Successful music career?

  • Thread starter Thread starter tone_aot
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tone_aot

tone_aot

Owner of ToneJonez.com
Whasup folks. I see most of you on here are doin it big. My question is how did you do it and where did you start from? I wanna have a music career so bad. I ordered the Indie Bible and it will be here in a few days. I need to know how to fully utilize this book. I would like to go straight to a music career but i gotta get school out the way first. I wanna get an associate in Health Science and Major in Radiologic Technology. Seems like the only way i'm gonna get beyond my $6.25 an hour piece of crap job. I have what it takes to make it in the industry. I play keyboard, drums, saxophone, guitar, make beats, do audio production/mixing, and i have an incredible ear for music. I usually hear whole songs before they are even made. All i have to do is reproduce what i hear in my head. People think i'm crazy when i start bobbin my head. If only they could hear what i hear!! I would really like to venture on a music career and actually make money doing it. I get tired of making other people money while i get cheated. I wanna have my own stuff. I know yall feel me. If you can, guide me on where i need to begin to get this off and poppin. I really wanna be a success.
 
i'd like to know also i keep a day job and sell tracks to pay for gear
i make music because its what i do the bread is icing on the cake i look forward to the day i will be able to make a living with it now im thankful that it pays for itself
 
Do you sell your beats locally or over the net? I wanna get into beat selling too so i can pay for gear with my beats and leave my work money for everything else.
 
Start out selling beats locally, that way you have a solid backing. Also, be careful on how you price your beats at first because you need to get your name out locally depending on where you live. If you charge too high and they know someone who might do just as good with a cheaper price, that's where they'll go. But first things first know your market. Know what people are wanting and then deliver.

When you start selling on the net, I've found that soundclick was a good way to keep beats available for people to listen to and get a little taste of your work. Never really sold through soundclick, but I like having it as a spot where you can preview tracks while my official site is being made. Also don't be afraid to offer custom tracks. I make most of my dinero off of customs because someone will hear a beat on my soundclick site and hit my email asking for something similar to it except with some changes here and there. Of course I charge more for custom tracks.

One final thing...don't know if you guys do this now or not but when you do sell a beat, be prepared to track everything out in the beat so that the artist who buys from you has each track separate (for mixing/mastering purposes) as well as the full beat available. Most serious artists willing to break bread won't even look your way if you don't offer this because they'll take your track to have it professionally mixed to bring out the best in your beat for the final version.

Hope this helps you guys out,
Fie.
 
It looks like you've got enough gear to get started. The next step is to make sure your business is in order. Incorporate your music production company. Register with publishing agency like ASCAP, or BMI (they doin't require you to have a commercial recording). The you've got to hustle, hustle, hustle!!!!!! And that starts with promotion. Promote youself, any and every way you can think of. Read publications that interview artist, see how they promoted themselves when they were first starting. Me, I started as a DJ, so I knew a lot of other DJ's, artist, artist managers, event promoters, and label reps, but I had to get all these people to know me as a producer, and not just a DJ. So I started doing remixes, and doing beats for local artists. After a while industry people began to recognize my work as a producer, I started to get on few major projects. When I say after a while I meant 4-5 years. It's a long grind, so be prepared.
 
Murdock Jones said:
It looks like you've got enough gear to get started. The next step is to make sure your business is in order. Incorporate your music production company. Register with publishing agency like ASCAP, or BMI (they doin't require you to have a commercial recording). The you've got to hustle, hustle, hustle!!!!!! And that starts with promotion. Promote youself, any and every way you can think of. Read publications that interview artist, see how they promoted themselves when they were first starting. Me, I started as a DJ, so I knew a lot of other DJ's, artist, artist managers, event promoters, and label reps, but I had to get all these people to know me as a producer, and not just a DJ. So I started doing remixes, and doing beats for local artists. After a while industry people began to recognize my work as a producer, I started to get on few major projects. When I say after a while I meant 4-5 years. It's a long grind, so be prepared.
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Yep. He said it...
 
i started locally selling tracks i use my website as a international buisness card for people to hear the quality to see if thats the style theyre interested in i have a contact page where they can leave contact info and my contact info is there also i like to arrange meetings whenever possible to meet with individuals in person some people cant afford a really in depth mix (tracked-out) so i lower the price of the track and sell a stereo version mixed on a protools session so they can add vocals and mix as they see fit if they want to change the arrangement of the breaks i will do that but thats midi without tracking i also offer to mix for them this way they save more overall if they want the beat tracked out its not a problem just alot more costly only because of time i offer to mix so because of that there is a charge to take the beat elsewhere to be mix not a problem but a charge
 
How long does it take for you to track your beats out salim? Depending on the beat I make in Reason, it might take me 20 - 40 mins, but it might be different for you. Also which way do you prefer to group them?
 
