Category: sethwCategory: sethw

What happens when you cold-email a bunch of radio contacts about your blackened death metal band?

In the case of Úzkost, vocalist Josh Thieler explains how it led to a memorable house show (and so much more).

Click play, it’s a wild story.

Josh explains how the magic has continued over the years:

“My understanding is, so the college radio stations started playing us and then one of these kids have like, graduated college and then started their own web radio stations. And so then they’re playing us on those, and then other people hear about it, and they’re playing us on their stations. And then some like real legitimate, like the one local radio station here, the Big Rock one has played us multiple times on it, which makes no sense to me.”

The band has gone from 200 Spotify followers to 2,800 as result.

As most of us know, it’s not just about unit sales and DSP playlisting:

“The last show that we played here, a mom brought her 13 year old trans daughter, and it was her first show she had ever been to,” says Josh. “And she’s like, I love you guys so much. And she’s like, bought each shirt, bought every record that we had. And she’s like, I want to play metal someday. And I’m just like, how did this happen?”

During our chat, Alex asked “what would you say would be an actionable tip from this experience that you would pass on to other people?”

“I’m learning that I know less than I did the day before. So try as much as you have energy for, don’t discount the things, you know, Seth pushes emailing lists and stuff. Do that. It’s easy to set up.”

Josh also dishes the age old wisdom for any creative person – networking is vital, but in an honest, organic, kind way.

“Just talk to people in bands. Talk to fans on the internet when you can, when you have the energy for it. Talk to people that write for different sites. Then, like I said, don’t discount any of the things that we look at as dead from the past, like mailing lists, radio.”

That’s the thing – you gotta start somewhere, but you gotta do it at your own pace.

“It’s obnoxious to like start this whole thing by yourself out of nowhere and just be like, okay, here’s everything. Let me start trying to do everything at once and collect all these different contacts and everything. Start somewhere, and you just keep doing it. Once you gather those contacts, it’s super low effort to just send a press release, you know, and you can use the same press release for your emailing list, you know, of fans that you send to your PR contacts and that includes all the radio people that you can find.”

None of this is a magic fix. Emailing your local college radio station this week might not be the answer – you just never know!

And if you’re not in a band, take this concept and run with it.

Maybe it’s not hitting up college radio, but maybe there’s a local print weekly, a flea market, a record store, a DJ night.

This is all built on people, on relationships. Build those up, and see where it goes.

Listen to Úzkost on Bandcamp.

Stories work, friends.

Feeling stuck on what to send to your fans this week? Here’s three things your fans might appreciate in the coming days:

🌮 Oct 4: National Taco Day

Don’t just say, “hey, happy National Taco Day,” tell your story about how you kinda met Jack Dorsey of Square. Okay, I didn’t really meet him, as I was busy stuffing tacos and making coffee, but he stopped by our little shop and hooked us up with shiny new Square equipment. Seemed like a nice guy.

💔 Oct 5: Mike Alexander of Evile passed away in 2009

Just 32 years old, gone far too soon. I got to meet Mike when I was running Noisecreep, when we had Evile in for an interview, and he was a sweet, kind dude.

💿 Oct 7: Candiria’s While They Were Sleeping came out in 2016

This banger turns seven years old this year.

Maybe you’ve got an epic story about getting tacos after a show. Or you have a killer salsa recipe.

Maybe you played a show with Evile, or you met Mike years ago, or just love their latest album. Share something genuine, and the spirit of Mike Alexander lives on, 14 years later.

Maybe you haven’t listened to Candiria in awhile, and this brings up good memories.

All of these are just ideas to show that you’re not just a band with an album to sell, an artist with a new print, or a photographer for hire – they show you’re a real person, with unique experiences and stories to tell.

And people buy from people that vibe with. Just saying.

NOTE: Please double check all these dates. I’m a one dude operation here, so mistakes happen, and yes, I’m gonna miss a bunch of stuff. Use this as a guide!

ANTI-SOCIAL

A vulgar display of social media hostility

“But now, the couple said, the change to Instagram’s algorithm has resulted in some (of Idea’s) Instagram Stories reaching barely 1 percent of their audience,” from ‘Instagram’s Favorite Bookseller Is Ready to Go Offline.’

“Instagram changed the hashtag system,” says Craig Gleason, “you can no longer see ALL the posts connected to a hashtag, only the ones they decide are “TOP” posts.” Not great!

“To be an artist, a writer, an herbalist, a creative and thoughtful person – we are risking so much at the hands of the apps that keep us sucked in,” says Cody Cook-Parrott Grace in ‘I quit Instagram.’

“My beef is more with Facebook and Meta than with the hackers,” says co-artistic director of Punkt Festival Erik Honoré in ‘The anatomy of a Facebook account heist.’

“You don’t need to reach a million people all the time. You don’t need to reach a thousand people all the time… one person can do it.”

This video centers on a simple but easily forgotten idea: impact doesn’t come from scale first—it comes from attention landing in the right place.

After talking with a longtime musician who quietly kept sending extreme metal records to college radio, the result surprised him. Once a station latched on, everything changed: “now instead of playing to old dudes with their arms crossed we’re playing to young kids who are going crazy.”

The lesson is this: “just because a thousand people didn’t see your thing, maybe one person that someday can do something with that is the person that you need to constantly be putting that in front of.”

You won’t always know who they are, but that’s why you keep going.

NO CURE vocalist Blaythe Steuer said from stage at Furnace Fest that he better not catch anyone littering. The band is from Birmingham, Alabama.

I’m sure “mention littering” was not on the marketing plan, but the universe did its thing, and here we are.

Steuer could have said nothing, of course. But he mentioned littering, and this jaded dude who’s been going to shows for 30+ years thought it was funny.

I’ve added them to my Bandcamp wishlist, and streamed their catalog on Spotify.

My experience is not universal, though. Some people definitely littered at Furnace Fest.

Every action is still an action.

You react, or don’t.

(more…)

Seven things your band could send to your email list after a big show:

1. Photos of setting up, playing, and hanging out afterwards.

2. A handful of the photos you took with fans, and the super cool people you met backstage, like that guy that wears yellow glasses and writes about heavy metal email newsletters (hey, that’s me!)

3. Talk about some of your favorite bands that played

4. Explain how you picked your set list (include a photo)

5. Send a store discount, and the code word is the second song title from your set

6. Ask people who saw you at the event to reply to your email with photos they took, or their favorite song of the night (this can be helpful for building segments)

7. Share a funny / weird / dangerous / scary story that happened

After all this, it’s a perfect time to mention your upcoming tour, or that EP you just released.

Not in a band? Talk about your upcoming photo shoots, upcoming designs you’re working on, courses you’re teaching, bicycles you’re building – whatever!