153 experiments in music promotion (preview)

prairie goth

you’re animal im animal i respect you and i care about you. i hate the economy.

three months or so before your release, stuff to have completely done: audio masters, album art, artist photographs, super short bio, album metadata, digital liner notes, lyrics, music videos, and write a draft template for your email pitches. get your physical media if applicable. cds and tapes might take a month, vinyl might take five. make sure you have control over your accounts for spotify for artists and apple music for artists so you can pitch music to their editorial boards. do all this stuff first so you don’t burn out and avoid doing it!

many people have been asking about what “promotion” i did when i released the ghosts beneath our feet last year. so i thought i’d get some of those thoughts down while they’re still kinda in my head. making music is hard, publishing it is tedious, and promoting it is soul-crushing. hopefully some of these thoughts can help get you through the process with your own projects. otherwise, welcome to a mortifying peak into my melted mind. my sincere apologies for being annoying, mean, stupid, boring, embarrassing, cringe, depressive, unbearable, useless, etc. etc.

have questions for me? want help with writing promotional materials and stuff? message me at https://noranygard.com/ ;

exclusive episodes at https://www.patreon.com/noranygard ;

the first half of this episode is 152 why i deleted all my music: https://prairiegoth.bandcamp.com/track/152-why-i-deleted-all-my-music ;

bandcamp artist guide: https://bandcamp.com/guide ;

here’s my bandcamp genre tag domination thing: https://twitter.com/noranygardx/status/1656026622036721664 ;

my interview with gus: https://www.mixcloud.com/radioaccess/a-musical-journey-ep-65-nora-nygard/ ;

god bless each and every one of you:

george cosby: https://georgecosby.bandcamp.com/album/talk ;

transy warhol: https://transywarhol.bandcamp.com/album/control ;

aversions: https://aversionsband.com/album/you-wanted-the-bike ;

also, listen to my album before it’s gone forever: https://noranygard.com/album/the-ghosts-beneath-our-feet ;

lil jeff !

i've always been searching. drumming in punk bands. singing into a cassette mic alone. trans angst, alienation, going on the road. synthesis, tape, poetry. two failed tours, two failed degrees. reclaiming my voice from the choir, reshaping my voice after punk rock. years of isolation, hormone therapy, production studies, and hundreds of releases with various projects.

how to be at peace. you gotta focus on the good stuff. you’re making music to make the people in your life happy. you’re making music to communicate how you feel to the people around you. you’re writing so you can learn about yourself and feel closer to yourself. you’re writing to remember, to sort out your life and how you feel and to internalize the memory of those feelings in a way that you can access in the future. you’re making records to have a document of this time. your voice, body, and brain will change and now is the only time you’ll be able to do this. you’re making a record so the people who care about you can feel close to you when you’re not around. you’re making a record so someone in a different time or place will find it meaningful and feel less alone. some of these things might not happen for thirty years, but you can only make the record now.

say hi: https://www.instagram.com/noranygardx/ ;

bandcamp: https://prairiegoth.bandcamp.com/track/153-experiments-in-music-promotion ;

should i just delete all of this