Written by James Muat-Dodd and Connor Wakefield

The current paradigm; guerrilla marketing and social media

In our modern time, music marketing is more impactful than ever. The internet put the power of demographics, targeting and distribution in the hands of any person willing to look for it. However, in this new environment competition is more prolific than ever and this wide accessibility has led to more necessity now than ever to think in new, creative ways, in order to stand out.

One of the first things that comes to mind when online marketing is mentioned is advertisement and while this is true to an extent, social media has created cults which avidly share information and content with each other at no cost.

Social media also have within them, a form of advertising; dependant on a concept which has come into its own since the widespread use of the internet, ethnography. “Ethnography draws on a family of methods, involving direct and sustained contact with human agents”…”It results in richly written accounts that respect the irreducibility of human experience” (O’Reilly, 2009). Now traditionally ethnography has been very closely tied to qualitative research, as above states it requires “direct and sustained contact with human agents”. However, thanks to the internet age, the form that this sustained contact takes has begun to shift.

Companies like Facebook and YouTube have the power to monitor users and their usage history of their services and build a profile which logs what content users are looking at. While this method has proven reliable and is far from a secret (managing to become the basis of a targeted ad system Facebook runs internally and the basis of the recommended video system within YouTube) it’s not the golden ticket to internet fame. With further optimization we could potentially see mass ethnographic data able to be collected quickly on a large scale, but it still couldn’t guarantee a sale.

So the question remains, how can a person grow a fanbase without online advertising? “How else can you connect with your fans than through social media? In order to increase your bottom line, you must focus on your fans. So stay in touch with them.” (Ramaut, 2014) this quote gets to the heart of online advertising. Through social media, a distinct style and regular posts, a person who’s no more than a personality can develop a following, never mind a musician. This following can then be nurtured and grown into a fanbase without any money being put into advertising.

This is largely due to the internet and social media bypassing the old gatekeepers and distribution streams of the industry. As the internet has become more popular it’s allowed artists to market and distribute their content to the world in new ways. The most prevalent of which being streaming services such as YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music and SoundCloud. However, a problem does occur with these new distribution streams “as widely reported in the media, many artists and record labels have criticized the small remunerations received from these services”. (Kaitajärvi-Tiekso, 2016)

Modern distribution, monetary shortcomings and alternative success

Unfortunately these widely accessible distribution tools do come at a cost, they make significantly less money than physical releases on average, with a total of “336,842 total plays to earn $1,472” (Sanchez, 2019) on Spotify, one of the current largest players in the streaming industry. By contrast, a $5 album would only need to be purchased 295 times to make more than this amount.

So how can an independent artist make money? Well, currently a strong trend is live performance, however if you redefine what constitutes commercial success for a musician, we start to see alternative methods of income from musicians.

As mentioned previously, a personality with clear branding and regular content can develop a following in our modern age. What if we were to take this basic model of a content creator on a streaming site such as YouTube and brand them from the ground up?

Well, a few artists which fall into this description already exist, one of which has been creating music endlessly for years and the other which started recently.

Andrew Huang

Andrew Huang has been creating music related videos since at least 2011, at the time of writing he’s approaching two million subscribers. His content gently tiptoes a fine line between vlog and music production. Often travelling to specific places and showcasing peculiar gear and then resolving to making music relating to the video’s events.

This is a new kind of success not seen before in the music industry, a musician who makes significant money off products other than music and merchandise. Not only this but his explorative nature when it comes to audio production and relatively high profile status allows him access to free music gear, which for an independent artist is an extraordinary bonus.
Strictly speaking however, Andrew Huang doesn’t make most of his money from just his music.

A look at his Spotify artist page reveals less than 64,000, bringing him barely up to our “336,842 total plays to earn $1,472” (Sanchez, 2019) stat from earlier, that’s if each of these listeners listened to a song of his a little over 5 times a month on average.

The issue with the model Andrew Huang has presented is that he’s experimental in his music, often using wild, outlandish noises that have usually been created through unorthodox means. This means while his videos are interesting, his music lacks mass appeal and can sometimes be challenging. A good example of this is his video entitled “Making music with actual sounds from Mars” (Huang, 2018) while the title is very self-explanatory, it does exemplify the outlandish ideas which usually serve as a basis for his creativity.

