Recently I decided to put a ‘draft’ track up on soundcloud, it’s the first time for a while I’ve done this. In the past I put most things up on music forums and learned a lot from doing that, but since being signed (to a small independent label, but a good one), I decided to try to take a more ‘professional’ approach to my music. I’m not quite sure what that really means, but part of what I think it means to avoid releasing anything on the internet apart from the final version, when it finally comes out through the label. The idea is obviously that people then only ever hear your music at its best, and never hear all the mistakes on the way. However this is a tough thing to do, and not just because you get quite impatient waiting for something to finally be released! In my day-to-day life I don’t have access to the quality of feedback available in various places on the internet, and I’ve been finding myself building up a number of unfinished of tracks which I’ve been unsure are really ‘good enough’ for release, either in terms of the basic ideas or in terms of how I’ve executed them… In the past I would have just finished these tracks, put them up on a forum, and judged from the feedback whether they were potentially releasable as part of an album or EP, but without this I’ve been struggling. Perfectionism is part of it, and confidence is another part. It’s very hard to work in the complete absence of feedback (and on that note, feedback on my music here or anywhere else is always appreciated) and I find it can affect my motivation to finish things. I’ve decided so I can work towards the next full release (whatever or whenever that is, I don’t yet know) I’ve decided I basically need to get more tracks finished, and if there’s something I really can’t judge, I just need to put it out there somewhere and try to get a second opinion… I won’t be releasing everything in draft form, but sometimes it definitely helps.
Tags: creativity, production, unfinished tracks
Thanks, the offer is appreciated. I may well take you up on that!
I completely understand where you’re coming from , as I’ve switched to this mindset as well. Its the most frustrating thing ever , when you’re so excited about your next release , but you force yourself to sit on your hands and not give sneak previews , until release day when you give an appetizer. The hardest part for me is that people aren’t shelling out for music like they used to do , and to finish something you’ve laboured over for months , and not give get any feedback from forums due to self-imposed restrictions , and not receive much feedback from sales either…is a very hard lesson to learn. I definitely like the idea of closed groups of trusted friends / colleagues and people whose judgement you trust sonically. I’d hope I can be a part of your sounding board Alastair , and in return , maybe we can help each other out in this regard. Feel free to send anything my way , and I’ll be as objective as I can be. Much respect mate =)
Can you have private groups on soundcloud? Just show the ideas to some people and finished, published tracks to everyone.
For our recent release, we produced 10 tracks and then asked a selection of friends to choose the best 4. Those 10 tracks were streamed from a password-protected page, so only the friends with the password could hear them.
There’s a marketing argument which says that you should let the fans know only about the finalized releases. This, in theory, focuses the fans and generates sales, whereas releasing unfinished ideas (not available for sale/download) just confuses them 🙂
I guess what I’m worried about is not getting enough feedback, it’s hard enough to get feedback from an open group let alone a smaller closed one. But it does sound like a good idea and I might try it out. I do agree with the point about not ‘releasing’ unfinished tracks, and even if a draft track is made available to everyone I’m not planning to publicice it anywhere apart from places mainly frequented by other musicians. I guess I don’t really have enough of a following on soundcloud for it to make much of a difference at the moment but I agree you have to keep draft and final tracks separate!