Posted by Mike McCready | October 5th, 2011 | No responses
Follow us on Twitter and join our Facebook page.
Then, during the month of October, retweet our tweets and share our posts. Each retweet or share will enter your name into the hat. The more you retweet and share the more times your name goes in.
At the end of the month, we’re going to give away 100 promocodes and a few other prizes via random drawing. You can win more than once.
This promotion is valid for the following accounts:
Mike McCready (Co-founder & CEO) on Twitter
Posted by Mike McCready | September 26th, 2011 | No responses
The music industry is changing quickly and with it so is the A&R / music supervisor model.
We know there are question you have that need answers. That’s why we’ve created this video. It addresses many of the frequently asked questions and concerns.
Posted by Mike McCready | September 20th, 2011 | 1 Response
Three songs were selected by Charlie Mac for the the new Spike Lee film called, “You’re Nobody ‘Til Somebody Kills You”!
It’s an action packed, gritty story of two New York City homicide detectives that are forced into the high-stakes world of the hip hop industry. A complex web of murder, sex, money and music unfolds as the homicide detectives track a serial killer with an appetite for some of hip hop’s biggest stars.
Posted by Mike McCready | September 15th, 2011 | 1 Response
What if you could know which new music is “trending” among top music industry A&R professionals?
How valuable would it be to your music business if you could see, in real time, which songs and acts are being heard and liked by your music industry peers?
If you are among the 1300 industry professionals who use Music Xray for free to conduct their A&R, you already have that information at your fingertips.
In the past 6 months over 3500 songs and acts have been selected for opportunities via Music Xray.
If you are an industry professional, consider opening a free Music Xray professional account. You’ll join the ranks of major and independent labels, Hollywood music supervisors, publishers, producers, radio stations and more…
Posted by Mike McCready | September 13th, 2011 | No responses
You probably already know about Music Xray’s referral program where we pay you when people you refer to Music Xray conduct transactions.
Music Xray is growing quickly. Refer the musicians you know before someone else does.
Posted by Mike McCready | August 8th, 2011 | 4 Responses
There are three things musicians can do online to advance their careers.
1. Get deals
2. Get fans
3. Get better
Music Xray is focused on helping you get deals and providing you access to people who can help you get better.
But getting fans? We think a lot about the challenge but Music Xray does not offer a solution beyond giving you an attractive way to present your music. So, we want to know, how do you identify likely fans and then engage them?
Do you use Headliner.fm? Do you use Jango radio? I like them and Music Xray has a relationship with both companies and we encourage you to use them. How about Fanbridge? Please share some of your experiences in the comments section of this post.
There’s another one we like and that we’ve been experimenting with and I encourage you to give it a shot and report back to the community. It’s called Music Connected Advertising (MCA).
The MCA service enables artists (as advertisers) to target (with an interactive ad) audiences of other artists that have fans that could also become their fans.
You following? Let’s say you think Coldplay’s fans would really be into your music. MCA let’s you create an online ad (really attractive ones) and then when people all over the Internet who are searching for Coldplay, already reading about Coldplay or have previously purchased or listened to Coldplay tracks will see your ad, hopefully click on it, hear some of your music and join your mail list or “like” you on Facebook etc.
In the past, digital advertising was reserved only for major label artists with massive promotional budgets. But now everyone can access this powerful promotional tool for a pretty fair price.
As I said, for the next few weeks, we are trying out MCA and wonder if you want to also.
Here’s the deal: You get 50% off the standard pricing and a free interactive ad (which they will create for you). The ad alone would cost you $1500 or more to build with a professional designer.
Here is what you get:
– 1 free interactive ad including a built in music player – 100,000 targeted ad impression (shown exclusively to people they know or are likely to like your music) – Complete analytics package (location of your fans, numbers of interactions, types of interactions, etc.)
– The cost is a very reasonable $600!
For everyone else, this package is priced at $1000 but we’d like to get a few of our artists using it and sharing their experiences.
All you need to provide is:
It’s that simple. If you would like more information, please email: sales@injectmusic.com and mention the “Music Xray deal.” One of their campaign managers will be happy to explain the details.
We think this is a great opportunity and hope you are able to take advantage of this.
Posted by Mike McCready | July 26th, 2011 | 1 Response
We have been here before too. Yes, it is hard for artists to make a living!
I was a hungry musician myself at one time and I was willing to do whatever it took to get in front of the right ears. I had to hustle, cold contact tons of people and find someone who could get me listened to by the people at the top. It paid off too because I eventually got signed. For me, those times were the 90’s. Musicians had to do that for the first decade of the 2000’s too. But not anymore.
Music Xray guarantees musicians get heard by the professionals they submit music to and they get a response for every submission the moment it is heard.
Yes, it costs them a few bucks. It’s part of what enables Music Xray to get results. However, we have recently had a few industry professionals ask to be removed from the site because some musicians are trying to save some money by directly contacting the labels or the professionals via email, LinkedIn, Facebook… you name it. Other professionals have asked to have their identities masked.
This is damaging for everyone. It makes it more difficult for us to offer a service that enables industry professionals a better set of A&R tools and it could cause things to revert to the way they were before, when you didn’t know who was seeking songs and talent and if you did, you couldn’t directly reach them.
Frankly, musicians who don’t feel confident enough in their music to spend a few bucks submitting it with the guarantee it will be heard, probably have music that doesn’t make the grade anyway. Part of the function of the submission fee is to reduce the load on the professionals. Additionally, the musicians who don’t value the work we’re doing for them (uncovering the opportunities and convincing professionals who used to have a closed door policy to open their doors – not to mention the technology architecture that goes into the site) and instead want to circumvent Music Xray, can’t possibly get upset at the people who think they should not have to pay musicians for their art. It’s sort of the same.
