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.