So how did Andrew achieve mainstream popularity as a YouTuber then, if not through musical following? Through interest pieces and manipulating the YouTube suggested video algorithm mentioned earlier (the algorithm powered by data collection on YouTubes userbase). In an interview with KVRaudio Andrew said “I just did the videos and people came. I would say that some of the videos I have done, I have had in mind that they would be an outreach video. Most of the videos that I do are just something that I thought of someday where I’m showcasing a part of something I’m working on that I think will be interesting to my audience” (KVR Audio, 2019) he then goes on to talk about the popularity of fidget spinners at the time and mentions “I made a couple of videos where I put the fidget spinners front and centre. And those got about a million views each.” (KVR Audio, 2019).

Finally, when questioned further on the topic he states “The more common ones for a music channel would be to do a cover of whatever the hottest song is at the time. That’s what a lot of music channels do to keep new viewers finding them.” (KVR Audio, 2019)

All of this paints an image of a content creator, trying to focus on popular trends and topics. No different to any other content creator but with his own, music based, twist.

Joji

In the context of a creator who rose to popularity through content designed to take advantage of the system, it may be worth examining another success story which exists as the antithesis to this.

Joji (A.K.A. Pink Guy or FilthyFrank) is an artist by the name of George Miller, whose internet presence was never particularly closely tied to music until recently. The early content which established his branding and personality were surreal to put it lightly.

While FilthyFrank often created music related videos on YouTube (outlined above from his earliest videos) his usual content was a mixture of dicey inappropriate humour and outlandish absurdism the likes of which hasn’t been captured before or since.

This comes back to one of the core principles of online popularity mentioned earlier, branding. His first major success came from the beginning of the “Harlem Shake” meme which swept the internet in the early 2010s, since then he’s taken the fanbase he earned in online comedy and used it to transition over to music under the stage name: Joji.

While his above videos may sit on between 1 million to 2 million views on average, after 5 to 6 years of being on YouTube, he currently gets almost 6.5 million listeners on Spotify each month, many of which may be listening to multiple songs.

However, this outrageous humour did land him in trouble throughout his career on YouTube, and while he doesn’t have a presence on YouTube as a musician (outside of his label; 88rising’s channel)
as a comedic YouTuber his videos were routinely a part of active controversy which saw them frequently being removed from the site.

The paradox of this being that YouTube routinely has 300 hours of content uploaded every minute in our current age. (Omnicoreagency.com, 2019) this serves as a basis for the most interesting issues in social medias. These companies do not have the resources to manually sift through each video and censor each one by hand, of course an AI can do that but these aren’t always accurate.

Only once a YouTuber get’s big enough to have an audience do they routinely run into trouble, however the more YouTube tries to censor users like FilthyFrank, the louder their audience becomes and as such attracts more people.

To outline the timeline of his success as simply as possible, he first created content with absurdist humour under Filthy Frank and started posting shock humour music as Pink Guy, finally he began releasing music under the name Joji which he has referred to himself as “serious music” in one of his songs “Rice Balls” – Pink Guy (TVFilthyFrank, 2015) when writing for BEAT (one of countless new gatekeepers which have emerged in the form of independent news outlets and blogs focused on music since the creation of the internet) Judy Mae writes about George Miller “if he teaches us anything, it’s that brand segregation is a must”.

Finally based on these two archetypes of online popularity, a structured 3 year plan for artist development.

Each social media have their own demographics, so for an independent artist struggling with time management it may be important to specify down to specific social media to meet their target audience. For this purpose:

Above we have a series of images (Spredfast, 2018) which highlight the age representation on each current social media. The full file outlines platform usage by wage, age, gender, time and device.

Our Artist

Let’s call our artist X, he’s white, male, brown hair, average height. He’s currently making music in his bedroom.

Firstly, examine what scenes emerging artists are currently coming from. Recently artists such as Still Woozy, Wallows and Mac Demarco (Who are all white men with brown hair and average (or above average) height) have been emerging out of the Bedroom Pop scene, a scene which has recently gotten a Spotify playlist which is getting new editions each week. So our artist should create bedroom Pop.

