Just a recap here......I went back over the entire section on Twitter in MMM, got everything set up, and it's working great! I think the first time I went over the Twitter section I was still so overwhelmed by all the info in MMM that it didn't really sink in. MMM is definitely not a "read once", it's more like an encyclopedia, meant to be researched over and over!

Cool it is!

My son and his friend recently asked me if I would rather be a musician "back in the day" as they call it, or now. I didn't even have to think about it! Definitely now! My only regret is that I didn't really know about and pursue all this internet stuff 10 years ago. But on 2nd thought, maybe some of this stuff didn't even exsist 10 years ago? Whatever, it is here now, and I am really pumped about it! 

I never believed that "make it by 30 or your done" crap! I wrote it off as arrogance by the big money suits at the major labels, and just kept going. I never intended to be a big star anyway. Stories of backstabbing and corruption in the "big time" music biz have been around for a long time, and I decided a long time ago that I wanted to keep my career within my control and be happy to just make a living at it. While I was never offered any real major record deals, I have had a few offers that had some "promise" to them, and I always turned them down.

I've been around long enough (let's just say that I am over 30, and leave it at that!) to see the music industry go through many huge changes, and right now is about the most exciting time for the average musician who wants to do this for a living that I have ever seen. Back when I first started, about the only income producing opportunities for most musicians was doing cover tunes in a smokey bar 5 nights a week, and only if you worked your ass off, and didn't mind living in poverty.

If you wanted to do a recording, you had to save like crazy to get enough money to go into a recording studio that had a 2 track tape recorder with worn out heads, and record 2 songs in an hour, on used tape, so you could put out a 45 rpm record. Multi track recording was out there, but only in places like Hollywood and Nashville, and way out of reach for most musicians. I slobbered, drooled and dreamed when Tascam, and later Fostex came out with 8 track reel to reel machines that were still out of reach for the average working musician. Even if you could afford to get one of those machines, you still had to get everything mastered somewhere, then send the master off to a duplicating company to be pressed into records or duped onto casettes, and after spending a few thousand dollars you wound up with a box of crappy sounding recordings, and no practicle way to promote them! I still know some former musicians with unopened boxes of casettes that they never sold.

Technology and the internet have changed all of that. For what you used to spend on a "state of the art" Shure Vocal Master PA system (4 channels, 100 watts, and two collumns with 6 oval car speakers each, as I recall) you can now have a basic recording set up and pump out your finished CD, and then promote it to the world on the internet. The opportunities are endless now, for those of us lucky enough and determined enough to learn how to work it. I'm glad I've been around long enough to see indie musicians reach this era!