J.D. Moyer

sci-fi author, beatmaker

Category: Music Business Page 1 of 3

Beat Week!

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On March 26

In Creative Work/Career, Electronic Music, Music Business

Last week I worked full-time on music production, something I hadn’t done in years. I called it “Beat Week.”

I’m between novels, and with the next one still simmering in my subconscious, it felt like a good time to briefly switch up my creative focus. I decided to take a break from my client work as well, and told everyone I was going on vacation. A vacation to my music studio!

Before I fully committed to writing novels (around 2008), music production was my main creative activity. Making beats frequently took up the majority of my waking hours. My friends and I had a really good run in the late nineties and 2000’s promoting dance music events and releasing tracks on our label. Our videos played on MTV, we wrote music for commercials and videogames (including Dance Dance Revolution), and we toured around the US and Europe to DJ at dance clubs. But the best part for me was always making music with friends, or working alone in my studio, late at night with my headphones, bobbing my head in the dark.

That lifestyle came to a natural end, a combination of getting older, having a kid, our parties making less money, and everyone’s priorities shifting. We kept making music together, and the record label continued to release tracks, but we accepted that our “full-on” music crew days were over. There were other things to do in life, and the music industry was changing rapidly before our eyes. New musicians were coming up through SoundCloud, Spotify, Bandcamp, and YouTube, with or without a record label. Our fifteen minutes of music fame was up, and we were pretty much okay with that. We’d kept the same party (Qoƶl at 111 Minna) going for fifteen years, an epic run.

All this to say that I hadn’t really experienced music immersion in a long time. So I was curious what it would be like to dedicate an entire work week to making beats. Here’s what I experienced.

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Music Update: Three New Releases, Still In The Game

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On August 23

In Electronic Music, Music Business

Arturia V collection (emulated, in my Macbook)

I’ve always hesitated to call myself a musician, composer, or even music producer. I can find the keys on a keyboard the match the melody in my head, but mostly I make beats, basslines, and sculpt sound with digital waveform transformations and effects. Sometimes I work alone, sometimes with a friend next to me. I like working both ways, the former to dig in and get work done, the latter to get out of my own head and expand the canvas–two minds are usually better than one.

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How I Broke Into the Music Business and Made $100K

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On April 28

In Creative Work/Career, Life Purpose & Goals, Music Business, Personal Updates, Writing

Jackie at the old Loƶq Records office on Brannan.

Jackie at the old Loƶq Records office on Brannan.

As I’m trying to launch a new career (fiction writing), I’m also taking stock of an old one (producing electronic music). I signed my first track in 1992, at the age of 23, to Mega-Tech records (an offshoot of the famous San Francisco disco label Megatone). I released my latest record, a reggae/breaks hybrid track, a week ago.

Breaking in wasn’t easy. I remember vividly sending out cassette tape demos in padded mailers to record labels in New York City and Los Angeles, following up via phone, and getting shot down by arrogant label runners (I’ve made a point to never be mean, running my own record label, even though our signing bar is very high).

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Switching to Self-Publishing Was Probably a Mistake

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On February 5

In Creative Work/Career, Electronic Music, Music Business

looq_red_blackborder_700

Writers: This post is about music self-publishing, but also IĀ get intoĀ the implications for writing self-publishing towards the end of the article.

I recently put together my Discography page, which gave me an opportunity to reflect on my music career to date. I’ve released original music on almost every kind of label, including a major (SONY/BMG), a barely-organized collective (Trip ‘n Spin Recordings), small imprints (SOG, NuRepublic, Kubist, Spundae, Dorigen, POD, Mechanism), my own label (Loƶq Records), “big independents” in dance music culture (Global Underground, Armada, Bedrock, Renaissance), and distribution/A&R deals (3 Beat, Silent Records).

My most active period of writing and releasing music was in my late twenties/early thirties. Creating dance music (house, techno, breaks) was my singular, obsessive focus. That period was also the heyday of Qoƶl, the weekly event I threw with DJ Spesh at 111 Minna for over a decade (hugely popular, with a packed dance floor and lines around the block), so I also had a deep sense of musical community, and also a great testing audience for new tracks.

At some point, around 2005, we (myself and my primary music collaborators, Spesh and Mark Musselman, the other halves of Jondi & Spesh, and Momu, respectively) stopped sending out demos to other labels, and started releasing music almost exclusively on Loƶq Records. This wasn’t a conscious strategic career decision — it was just easier. I was co-running a respected, profitable label, so why not release my music on it? Benefits of self-publishing (or at least “own label” publishing) include:

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Disruptive Distribution – a Shareable.net Interview with Michel Bauwens and Neal Gorenflo

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On February 4

In Alternative Economics, Culture Rants/Shares, Music Business, Utopian Speculations

I met Michel Bauwens over at Marvin Brown‘s place when Michel was in town giving a talk on The Future of Peer Production. Talking with Michel (and reading some of his work) was part of the inspiration for my recent post “Watching Open Source Destroy Capitalism.” I forwarded the post to Marvin, who sent it on to Michel, which eventually resulted in the following interview with Michel and shareable.net co-founder Neal Gorenflo. The original can be found here.

Civilized comments from any point of view are welcome as always.

Michel Bauwens: You are a music entrepreneur, and reportedly doing quite well. Can you explain the basis of your success and whether you use music that can be shared, for example based on Creative Commons Licensing?

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