Given that genre, creating an “image” for the artist is key, one of the key features of this music scene is eclectic fashion highlighted in Still Woozies “Goodie Bag” (displayed right, (Still Woozy, 2018))

This is the basis for our artists image, except with prominent branding. Perhaps a t-shirt with artist logo visible across the chest or a distinct hat?

Now that the idea of the artist has been established, consistent branding must be created for social media and alongside this, a webpage which directs to social media. Branding featuring similar colour palettes to these videos and fonts which reflect the feel of the music being created.

The Year Plan

This plan aims to combine the humour which made FilthyFrank so shareable, with the musical enthusiasm which has make Andrew Huang so popular with other musicians into an image based on a current emerging scene.

Post a simple, absurdist cover which sodomizes lyrics; similar to Nullberry’s, “Take Me Home, Country Roads except I lose all grasp on reality during the chorus” (Nulberry Official, 2019).

From here, begin making more comedic content pertaining to music, possibly branching into other communities like Seth Everman and his surreal pop culture/music hybrid comedy. (SethEverman, 2019) or possibly something similar to Hovey Benjamin and his pop culture filled slug fests (Hovey Benjamin, 2017).

Share this content via the established social media and feature your website at the end of each video, the content should be in small, easily digestible playtimes for maximum share potential. (The trick here is creating content that users want to send to one another, hence the humour which is something people innately bond over.)

Begin local performances, at open mics/ any gigs which pay. Make sure to talk to your crowd both on and off set and plug your music once at the end of set. Don’t be afraid to promote this more one on one.

As local buzz starts to generate and fanbase slowly grows, drop a bedroom pop track with subtler comedic elements but more focus on musical elements and catchy-ness. Perhaps tease upcoming release?

Continue posting personable content regularly on social media while releasing slightly more complex ideas as videos on YouTube.

Keeping all of this up a fanbase should start to grow, around this time possibly release a music video for your song with the most promise, make sure to include the air of share-ability again, and to keep the content on brand and standing out.

Finally, with a reasonable following and a great portfolio, begin seeking representation.

Bibliography

Hovey Benjamin, 2017. Fidget Spinner / Vape – Hovey Benjamin (“Official” “Music” Video) [online video] from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IecNbQNU1M [Accessed 6 May 2019]

HUANG, A., 2018. Making music with actual sounds from Mars [online video]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iovUGHuuIyo [Accessed 5 May 2019]

Kaitajärvi-Tiekso, J. (2016). ‘A Step Back to the Dark Ages of the Music Industry’: Democratisation of Record Production and Discourses on Spotify in Kuka Mitä Häh?. Networked Music Cultures. [online] Available at: https://www.academia.edu/37250869/A_Step_Back_to_the_Dark_Ages_of_the_Music_Industry._Democratization_of_Record_Production_and_Discourses_on_Spotify_in_Kuka_Mit%C3%A4_H%C3%A4h_ [Accessed 6 May 2019].

KVR Audio. (2019). Andrew Huang Interview: Launching a music career on social media. [online] Available at: https://www.kvraudio.com/interviews/andrew-huang-interview-launching-a-music-career-on-social-media-44512 [Accessed 6 May 2019].

Nulberry Official, 2019. Take Me Home, Country Toads except I lose all grasp on reality during the chorus [online video] from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTcGr7wZ9lo [Accessed 6 May 2019]

O’Reilly, K. (2009). Key Concepts in Ethnography (SAGE key concepts). Sage Publications.

Omnicoreagency.com. (2019). YouTube by the Numbers (2019): Stats, Demographics & Fun Facts. [online] Available at: https://www.omnicoreagency.com/youtube-statistics/ [Accessed 6 May 2019].

Ramaut, S. (2014). How Beginning Indie Bands Should Promote Themselves Using Social Media.

Sanchez, D. (2019). What Streaming Music Services Pay (Updated for 2019). Digital Music News. Available at: https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2018/12/25/streaming-music-services-pay-2019/ [Accessed 8 May 2019].

