We’re working together with our friends at Electronic Music Conference! You can hear Ninajirachi, BRUX and Human Movement talk as part of EMC this week. Learn from the best, as you get a masterclass by artists who know how to make an impact. Check the full program here.

Being a new artist is daunting. With the endless amounts of talented people it’s hard to pinpoint what it takes to stand out. Making an impact is something that artists constantly struggle with and will continue to struggle with until the end of time.

With the mass amounts of music being produced daily it’s inevitable that some of it’s going to come across sounding the same, remember the future beats movement after Flume‘s come-up? But if there’s one thing that all artists seem to agree on and in our chats with BRUX, Human Movement and Ninajirachi they all emphasised the same point, it’s that you have to be yourself in production.

Trust yourself and be yourself

This whole point is about making music that is definitively you. It’s okay to have influences, but sometimes when you mirror said influences your music becomes something that’s likely been heard before. Sydney experimental house artist BRUX said that the best way she saw artists making an impact was by “staying ahead of the curve by staying true to themselves and not following trends.”

Similarly, the house and techno lads at Human Movement believe they made their impact through their personal sound, “we don’t really try and imitate a certain sound or style with our music, we just make what we feel and I guess that translates.”

This ties into the next point. Sometimes you have to steer away from the mainstream, namely, trying something different, going a direction that hasn’t been heard before.

Stray from the mainstream, be different

BRUX is the perfect example of straying from the mainstream to make an impact. She arguably had made an impact through her previous incarnation, but when talking about her recreation and why she moved on from her past it was simply that she “became bored writing pop music with the intention of having airplay and just wanted to abandon all rules and have FUN” 

It all comes down to making something unique, Human Movement emphasising something that seems so basic, saying simply to  “make more original music…”  admittedly they gave some follow up advice on the same tangent of straying from the mainstream. “Don’t be afraid to step out of the commercial bandwagon.” Do something that will get you noticed as a point of difference, not something that leaves your future lined up against a bunch of similar sounding others.

Truthfully, there’s a little more to it than just the music. Touring and shows in addition to strategy, thought and marketing are all quite important. This one’s a little controversial, but at the end of the day it rings true.

Strategising marketing and shows

In an ideal world the artists who made the best music would play shows whenever they want and would skyrocket to the top without worrying about a thing. There’s more to it than that. There’s no doubt that playing shows are a necessary way to push your brand, BRUX saying “listeners can connect with recorded music but there’s nothing like the energy within connecting to an artist who is performing live” but if you dive a bit further you’ll find out there’s a bit more to it than that.

Ninajirachi throws a big emphasis on strategising, putting a lot of the difficulty with her initial breakthrough on a lack of knowledge and guidance that she’d eventually get from her manager. “I had no idea what I was doing and I was the only person working on my project.” 

Human Movement completely shared the sentiment, putting huge emphasis on the timing of shows. “There’s a massive business side of the project.” 

“We would usually run an Australian tour off the back of new EPs, that way we coud keep it fresh with the music we performed and have some buzz from new releases.” 

Simply put they think that to make an impact through live shows sometimes you need to “perform less locally… Then when you’ve got a fire EP coming go HAM [sic] on a couple of shows” 

To make an impact means making yourself noticed and to have that lasting impression on people in a scene where there are so many others trying to do the same, is no easy feat. What we will say is that some of the wisest words come from those who have experienced themselves.

We’ll leave you with this little nugget from Ninajirachi, the impact you you should be comfortable with, is relative and you have to “think about how to make your music reach the people you want to impact.”

“I think it also depends on the impact you WANT to make. One’s whole career could be writing only a handful of songs that are loved deeply by a few people – that’s still impactful.” – Ninajirachi

You can catch them all talking shop at EMC Sydney this week and beyond, check the full program here.