Terry Edwards

This is a video of Terry Edwards. He played sax on the Fierce And The Dead record. Hes bloody good. Google him now :)

Anthrax - Celebrated Summer (Husker Du cover)

Anthrax cover a Bob Mould song. Massive win.

Should I make my new album free/pay what you want?

IMG_0493, a photo by mattstevensguitar on Flickr.

Pay what you want has worked really well for me - it has allowed me to build an audience I never expected, it has been great. I've been very lucky.

My thoughts on all this is that you should use "Pay What You Want" as a way of building an audience, as free marketing. In the early days of your career it is very hard to get people to even listen to your music, let alone buy it. I've been there, when you haven't got audience/radio/podcast/blogpress support you are just another person asking listeners to "check out my music" - I hate that phrase.

The idea is that you exchange the download for the audience's interest and an email address. Hopefully then at some time in the future they will decide to pay for something you sell and tell their friends about your music. I seems like an honest exchange, especially when there is so much music out there at the moment

When I started making my my music available "Pay What You Want" I had no idea that the music would a couple of years later be reasonably successful and I'd end up with print press, playing quite big gigs and thousands of downloads. I didn't expect that and I'm hugely grateful to my audience for making that happen. It worked :)

So what now - someone emailed me the other day saying "established acts like you giving away albums spoils it for the rest of us trying to get going". I asked everyone on Facebook and the response was mixed, some said I should some said no.

Well first of all I'd say I'm not really an established act, I'm very obscure and why does what I do relate to anyone else's business model? I want as many people to hear my music as possible, this is what most musicians want.

I would like music earnings to cover recording costs and help with my living expenses, this seems realistic - this is what happens at the moment. But I am not entitled to anything, it is all down to if the audience likes the music. Musicians who say they are entitled to payment for music because they have worked hard at it, even if no one likes it are crazy. Nobody owes you anything, if anyone likes your music you are very very lucky.

Even if I do decide to make the next album a paid download I am aware a free option will be available via torrents/DL sites within a small amount of time as my music is freely available on torrents now. This is good - free promotion! I'd be very worried if Ghost wasn't on the torrent sites. If your music isn't torrented it means no one wants to share it. Not good.

Artists should take torrenting as a compliment. So perhaps making paid downloads a main feature of my website is a good idea, with the option of a free version still being available somewhere online. However if people do decide to torrent don't get their email address and I can't build a relationship with them for years to come - email addresses/relationships are worth a lot over the career of a musician.

One thing I am concerned about is that "Pay What You Want" is becoming less remarkable. Perhaps to be interesting and remarkable it is time to say this album is £5 and that's how much it is. Is an album that is charged for of more value to the listener?

If I don't charge for Relic I'll probably charge full price for the next one, they're not cheap records to make. I think we're at that point now, the audience are there, the torrents are available. I think it is almost at the point to charge for my music rather than do "Pay What You Want". Change is good.

Do some audience members perceive that if an album is available free that it is not very good?

What do you think?

A brand new website - thoughts and feedback please :)

110429-Matt live-023, a photo by mattstevensguitar on Flickr.

I've been busy building a new website - have a look here and let me know what you think:

www.mattstevensguitar.com

Thanks for having a look :)

Matt Stevens - Album 3 - Relic - promo 1

Cannon And Ball - together we'll be ok

Says it all :)

The End Of The Road

IMG_0449, a photo by mattstevensguitar on Flickr.

That's it then, Ghost gigs over. No more acoustic gigs for a while and next time it will probably be a very different set list, even though I've been playing a couple of "Relic" songs in the current set (Rusty and Scapegoat) and they seem to work well live. I'm not sure how much of the new material will work with just guitar to be honest, the new stuff has some more complex arrangements. It was nice to put up a live album to end it all - thanks loads to everyone who has purchased it, I've been amazed by the response - you can get it (free/pay what you want) at:

http://mattstevens.bandcamp.com/album/live-in-blackpool

I'm really pleased to say the final gig in Islwyn was one of the best Ghost ones, great crowd and I got to play a couple of songs (Big Sky and Get Carter) with my friend Alun Vaughan (some of you may know him from prog rock beat combo Panic Room) on bass, he is brilliant. A lovely small appreciative audience and the other acts Andy Long, Dr Lewney, Alun Vaughan on great solo bass and the wonderful guitar duo Chris and Dan Fry were all great. A wonderful way to finish it off. I was so pleased so many people made the effort to come and see me so far from home and I still find it amazing when they know the songs.

I've a couple more gigs booked for later in the year. I'd like to have some other musicians with me for them, if possible or they may be guitar and pedals gigs - perhaps for a one off gig next year? I'm not sure really. Any volunteers? :)

For months all I've been doing is worrying about getting theses gigs done, I'm happy it is all over so I can think about finishing the next album for the autumn and look back on the year I've had at the half way point.

In the last 7 months I've played with Barclay James Harvest, Panic Room, Godsticks, Alan Reed, Touchstone, Credo, Also Eden, Fish, From Great Height, Jump and loads more. I've played to 20 people some days and hundreds the next. In London Islington Academy, Kingston, Blackpool Electric Garden Festival, Brighton Great Escape Festival, Mattfest, Rotherham, Islwyn in Wales, Rushden and all sorts of other places - Leisure Centres, to pubs to festivals to big london venues and the wonderful Peel. I've met hundreds of amazing, lovely people and some people who thought I was an idiot playing along to backing tapes (surely if I were using tapes I'd make them perfect every time?). Classic Rock Prog, Alarm Press, Progression, CRS,Acoustic, R2 all picked up on my stuff as did some wonderful podcasters and bloggers, I've been very lucky. Its interesting how opinion polarises as your music becomes more well know (and I'm still very obscure). Some people really got it and some people said "why won't he sing" - not everyone is going to like what you do and I'm very thankful for the wonderful people who do get it.

Stuff I've learned:

Book Train Tickets in advance
Some promoters are better than others
Take photos
You can get away with a lot if you look like you know what you are doing
People are nicer than you think
Twitter gets people to gigs.
Be careful what you wish for
Don't google yourself after a support slot :)

For the Relic gigs I want to do a week tour rather than spreading them out, if possible. We'll see, depends how the album is received really.

I'm going to be offline for a while to work out some new stuff and start again with the new music. And do some Fierce And The Dead stuff.

See you soon and thanks lots,.

So long and thanks for all the fish.


Matt Stevens
http://www.fierceandthedead.com
http://www.mattstevensguitar.com
http://www.spencerparkmusic.com
mattstevensguitar@btinternet.com