SethEverman, 2019. baldo mode [online video] from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBBOcCe9Mak [Accessed 5 May 2019]

Spredfast. (2018). The 2018 Social Audience Guide. [online] Available at: https://www.spredfast.com/social-media-tips/social-media-demographics-current [Accessed 5 May 2019].

Still Woozy, 2018. Goodie Bag [online video] from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL3wWykAKfs [Accessed 6 May 2019]

TVFilthyFrank, 2015. RICE BALLS [online video] from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeMVDuIO3J0  [Accessed 5 May 2019]

Friday 2^nd Nov 2018

I’m using this blog to outline my study and preparation for a project for my ADR and foley module, for this project I will need to recreate all audio from a 5-minute clip (excluding music). This includes all dialogue, foley and environmental sounds.

Today my classmates and I chose which film clips we would use. Knowing that there had to be a reasonable amount of dialogue to meet our criteria for ADR my group and I elected to use a scene from the film Gladiator. This is as the film is filled with strong, well-paced dialogue while also taking place in a variety of environments. The scene we’ve chosen features 3 environments, dialogue from 7 characters and a variety of sounds which will need to be replicated. Unfortunately, there were some issues which needed to be addressed with the rate of playback which prevented us from progressing any further this week. By the 9^th I hope to have marked all of the audio queues in our ProTools project and to have studied some more of the functionality available in ProTools to improve my workflow when it comes to producing my final piece.

Friday 9^th Nov 2018

Since my last entry my group and I have plotted all audio queues for our project and categorised them based on whether they’ll need to be recorded in the studio or with field recorders. This was mainly divided by whether the sounds were environmental or not. We also discussed how we intended on recreating some of the sounds we needed to capture, below are the notes I took during this session.

As shown here we intend upon recreating the audio as realistically and faithfully as is achievable within our limited timeframe. I personally also intend upon using a limited collection of audio processing (such as EQ and compression) in order to make the sounds more similar to those in the film. I’ve also been studying hotkeys available in ProTools since my last update which have proven useful in the audio plotting process.

By my next update (16^th Nov) I hope to have begun the recording process and to be gathering some of the resources required to recreate some of the more complex audio.

Friday 16^th Nov 2018

Since my last update my group and I have prepared more for the recording process by creating a list of every audio queue, whether we’re recording it in the studio or with the field recorder and how we intend upon recreating the audio.

Friday 23^rd Nov 2018

Since my last entry Connor (another member of my group) and I have been out and done field recording for our project in an array of environments from quiet libraries to noisy halls, while not all of them will be used in the scene we hope that we’ve captured a span of environments large enough to cover all bases for the scene we’re working with. While recording we did focus on noise levels and realistic usability. We made sure our environments were always a similar volume to an environment from the scene that we had in mind, we also made sure to avoid any unsuitable recording environments. We got a map off the Edge Hill website and used it to mark where we could record, their likely noise level and any interfering sounds we could think of.

(Map available at https://www.edgehill.ac.uk/about/campus-developments/future-developments/)

(When noting sounds which may interfere with our recordings we elected not to note sounds which could be present anywhere outside of the relative ambience such as people being excessively loud.)

While we had marked a 7^th location on the map, the Sports Centre, we elected not to use it as it’s primarily a leisure facility and we didn’t want to disturb people.

In the end our best recordings were taken at the roof garden of location 1, the silent rooms in location 2 and in location 6.

By my next entry I hope to have applied these sounds to the clip and to be trying to find potential voice actors. Before that I need to consider the characters voices in the original clip and consider vocal ranges. My reasoning for this is for the sake of the voices matching the characters.

Wednesday 28^th Nov 2018

I’m writing this entry as an update on the progress of finding voice actors. Below is a screenshot of the spreadsheet for voice actors and their respective characters.

After I spoke with my group, we elected that voice actors would be a second thought once we had the rest of the scene recorded, as this project is more of a test of our technical skill than ability to recruit voice actors. Having said this, it’s still useful to have this table as a simple plotting device for when we get around to the voice acting.

