Garnish Music Production School, Worldwide

How to Get Your Tracks Noticed

 

Getting your tracks noticed by prominent DJs and record labels is one of the hardest things to do for any aspiring producer. With so much musical competition around these days, times are tough even for the most talented of producers. Sometimes success can be down to complete luck, other times it can be by the old adage ‘it’s not what you know but who you know’ that helps artists break through. Usually though, it’s persistence and hard work that sees the cream rise to the top.

Here are a few tips to help you stand out from the crowd when sending out your demo tracks to record labels and DJs to get support. One thing is for certain; it pays to be nice!

Don’t Spam
Be selective with who you send your material too. If you think you’ve written the latest dance hit, then just blindly spamming it out to every label on the planet will not get you anywhere. Do a bit of research on who would be most open to hearing your work and if you are sending your track to a specific DJ, make sure it’s something that would fit in with their musical style.

Label The MP3 Properly
Instead of just sending off a track with just a track name in the ID, why not add all your information into the mp3 name so the listener has all your details in one go? Saves a lot of time and hassle if they want to get in touch with you if they can look at your web address running across iTunes as they listen.

Master like a, errrrrrm, MASTER!
Ensure you’re sending out the best possible version of your tunes by investing time and effort into mastering. This will really help your track stand out and if you don’t know how to do it yourself, pay someone to do it for you. You may be sitting on a future hit, but a muddy mix down and master could lose the tracks initial impact. You only get one chance to make a first impression.

Be Polite
There’s nothing wrong with asking for feedback, but having good manners costs nothing and can be worth their weight in gold in the long run. People are busy, so constantly harassing someone for feedback is not going to get you anywhere. A polite follow up email is more than enough; if they like what you’re doing they will certainly let you know.

MP3 or Die
Do you want your inbox jammed full with enormous WAV files from people you don’t know? Didn’t think so. That’s why it’s nice to send over a well-worded email with an MP3 attached, or even a simple download link to save space. Record labels and DJs have thousands of emails in their inbox; make yours stand out with a good design and a dash of humour.

Obviously if you’re producing a load of nonsense then I’m afraid none of the above is going to help you in any shape or form! Keep putting those hours in the studio though, as you never know exactly where you could be in 6 months time and nobody got anywhere without hard work in this life. Always worth remembering that when you shut your computer down to go and watch the TV. Put the hours in now and reap the rewards later.