Making a Scene Presents

Making a Scene Presents Gerry Casey's Interview with Santiago Periotti of Santiago and the Soulmovers Santiago Periotti is an Argentine singer, songwriter, and guitarist whose playing brings blues grit, rock drive, and a warm, soulful edge—now focused in the London music scene. Known for his passion on stage and a sound that blends energy with feel, Santiago has built his career the old-school way...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with Tim Wagoner of The Fabulous Trutones Comin’ Back Live finds The Fabulous TruTones doing what great live bands do best: locking into a groove and then refusing to stay in one lane. The album moves effortlessly from classic blues in the spirit of the Three Kings, to the sun-baked shimmer of mid-’70s Southern California roots-rock, to the rocking edge of old-...

Making a Scene Presents - Canada Just Put Money Behind the People Who Build the Stage FACTOR’s new live music investment is more than a press release. It is a reminder that if you want a real music middle class, you do not just fund songs. You fund the ecosystem that gets those songs in front of people. There is a big difference between saying you support music and actually building a system that...

Making a Scene Presents - Reverb and Depth: How to Place Sounds in a 3D Space Flat Mixes Do Not Sound Cheap Because the Song Is Bad A lot of indie artists think their mixes sound small because they do not have enough expensive gear, enough fancy plugins, or enough studio prestige. That is the lie the old gatekeeper system sold for years. The truth is rougher and more useful. Most flat mixes sound...

Making a Scene Presents - The American Music Fairness Act Could Finally Make Radio Pay — But Indie Artists May End Up Paying a Different Price Terrestrial radio is no longer the artist-breaking machine it once was. That is exactly why this bill matters, and exactly why indie artists should be watching it closely. The Tower That Once Ruled the Music Business Is Not What It Used to Be For decades, r...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with Stacy Mitchhart Stacy Mitchhart’s musical journey began in Cincinnati, Ohio, in a house where jazz guitar masters like Wes Montgomery and Johnny Smith were always spinning on the stereo. With that kind of soundtrack in the air, it was only natural that he gravitated toward the guitar. But it wasn’t just the notes that grabbed him early—it was the performan...

Making a Scene Presents - Ticketmaster LiveNation Court Decision -When the Gatekeeper Finally Got Dragged Into Court In May 2024, the U.S. Department of Justice walked into federal court and said out loud what fans, working artists, indie promoters, and venue operators had been saying for years: the live music business was not just frustrating, it was structurally broken. The government sued Live...

Making a Scene Presents Gerry Casey's Interview with Keith Forde of Linkwells Linkwells are a four-piece indie-rock band from the scenic town of Malvern, quickly gaining attention for a sound that puts melody and classic songwriting front and center. Their music combines the anthemic lift of Britpop with a sharper modern indie edge, creating songs that feel built for singalongs without losing thei...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with The Gated Community The Gated Community is a Minneapolis-based country and bluegrass band with a mission and a pulse. Formed in 2006 by South Asian-American Yale graduate, political activist, and University of Minnesota music theory professor Sumanth Gopinath, the band has been described as “Americana to fight fascism” (Adobe & Teardrops)—a line that captu...

Making a Scene Presents - Making Recorded Music a Product Again There was a time when recorded music was the thing. The record was not the flyer. It was not the teaser. It was not the loss leader for a T-shirt, a tour, or a playlist slot. It was the product. Fans saved up for it, hunted for it, lined up for it, argued about it, and lived with it. The album sat on a shelf, in a car, in a stereo, in...

Making a Scene Presents - Touring Used to Sell Records. Now Records Exist to Sell Touring. What Happens Next? The old deal is dead For a long time, the bargain in music was pretty clear. You made records so people would care. Then you hit the road and turned that attention into ticket sales, merch money, and a bigger audience. Before streaming ate the center out of recorded music, albums were not...

Making a Scene Presents - Parallel Compression: Making Your Mix Punch Without Killing Dynamics The Trick That Sounds Expensive Even When Your Studio Isn’t There is a moment almost every home-recording artist runs into. You finish a mix. It sounds clean. It sounds balanced. Nothing is obviously broken. But when you play it next to a record that hits you in the chest, yours feels polite. The kick do...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with Katy Vernon Katy was born and raised in London, UK, but over the past dozen-plus years she’s become one of Minnesota’s busiest and most recognizable musicians. Blending melodic pop-folk songwriting with the twang and drive of an Americana band, Katy delivers songs that are hooky, heartfelt, and built to connect—whether she’s playing an intimate room or a b...

