Archive for the 'Book' Category

• Author : Chris Juergensen
• Publisher : Lulu
• Cost : $14.99 (Paperback) – $7.99 (Downloadable PDF)
• Buy Book : Lulu
• Pages : 133
• Star Rating : 9 out of 10

Chris Jurgensen is a name familiar to many Indie Launchpad readers. I reviewed his last album “Big Bad Sun”, back in September of 2006. His latest album, “Strange Phenomena” is currently towards the top of my review stack, but that will have to wait a little longer, as out of the blue came an email from Chris, letting me know I’d been mentioned in his latest book. Lo and behold, not only is Chris a crack musician, he’s also an author. His previous book “Infinite Guitar” comprises of the guitar lessons previously published on his web site. His latest book “The Empowered Musician” has the sub title “Finding financial Freedom in Music”, and goes into fine detail of what to expect when you enter the music business, from the pound of flesh you can usually expected to part with with your first recording contract, to doing it all yourself.

Before going any further, I think it’s important to say I read this book, from beginning to end. I am not a musician, just someone who’s passionate about music. I’ve been told many times, I should be a singer, but unfortunately the only thing that cures me of stage fright is vast amounts of alcohol and then as you can imagine, that’s not really conducive to a charismatic stage presence. Anyway I originally only intended on skimming this book and writing a quick paragraph or two, but with Chris’ great writing style, I found it pretty effortless to digest the whole thing. Admittedly this isn’t a large book, at 133 pages, but this is also reflected in the cost. That being said, what you are paying for here, is quality rather than quantity and there is just a ton of information here, for anyone looking to make a living from their music.

The book is broken down into 12 chapters :

1. Introduction
2. How the Professional Thinks
3. Education
4. Understanding the Music Business
5. Empower Yourself
6. Your Website and Marketing
7. Internet Radio and Podcasts
8. Press Kits and Where They Go
9. A Word of Caution
10. Making a Living
11. Finances and the Keys to Success
12. Questions and Answers

As you can see all the areas are covered, with the emphasis of actually making some money from your hard work. There were a few times, I felt that some of the chapters could benefit with being expanded a bit, but I’m sure most of that was due to me enjoying Chris’ writing style.

Conclusion : If you are in a band or recording solo and are looking to persue music as your career, this will certainly get you up to speed, let you know what to expect and even point out some of the many pitfalls. Even if you aren’t a musician and just curious about the music business, this books serves as an interesting insight.

• Author : Dave Wimble
• Publisher : The Indie Bible / Big Meteor Publishing
• ISBN Number : 0968621457
• Cost : $29.95
• Buy Book : Book Store
• Pages : 325
• Star Rating : 9 out of 10

I don’t review many books on Indie Launchpad, but sometimes I see a book that so needs to be featured. That book is the Indie Bible.

Music is all about passion. Musicians put their heart and soul into what they do. Many do it because it’s like a fire that burns within. Some do it because they like to feel what they do affects people, in no matter how small a way and some do it because they have something to say. Ultimately everyone that is featured in Indie Launchpad and indeed the majority of artists, all want to have as many people as possible listen to their creations and I have no doubt that the Indie Bible can dramatically help in boosting an artists exposure.

The book is broken down into seven sections:

1. Reviewers of Independent Music
2. “Regional” Publications and Resources
3. Radio Stations and Shows That are Willing to Play Independent Music
4. Services That Will Help You to Sell Your Music
5. Sites That Will Allow You to Upload Your Music Video Files
6. Helpful Resources for Musicians and Songwriters
7. Articles That Will Help You to Succeed in the Music Business

Just to give you an additional idea, to the depth and breadth of this book, here’s the authors own breakdown:

1. 4200 publications that will REVIEW your music!
2. 3400 radio stations that will PLAY your songs!
3. 600 services that will help you to SELL your music!
4. 350 sites where you can UPLOAD your bands MP3s or videos!
5. 52 articles that will help your music career to SUCCEED!

Please don’t be mistaken, this isn’t a get yourself famous quick book. Don’t just blindly look up your region or genre of music and blanket submit your music. Do the research. Sending your material to a company or service with no interest is a waste of their time and yours, not to mention the associated costs. The book has a great opening on how to use the book and is well worth reading.

If there were a general business book like this, it would easily be in the top 10 best seller list. In fact companies like the Economist earn a substantial amount by compiling lists like this and selling them to companies, to target mail outs. This is definitely an area that the Indie Bible should consider. Imagine being able to enter your criteria on a web page and receive back a file that you can mail merge into a word processing file, now that would be powerful stuff.

Conclusion : When all is said and done, for about the price of a 50 pack of blank CDs, you can gain a huge amount of useful knowledge and leverage yourself further up the exposure ladder. Many areas of business have their so called bibles, for independent musicians, this is it. Available in both regular and electronic print versions, this should certainly be a part of any musicicans toolkit.