Don't

Forget the Business

Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business

DON'T FORGET THE BUSINESS

IN THE

MUSIC BUSINESS
Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business

DON'T FORGET THE BUSINESS

IN THE

MUSIC BUSINESS

HOW TO BUILD A STRONG FOUNDATION TO

MAKE YOUR GIANT LEAP

ANTONIO PONCE
Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business

For God, Megon, my family and everyone

that this content will help

Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business

Contents

Preface: Don't Forget the Business in the Music Business

Chapter 1 - Our Story

Chapter 2 - Budget

Chapter 3 - Building Relationships

Chapter 4 - Promoting your Band

Chapter 5 - Social Media Marketing

Chapter 6 - Selling your Music

Chapter 7 - Funding

Chapter 8 - Playing a Show in a Different City

Chapter 9 - Booking Tours

Chapter 10 - Booking Festivals

Chapter 11 - Playing & Creating Music

Chapter 12 - Recording

Chapter 13 - How to Get on the Radio

Chapter 14 - Getting Signed

Chapter 15 - Awards

Chapter 16 - Who are you Competing With?

Chapter 17 - Final Words

Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business

DON'T FORGET THE BUSINESS

IN THE

MUSIC BUSINESS
Antonio Ponce
 Don't Forget the Business 1

PREFACE

DON'T FORGET THE BUSINESS

IN THE

MUSIC BUSINESS

This is a book to help your band in the music business. The

keyword being business. We all focus on making great music but
forget about the major part of the music business and that all the
key players in the chain are trying to “make it” in their own way. Its a
very rare story for an unknown band to hit super-stardom based
solely on their musical talent. Yes there are examples of this
happening but just like in the business world they are the exception,
not the standard. Most bands that have attained some level of
success put a lot of hard work to get where they are. We never see
all the behind the scenes marketing, relationship building,
networking, practice, travel, sacrifice etc

I’m keeping this book as short as possible and eliminating any fluff
to give you only the information you need to build a solid foundation
for your band. I may give some stories to get my point across, but
I’ll try to keep it at a minimum.

 2 Antonio Ponce

A lot of people put their dreams and goals on a massive pedestal,

but most of them are not as hard to attain as we make them out to
be. Yes there are factors that are outside of our control that will
determine our success or where we “make it”. The purpose of this
book is to give you a strong foundation to take the big leap to the
next level. My hope is that after reading this book you will have all
the tools necessary to set yourself up for success. I will also show
you how you can influence those outside factors to increase your
chances of “making it”.

A little about me before we dive into building your foundation. I was

part of a rock band called NN. We had a surprising rise for a punk
band in an Electronic Dance Music era. We went from playing our
first show in a small local bar to playing Japan Music Week in Tokyo,
Japan in 6 months. A couple of months later we released a full
album of our best music which was written in the months between
our first show and the shows in Tokyo. Prior to that we only had 5
songs written in 5+ years. We also recorded an amazing video
during that time that got carried by NME and shared by various
media sources. Momentum can be a powerful thing. In the following
pages I’ll talk all about how we did that.
 Don't Forget the Business 3

Chapter 1
Our Story
 4 Antonio Ponce

In the following chapters I’ll break down how we did everything I will
talk about in this chapter. This will also be a quick overview of our
story as I want you to get the valuable information quickly rather
than reading through all the steps of our origins.
We formed around 2006-2007, the true date is hard to pinpoint as
some of us were jamming together before the full lineup magically
came together one night in my parents basement.

Between 2007-2010 we partied every weekend and played music on

the side. By this point we had our own practice space in a building
with other bands and had about 5 songs that we would play over
and over. We also were not good enough to play any cover songs,
so that was not an option. We really had no plans to play any shows.
Mostly we were chicken.

Around February 2010 a guy from another band knocked on our

door and asked when our next show was. We told him we didn’t
have one, he asked us our band name? We again replied we didn’t
have one. He asked us to play our first show with him. We turned
him down. He would then knock on our door every weekend and ask
the same thing until we finally agreed to open for his band. We were
so scared we didn’t tell any of our friends and family about the show.
Then as we were gearing up for the show we ended up writing a
couple new songs and also came up with our name. The new songs
were pretty good. We played the show and it was an amazing
feeling. We wanted to play another one right away. We booked
another show the next month which we headlined as our coming out
show. I believe we played every song we had at this show, including
the new ones. This was the first time where we set up the show with
the venue and where they tried to switch things up on us last
minute, I believe the show almost didn’t happen hours before it was
 Don't Forget the Business 5

to start because of issues with management.

In the next couple of months we would write more songs including

the song that brought us a lot of attention and opened doors for us.
We knew we had to record something at this point. Our guitarist
recorded us live in our practice space and then we also recorded
some songs at a really nice studio. The combination of recordings
became our first EP. I sent these audio files everywhere and to
anyone I could access in the music scene with some pull. We would
get little things here and there but nothing big. I probably put our
music in front of over 100 music people, including representatives
from Sony and Universal who were local but handle more pop
releases. I didn’t care, I wanted everyone to listen.

During the summer months we played a bunch of shows and were

also submitting applications for music festivals. A lot of the shows
we set up were done with other bands that also practiced in the
same building. Later we started getting show offers from venues and
local promoters putting shows together. We were happy to play
anything at this point, and we did. Everything from a big music
venue to an electronic festival in the middle of nowhere to
someones basement.

Most of our festival applications and other submissions got rejected.

