Help needed for single release ins and outs

This is

hello!

im in a band thats planning for a single to be released at christmas time.

we have several things that arent too clear to us

1. When all is done how is music presented to a radio station .. what are the official corridoors it goes through in terms of getting played, royalties etc?

2. Is distribution costly? Can it be done on a store by store basis and still chart?

3. How do most bands begin to get played on online/regional national radio...? whats the most standard approach??

so if we have studio-mastering-replication-distribution where are the biggest obstacles


over n out

PaulBrewer

What do you hope to achieve with the single release , This is ?

PMI

As Paul said whats the bigger picture?

1: Christmas time = westlife or some other million selling international acts releasing at the same time so where as you might of only needed 500 to chart on a boring 2nd week in Feb you now need mahooosive amounts of sales to even stand a chance of hitting top 40

2: Store wise, you have to remember that not all stores are going to be counted as they arnt in the game. In this day and age you need digi downloads and stores and everything else too....

3: All Radio is run by only a few people and they issue the playlists to the radio stations and they stick to it, the playlists are/were run (back handers) by record companies play our artistes and off ya go....

4: how big is your fan base? how many people do you play to on a regular basis? 1k-2k-3k people a week? or 20?

5: PR = most expensive side of the game, how to get your band into peoples faces, some companies will give it a bash for ya for maybe 10-15k but then its up to how good you are and how good your songs are as they cant polish a turd they can just put you out there either to make it or be slaughtered.

6: If the track goes top 20 make sure you have a vid ready as TV are gonna want it which is more dosh again estimate 1st vid 4-8k ish?!? dont properly.

7: fingers are aching im stopping typing, Pauls the man for the job on this one, also give us a listen to what your thinking of throwing out there

madtheory

Great post PMI, you've not left anything out there!!

I think this should be point number 1, 2 and 3:

PMI wrote: »

how big is your fan base? how many people do you play to on a regular basis? 1k-2k-3k people a week? or 20?

The answer will tell you how much to invest, or if it's just a vanity project.

This is

I understand what a playlist is and what record companies do everyone knows that but there is never the same 30 songs played all day on every station, even though they all have similiar cash rollin playlists.

what i was curious to understand was how bands on indie labels get onto Radio off peak and get played regularly? is it requests? is it good contacts? is it after they do an "in studio" and gain a relationship with the station? (ex Phantom).

the song is bein recorded and released for charity.

we are having the single available on a local scale and so we want local radio play primarily but want to try and get national and online radio play so long as we understand how to go about it

The digital release will happen simultaneously through whoever is the best to look after that theres tons of online companies around.
that will make it easier for local ppl to buy it.

its not a vanity project, its a combined effort to raise money for a charity we hope to raise a bit of awareness for and what I wanted to know was

how do we make contact with radio stations when not on the playlists, is there times of the day shows etc that have an open door?

how songs become registered to chart
i.e. what regulations/standards need to be adhered to?

how the money comes back, particularly from the digital companies and the local distribution...i mean you dont turn up looking for money at the store so how do they get it back to the charity?

This is

Paul,

we hope to get the charity exposed on a regional scale with this single. the radio play will help this enormously because the charity will be plugged before every play.
it will be 2 bands and a singer songwriter collaberating on the song itself and it will have a b side from each band.

we are also gonna have a launch with all proceeds going to the charity.


so any advice guys?

tweeky

The chart position in Ireland is irrelevant as A, very few people can know who is number 1 (unless they look it up on the IRMA site or buy the Sunday World....) and B, even if you are number 1 this still doesn't guarantee that radio will give you even 1 single play. ( there has been about 5 charity records at number 1 this year, can you name them, did you hear them? probably not)

If the aim is to raise cash for charity the best plan is to sell it at your launch/ gig's / local newsagent whatever and raise as much as you can. Best of luck, let us know the cause / artists and release date and we maybe can buy a copy.

madtheory

You could've told us at the start that it was a charity single... different ball game, as tweeky points out...best of luck with it!! I've done a few of these, it's all about local promo. If you local radio DJ likes it, he might pass it on to one of the national DJs, they all know each other, pretty much.

shayleon

Great post PMI!

Guess you are recovering from your b-day in Curra !

shayleon

From my experience, radio is usually quite indifferent to local music UNLESS you know someone at the station. If you do - you can release rubbish, and they will play it. Better yet - have some twit from the station play on the album, and you are guaranteed radio play!

If this is a known charity and THEY will push the single, you stand a chance, but if you just send a single by yourself, it's a tough stupid reality.

My guess is that radio stations in Ireland are being sponsored by the big USA labels to play their ****e. Hopefully I am wrong.

PMI

shayleon wrote: »

Great post PMI!

Guess you are recovering from your b-day in Curra !

Ha, yeah hope we didnt wake anyone