So, after several months of dedicated work you’ve came to the magnificent moment, when you must step out of the studio and begin showing & offering your songs (or demos) to record labels & the A&R. Heart beats rapidly, everything around comes in pink and you can’t help imagining yourself on the cover of Rolling Stones. Well, sorry for the spoiler, but all the glory will fade away very rapidly after you’ll celebrate your hundredth mail without answer. The main problem is that 90% of the record labels, even the small indie ones don’t accept unsolicited material. And another problem is that even the ones who don’t accept it, still encourage you to send your demos to them. So even if you spend a lot of time in a web research, you’ll still have no idea if your demo will be sent to the spam box or trash can automatically or not.
Well, in case if you don’t know - unsolicited material means materials the record label hasn’t invited you to send, or materials submitted by representatives with whom label has not had business association with.
Well, you do have a tough battle in front of you. Labels or A&R persons are not in habit of answering for several months even if they like your material. They have to check a lot of things until they contact you. So you never know how much time will pass until you get answered (mind you, this is the rare case when they get interested in you, in 95 from 100 sent emails you won’t even get auto responders answer). A middle-budget UK indie label receives about 150 solicited demos per week and 500-700 demos from guys like you. Feel free to calculate your chance.
Most labels encourage you to send your demos in a post envelope or an email. As a common rule, the demo package must content a bio, several tracks, photos and links. But even if you can provide all these, you still need the knowledge of the form of sending your demos. Because if you put something inappropriate in your package, you’ll definitely miss the tiny chance that you have. So here are the essential tips that will keep your demos as far as possible from the trash can:
Know whom are you sending your material to – If you are a garage rock band and send your demos to a hip-hop label that’s a waste of time. Do a little research of what kind of music does the label deal with.
Make everything clear and easy to listen and discuss - don’t submit a link that they’ll have to join, search your name on or anything else that’s pain in the ass, they have no time for all that crap. Make it so that all they have to do is click play. Do not submit something that has an expiration date, because they might draft your email and get back to it in 2-3 months and get disappointed.
Check if you’re addressing the right person – most of the labels have several departments and do not mix them. Don’t send your mp3 to a technical director instead of A&R.
Most important - Keep it as short as possible: - short band bio. Not a 3 page booklet of how magnificent they are and how the vocalist stole his grandmother’s money to buy his first guitar. Keep it professional and not longer that 2/3 of a page. Who are you, what style do you play, where have you performed, reviews you managed to get, ingredients. Enough. Do not praise yourself, just put down the facts. Short demo – go with 2 or maximum 3 of your best songs. More just won’t be listened. With most of the labels sound cloud and YouTube are fine. Several best pics – and check out do they prefer attachments or links in that case.
Don’t worry too much about the demo quality - As I’ve already mentioned, record labels do not expect to hear professional recording quality on demos form beginning artists. Well, though you must have some limits – a detuned acoustic guitar recorded through a 5$ Skype microphone doesn’t count for a demo.
Pick songs which have a superb start - Here’s a secret: most of the A&R persons listen to just first 30 seconds of a track. If it doesn’t grab their attention, they throw it away. So do not pick up a song which is mild for first 2 minutes but has a divine guitar solo in the end. It won’t be heard.
Include all the links – Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Sound cloud, Bandcamp, etc. They want to see how far have you gone while promoting yourself.
Be polite – Though most of the people you’re about to contact come from music (and frequently from the least academic music), they still won’t appreciate you being unceremonious with them. Vanity is the Devil’s favorite sin.
Sending Demos is a cynic business. You just won’t hear back from more than 90% of your submissions. Also, you’ll hear “no” a lot. But don’t be scared and use every opportunity, even the negative answer – ask for a advice, suggestion of other label who might like you and so on. Look at this as a opportunity to turn it in a positive answer for the next time.
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