Every festival or event that happened that summer said no to us.
Then out of nowhere we got invited to play Japan Music Week in
Tokyo, Japan. When you get invited to play a festival, they just offer
you the stage and time. You have to find a way to get there. We had
two major problems, this festival was on the other side of the world
and we had no money. Also we got the invitation in August and the
shows were in November, so we didn’t have much time to figure
 6 Antonio Ponce

things out. But we decided to go anyway and made it happen. We

played 4 or 5 shows in Tokyo and it was amazing. This was a major
turning point in our future festival applications. Having a big festival
on the other side of the world as part of your bio makes you stand
out from the rest of the crowd.

It also tells the festival organizers that you are willing to do what it
takes to play their festival, while some other bands who may be
more talented will not.

Our band really isn’t that different from many of the bands out
there. We just kept walking through the doors that would open for
us. We headlined most of the shows we played even though we
were a new band. This was not by choice, it just kept happening. I
don’t know if the other bands just wanted to leave early or lacked
confidence. Our band usually was not happy about headlining, but
in the end it helped elevate our brand. While in Japan we played
mostly new songs we had recently written and recorded a new
album when we got back home. A friend of ours recorded a really
awesome music video for us at no charge that was well received. I
also sent our new songs and video everywhere. We followed that
up with a national tour. Nobody invited us, we just wanted to do a
tour. The new songs, the new video and the national tour
information was added to our bio and festival applications. This
also included interviews with newspapers, magazines and radio.
We soon started getting accepted to many things we applied for.
First major festival was Canadian Music Week in Toronto, then
NXNE again in Toronto. We started getting a lot of requests at this
point, including if our music could be used in film.
 Don't Forget the Business 7

This is around the time I left the band to pursue other dreams that
I'm excited about fulfilling. The band continued and recorded another
awesome music video that put them into a Full House episode like
Weezer’s Buddy Holly. They also played another major festival and
will continue their push forward should they choose to do so.

In the following pages I’ll break down how we got our ordinary band
invited to major showcases around the world. I’ll also share a lot of
things we did that we thought were impossible but ended up being a
lot easier then expected.
8 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 2
Budget

A small leak will sink a great ship.

-Benjamin Franklin
 Don't Forget the Business 9

I purposely put budget at the front of the book. Your financial habits
will either help you to build or will sabotage any plans or dreams you
may have. Your big dreams likely have a big cost to obtain and if
you have poor financial habits, you’ll end up shrinking your dreams
down to what you can financially afford. For most, your dreams and
plans will fade as your money leaves you every month. But there is
good news, you can always make the decision to turn things around
and it all starts with a budget.

Ideally you would want your band to keep all the band income in
one account and only use it for band things. But in reality everyone
will pocket the income as it comes in and then may struggle when
band investments come up like albums or tours or whatever
because their own financial habits are out of whack. This is the
world we live in today, It is incredibly rare for someone to be
disciplined with all the temptation and marketing coming at them.
Most people also don’t track their expenses and have no idea why
their money runs out before the month does.
Money will find ways to leave you if you don’t tell it where to go.
Budgeting is just tracking where your money goes and setting limits
for what you want to spend. We learn math in school, but we don't
learn finances. Math does not factor in peoples emotional cravings and
habits. You could be winning with an extra $100 in your bank account
thinking about those new shoes you’ve been saving for and bam, have a
horrible day at work. Now you tell yourself you need a couple drinks and
some comfort food and you don’t want to cook so you eat out. There
goes $60 and since you only have $40 left might as well just use that for
other temporary thrills. That’s how I thought about finances and still
struggle with budget. We are human and constantly marketed to, being
told what to feel and what to buy when we feel a certain way. Billions of
dollars are spent on research by retailers to find out how they can set up
 10 Antonio Ponce

their stores and products. Then add all their marketing campaigns, we
encounter ads everywhere, All of them subconsciously telling us we need
it. Malls are like casinos, the house has the best odds while you didn’t
even know you were in a game.

The simplest defence is tracking your finances and sticking to your

budget. Doing this over and over again will build a great financial
habit. I thought this was a music business book? It is. You need
good financial habits in any type of business. Equipment, tours,
practice space, recording time all cost money. The band will have to
cover all these expenses when they first start out. Later others may
take care of these expenses for you, but right now it’s on you.

Most people learn finances from their parents and if their parents
have bad financial habits, guess what? So will they. That same
knowledge will continue to work its way down their family tree until
someone seeks financial help from someone with financial fruit on
their tree. Beware of the looks good, smells good, nice car, nice
house, hundreds of thousands in debt illusion. This person can only
shows you how to trade away your future.

I was taught to budget in estimates, which is not that bad but also not
that accurate. The one thing I was not taught to do was to follow up
consistently to see if I was meeting or exceeding the estimated targets I
had set. That meant I had good intentions but no execution. When you
follow up consistently you see where your financial leaks are. When you
see the same waste every week you start to focus on eliminating that
waste, also called changing your habits. For me it wasn't until I started
my second company that I met entrepreneurs that taught me how to
budget & track every dollar. By tracking my expenses I found that I would
spend $400 on Starbucks every month, add $40 every weekend at the
bar plus eating out and random small purchases whenever I would leave
 Don't Forget the Business 11

the house. We found I was spending about $800 a month on junk. I

could make the decision to not buy those things and pay myself instead.

Making those small little changes will take you out of overdraft to
being a hundredaire to being a thousandaire. Instead of money
constantly leaving you, it trusts you now and more of it wants to stay
with you, and they also want to bring friends!

There are a lot of books and teachings on delayed gratification. We

live in a now society. We need everything and we need it now. Kids
are coming out of high school wanting the millionaire lifestyle
tomorrow without putting in any work today. Credit companies and
banks make money off you sacrificing your future earnings to them.
They want you to finance a car, a house, a wedding, furniture,
clothes, holidays etc. That’s how they make their money. If you
slave away your future to lifestyle loans then you won't be able to
invest those future earnings into your band or your future, because
you're paying for the banker kids first BMW.

