The Samurai and the Sword - Debunking the Myth of Music in Japan

The latest hustle to indie artists is pitching Japan as a gold mine as far as music sales and touring. Is this really true? Let’s use common sense.

Japan has a lot of bands (local and foreign) competing for venues and radio station time. It’s actually more competitive there than it is in the states. The Japanese give their start-up artists more attention than American radio stations do.

There are American promotional outlets promising that your music will get heard on Japanese radio but they have no way to track it. You should ask if the radio station has independent charting and how often do they send reports to the band of airplay and charting.

The “Big Three” (Time Warner, BMG and Sony) have always been the gatekeepers in Japan as far as American music is concerned. It’s not like they are going anywhere, anytime soon.

The best way to get your music in Japan is by internet promotion. The Japanese are really great when it comes to using technology. You might want to hit message boards, chat rooms and web rings in that country to expose your music to Japanese consumers. A lot of being exposed in Japan can come through grass roots efforts.

So before you spend all that “promotional money” just to get your music played, look at the various options that you can use with little or no money to get your music noticed in Japan.

 

Government Funding of Music 5

As an Indie artist, you cannot afford to get involved in the politics of arts funding. Congress is trying to figure out ways to make it hard for indie artist on the Internet regarding taxes and music so here is what you do.

Use technology to collaborate and create with other musicians.

Learn how to merge live recording technology with VST technology.

Use the internet as a virtual office for most of your affairs (record label, selling CD’s, press releases, etc)

Take advantage of the free lessons as far as instruments on the internet. Use Google to find these sites. Many of them are interactive.

Share the resources with other musicians. Have a resource section on your web page and join as many web rings as you can.

Don’t depend on the government, a large conglomerate or a record label to fund you. Usually, there’s some catch behind it. Take the time to establish your independence and pass the knowledge along to others. Remember, you’re INDEPENDENT!

Government Funding of Music 4

At the beginning of the 1980’s, the government had completed its mission concerning Fine Arts programs and especially music. The goal was to provide funding for expressive arts program and then monitor or censor those programs. Basically, the man defined what art was supposed to send like and look alike.

Only a few people in the Fine Arts community saw what we call down South “the okie-doke”. Most people were fooled into thinking that the government would be fair in this relationship. The government, acting out the role of “pimp” started cutting back on funding for the arts. All of a sudden, overnight, artists cried foul not knowing that when you get in bed with a smooth operator, you’re bound to get burned.

Schools started struggling. The striving programs that replaced your neighbor sitting on the porch playing guitar ad chewing Wrigley’s was all of a sudden gone. In the music world, bands were trying to find innovative ways to record music without hiring horn sections and full rythmn sections (see Tom Tom Club and Culture Club).

Debates came up in Congress that shocked the public on the debate on whether to fund Fie Arts programs or not. The Reagan, Bush and Clinton Administrations’ cast an eye on terminating most arts funding.

So as an artist, how can you not depend on government funding of the arts and establish your career? The answer is in the next article.

 

Government Funding Of Music 3

The late 1960’s and 1970’s saw a host of non-profits created for the arts, especially music. In schools, especially in the inner cities, they started creating expressive arts programs, followed by the government writing the guidelines on what should be in an expressive arts program. Schools started receiving funds to have full bands, choirs, orchestras and jazz bands.

The trick was to find out what they allow musical institutions to do and what not to do. Music programs taught the students how to play an instrument but they didn’t teach them about the music business. The career track during this time was for most kids to become low-paid music teachers instead of artists that had clout.

By using this method, the government could monitor and secretly censor programs that didn’t fit in with funding guidelines. In other words, the government defined what is to be funded and what’s not to be funded!

But artists didn’t care. They saw this as easy money to do what they wanted to do. Most artists only went as far as having an impact in the community and that’s it.

But as Rick James says, when you’re standing on the top, there’s really no place to go but down. The 1980’s would signal the beginning of the end of the “gravy days” when the government and the Fine Arts community secretly would meet for midnight passion under the deception of a love affair that would last forever!

 

 

The Government’s Funding of the Arts 2

The U.S. Government and Fine Arts are strange bedfellows and it’s all rooted in the 1960’s.

Before then, most schools were lucky to have a music program. Most musicians learned their craft while playing or through private instruction in their neighborhoods. They would go on to form rock, doo-wop or soul groups, usually with one of the member’s semi-sharp in music composition. There were no grants that they could get and many times, they had to rehearse in neighborhood garages. There were no recreation centers or city complexes to go to.

 

Because of the upheaval of the 1960’s, most artists wanted to make statements. They found ways to do more with less and before you know it, the whole world was listening. How did these guys do this when they started out with no arts programs and nothing!

 

Well, as always, when the government sees a good investment, they invest! To control the exploding arts scene, the government made funding the arts as a part of community revitalization programs which meant that the U.S. government would fund arts programs and provide block grants to communities. This is where your hippie musicians come in because they took full advantage of the program. Many hippies went from condemning the government, to being paid by them to being millionaires overnight.

It was the government’s way of controlling and censuring the arts subliminally.

Stay tuned for part 3!

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