Making a Scene Presents - Content That Adapts: Using AI to Personalize Posts for Different Types of Fans There is a quiet little lie baked into modern music marketing, and most artists have been trained to accept it. The lie is this: one post is supposed to do everything. It is supposed to hype the hardcore fans, introduce the new people, move tickets in one city, sell merch everywhere else, wake...

Making a Scene Presents Gerry Casey's Interview with Mike Guldin Mike Guldin first picked up a guitar at age 15, and he’s spent the last 45+ years turning that spark into a road-tested blues career built in roadhouses, clubs, festivals, and theaters. A guitarist and vocalist with a deep respect for tradition and a serious love of groove, Guldin’s sound blends Chicago blues grit, Southern rock fire...

Sassparilla is a Portland, Oregon–based “punk-Americana” / roots-rock band that plays like a bar fight with a backbeat—in the best possible way. Led by singer-songwriter Kevin “Gus” Blackwell, the band blends the stomp of old American traditions with the bite and speed of punk, creating a sound that feels like hill country blues and old-time string-band music dragged into a loud, modern room and t...

Making a Scene Presents - The Suno-Warner Deal: When Big Music Stops Fighting AI and Starts Designing It Something important just happened in the music business, and indie artists need to pay attention. Warner Music Group and Suno announced a partnership built around licensed AI music. Under the deal, the companies will work on next-generation licensed models, Warner artists can opt in to AI exper...

Making a Scene Presents - The Artist-Owned Ecosystem: Replacing the Label, Distributor, and Platform The night the old deal stopped making sense It usually happens after the show. Not onstage. Not in the comments. Not when the playlist adds hit. It happens when the room is half empty, the drummer is packing hardware, somebody is folding shirts at the merch table, and the artist is looking at a pho...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with Alexis P Suter Alexis P. Suter is a three-time Blues Music Award nominee—recognized in major categories including the Koko Taylor Award and Best Soul Blues Female Artist—and one of the most commanding voices in modern blues and soul. Raised in Brooklyn in a musically gifted family, Alexis grew up with the belief that music is not just entertainment—it’s an...

Making a Scene Presents - AI-Driven Fan Journeys: Mapping Every Step From First Listen to Lifetime Fan There is a quiet tragedy happening in the modern music business, and most independent artists have been taught to call it normal. A stranger hears a song in a playlist. They like it. They tap through to a profile. Maybe they watch a clip. Maybe they save the track. Maybe they even tell a friend....

Making a Scene Presents Gerry Casey's Interview with Aleksandra Josic of Here and Everywhere Fronted by Aleksandra Josic, a vocalist audiences regularly describe as “one of the most powerful and emotional live voices in the world today,” the band has earned a reputation for performances that feel raw, immersive, and unforgettable. There’s a rare kind of honesty in what they do—no posturing, no man...

Compression in Context: Why Soloing Tracks Is Killing Your Mix There is a little button in every DAW that has wrecked more home studio mixes than bad microphones, cheap headphones, and internet “preset culture” combined. It is the Solo button. That sounds dramatic, but not by much. Every indie artist knows the move. You are deep in a mix. The vocal feels uneven. The bass feels wild. The snare is j...

Making a Scene Presents - A Buyer’s Guide to Recording Interfaces The Box That Decides Whether Your Studio Feels Fast or Feels Broken There is a certain kind of gear mistake that musicians make all the time. They obsess over microphones, plugins, monitors, and shiny rack toys, then they treat the recording interface like a boring utility purchase. That is backward. Your interface is the center of...

Making a Scene Presents an Interview with the Avery Set The Avery Set began in the early 2000s in Frankenmuth, Michigan, growing out of a close friendship between Chris (lead singer) and Jake (drummer). What started as two friends making noise quickly turned into a real band with a shared sense of purpose—writing songs, chasing shows, and building a sound that felt honest and lived-in. In 2006, th...

Making a Scene Presents - Subtractive EQ vs Additive EQ: The Secret to Clean Mixes There is a reason so many home studio mixes sound busy, cloudy, and weirdly tired even when every track is “exciting” on its own. It is not always the mic. It is not always the room. It is not always that you need some expensive boutique plugin blessed by a guy on YouTube wearing a beanie in July. A lot of the time,...