If you are reading this and are already in massive debt, being on a
disciplined budget will help you get out of debt. Depending on your
priorities you may want to look into finding more sources of income
to expedite your climb. All hope is not lost. I personally know a
bunch of people that have climbed out of hundreds of thousands of
dollars of debt and there are countless stories of others that have
done the same.

Accounting at the personal level is not that difficult to do, you don't
need to hire an accountant or a financial planner to manage your
expenses monthly. You just need to track your expenses and
prioritize your budget. Once you build this habit, you can apply the
 12 Antonio Ponce

same principles to your most precious asset, time.

Quick Blurb on time: Where is your time going? Treat it like a

budget. What you do with your time will also determine your future.
We all have 24 hours. If we sleep for 8 hours, work for 8 hours,
commute for 1 hour, and lets give 2 hours for all meals and
bathroom. That's 19 hours. That means we have 5 hours left for us.
That's 35 hours a week, more if you don't work weekends. Are you
busy just to be busy or are you busy with things that will help you
move forward?
 Don't Forget the Business 13

Chapter 3
Building Relationships
 14 Antonio Ponce

Another name for building relationships is networking. This will

happen organically with show promoters, venue bookers and other
bands. You will intentionally seek out promoters and venue bookers
so they know you exist. Eventually you will get on a show and meet
the other bands you are sharing the stage with. A connection will
usually be made and later on you may help each other out if
another band is needed for a show, share gear, whatever it is that
comes up. We made the majority of our contacts in this way and a
lot of the show offers usually came from past bookers or bands we
played with.

We also did a bit of strategic networking where a couple of us

would attend band networking events. Other bands would attend
and exchange music, but also in attendance were representatives
from local radio stations, music venues and record labels. This
gave us incredible access to talk and book shows with bands or
venues we would not have been able to reach otherwise. The
access to the record labels and radio stations was fantastic. By
attending the event I was able to have a great conversation with a
Sony record label scout for Western Canada, connect over stories
and drinks, shake his hand and hand him our cd. Then go out to the
parking lot and listen to it in his car. You need to attend any music
networking event or conference in your area. The access you get to
people that can change your life is ridiculous.

One of our band strengths as a whole was the ability to connect

with most people. All the band members would leave lasting good
impressions on almost everyone they spend some time with. I'm
always being asked by people how individual band members are
doing, even though they had met once years ago. This ability was
natural at this point to our band. They would communicate with no
 Don't Forget the Business 15

judgement and connect with people on everything from obscure

bands, pop culture, sports, movies, travelling and whatever else
came up.

The good news is that if you don't have great communication skills,
you can work to develop this ability. I'll share what I was taught by
the same people that showed me how to budget.

First you need to be able to look people in the eyes when you speak
with them. That is a strong connection point. Don't look down or
away when someone is trying to make eye contact. This is a sign of
a lack of confidence. I introduced someone with a low self image to
someone with a high self image, watching the squirming during their
conversation was uncomfortable. He could not make eye contact.
You will also need to be able to ask questions, find a common
interest and connect on that, tell a story or two.

Here is how you develop that skill:

When you walk passed someone don't look down or away. Try to
make eye contact, smile or don't smile depending on the creep
factor of the situation. A head nod also works.Start conversations
with people you don't know. Complimenting them is usually a great
conversation starter. Great jacket, cool song, nice shoes. Ask a
question if you are able. Nice shoes, where did you get them? Insert
strategic questions to guide the conversation. Don't forget about eye
contact!

I believe if we would not have done what we did as fast as we did if

we had not worked at building relationships. If we were the quiet
band that left after the show, I don't think anyone would have paid
attention to us or opened the doors that were opened.
 16 Antonio Ponce

Do those steps over and over. Simple as that. You will get more
comfortable with eye contact and simple conversation. You will be
ready for the day you meet a door opener and have at least a
decent ability to communicate. Shake hands with medium grip
strength, too soft or too hard send negative messages. Developing
your people skills will make a massive difference.
 Don't Forget the Business 17

Chapter 4
Promoting Your Band
 18 Antonio Ponce

Besides creating your music, promotion is the key that unlocks the
door to success. Nobody will know who you are or ever come
across your music if no promotion is done. You need to become a
master promoter. There are millionaires out there that don’t create
any content, they are just really really good at creating hype for
other people’s content.

Your shows will be empty if nobody knows about them. Your music
won’t sell if nobody knows its available. Labels won’t come looking
for you if they don’t know about you or how to find you.

Most big bands will have constant commercials on TV, radio, online,
and just about anywhere you look when they have something new
happening. Two years later after their album promo and world tour
are done you will ask yourself what happened to them because all
the adverts have stopped. Then the machine starts up again
because they have something happening again.

Businesses don’t turn the machine off. They are constantly

advertising their services or products. Most would go out of
business if they stopped. Think of it like walking up an escalator
that’s going down. If you stop walking up the steps you’re going
down.

All new bands will have to be promoting consistently. This doesn’t

mean every minute. You just want to promote enough to let
everyone know your still in business. Once a week should be
enough during a down time, but it should be increased when a band
event is approaching.
 Don't Forget the Business 19

When funds are tight you will have to do a lot of person to person
advertising along with some street posters and social media.
Contact blogs, magazines and radio to see if anything can be
worked out.

When you have access to some funds consider hiring a publicist.

