The Tennessee Hot Damns began as art for art’s sake, but our DIY
attitude has helped us garner label offers and other opportunities. For
ideas on ways to promote your own projects, check out our Facebook
page and YouTube channel.What do you call a person
who sells 100,000 CDs
independently? A millionaire.
Regrettably, I don’t know how
they do that, but I imagine it
involves clever marketing, hard
work, and lots of luck. That
said, if you’re a musician who
wants to advance your career,
cutting your own album might
help get you to the next level,
though big sales are rarely the
biggest benefit. Here’s the story
of the CD I cut a few months
ago—and the happy results.
When my wife, Megan
Mullins, broke up with her
record company a few months
ago, we saw it as an opportunity
rather than an end. Without
a label saying she needs to
wait—“Let’s wait until the radio
playlist has opened up” or “Let’s
try another producer” or “Let’s
hold off until the country music
radio seminar next year“—she
could finally get a CD out there.
First we looked through
songs in our catalogs to find the
best contenders. Songs selected,
we enlisted Megan’s brother
Marcus to give the project a
fun, band vibe, and then immediately
began recording in my
living room with my small Pro
Tools rig, playing live to drum
loops. One week later we had
12 songs recorded and mixed,
and remixed, and remixed
again, and again.
Next we did a goofball
photo shoot in our foyer using
a consumer-grade camera taped
to a tripod. The pictures looked
pretty cheesy until the three of
us began jacking with them on
Photoshop. We did not know
what we were doing—just
pushed buttons until it looked
like an Andy Warhol painting.
We then came up with a
band name that seemed to go
with the music and images: The
Tennessee Hot Damns—named
for our state of residence and
the nasty cinnamon-spiked
booze that fueled some of our
recording sessions. After determining
the band name was
not being used, we claimed it
with a Facebook page, YouTube
channel, ReverbNation page,
Twitter account, and a website
through WordPress.
Once we had the web spots
secured, I taped a flip video
cam to our broken tripod and
then shot a few quick live videos
of us playing some of our
songs and covers in the same
foyer. We posted them on our
YouTube channel, linked them
to our Facebook page, and then
linked the band’s Facebook
page to our individual Facebook
pages. Total budget thus far:
$ 00.00. It was time to spend
some dough-re-mi.
I contracted a company to
print 1,000 CDs. I don’t want to
mention the name because that
reeks of shilling for the man.
Let’s just say it was a big company
that’s been in business a long
time, does good work, and has
a media package that gets music
on many of the online outlets
like iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby,
etc. Many companies offer CD
reproduction at very affordable
rates today, but this media package
appealed to my impatient
nature. Perhaps I could have
found a better deal, but I would
have wasted days scouring the
net and maybe have saved $50.
Regardless, it’s a fairly affordable
way to get 1,000 CDs—or drink
coasters, depending on sales.
One has to be realistic about
CD sales. On the good live gig
with roughly 100 people actually
listening to your set, you
will be lucky to sell 10 to 20
CDs. In a half empty bar of
indifferent strangers, your sales
will hover around the embarrassing
3 to 0 mark. At that
rate, it’s going to take a long
time to burn through those four
full boxes of CDs stacked in
your garage. But ultimately, it
is about promotion more than
sales. Sell what you can to offset
cost, but be ready to give most
of them away—that’s how you
advance your career.
Give your CD to anybody
who may help you advance
your career!
Give it to venue bookers.
Having your own CD will get
you work (if it’s well done).
Venues need to hear you before
they hire you. This makes you
look like a pro.
Give it to people who
work in the film, television,
or music industry. I sent
our CD to Dave Bennett and
William Shockley, the team
who produced Megan’s last label
video for the CMT and GAC
networks. William loved one
of our songs and added it to
the soundtrack of ThriftStore
Cowboy, a film currently in
production with an incredible
cast and a soundtrack with
Kix Brooks, Travis Tritt, Tracy
Lawrence, and others. More
important than the money from
the soundtrack, an endorsement
like this legitimizes our work.
Give it to other artists who
may cut your songs. They
may ask you to open shows
for them or give you glowing
tweets. Megan plays in Jamie
Lynn Spears’ band (Britney’s
talented little sister). Jamie
Lynn tweeted that she loves
Megan’s CD. Some of her
quarter-million twitter followers
became Hot Damn followers.
This doesn’t translate into
money, but promotion eventually
can become income.
The promotion worked
for us. The Hot Damns have
an offer from a small label to
release our album and an invitation
to showcase for a major
label. We’ve gotten some good
press and more gig offers. A
major artist is considering cutting
one of our songs. Best of
all, we’ve had fun playing our
music. It began as art for art’s
sake but led to some recognition
and opportunities. Don’t
wait for a label to discover
you—get your work out there
and see where it takes you.
John Bohlinger is a Nashville multi-instrumentalist best know for his work in television, having lead the band for all six season of NBC's hit program
Nashville Star, the 2011, 2010 and 2009 CMT Music Awards, as well as many specials for GAC, PBS, CMT, USA and HDTV.
John's music compositions and playing can be heard in several major label albums, motion pictures, over one hundred television spots and Muzak... (yes, Muzak does play some cool stuff.) Visit him at
youtube.com/user/johnbohlinger
or
facebook.com/johnbohlinger and check out his new band,
The Tennessee Hot Damns.