Friday 30^th Nov 2018

Since my last entry Connor, Nikita and I have recorded in the studio, we mostly captured footsteps and clothing, to provide a touch of realism before continuing to work on the clip. We’ve also recorded a lot of the drumming in the clip we’ve selected. While this is only a small dent on the list of overall sounds we have yet to record, it does make an impact in the overall clip.

This week I’ve also been researching sound design more, perusing the sound effects bible in my spare time. So far I’ve begun to understand the relevance of balancing Foley, ADR and music to maximum effect. Simply distinguishing between hard sound effects and foley sound effects has been a massive assistance in the recording of sound effects, understanding that for Foley it is the performance in the recording process that sells the final product (Viers, 2008).

Friday 14^th December 2018

Since my last entry I’ve applied the environmental sounds that Connor and myself recorded, while they don’t suit every environment in the scene we’ve chosen they are widely useable throughout, I intend upon finalising these decisions and then going on another recording session to cover any environmental sounds that haven’t already been addressed.

I’ve also been reading on sound design in 3D environments in preparation for the project, most notably “Sound Design to Enhance Presence in Photorealistic Vitrual Reality” a brief write up on a section of the International Conference on Auditory Display, Sydney, Australia, July 6-9, 2004. The section focuses namely on virtual reality environments, however a lot of the auditory methods discussed have their origins in film sound. Some interesting techniques I intend upon utilising that I drew from this excerpt include; using stereo panning to track noise origin movement, exaggeration and emphasis of sound effects to capture viewer attention and utilising low frequency sounds to immerse the viewer in the world and give it tangible presence (Serafin and Serafin, 2004).

I believe this link between low frequency audio usage and immersion stems from the physical presence that loud bass-oriented audio can present in terms of vibrations. Having a physical reaction occur in the viewer through audio, at the same time that an event happens on screen is invaluable in selling the believability of the audio we’re recording in my opinion.

However with all of this in mind, it’s also necessary for the audio to hold up in mono, and on a variety of speakers. These two contrasts of playback environment, in my mind and with the knowledge that I have of sound design, seem to create a form of balancing act, one that’s present in the mixing and mastering of music. Hopefully my abilities in that field will transfer well into sound design for film.

By my next entry I hope to have recorded ambient environments for the rest of the clip using the field recording kit and also to have further researched the field of sound design for movies.

Friday 28^th December 2018

Since my last entry I’ve been attempting to make arrangements for voice actors to come in and record in the New Year however it would appear the majority of students in my class have had a similar idea and as a result of this the majority of acting students I’m able to get in contact with are already busy throughout the new year. At this point I’m considering one of two options, either publicly advertising the position throughout university campus in the form of posters and fliers (although I assume this would require getting permission from the department or university). Or, recording the dialogue in-house using the voices of myself and my friends. Although this second method offers the disadvantage of less than professional voice acting, it does offer a lot more flexibility in the recording process, in theory this flexibility would allow us to capture as many takes as needed to get a professional result.

I’ve also attempted to borrow the field recorder for the sake of capturing the ambient environments I spoke about in my last entry, however this was to no avail due to being out of term-time. Luckily a friend of mine had a high quality lavalier microphone that I was able to borrow and use to record with my laptop.

By my next entry I intend to have started the recording process for the dialogue within the clip using my own personal set-up. Obviously, this isn’t ideal compared to the facilities provided by the university however the deadline for the work is closing in and at this stage I’d like to be working on it in any capacity that I can. If by the time the work’s complete we have an opportunity to re-record the dialogue I’d be more than happy to discard the recordings, I’ll be making over the coming week.

Friday 4^th January 2019

Since my last entry I’ve travelled back to my home studio and recorded some of the dialogue for the chosen clip using my own voice and the voices of some of my friends. In my last entry I spoke about how ideal this process would be, stating how audio quality and the quality of the acting would suffer. While this is somewhat true for the quality of the acting within the clip, the overall sound quality is very usable. The sound profile of the voices is well-rounded and warm, and while there are technical issues with some of the audio (plosives and sibilance related) the entire process has been successful and would provide a good backup, should we not get the chance to re-record before the deadline.