They usually have a big network across the country they can reach.
This includes newspapers, radio, labels, venues, bigger music blogs
and magazines. We hired a publicist for our national tour and he
booked interviews with newspapers and radio in all the cities we
would be playing shows. Our music was also sent to every radio
station in the country. This would have been time consuming for us
to do, but he already had the network in place. I think we paid
around $800 for this service. There are many publicists out there, do
your research to see which one is the best fit for your content.

When you're starting out you'll be looking to family and friends for
support. They likely will be the first to hear your music and be the
majority of your crowd at your live shows, even if they don't care for
your music. We had some core friends that always came out which
really helped with confidence but also helped to get the word out.

You could also make your own physical and online posters that can
be placed in areas designated for upcoming events that are checked
by many. Local music blogs, newspapers and magazines are also
free to contact. Don't be afraid to ask, these outlets are also looking
for new stories to print.

The key point in this chapter is you need to be constantly promoting

if your main goal is to be a full time musician.
20 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 5
Social Media Marketing
 Don't Forget the Business 21

Most people use at least one kind of social media. The big ones out
there are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and Youtube.
If a band could only have one, they should have Facebook. Most
people you know will have Facebook, it lets you make a fan page for
your band that people without Facebook can also access. You can
stream/sell your music, post pictures and tour dates, and market to
your network and beyond. The great thing about Facebook is that
you can direct market your shows to your friends and they can
repost events or releases for you to their own network. Most don’t,
but the option is there. You could also run ads to users in other
areas for your upcoming show or release in their area.

Youtube is also good once you start recording music videos or

doing any kind of video promotion. We used to do teaser trailers for
our albums or song releases.

The others are also good. But they are only as good as you use
them. Eventually you can hire someone to handle all of this for you.
But in the beginning the band has to stay on top of it. Hopefully you
have more than 1 person comfortable using the different social
media marketing tools out there. One can be in charge of Facebook,
another in charge of the bands Twitter and so on.

Most festival applications will ask for your social media sites to see
how many followers/subscribers you have. The organizers basically
want to know how many people like you and how many you can
reach. Remember the festival is also a business, they are not only
looking for good bands, but those that can expose their festival to a
lot of people. So it’s important to put a focus on growing which ever
social media sites you use. Your follower numbers should be in the
thousands.
 22 Antonio Ponce

There is a lot of free content out there that can teach how to master
social media marketing. If you seek, you will find.
 Don't Forget the Business 23

Chapter 6
Selling Your Music
 24 Antonio Ponce

There are various ways and places to sell your music. The best point of
purchase for us was always at live shows. We had all our music
available everywhere online but our main market was our local market.
Even our online sales were mostly from our local area.

For a new band starting out it’s difficult to have someone pay for
your music. Yes your family and friends buy it, and some of their
friends may buy it if they come out to a show. But when you’re the
local band and have no name or brand power, the customer has a
hard time seeing the value you bring. Let’s also add that people are
used to pirating music nowadays, so if they are not paying for the
new Strokes album, why would they pay for your unknown band’s
music? We got caught up in the online sales side of things. We had our
music everywhere you could put music. Places like Itunes, Spotify,
Bandcamp, and various online radio stations. Did we get a lot of sales
from doing this? No. When we would get sales from a place like Itunes,
we would get about $0.30 per dollar. This would add up if we were
consistently selling thousands of songs. Since we were not, we were
basically giving money away to Itunes.

We used a service called Tunecore, which for a flat fee will put your
music on all the major digital selling and streaming sites. This took
the hassle of trying to add your music to each site individually.
However for a band that’s just building its foundation, you don’t need
all of this. When you get signed to a label, they can handle this for
you when it’s needed.

The best value for online music and streaming sales for us was
Bandcamp. Your music was available on the site for streaming and
purchase. You could also add physical copies and other
merchandise to the site for sale. Bandcamp would take a small
percentage of any sale with the artist getting the bigger piece of the
 Don't Forget the Business 25

sale. There was no fee to join or any type of monthly fee. They also
had a Facebook app that you could add to your bands Facebook
fan page. Fans had the option of buying while listening to your
music on the app. The other great thing about Bandcamp is that
you could use the page as your bands website. You could change
the URL to your own band link and post tour dates. Other social
media pages could be used to offer news and updates. This would
be the best option to keep your costs low.

Though I believe your best point of sale will be at live shows, having
a space online where people can stream and buy your music is
important for every band. Having streaming streaming available is
key if you are doing radio or print interviews, or even just fan
referrals. All the traffic can be directed to your online space.

Is it important to have physical copies of your music in stores? Not

really, but it feels cool to know your album is in a store. This was
surprisingly easy to do. There are a lot of local music stores that will
carry your album and even pay upfront for it. Others will offer
consignment, which means you only get paid if they sell it. We
honestly were just happy with them agreeing to shelf our album in
their stores. The upside for them is that you will be promoting their
store as a place to buy a physical copy of your album. Please note
these stores won’t take hundreds of copies, they’ll take 3 to 5. This
was all done in person. We walked in and asked if they would sell
our album, all of them agreed. That was all there really was to that.
For the consignment we signed a form agreeing to the
consignment. Boom your album is in a store.
26 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 7
Funding
 Don't Forget the Business 27

There are many ways to get funding for your band. Most of the early
recordings, practice space, instrument costs and all other startup
costs will come from you. This is the organic way to do it. You earn
the next level. If someone in the bands network is wealthy, they may
cover all expenses. This is not usually the case.

