John 00 Fleming: "Pequeños consejos"

The single most frequent question I get asked at the end of most interviews ……’and finally what advice would you give to up and coming DJ’s’? My answer used to be the same, ‘just be original and you’ll get noticed’. But have things changed in this day and age of technology? My answer today should be, ‘get a team of clever IT people around you and market the hell out of yourself. Don’t worry about the actual DJ aspect, just manipulate Facebook and Twitter then you’ll be booked around the World. That’s exactly how many of today’s new DJ’s have broke their careers,’ Unfortunately it’s a reality.

I have to admit, the web side of things is my personal weakness. I can’t design any form of website or newsletter. I haven’t got a clue about HTML, Flash or any kind of web based complicated language. I saw the change happening around the birth of Myspace. The back end of Myspace was so complicated to customise, people like me had the standard page whilst others started making really nice custom pages. These are the pages that stood out and got more attention. They looked more professional, giving the impression the person behind it is more professional and already a star. I think this moment was a game changer. We then saw super fantastic looking newsletters, websites, Youtube TV pages and eventually custom Facebook pages.

These DJ’s had the help of very clever IT people ensuring every possible coding was in place to gain as many clicks as possible. Gaining new virtual; friends, I likes, Youtube hits has become a major priority over the actual music or DJ skills, it’s a trophy status to say ‘hey look I’m popular’ so you must follow or book me. Effectively you’re building and creating a virtual superstar.
So surly this should be my answer to the aforementioned question?

Yes it works in the short term, but at some point behind all this ‘in your face’ marketing you have to come up with the goods to back it up. People will get sucked in quickly, but also leave just as quickly if you don’t impress them. At this time of year we see a massive amount of disillusioned DJ’s and producers trying to figure out where to go in their careers because they haven’t made it into a popular poll, or kept their high placing. Again they used all the tricks in the IT book to gain support, but it didn’t happen. Here lies the danger. If you base you career on heavy marketing or a ‘number’, once the marketing starts to fall on deaf ears or you lose that precious number placing, you have no other form of substance to fall back on; the results can be disastrous and we see many fall.

My advice still stays the same; be original. Produce and play the music that you actually love and have a passion for. When in the studio, don’t make music for others to play on their radio shows, make it for yourself and something that you would actually play. Having your own sound becomes the most valuable asset you can ever own, because it’s unique to you because no other DJ or producer can create what you have. It puts you in an extremely powerful position. The world is currently saturated with copy cat DJ’s and producers, these guys and girls make the same mistake thinking if they jump on the most popular music style it will fast-track their careers. It doesn’t. You just sit with thousands of others doing exactly the same thing.
Learn everything possible about your art. If producing, then teach yourself how to actually produce, this way you can take those ideas from your head and translate them into physical music. This way you are creating your own sound dynamically. There are thousands of tutorials online, Youtube is your friend here.
It goes the same for DJing. Learn how to open a room professionally, how to hold a crowd. How to handle every possible scenario a live dancefloor can give you. This can make a difference between you getting rebooked at your first gig, or not.

Learn how to promote yourself. Yes social network tools are important, but don’t over cook them, don’t make these look like you are a superstar, when you’re obviously not. Keep everything in context of where you are at in your career. Facebook is an important tool, but it’s not a magic gateway to the start of your wonderful career. Most of my own fans don’t bother with Facebook. In fact a big chunk of the World has got fed up with social networking and are starting to turn off. Your music will make more noise than any social network can create, my own career seems to be testament to that. While others seem to have to shout about what they are up to and force feed it to you, I find putting a solid; mix, radio show or track out makes a lot more noise. Word of mouth is the most powerful tool in the World.

Toyota, Ford and Nissan all have to do a hell of a lot of marketing and make a lot of noise being in a mass market. All this to sell a mediocre product. Create a quality product built with passion in the same way; Aston Martin, Bentley, Ferrari do, you’ll get a cult following for life.

I’ll have more blogs in the making regarding giving advice with DJing and productions tools.

Lo puso en Fb y me pareció interesante compartirlo....

Muy interesante, comparto totalmente!!! Esto pasa no solo en la electrónica, pasa en todos los ambitos de la musica, lease Mambru, Bandana, o esas rubiecitas tontas que sacan un video en MTv.

Yo soy músico, y en mi corta experiencia, puedo decir q ademas de la originalidad, lo q te diferencia del resto creo yo, es la actitud y la pasion con la cual encares tu proyecto. Tampoco es el otro extremo, hacer música del carajo y quedarte sentado en tu casa esperando q t llamen. Para mi, debe haber una combinación de ambos, talento y originalidad por un lado, actitud y buena promoción por otro (con buena promoción me refiero a como uno se muestra hacia el resto, mal q mal, somos un producto).

Jaja lo de "pequeños" fue figurativo nomás.. Dió GRANDES consejos según lo veo yo...

Lo que plantea John en esta nota es lo que siempre dice con respecto a la actualidad de la industria musical hoy en día.

Los dj/producers se venden como un producto de góndola el cual se puede promocionar exageradamente mediante las redes sociales, ya casi no existe la originalidad musical.


Y los consejos que da son el de no dejarse llevar por el encantamiento de las redes sociales, que si bien son una gran herramienta para la promoción no lo son todo. Sí un artista quiere producir que lo haga pero que lo haga para él mismo, no para que le gusta a los demás o para pegarlo en el primer sello que se ofrezca.

Lo más importante es ser originales, el resto viene sólo, John dice que la herramienta más fuerte para la promoción es la que se hace en el boca a boca, sí la música que producen es original el resto se hace solo. Nunca hay que dejar de hacer música que a uno le gustaría pasar.