In my opinion, bands and musicians can't take the fan equation seriously enough, especially since making great music just isn't enough anymore. Not too many of today's musicians can be like Steely Dan or The Beatles and stop recording or not play live anymore, yet still have hits, i.e., record sales.
We might equate making money with a great show or record sales, but there are plenty of bands and musicians who would play for free just to be able to be heard by a live audience. In the beginning, the money isn't as important. The same can be said with any new business: You want to get your name out there, generate interest and yes, eventually make a few sales.
Making music today can sometimes be so focused on the business side, it ends up stripping the romanticism out of actually making music. You have to make cold calls to set up shows, mail press packages, distribute flyers and network with other bands. The fans are your customers, the clubs are your vendors and your vehicle gets the message to your customers/fans. But ask any musician or band and they will tell you those 40 minutes on stage, or hearing your song on the radio, makes all that crap worth it.
Mike Watt of The Minutemen and Firehose like to tout the term "flyering" for what they did, everything from putting out an album, sending out press kits, putting up flyers, networking and everything else that would help them make money, which they made playing live. Watt also made a point to meet the fans after every show, party at their houses, even sleep on their floors.
A good non-music example is independent filmmaker Kevin Smith. He funded and released his own movie and built a solid fan base. After what we might call being "put out by a major," his fan base was solid enough that if he was dropped by his major, he could release a movie on his own and still make some money. He's always had fan-based events, special merchandise for fans and uses the Web to keep fans updated on his projects.
In this issue, we talk with Mason Jennings; he's spent almost 10 years writing songs, building a fan base, touring and releasing his own records. Now that Jennings has signed to a major label, it can only help his music career; he's proven he doesn't necessarily need to be on a major record label because he's already done it on his own.
So be cool to your fans because word of mouth is very powerful. If they like you, they'll tell their friends. If they don't like you, they'll still tell their friends and maybe a few others, too.
We all dream of having fans - hey, I'm no different. I dream of having Rift taken off the magazine racks so fast, people scramble to get their copy. But we have to remember success takes time, patience and most importantly, win new fans one fan at a time. Then we can all be incredibly famous rock stars - or incredibly famous magazine publishers.
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