Once you get some recordings you could start selling your music
digitally, this won’t cost you anything to set up. The hosting site will
take a piece off the transaction. Later you could also sell physical
copies although many think this form of sale is done. I say if people
still have cd players in their cars then it will never be done. People
can buy your cd at a show and then listen to it on the drive home.
People are creatures of habit and like things they can touch. The
newer generation is more likely to buy the digital copy from their
phone while at a show. But there are still many people who don’t
shop online and would buy your CD if they liked your music and it
was right in front of them. I’ll get off my soapbox now.

There are also many music/art grants available. This is money you
don’t have to pay back. Think of it as a music scholarship, just make
sure you watch the wording in the terms and conditions. These
grants cover things like recording, touring, festival applications,
music videos and other miscellaneous things. Most cities, provinces/
states, and countries will have their own type of grant. A lot of mid-
size record labels apply for these.

Local and national music associations will also have their own
internal grants. Some require a membership fee and some don’t.
Some of the grants are also automatic. We automatically got a grant
for international tours when we went to Japan and proved we were
there. Some of these associations come with extra benefits like
 28 Antonio Ponce

copyright protection, collecting payment for music use, radio play

and free tickets to big local concerts. You could also apply for loans
or ask your network for a loan or donation. A loan means there is
debt. I would avoid this at all costs. This will just add stress to your
band life. When we needed extra funds we would hold fund-raising
events where bands offered their time to perform for us or even
things like garage sales. For the garage sale you could ask your
network for donations of items they don’t want anymore. We had a
garage sale that lasted a month because people kept giving us
things we could sell.
 Don't Forget the Business 29

Chapter 8
Playing A Show
In A Different City
 30 Antonio Ponce

There will come a time when you think its time to spread your wings
and play a show in the nearby town or city. You may get this
opportunity early or you may have to make it happen.
If you find it hard to get people out to your show locally, then it may
be a big issue trying to get people to come out in a different city
where nobody has heard of you. Nobody wants to play to an empty
room, which we had done a few times.
Promotion again becomes a key part. The best scenario would be
to get an opening slot on an already established bill or get on a
local promoters upcoming bill.

To get on an already established bill, contact the bands directly and

ask them if this is possible. If it’s a bigger venue, contact the venue
booker to see if he can add you to a bill. Many times we have
arrived to play a show we put together and found the venue had
added another band.

Do some research and find the independent promoters in the area.

These guys actually promote shows and have a network they can
market to directly.

You could also do your own marketing by reaching out to local

blogs, local bands and radio. Most blogs and small radio shows are
always looking for content to share and bring attention to their own
product. More attention means more advertising. Not all people are
out to make money, some do their radio shows or blogs because
they love discovering new music and sharing what they come
across. Submit your music to them with a little bio and that you
expect to be playing the city within a month. This is a way to start
getting some exposure to a new market. The radio and blogs will
start sharing with their groups, ask if you can do an interview or
 Don't Forget the Business 31

two. Look up local bands in the area that play similar music and
engage them. While doing all of this you will want to book your
show so you can let all of them know when they can check you out
live.

Things to avoid:

-Don’t headline a show in a city you have never played before,

unless you are getting a lot of hype and a lot of people are going to
check you out. Otherwise most people will leave once they hear the
local band they wanted to check out and you are left with an empty
room.

-Don’t join a show of unknown bands that was put together last
minute. Any promotion that was done doesn’t matter at this point.
The bands no longer playing have already let their fans know.
Promoting a new show with another lineup of unknown bands in a
week is a disaster. Especially if there is no promoter and the venue
is not well attended to begin with.

-Stay away from large venues. Again if the band headlining is a big
band then go for it. But most likely the show you get offered will be
an unknown band playing with other unknown bands. Keep in mind
that most local bands will only draw about 10 people each, 30
people in a 500 person space is not cool. Usually the venue booker
will look to have some of their expenses repaid to them if the band
putting the show together had higher expectations than they should
have.
 32 Antonio Ponce

Please note that most venues will not promote your show. They may
at most put up a poster. Don't assume they have a great system for
selling out shows. They are relying on the bands to bring in people to
sell booze and make money. There are some venues out there that
put in an effort for you, but most will not.
 Don't Forget the Business 33

Chapter 9
Booking Tours
 34 Antonio Ponce

Booking a national tour was both easy and hard. Having people
attend a show in a city you have never been in is the hard part. We
basically looked at past tours of bands similar to us and contacted
the venues they played. Some responded and some didn’t. A few
helped us put together a show, others flat out said they were not
interested in having us. At this point we had a lot of success with
local underground promoters in our area. So we started contacting
those same style promoters in the cities we were going to. We
primarily wanted to jump on someone else’s show as an opening
band. No promoter wanted to work with us. We had to put all the
shows together. We had to find the venues, find bands and try to
promote. I believe we ended up headlining every show.

This tour was across Canada and took about a month to book. All
booked through email. We found a van big enough for us and our
gear except for the drum kit. I asked the other bands if we could use
their drums and none had a problem. We didn’t book hotels ahead of
time. Most nights finding a place to stay was not an issue. In bigger
cities it got difficult because of tourists and conferences.
Our tour: Edmonton, Calgary, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, &
Montreal . The distance we drove is comparable to driving from
England to Russia.

Some shows were ok because of the size of the room, the big rooms felt
empty. Usually the other bands on the bill were pretty good at
promoting, but it's rare that they would be able to fill a room on their
own.

Touring is amazing. Make sure you do a lot of advanced promotion

to avoid playing empty rooms. Try to book hotels in advance if
possible so you know your budget. Buy groceries along the way to
keep costs low.
 Don't Forget the Business 35

Chapter 10
Booking Festivals
 36 Antonio Ponce

Who doesn’t dream of playing a major music festival? Headlining is

great, but when you’re starting out, even the side stage at a festival
like Coachella would be amazing. Imagine being invited to play a
festival that included names like Coldplay, the Strokes, or Kanye
West.

