Getting Pissed at the local scene!

Jhanes

Junior Member
So i am a local musician and have recorded and played with many people...
But i am in California and i am getting tired of this sorry hardcore music scene is getting worse and worse... i feel lik i have no options with my band we aren't hardcore nor are we like fully metal or anything but we cant ever get a with any hard rock or alternative bands...
it makes me wonder how do bands get big? like how does a band like chevelle or maroon 5 get huge and radio play? how does a local band get anywhere when all they are surrounded by is stupid hardcore bands... even that crap where all these guys singing in there stupid horrible falsettos that sound the same.... ugh i am just wondering ultimately how the heck does a band that isn't hardcore get noticed anymore?
 
Write a bunch of great tunes with a style that is unique to your band, rehearse the hell out of them until the band is ridiculously tight, get a band website up and then live like dogs while working your butts off to get your music heard by anyone and everyone.

Forget about the "scene." Live for your music, that is if the music is good enough to live for. If it isn't good enough then move on. Getting angry, though, is the last thing you want to do. Trust me, it doesn't accomplish anything.
 
Write a bunch of great tunes with a style that is unique to your band, rehearse the hell out of them until the band is ridiculously tight, get a band website up and then live like dogs while working your butts off to get your music heard by anyone and everyone.

Forget about the "scene." Live for your music, that is if the music is good enough to live for. If it isn't good enough then move on.

qft, ignore what other people are doing, if your music is good, whatever style, then people who dig that style will take notice. You might have to adjust strategy ie., don't look for support slots with Hardcore bands - target your core audience.
 
Great advice so far......remember, you'll stand more chance of being noticed by being different to every other band out there. If there's a million bands all blasting out the same kind of metal, then who's gonna notice one from the other. Be unique....be yourselves.
 
Well guys thanks !! KEEP the Encouragement coming more advise please!! haha
 
Are you really in Lodi, Ca? That's a pretty small place. I'm not really sure your local scene is really a representative of the bigger picture you seem to be after.

Regardless, every style of music has 1,001 bands in the same scene.
How to stand out is to worked harder then the rest.

One band I was in 10 years ago was named one of the best unsigned bands in Los Angeles, and won local awards. The band prior to that played in front of a rep from pretty much every record company in existence at the time.

How did we do it? We worked hard.

When other bands were rehearsing once or twice a week, we rehearsed three times a week until we were a well oiled machine. We would sometimes rehearse with a click through the PA (the 2nd band used loops, so everything was to a click). This made sure we were tight, and it showed in our live shows.

Someone (usually me) went out to clubs that appealed to the same crowd as our music and flyered. And not just handing out flyers, but getting to know people in the other bands, getting to know the potential fans.

In the 2nd band, before cassettes became passe, we printed up 1000 cassette singles and gave them away at clubs.

The bands had professional press kits to give out to those in the industry. We had websites, email lists, pretty much everything a professional band would have.

This was all before myspace, before youtube, before social networking. I can only imagine how much more we could have done had those things existed at the time.

My last band eliminated the going to clubs and flyering and concentrated on target marketing online via these new online social networks. We knew we had a niche market for the music we wanted to do, and we knew it wasn't going to appeal to most people. So we focused on finding those niche people around the world. Thankfully, a DJ in Chicago liked us, and a DJ in England liked us, and suddenly we were getting on internet radio shows and pod casts. Next thing I know, we're selling CDs from Japan to the Netherlands to Brazil. Granted, we did not sell a ton of copies, and some unfortunate events prevented us from following up on our momentum, but hey, we're out there.

The key was in this third band is we just bypassed the local scene, we didn't even really think about it, and we looked at the global scene.

I know of plenty of bands that can't fill a club in their home town, but are well known over seas.

I hope that helps.
 
LOL man well i know i am doing something right!!! i can say that we have done most of that and we do practice to clicks and yeah i guess i am just like tired of the small town crap but we are doing well i mean we are opening for meat-loaf's daughter and we are recording our first ep and we feel confident it is just little we can do when places only book this stupid fad!! HAHA oh well i know we are on the right track...
WE barely started in October of 2009
 
... when places only book this stupid fad!!
Get used to that stupid fad (whichever one you were referring to) because it never goes away - it just morphs from one to another, so it's fair to say it's one long continuum of stupid fad that always has been, and always will be with us.

But I would caution you not to throw the baby out with the bath water. There are always innovations buried in those fads that you don't want to completely ignore. Take from it what is appealing and useful and toss the the rest. Mix it in with the style (fad) you're currently trying to "make it" in and keep on the lookout for new things to incorporate/reject from other fads (from all eras). That's how progress is made and originality maintained.

If you're a purist and are trying to stay "true" to a particular style, you'll for sure go out with it (if it isn't already gone).
 
If you're a purist and are trying to stay "true" to a particular style, you'll for sure go out with it (if it isn't already gone).

Now this speaks volumes of wisdom. Every musician, no matter what kind of music he plays, should keep it in mind.
 
Well thank you mike and yes very wise to say... i guess it is just this hardcore music man... it is all the same i mean i know i sound like an old person but it is tiring when the music is just an equation for the musician... when a band says well okay here is what we want our song to sound like that is cool ... but when a band goes okay we need a breakdown here (because every song needs a break down) and a circle pit part here (just like every other song) and a crowd shouting part here in the same order every song which is basically reverse of what i just listed then it is like ugh man where is the heart? but i seriously think people are tired of it also... so i am glad to see that a new type of music shall be rising soon. i hope i will be a part of it... i cant say we have a genre in my band but i can say that we are unique and people like us... but we just have to find our place to grow!!! so i am encouraged and i am willing to move on up but i am not willing to be heartless to my music... does that make since... like i love different music and all music if it is real!!! when it isn't heartless!!!
 
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