We got in this business to help create a better way for us all.
What will we do with all of the bad guys?
We are thinking about this issue, communicating with the professionals on the site to come up with ways to handle this – such as have them simply forward unsolicited emails and the names of musicians who are causing this issue. Perhaps we will ban them from the site. Perhaps we will create a wall of shame on the site and make some folks famous in ways they probably won’t appreciate. But we will definitely handle this problem.
Please keep in mind, there are many many musicians who use Music Xray in legitimate ways and play by the rules. We work to keep fees very low and we want to help as many musicians as we can. We are in this for the love of music not the love of money and we will do everything we can to prevent the few from ruining it for the many and to protect a system that is working for most. You have our word.
Here’s to great music and to an open, transparent way of getting it to the ears of professionals who have real commercial and exposure opportunities for it!!
Mike McCready
Co-founder & CEO Music Xray
Posted by Mike McCready | July 14th, 2011 | No responses
Nashville Music City
This past week we left our New York digs and spent some time in Nashville, which for generations has been relatively closed to non-local songwriters and acts.
That is, until now.
At Music Xray, we have been focussing our efforts on your behalf to ease open the doors of Music City. This is something not even the songwriters’ associations have been able to achieve for their members on a regular basis. In some ways, the opening of these Nashville doors is historic for this industry.
Today’s newsletter will have a special emphasis on Nashville.
The Music Xray Team
Posted by Mike McCready | June 16th, 2011 | 1 Response
Just log in to your artist account and click the button that invites fans. Enter the email address (or import the addresses) of those you’d like to invite and click the button.
Along with the signup for the account you can also use your affiliate id with our rss feed. Just replace the MYAFID with your affiliate id that you will see in your account http://www.musicxray.com/artist/categories.rss?afid=MYAFID.
It is that simple and you will earn money for every artist, fan or music professional that signups on Music Xray due to clicking one of the links provided from the feed.
Posted by Mike McCready | February 24th, 2011 | 1 Response
In the 90 days from February 1st to April 30th over 1550 songs and acts were signed or placed via Music Xray. And we’re just getting started!
The truth about the current music business is that there are more opportunities at the fingertips of independent artists/musicians than there has ever been in the past. Companies like Music Xray are making it easier for music industry professionals and their companies to tap into the talent pool of independent acts without becoming overwhelmed. Still, it can feel to an artist like they’re roaming around in the dark, unsure if they will find a deal and unsure of how to get it done.
While there is no one formulaic way to success, we’re starting to see an increasing number of success stories emerge on Music Xray and I’d like to share the stories of two artists and how they each got it done differently.
Mary Sarah is a talented teenager from Texas. She began submitting on Music Xray about 7 months ago. She submitted to some of the top producers who were offering detailed feedback, song critiques and career coaching. Each of these people were impressed with what they heard. Some of them passed the music on to people they knew. All of them wrote stellar critiques and as always, the industry professionals on the site rated the music for Music Xray’s back-end statistics (keep reading. You’ll see why that’s important).
Then, once she knew that the music she had recorded was standing up to tough scrutiny, she began submitting her songs to all sorts of opportunities: label deals, management deals, sync license deals, exposure opportunities on blogs and more.
Finally, she was spotted by Nan Cassidy on Music Xray, an artist developer based in Nashville together with Sharon Dennis of Dennis Management. When they heard Mary Sarah they knew there was something there. Right on Music Xray, they were able to see Mary Sarah’s stats via statistics from Next Big Sound. They could see that Mary Sarah’s Twitter, Myspace and Facebook followings were growing. Lastly, they were able to look at Music Xray’s back end statistics and that’s when they knew.
One of Mary Sarah’s songs had been submitted to industry professionals on the site 38 times and it had received an average of a 4 star (out of five) rating on every measured attribute (composition, arrangement, performance, production & hit potential).
That is the power of collective A&R!! Thirty-eight industry professionals had heard and LOVED Mary Sarah’s music but none of them had opted to (or been able to) offer her a deal. But they had taken the time to listen and rate her music because Music Xray had made that possible and due to that, Nan and Sharon were able to feel even more confident that their instincts were spot on. Nan and Sharon signed Mary Sarah to a management deal and now she’s on her way in Nashville. Subsequently, Maray Sarah won a $50,000 promotional marketing campaign from Musicati based on yet another submission.
Grand$un is a hip hop artist from the New York area who has written and produced a couple yet-to-be hit songs. They are really good. He doesn’t have a big budget to invest so he watches Music Xray’s opportunities closely and instead of taking the shotgun approach that Mary Sarah did, he sits back and makes sure each opportunity is as close a match as possible for his songs. He submits only when he reads of an appropriate opportunity or if his songs are matched to an opportunity via Music Xray’s song to opportunity matching system (S2O).
He has secured a few opportunities but nothing that blew the doors off the hinges for him. But then, it happened and he was signed to a one-album deal at Orpheus/Fontana (Universal). You just never know when it’s going to happen. Grand$sun added, “I couldn’t have done it without Music Xray”.
In both cases, both artists were given a lot of validation by professionals on the site who told them they had what it takes to make it. That’s why, if you’re not getting deals on Music Xray, you should be getting as much professional feedback as possible. It could lead directly to a deal but at the very least you will learn how close to a deal you are, your song will accumulate data within Music Xray’s statistics back end that other professionals can see (as in the case of Mary Sarah) and you will learn what you need to do to make it happen.