We were invited to play a couple festivals with names on the bill that
included Rihanna, Metric, A$AP Rocky, Nick Cave, Heart, Raekwon
(Wutang) & I think even Slash was part of one speaking.
We also played some festivals that included no known bands.

How do you get on the bill? How do you get invited?

Most festivals will have a submission process. Some festivals are

invite only. You can find out what their process is by visiting their
website or by searching for the information via search engine.
There are a ton of festivals that use Sonicbids for their festival
submissions. You have to pay a monthly fee to post your profile on
Sonicbids and then have to pay the festival application fee if there is
one. This gets pricey fast. We used to start our membership when
the festival season started and submit our applications and then
cancel our Sonicbids membership to avoid paying the monthly
membership fee. We would still get the festival invites.

Make sure to fill out your profile as much as possible. Make your
band bio entertaining, tell them why you are awesome and different
from the thousands of other submissions they are receiving. Post
only your best songs. Remember your future is in the hands of
human beings. What would interest them? What would they want to
see? You have a good chance of being selected if you have a cool
story and your music sounds interesting. There may be 5 other
 Don't Forget the Business 37

bands that sound like you, so it will be the other small things that
make the difference. Also note that some categories are stronger
than others. Most festivals will have shows based on genre. Our
band could slip into any rock category, while a country act could only
get onto the country bill. In this case you will have to work harder on
your application to get selected ahead of all the other country acts
that apply.

There are occasions someone in your network or a fan of your band

may have a connection to a big or small local music festival. These
are all great opportunities to showcase your band. The bigger well
known festivals are where you want to be. There will be many talent
scouts, record labels, and powerful music personalities attending.
Many bands get discovered at these events so make sure you'll be
able to make it to the festival if you get selected to perform.

With any type of promotion, you may feel a little shame for
constantly marketing to your network or writing positive things about
yourself in your band biography. This can be a mental challenge.
Just remember that people work hard and are always looking for
content or experiences for their own enjoyment. You are just
providing an option. If they go its because they want to be there.
Support for the sake of supporting will fade.

At the beginning you will have to be your own hype man. It's like
when you really want a new job. You will need to tell them why
you're right for the position, what skills you bring that make you a
better fit than the 50 other bands that want the position.

Don't be completely shameless, but also don't be ashamed. Both

will get you put on the NO pile. Like a a great handshake, find the
middle ground.
38 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 11
Playing & Creating Your Music
 Don't Forget the Business 39

I’m skipping over the learning an instrument, picking your band and
how to write music. You can be intentional about doing these things
but what I’m writing about is more directed to bands looking for how
to get to the next level.

Likely you already have a dynamic of how your band writes music.
There is no right or wrong way, its whatever works best for you. This
is something you will only figure out by doing and experimenting
together. The only thing I want to touch on is what you sound like
and how you perform.

Your sound is very important. Do you sound like something new and
cool? Or do you sound like one of those bands that sound like the
same old bands you see in bars around town?

This is very important as it will create a positive or negative effect for
your progress.

The new and cool effect: more people find it interesting, they tell
others about you, they attend your shows and bring friends, you will
get accepted to more festivals, offered more shows, radio play, more
opportunity.

The same old boring band: You remind everyone of the same old
band they have heard and they tune out after one listen, no show
growth, no festival invites, limited radio play, very little opportunity.

How do you create a better sound? Listen to music, learn all the cool
riffs/beats you hear and then incorporate into your song writing. I’m not
saying use other riffs, just let them influence you a bit. Don’t lose who
you are and become a copy of some other band, people see through
that. Just let musical influences you have, influence you.
 40 Antonio Ponce

You may also need to switch your line up if your entire band listens
to the same music. Our great strength came from our band
members having very different musical influences. This resulted in
us being a punk band with influences that included hip hop, latin,
noise, & electro. The result being most people who would never
listen to hard heavy type of rock found us interesting enough to
check us out more than once or even help promote us.

How you play live is also very important for two reasons. One is
that live shows are important for all around growth including belief,
skill, crowd experience, fan growth, music reach and sales if you’re
selling product. The more polished you are playing your songs the
better. The two consistent compliments we’ve gotten after playing a
show are "your music is awesome" and “you guys are so polished/
tight”. We practiced a lot. During the time we experience the
explosive momentum we were practicing a minimum of 2 nights per
week for at least a couple hours a night. When we had a show
coming up the hours and days would increase. We wanted to be
tight during the show. We tried to be as perfect as we could be while
performing. That doesn’t mean stuff didn’t happened like my
drumstick flying out of my hand mid song or a guitar string breaking
or we drank too much before the show. All the practice we put in
prepared us for how to handle those situations when they did
happen, including the drinking too much.

Second reason it’s important to be polished is for recording your

songs. Many bands are on a tight budget of no budget. So when you
want to get professional recordings of your songs, the more
polished, the less expensive it will be. Some of the expense will
also just come from which studio or sound engineer you work with
(more on that later). We went into the studio tight and recorded 4 or
 Don't Forget the Business 41

5 songs in two days and recorded live off the floor instead of the
single instrument method of recording most studios use. The result
was still great and professional sounding. Another time we went into
recording with less practice than usual and were only able to do 2
songs in two days. Being polished makes a big difference for your
bank account.