However, this could be indicative of a bigger problem. Reading through multiple informational sources on sound design in movies paints one overarching theme, the practise is a matter of taste and while there are certain standards to be met, for the most part there is no definitive “right” or “wrong”. Following this train of thought, how can I ascertain that the only reason that this audio sounds fine to me isn’t because I have terrible taste? With little experience in the field and having never been educated on it, unfortunately I cannot ascertain this.

By my next entry I intend upon having pieced together as much of the audio as possible and showing it to people, in multiple environments and through various sound systems (phones, televisions, studio monitors and headphones) to get a general consensus on the overall quality of both the recordings and the acting.

Friday 11^th January 2019

Since my last entry I’ve shown the clip to multiple gatherings of people and spoken to them after about any improvements they thought could be made. A few noted the voice acting, stating not that it seemed out of sync but that it wasn’t a convincing portrayal of the character. None mentioned audio quality and it seemed to hold up in a variety of situations to the average listener.

With the deadline closing in next week I don’t think there’ll be a chance to re-record the dialogue in it’s entirety, however we can re-record any of the characters which are most problematic acting wise.

An immediate problem being faced at the moment is the deadline, unfortunately we’ve not completed our list of audio required for the clip yet and are still missing multiple hard sound effects and foley sound effects. As a result of this Connor and I intend upon getting studio time next week to finish the recording. At this moment the situation is disheartening but I believe it can still be done, one of the issues I believe that will make itself most apparent in the final stretch will be managing to meet the technical specification in the amount of time we have to do so. However this is something which I could stay up all night doing if need be and really the nature of the project demands that this be left until last anyway.

By my next entry I hope to have read more on sound design to help prepare for our final recording session and to get the most out of it.

Tuesday 15^th January 2019

Today Connor and I went onto campus and booked studio time for Wednesday the 16^th (tomorrow) for a final recording session before the work is due. I’ve been reading The Sound Effects Bible front to back over the weekend in preparation for this and believe I have the majority of the ideas presented in the book retained in my mind.

While I feel confident about the level of preparation I’ve done for this project, I’m less confident in my time management skills and it’s shown throughout this journal. This, combined with a lack of communication up until this final week between myself and my group, has ultimately led to a rush to get work done before the deadline. While this hasn’t been great for overall stress and morale it has seen a massive increase in productivity from all members within our group.

Provided that Connor and I can get all the recording done that we need to tomorrow, then throughout tomorrow evening and Thursday evening I can work on my own individual mix of the project to ensure that it meets technical specification. I am however worried about my fellow group members and am afraid they may not have the time to work on this piece before it’s due in as I do.

By my next entry I’ll have been through the final recording process with Connor and will be preparing for final work on my mix of the clip.

Wednesday 16^th January 2019

Today Connor and I went to the studio and recorded the final sounds we required for recreating the scene. Over the next two evenings I’ll be working on the piece for submission on the 18th.

By my next entry I hope to have finished the process and be ready to submit my work.

Friday 17^th January 2019

Since my last entry Connor and I added in some more sounds which he’d recorded externally in his studio for a further amount of detail in the piece to hopefully aid the immersion. In the evening we rendered the Foley and Sound Effects to their own stem and the ADR to its own stem ready for our final studio session this morning.

This morning Connor, Nikita and I went into the studios to normalise the overall volume level of our piece. Our piece had to match the European standards stipulated by European Broadcasting Union R128 standard, to measure this we used Izotope’s Insight. We made sure our audio levels remained tightly within the range of 22.5 to 24 LUFS, (EBU R128 stipulates 23 LUFS with a 1 LUFS headroom). Unfortunately after this we faced a prominent issue in that the audio playback was drifting from the video. Not only during playback but also during rendering, causing our audio and video to be wildly out of sync. To fix this we took the files out of the studio and to a Macbook pro which we’d been working on the file on without issue. We rendered it on there and it corrected the error we’d ironically been labouring on for a few hours downstairs.

After this we submitted our work. Overall the process was difficult at times but ultimately successful. Were I to do anything differently I’d have prepared better for the process with more external reading and have started working on the project earlier. Ultimately, I believe my biggest weakness was mediocre time management, causing a sizeable amount of pressure in the last few days of the process. It by no means compromised the work, but it did cause an amount of stress within the group.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton