A Song A Day

One of the only good things (assuming you’re OK with it) a major label record deal would provide you is the chance to get your songs used on adverts and films – syncing, as it’s known in the industry. It’s hard to get your music noticed by the kind of people who license songs in this way, but it’s getting much easier thanks to companies like PumpAudio and now YouLicense.

YouLicense calls itself an ‘online music licensing marketplace’ and is currently in invite-only beta; but we’ve managed to get a look inside, and it’s a fairly impressive service. It’s free for the time being, although they will charge in the future depending on how many tracks you want to upload. They also take a 9% commission which will be “charged directly from the artist, once a deal has been agreed upon by both sides.”

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Popularity: 4% [?]

Currently the best place to sell your music online is Indiestore. It gets a lot of things right (with a Pro account you get assigned ISRC numbers automatically, it’s viewed by A&Rs and journos looking for the next big thing, they work with sync companies so there’s a chance you’ll get your tracks licensed to ads or movies) and a lot of things wrong (little customization, pricey Pro account, bad customer service, no way of tracking who’s buying your music) – but you can’t argue with a service that gives you the opportunity to get in the charts without being signed to a label.

The key thing that makes Indiestore so important to the unsigned musician is the fact that you can sell your tracks via SMS (if you have a Pro account, natch). This is the main reason why Koopa managed to chart, as their fanbase was predominantly young males with no credit card or Paypal account between them. Everyone, obviously, has a mobile phone, and when you buy tracks via SMS at Indiestore it just gets added to your monthly bill. That’s how you must sell these days.

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Popularity: 5% [?]

Yes, it’s the anniversary of ‘Sgt Pepper’ and bizarrely this obscure newspaper has run perhaps the most interesting feature I’ve read today.

FakeSensations – George’s Book

Popularity: 6% [?]

This is a blog about promoting, distributing and selling your music online. It aims to draw on experience I’ve gained in the music business as a journalist (over 5 years writing for the likes of NME, Uncut and lots of sadly departed dance mags like Muzik and Jockey Slut), a music publishing assistant, a PR, a club promoter, a Last.fm staffer and - last but by no means least! - a musician who has had tracks released by honest-to-goodness actual record companies (Wall Of Sound to be precise) and is now going it alone in the brave new Web 2.0 world.

Obviously, you need to get noticed when you’re starting a blog, so I will get this bit of shameless promotional sleight-of-hand out of the way immediately.

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Popularity: 7% [?]