Having that little bit of extra polish distinguishes you even if it's just
by a slight margin. You come off looking more professional than
most of the other local bands people will see. This slight margin
becomes a big difference and you'll carry that extra tiny sparkle that
subconsciously people connect with being that different special
feeling. Thats the feeling that makes people talk, share your music,
and continue to support your band a long the way.
42 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 12
Recording
 Don't Forget the Business 43

The way you sound is important. When you are creating and playing
your art, you adjust and tinker until you get it the way you want it to
be. When you work with another artist to capture your art, you need
to find someone that hears YOU and understands what you are
trying to do. There are a lot of people that can record your music.
Some have nice studios and others don’t. They all have their own
way of recording, some will just record, some will enhance your
sound and others will try to enhance but instead they make it worse.

We were on a tight budget of no budget. So we were looking for a

professional sound at a cheap price instead of looking for OUR
sound and a price we make happen.

We learned quickly from our first experience. We went to a beautiful

studio that a lot of the local bands and solo artists used. We heard
some of the recordings and they were very clean, crisp and
professional. It was a little on the pricey side but in our minds it was
worth it. We were recording at one of the top local studios with a
respected sound engineer. The result was ok, but it didn’t capture
the raw energy and power you would hear when you saw us live. It
felt like a jab instead of a knockout blow. The recording had no balls.
Looking back we should have seen the flags when listening to other
bands they had recorded. None of them were near to our musical
style. They were all clean and crisp while we were fuzzy and loud.
For the next recording sessions we did our research. Back then
MYSPACE was still popular, so we listened to a lot of local bands
and then followed the trail to where they recorded. We found a local
engineer that mainly did bands with our sound. We had the option of
recording in the studio he worked out of or to record in his living
room. We recorded in his living room because of budget. We
learned the right engineer can record anywhere. After hearing the
 44 Antonio Ponce

playback of the first recording we knew this was our guy. He not
only captured our sound, but made us sound a little better in the
process. The first studio gave us a “this is alright” feeling and the
second engineer gave us “everybody needs to hear this” reaction.
You have not found your engineer if the playback is not giving you
the second reaction. Do your research and find your fit. The wrong
engineer can hold you back. But also don't be afraid to speak up if
you don't like the final product. You are paying them to record you.
As it was our first time we didn't know how the whole process
worked and we just took the first recordings as a learning
experience and found someone else. We also didn't believe the
studio could capture the sound we wanted and could not afford to
keep trying with them. I think we were paying something like $200 a
day. That gets expensive quick if you have no budget.

Another option is to get some gear and record in a makeshift studio.

We did this a few times as our guitarist was pretty good with sound
gear. But it is a lot of work when you are trying to mix everything
together when you don't have the training. I don't know how many
hours he put into making those recordings decent. I'm sure if we
kept recording ourselves we could have released some decent live
recordings, however this might have also killed our guitarist. Much
like using a publicist for marketing, using a sound engineer who has
all the equipment, training and knowledge is the best way to go if
you can afford it. But you could always run lean if you need to.
 Don't Forget the Business 45

Chapter 13
How To Get On The Radio
 46 Antonio Ponce

When you watch movies about bands during the 60s it was a major
deal to hear your music on the radio. Back then there were not that
many stations. Today there are more in your local area then there
was across the country back then. This means its easy to get played
on the radio since there are so many stations and shows. Our digital
age also makes it easy to get your music to a DJ or radio show that
might play your music. However its still difficult to get on the major
popular stations, you'll need a major label to submit your music to
the station, or have enough fans demanding to hear it on the specific
station.

The first place you should submit your music is to your local college/
university radio shows. Find shows that play your style of music. All
stations are looking for new content they can share. Contact them
first by email if possible to find out if it would be cool if you delivered
your music to them. Go in person, there may be an opportunity to do
a quick interview during their show to introduce yourself and your
music before the DJ plays it. This is also a great way to create a
good relationship with the DJ who later will play your music and talk
positively about you and your music to other DJs at the station.
Unless you give a poor first impression, then don't expect your music
to be played. Remember High School Science, for every action there
is a reaction. Positive encounter usually leads to positive action by
the show host. Negative encounter for sure means your music is
going into the trash bin. There are thousands of musical acts that are
likely as talented as you trying to get into the same doors. Being
polite and humble goes a long way.

If you think your music is ready to be played on the bigger popular

stations. Contact their music director. Their email is usually listed on
the station’s website. Send them a link and ask if they would be
 Don't Forget the Business 47

willing to play it on their new music shows. You could also deliver it
in person to the stations front desk. Most accept submissions,
especially if they have some sort of local band show. All
submissions I’ve made to a musical director has brought me a
response from them. Usually saying it’s not a fit for the station,
which is normal if you have a crazy rock sound and they are a pop
or soft rock station, or if they are just trying to let you down easily.

The main point is that it’s easy to access people with the power to
play your music on the radio. Most DJs are on social media and are
happy to engage you, but remember the most powerful ask you can
make is in person. Anybody can send an email or letter, but if you
can get access to one of these people in person, seize the moment.
This is where you use the people skills you've been working on,
start a conversation, find a topic you can connect on and ask if
they'll give your music a listen.

Yes it’s easier to get on the radio in this century, but that doesn’t
mean it isn’t a cool experience to hear your music played, especially
with all your friends and family listening around the world.
48 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 14
Getting Signed
 Don't Forget the Business 49

We had a bit of an obsession about getting signed...well I did. Our

thought was if we create awesome music, word of mouth would get
to big music labels and they would all be trying to sign us to a million
dollar contract. The dream would continue to have massive radio
play followed by an international tour. All of that didn’t happen for us.
This dream will happen for few, but most will have to build their
product up to a certain level before someone will take a look at
them.

