From Musician To Artist

It's super scary to walk into the studio and show the engineer your song. Pitching to the producer! I've seen this battle from both sides, I've been an artist pitching my music, and I've also had hundreds of artists play me their song for the first time before we begin recording.  This episode is all about the role of the producer, what are they thinking while you're pitch...

In working with hundreds of artists in the studio I've made some observations around the different ways we view life. More over, I've noticed we all have different drives, and our emotions are attached to different values. Smart Goals Download - https://www.dottedeight.com/artist I've categorised them in this episode by being past, present, and future. Past - Memories and legacy is...

I sat down with local artists Megan Woods, to chat about her goals! We discovered that her main goal for the next three months was to get her website published and working for her. So in this episode we ran this goal through the SMART goal method to make sure this goal is; SPECIFIC, MEASURABLE, ACTIONABLE, REALISTIC, & TIME BOUND. Checking your goal against these guidelines ensures your goal c...

Should your studio recording match your live performance? This is a common question I work through with artists in the studio all the time. Weighing up that natural approach that feels honest, vs the produced approach that enhances your music and gives you a more polished result. Like everything creative, I don't think there's a right and wrong, but there certainly is an ideal way for YO...

We all have desires for our music, ideals that we would love to achieve one day. Today I wanted to help you walk towards those ambitions by setting smart goals. Smart goals are a way to qualify your goal and make sure it's something you WILL be able to achieve. Smart Goal Download - https://www.dottedeight.com/artist You goal could be anything from, getting more gigs, to getting 10,000 stream...

Lockdowns are extremely tough on the music artist. When venues close down, love music is the first thing to go! It seems like an uncertain road back to the regular, dependable gig.. So what can we do to make sure our music survives the lockdown? How can we lock down proof our music, and keep walking forwards when the world around us stops? Thats what I'm chatting about in this episode. This i...

Music videos are a great way to grow your audience. Video is such an engaging form of media, and it's set up to work across pretty much all of the social platforms. It's much, much easier to get someone to watch your video, then to go across to Spotify and listen to your music. I've been getting into video a lot lately, and I really believe in it's power to grow your music and...

I'm privileged to be able to work with a ton of great songwriters, and work on a lot of great songs here in the studio. This has helped me to see what makes a great song, and what takes away from a great song. While it's difficult to simply teach, 'how to write a good song'  or 'how to write a hit song'. I can teach about a few common songwriting mistakes I see, and t...

Don’t stop ‘being’ thankful, but we need to shift our responses from simply being ‘thank you’ I’m talking about reply to comments on your social posts (Facebook, instagram, or YouTube comments). Somebody writes in a tells you how much they love your new song, the easiest response is ‘thank you so much’. What we don’t realise is that this is killing the conversation! It’s not giving us a chance to...

A question I get asked all the time is 'how do I get my music on Spotify' or 'can you help me get my music on to Spotify' So in this video I do exactly that. I explain the entire process, and share my screen as upload a song to Spotify and Apple Music. The process seems daunting because it's different to everywhere else we upload, Instagram or YouTube we just upload our mu...

This week I chat with local artist James Sutherland about using Instagram as a music artist promotion tool. We also have a dive into his latest single and chat about his song writing process, his studio experience, and take a look at the production of his latest single. I wanted to highlight James in this 'Artist Wins series because he just has such a good attitude around being an independent...

I explain my full recording process! From preproduction through tracking / recording, editing, mixing and mastering. What is the engineer / producer doing? And what can you (the artist) expect during the recording process. Every studio will probably approach this slightly differently, this is a detailed unpacking of how I approach recording so that you can get a clearer picture of what happening b...

Apple Music have rolled out spatial audio (dolby atmos) to their playback systems. How does dolby atmos work? How does it deliver a spatial sound to headphones? In this episode I explain how it all works, and look into the potential impact this could bring to the music industry for independent artists I've been really enjoying the immersive experience from spatial audio through my Nuraphones,...

How do I write my artist bio? Probably a question you've asked yourself right? Well how do you go about writing a good artist bio? Where do we need our music bio? Instagram, Spotify, Youtube, EPK.. It's almost everywhere. I notice a lot of artists find it easier to write in the the 3rd person, because it's difficult to talk yourself up all the time. While there are good benefits for...

What's the next stage for your live show? What is a better gig for you? We're all trying to get better gigs, get bigger gigs, or move to the next level with our live performances. In this episode I have a look at the progression of the live performance. It starts with you picking up and instrument for the first time, and goes all the way through to that stadium tour. This episode is help...

Should I record at home? Or should I be hitting up a pro studio? For a lot of us this is one of those burning questions. We hear of a lot of artists getting great sounding recordings from home, we know the gear is relatively cheap, and it's fun!  I am certainly not against home studios, and recording from home, I think there is absolutely an opportunity for that! and sometimes it makes good s...

Getting paid for your music can be difficult! I have a bunch of ideas that might help you earn some income from your music. Some different ways you can release your music, or promote your music in a way your true fans will WANT to pay for! It's almost less about your music, and more about the experience you can offer with your music. It's actually almost all about giving/selling your fan...

Take your songwriting to the next level! Grab my free songwriting guide here! https://www.dottedeight.com/artist What do your fans want? They want an experience with your music, they want to be able to feel something when they listen to your music. Perhaps they don't know that yet, but it's actually the feeling and connection we have with music that draws us in, and more importantly, kee...

How can we do business as a music artist? how can we make music our business? and can we do it my keeping our music as art, and not let business ruin that. Business is a mind set, in this episode I chat about approaching your music career like a business, in that you want to serve and value your customers, in our case, our audience or fanbase. If we can see our music as a valuable experience that...

I love both YouTube and Spotify! I think they are both excellent content platforms. I wanted to do a comparison discussing some of the pros and cons around growing your audience on these platforms. Both Spotify or Youtube are great for having long lasting reach for your music, but both of them are a slow burn, requiring patience and planning when building them up. In this episode I chat about 3 ma...

Adding production elements to our songs can be a bit scary, where do we start? How do we learn these production tips? I think it’s helpful to be thinking about production during the songwriting phase. If we can write our songs with production in mind, we can be more confident in finishing songs! Because we know that production will help it sound complete! In this episode I chat about the importanc...

Adding extra parts to our songs can bring them to life, and give that element of depth and width that we’re used to hearing in our favourite songs. Free Songwriting Guide - https://www.dottedeight.com/artist Songwriting in the box episode - https://youtu.be/_wTYOrst9pc  In this episode I chat about how and where we should be adding these parts. It’s all about writing a musical story, so that witho...

Continuing our songwriting series, we’re taking a look at Lyrics & Harmony. We’ve been talking about songwriting inside the box, and to a set of guidelines that make sure we’re finishing our songs and connecting with our audience. Make sure you download my free song writing guide, which follows along with this series, and sets up a songwriting template that you can work within. Download link h...

In this episode I’m unpacking how we write story into our melody and rhythm.  Download Link - https://www.dottedeight.com/artist Writing 'Inside the box' episode - https://youtu.be/_wTYOrst9pc This is the second part of a four part series on songwriting. In the previous episode I looked at an approach to songwriting ‘inside the box’ so that we can make sure our songs effectively carry ou...

This episode unpacks an approach to songwriting that makes the whole process easier. It’s about setting up some guidelines around songwriting that ensures our songs connect with our audience by carrying our story effectively. Songwriting Guide - https://www.dottedeight.com/artist We understand the concept of thinking outside the box. This means coming up with something new right? When we think abo...