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Music Information Articles
Music Showcases and Indie Bands: Hype or Hope?
Dave Larson
MMSdirect Sales and Customer Service
With the surge of independent artists and bands in the nineties the music conference showcase event has become big business. There are close to a dozen major events and a multitude of smaller events put on every year in North America alone.
If you listened to the hype created by the music industry you might believe the quickest way to get signed a major label deal is to play at music conference showcase events. If you enter into one of these music conferences thinking you´re going to get a record deal and that you´re automatically going to be successful, I believe you´re wrong.
The people that put these conferences together will lead you to believe otherwise. They play on a musicians desperate quest for success and are willing to exploit that musician in the hopes of making their conference into a money-making machine.
If you´re playing at these shows to gain experience, meet new people and believe that these events promote a particular city´s music scene, by all means play the show. If you don´t go in with the expectation of a miracle than I believe that these showcases can be invaluable.
My experience at these events has been positive, because I didn´t have unrealistic expectations. I have been to several music conferences around North America in the last couple of years. The best experience I´ve had outside of Canada has been at my two visits to the CMJ conference in New York City. My expectations before I went were to have a great time in a cool city, take advantage of the great panelists and play a great show in front of a brand new audience that has never seen or heard of my band before. In my second visit we were lucky enough to play on a bill with great bands that brought out a big crowd. I had a chance to play under the most pressure I had ever felt in my career, and we had a great time. I didn´t expect some big time A&R person to see us play, take us out for an expensive dinner, give us a huge record deal and become famous just because we played at this particular conference.
I have also had the chance to play at the three largest events put on in Canada, Canadian Music Week, North by Northeast and Music West in Vancouver. My expectations at these events were different than CMJ. I wanted to play with other Canadian bands I would not ordinarily get the chance to play with and contribute my time and effort in hopes of enhancing Canada´s musical community. These expectations were met. These events are great for that purpose and as a result of putting these showcases together, Canada has increased international interest and is now known as a breeding ground for great musical artists.
Canada has created a very distinct niche in the musical world and our artists are in great demand. We can attribute some of that growth to these events. However, if the people that put these events together continue to sell bands on playing these events by claiming that it is the easiest way to become successful their luck will surely run out; musicians are smarter than that.
My experience at these events have been very positive. I really enjoyed participating in the CMJ conference in New York. It is a great city and I really took advantage of what the city had to offer both musically and culturally. The Canadian showcases were even better. Building a musical community is very important in sustaining creativity. Without the sense of community people are not as motivated to make music and the risk of a musically stagnant community will inevitably become a possibility.
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