Don’t forget the business in the Music Business. When you watch
Dragon’s Den or Shark Tank, very rarely does a shark sign a deal
with a business that is not making money or at least getting a lot of
subscribers to their content. Music labels are no different. They are
looking for a proven model for generating money.

That being said, thousands of bands submit their music to these

bigger and middle sized labels with the dreams of being signed, not
even knowing what the labels are really looking for. That is one of
the reasons I decided to write this book. Most bands have no idea of
the business side of the music business. Yes your music is beautiful,
but that is only part of the equation.

The band The Black Keys are a great example. This is a band that
made great music, toured everywhere and grew a decent size fan
base. But they still struggled to make it. They formed in 2001 and
took a lot of losses over the years but continued to push forward. It
was not until 2010 with their album Brothers that they got the
success we all dream about. Massive radio play, international tours,
playing major festivals and tv shows. This is not an easy road and it
will take a toll on you and your family. Most people would have quit
after passing hurdle 1 and coming up to hurdle 2. The Black Keys
 50 Antonio Ponce

pushed through hurdle 2 and the rest of the hurdles that came their
way.

Would you?

There is a price to pay for success in anything, what price would you
be willing to pay?

Here are some things to help you to get signed:

- Think of your band as your company. Your music is your product.

Do what companies do if they want to be bought by another
company. Have a budget, keep your income/sales organized, keep
your customers engaged, and constantly be on top of marketing to
build your fan base.

- Remember all label and management companies are businesses

that are also trying to make it. There are a lot of small music
management companies that are for hire. You could “sign” with one
that fits your musical style and though you are paying them, you will
have access to their network which could include major labels and
media publications.

-You will need a large fan base or at least the potential to attract a
large fan base. Most major labels will take “marketable” people with
little musical talent and surround them with musical talent. Ex.
Britney Spears. For a band, you would have to bring a lot to the table
already. Your chances increase if you have a “marketable” band. If
you don’t, your music better be good and you’ll have to grind like no
other. This means a lot of marketing and a lot of live shows. All those
stories you hear about sleeping in a van, playing a different city
 Don't Forget the Business 51

every day for years. That could be your story. That’s what the Black
Keys did.

Whatever you want to succeed in has to become your priority. You

have to invest a lot of time and energy to make your dream grow.
This includes everything from your music to relationships. Tend your
garden.
52 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 15
Awards
 Don't Forget the Business 53

How do you get nominated for a big music award?

We all see the big award shows every year, the Grammy’s, the
Junos (Canada), the Brits. We found out in our first year of
publishing music that you have to submit an application and your
music to these awards. The same application process exists for
small local award shows. For every application there is an
application fee. The application usually asks about your sales, local
and international, your genre of music, composers and if you have
any management labels/music associations.

Winning local awards don’t mean much at the start but you can add
that information to your musical resume. It does stand out when
submitting for bigger awards, festivals and grants.

Beware: whoever is running the local awards likely has some

involvement in the local music industry. This person may even have
their own label. Don’t be surprised if their network of bands wins
most of the awards even if their music isn’t very good. You would be
wise to have some kind of relationship with this person. A positive
hello/goodbye relationship should be enough. As long as he could
put faces and positive vibes to the music submitted.
54 Antonio Ponce

Chapter 16
Who Are You Competing With?
 Don't Forget the Business 55

There are a lot of bands and solo artists that are putting out content
and trying to get to the next level. This includes current big bands
and the big bands of yesterday. It used to be that a band would put
out three albums and be gone. But now bands like U2, Aerosmith,
and others that have been around for decades and continue to put
out new content. That means you are trying to compete against a
band like the Red Hot Chili Peppers for peoples time and dollar. In
the retail business world this is called competing for “shelf space”.

However there is also other competition. Basically anything that
people could give their attention. Things like television, Youtube
shows, movies, podcasts, and this list could go on and on. I read the
other day that 300 hours of content is uploaded to Youtube every
minute. That’s just Youtube.

The good news is that you are also in the live entertainment
industry. People are always looking for things to do and wanting to
check out new and familiar experiences. You need to become a
hype man to make sure as many people as possible know you have
an event happening. Make sure you write an exciting description of
your event to try to get whoever reads it interested in attending. Try
to make the band lineup for the show a good one with bands that
will also hype the show. Most importantly you need to deliver a great
show. This might be some peoples only night out that month and
they chose to spend that on your band. This usually includes
booking that time off for you, spending time to look good, maybe
even saved some money for this night. You deliver and they will tell
everyone and bring people with them next time.

It can be overwhelming to think about all the factors you’re up
against. Focus on building your foundation and being better
 56 Antonio Ponce

musically today than you were yesterday. Never stop promoting and
play as many shows as possible to find mastery. Do this consistently
to rise above the shadows.
 Don't Forget the Business 57

Chapter 17
Final Words
 58 Antonio Ponce

I hope this book has been of value to you. I wish I would have had
something like this when we were starting out or even when we hit
our stride. So many things we didn’t know that really would have
accelerated our growth, focus, and goal setting.

This information should save you money. There are so many

unnecessary expenses that happen when you are trying to be
something you are not even close to being yet. People see through
that stuff anyways.

If you skipped the chapter on budgeting, go read it. This chapter will
change lives.

I wish you well on your journey and hope nothing but success for
you.

Cheers.

Connect

Instagram @antoniousinsta
Website apjonescities.com
Don't Forget the Business 59
60 Antonio Ponce
Don't Forget the Business 61
 Who should read this book?

-Anyone wanting to get into the music business

-Anyone struggling in the music business

-Anyone needing help with finances

-Anyone with dreams