I'm working on releasing my first EP and I was wondering if anyone had any tips, be it promoting, mastering, etc.
Right now I'm working on making seamless transitions for the tracks. What have others done to prepare the layout and such?
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The Multiverse ::: [CA, Sac]
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The Multiverse ::: [CA, Sac]
godinpants wrote:
Make sure the songs are good.
Well, shit. Nvm then.
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Tokyo, Japan
I don't think he was being facetious, if it is your first EP the main thing which is going to influence peoples opinions of it, unless you get very lucky of course, is how good it is. If I were you I would write all your tracks, find people to give you constructive criticism and don't release the EP until you are damn sure it is very good. Once you think it is release worthy, wait a couple of weeks without listening to it then see how you feel about it.
If you don;t get the quality bar high then all the subsequent stuff like promotion and layout isn't really that important, especially bearing in mind, with all due respect, you aren't very well known.
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Armidale NSW Australia :D
Lazerbeat wrote:
I don't think he was being facetious, if it is your first EP the main thing which is going to influence peoples opinions of it, unless you get very lucky of course, is how good it is. If I were you I would write all your tracks, find people to give you constructive criticism and don't release the EP until you are damn sure it is very good. Once you think it is release worthy, wait a couple of weeks without listening to it then see how you feel about it.
If you don;t get the quality bar high then all the subsequent stuff like promotion and layout isn't really that important, especially bearing in mind, with all due respect, you aren't very well known.
+1
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hardcore, Australia
Lazerbeat wrote:
I don't think he was being facetious
Partially was. But mostly everything else you said.
There are really 3 approaches to releasing music.
1. Release 50 EPs in your first year and be ignored until at some point you reach a crossover of someone listens and it's good.
2. Become well known from forum interactions/individual tracks and people beg you to release an EP.
3. Work really hard on quality control and come out with something amazing first time around.
Last edited by godinpants (May 10, 2012 12:00 pm)
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Finland
Lazerbeat wrote:
If I were you I would write all your tracks, find people to give you constructive criticism and don't release the EP until you are damn sure it is very good. Once you think it is release worthy, wait a couple of weeks without listening to it then see how you feel about it.
Actually I think this could work against you too. I know shit tons of musicians who have enormous amounts of cool gear, good songs etc but they just dont release them because they think they arent good enough.
I mean of course make best songs you can but sometimes getting better at things just requires you to just do that stuff as much as you can. There's little chance that the first EP or whatever will be masterpiece but it can be something really interesting and different!
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Tokyo, Japan
Oh yeah I mean "art is never finished only abandoned" and all that, one has to draw a line under a song and move on at some point. That is why I said "very good" not "as good as Trash80" or nobody would release anything.
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Gosford, Australia
Lazerbeat wrote:
That is why I said "very good" not "as good as that handsome victory road fellow" or nobody would release anything.
fixed 
have really good album art
if not "really good" then at least different
there's more than enough random ms paint laser puke album art imo but if you can do that well then that's fine i guess.
bit of a tangent here, but more chip releases with photographed album art would be fantastic i think. like not iphone photographed like my first release but honest-to-goodness professional SLR work.
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be really into it yourself, make sure you know it is good, show your passion, pour yourself into this
make it something more than just the music, make it a piece, the image the sound, your bandcamp layout, your aura
honestly, promotion isn't going to work if you have no one to promote it to in the first place. make yourself an audience before you release something like this. (idk maybe you do have an audience, maybe you dont even care)
something else to note would be that 8bc doesn't exist anymore. the likes system on there made it easy for people to become known (even if they shouldn't have been) no offence chipmusic.org but it's really not so much a focus on here, you only listen to the artists you have heard before. i guess what i am trying to say is that, it will be hard to become known w/o 8bc. no one is going to catch you on the face of this website. you have no display of popularity.
oh and post it on reddit
Last edited by Je Mappelle (May 10, 2012 1:09 pm)
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Rochester, NY
post it on reddit, even though no one comments or upvotes or actually does anything there apparently even we got some listeners from posting our release there
even if your EP is the greatest thing ever no one is going to listen to it if they don't know about it
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New York City
Auxcide wrote:
godinpants wrote:Make sure the songs are good.
Well, shit. Nvm then.
Why would you release anything if you don't think it's good?
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The Multiverse ::: [CA, Sac]
Wow some great advice in here, thank you everyone. Posting on reddit is a good idea. Je Mappelle, yeah since 8bc closed, I've been using soundcloud to spread my music and build a base.
I think maybe I came off as not putting the music first in my post but that is not the case. It's true that I'm not as serious about people caring about this EP but that doesn't mean I don't want the music to be right. I could care less about the money or the art or even how many people download it for free, as long as the ones who do enjoy what they hear. 
And I hope it didn't sound like I was just just going to release one tomorrow or something. This is a long process and I'm very nitpicky and kind of a perfectionist. I just wanted any advice I could, and you guys stepped up. I was planning on posting in the constructive criticism forum.
Another question: how many songs would you recommend? I've been building up songs for this for a while and I need to start weeding some out.
akira^8GB wrote:
Auxcide wrote:Well, shit. Nvm then.
Why would you release anything if you don't think it's good?
If you're talking about me, I was being sarcastic.
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Lexington, KY
I'm not gonna lie, more than 6 tracks on an ep of an artist you don't know is quite an ordeal to listen to. So, I'd say, between 4 and 6... Or 3 if they're REALLY FUCKING GOOD.
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Bristol, UK
As far as seamless transitions between songs, isn't that impossible with most digital formats? Or just mp3?