Murdock Jones said:
It looks like you've got enough gear to get started. The next step is to make sure your business is in order. Incorporate your music production company. Register with publishing agency like ASCAP, or BMI (they doin't require you to have a commercial recording). The you've got to hustle, hustle, hustle!!!!!! And that starts with promotion. Promote youself, any and every way you can think of. Read publications that interview artist, see how they promoted themselves when they were first starting. Me, I started as a DJ, so I knew a lot of other DJ's, artist, artist managers, event promoters, and label reps, but I had to get all these people to know me as a producer, and not just a DJ. So I started doing remixes, and doing beats for local artists. After a while industry people began to recognize my work as a producer, I started to get on few major projects. When I say after a while I meant 4-5 years. It's a long grind, so be prepared.
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... that's the path I'm following as we speak...
 
I track out my beats but i have so many different sounds that i can't load it properly into acid pro for adding vocals with instruments. I had 17 tracks of sounds that i opened in acid and it was too much for my ram. I had to restart the computer. I need to find a way to maybe group sounds, or decrease the number of tracks without sacrificing creativity.
 
Fieva said:
How long does it take for you to track your beats out salim? Depending on the beat I make in Reason, it might take me 20 - 40 mins, but it might be different for you. Also which way do you prefer to group them?
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depending on the song it can take up to several hours including backing up the media some individuals prefer to have there beats tracked but if theres 2 or more songs it can get timely overall i work a day job so i understand the cost of a dollar my purpose now is to provide quality production for the price of a pair of shoes so evryone can afford a quality beat but in order to do that cuts have to be made somewhere down the line i hope i dont sound arrogant but time is the factor
im not sure i understand the grouping ques i record in protools and i usually track evrything if i track each on its own track kik,snare,clap hihat,openhat,bass,leads,strings and keys(organ piano) and guitar stereo
 
tone_aot said:
I track out my beats but i have so many different sounds that i can't load it properly into acid pro for adding vocals with instruments. I had 17 tracks of sounds that i opened in acid and it was too much for my ram. I had to restart the computer. I need to find a way to maybe group sounds, or decrease the number of tracks without sacrificing creativity.
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i dont currently use acid pro but when i had similar problems with pro tools i made a submix or seperate mix for ex. all my drums mixed down to 2 tracks or 1 stereo track then all keys and leads on 2 tracks or 1 stereo track add bass and thats a total of 5 tracks being used if thats still to many bounce or mix down to 2 tracks or 1 stereo track start a new session import your stereo music mix and add vocals you still have the other sessions to go back to for a in depth mix at a later time
 
Fieva said:
How long does it take for you to track your beats out salim? Depending on the beat I make in Reason, it might take me 20 - 40 mins, but it might be different for you. Also which way do you prefer to group them?
Click to expand...

That's why I use Reason now a days. The old MPC/Keyboard days it took HOURS to track out beats. Now it's like 5 minutes to dump into Nuendo/Pro Tools.
 
jb4play said:
That's why I use Reason now a days. The old MPC/Keyboard days it took HOURS to track out beats. Now it's like 5 minutes to dump into Nuendo/Pro Tools.
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im just learning reason so im going through the learning curve
 
On average, how much do yall make monthly selling beats and about how much do you sell them for?
 
tone_aot said:
On average, how much do yall make monthly selling beats and about how much do you sell them for?
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lol.. Not that ur asking me.. but. I've never sold one.. and make $0 a month....

at the same time.. I continue to sink hundreds of dollars a month in it... lol...

Oh well.. I enjoy the ride anyway....
 
Where the heck do you work? All i have to work wit is about $600 a month. After bills and all the other crap that happens in life, about $60.
 
tone_aot said:
Where the heck do you work? All i have to work wit is about $600 a month. After bills and all the other crap that happens in life, about $60.
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I work in the computer industry.. But... I won't say that I'm not busting my ass on both sides of the game... If I don't make it on my music money.. I'll get it with my job money.. It's a win-win situation... I've been plottin' this whole thing since I was about... well.. born...
 
That's what i'm tryin to do. Like i said, i'm going back to school in the fall to get an associate degree in health science. I going for a job as the person who x-rays people. They pay about 37gs a year. That's enough money for me to do music and live comfortably.
 
tone_aot said:
That's what i'm tryin to do. Like i said, i'm going back to school in the fall to get an associate degree in health science. I going for a job as the person who x-rays people. They pay about 37gs a year. That's enough money for me to do music and live comfortably.
Click to expand...

No doubt... I'm not makin' that much... but my job path does have potential.. Good luck, homie...
 
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