active believers seem to be slowly fading away, that's one example of why I'm going to be making an effort to get back to being the knifelady of old, despite the fact it is amazingly hard work. The quote from Francis Rodino's website blog "Love me, hate me, just don’t ignore me!" and something another artist once wrote to me "Sometimes it feels like nobody ever gets to hear our music" are both significant here. Sometimes the most important thing you can do for an artist is to let them know there is someone out there (or indeed still someone out there) rather than have them feeling like they're yelling into a vacuum. So instead of ghosting around and posting a selection of what I've been doing each month in this blog, you'll be seeing a lot more of me posting around on artists profiles and attempting to strike up conversations with artists both new and old alike as well as attempting to give you the roundup every month here as well. People like Mandyleigh would have been tempted to think I hadn't read the blog on her website and learnt about the 10 month publicity struggle she's had, because I didn't leave a comment on the post itself. There are so many cases like this where I've been a ghost and I haven't always made my presence known, so the artist probably thinks I've stopped caring when that's not the case. I may not be able to get everywhere on every day, but that doesn't mean I don't drop by once in a while. It's something I should communicate more, because it's important to artists for them to know they haven't been forgotten.

So I've said it already, but I'm therefore going to repeat it again. Music lovers say they want interaction with artists yet I don't see many of them on Sellaband actively looking for that interaction, despite the fact I'm convinced it's the place for it. If you as a believer want your own "special stories" to emerge, you have to be prepared to put the effort in. Maybe I have to show you what I mean by actually being that knifelady of old, but I'm still amazed that the majority of believers don't seem to have worked out for themselves what an amazing place Sellaband can be when you do take that much of an interest.

That's all for this month. Hopefully next month will be a shorter post (and hopefully actually published on time too!)