Releasing your music out into the big, bad world can be daunting to say the least. You’ve worked on it potentially for weeks, months if not years and well, you want to get the best return for all the hard work you’ve put in and kick-start that career you’ve always wanted.

Additionally when you consider something like 200,000 tracks are uploaded to Spotify DAILY you really need to line up your ducks so you can start knocking them down when you’re ready to unleash that trap monster or moody house romper to the masses.

In an effort to get a head start we’ve put together five important tips to get your release just a bit more primed for the good times!

Press Shots

While press shots in theory shouldn’t be the be all and end all of how your music is received it does play a decently important role in how people perceive your music. This is for the most part, the first time potential fans have even seen you and it can really sway someone to dive deeper or not.

Not sure how to go about it?

Drop an update on your Facebook or reach out to some Uni’s or TAFE’s to see if friends or students would be happy to take some snaps of you for free. If you can, put a little bit of cash on the line as this certifies the process a little and means you can put an easy deadline in place and you’re not chasing until the day of release.

P.s. Beers and food are also valuable denominations for friends and more so uni kids!

Blogs/Online

You are 99% there having finished your tunage and getting those beautiful press shots done. What now? Time to get the music to the right people!

Easiest way to do this is kick off a spreadsheet (Google Sheets are great for this) and write down all your favourite sites and blogs that post the same kind of music that you’re making. Be sure to round up emails which you can find on the blog or site and if not, the Facebook, Instagram or Youtube channel should have the answers. Make sure your music is a good fit as electronic music writers/bloggers *cough* will appreciate this over emails about folk, rock and country music.

Full disclaimer getting a reply can be hard, you should always follow up but maybe give it a few days and when possible, have a reason to follow up. This could be an update on plays, support from DJs or artist so you’re not forcing the email.

Keen to get your music out there? Here are ‘The Best Music Blogs In Australia’ with a sneaky list of of their contact emails!

Tools

There are actually a number of handy tools out there to help get your music to the people that A) don’t take too long to get your head around and B) can reap those rewards! Give yourself a bit of time to understand how they work ahead of your release and they can be the make or break for your music.

• Unearthed – Triple J often look to this fertile ground for unsigned music to support. It’s free to do and potential opportunity for Triple J play if you get enough love.
• Airit – Get your music sent to community radio stations around Australia and potential radio play to update blogs, labels, bookers or managers
• Submithub – The site allows you to bump your music over to a number of blogs and Youtube channels around the world and receive feedback.
• Hypem – Hype Machine aggregates a number of blogs around the world and ranks them based on popularity. This can be a big driver for Soundcloud plays and potential Spotify playlist addds

If you know of any other tools be sure to drop your suggestions in the comments!

Register with PPCA

We’ve actually touched on PPCA before, they are a music rights organisation that represents labels and artists and make sure that if your music is being played, you are getting paid. They actually work with over 55,000 venues around Australia and grant licenses based on their catalogue of registered music.

What PPCA do is grant licences for the broadcast, communication or public playing of recorded music (e.g. CDs, records and digital downloads) or music videos. They then distribute the licence fees they collect to the record labels and Australian recording artists registered with them.

Be sure to sign up for free here.

Distribution

While everything above has sort of been free advice, this is a paid avenue but can take your release to the next level. Without something like distribution you can miss out on your music being found on Spotify or Apple Music and also able to be bought and downloaded via iTunes etc

If you are serious about music, it’s about putting your best foot forward and potential labels, bookers or managers will see you’re investing and backing yourself and potentially give you a reply email or phone call that could change it all.

There are of course a whole heap of other ideas to help your release but we couldn’t fit them all in! Be sure to drop a comment below if you have any ideas or questions and we’ll be sure to answer them.

With these steps you should be well on your way to making some of that hard earned dough!