Bob Findlay...Blues Rock from Tasmania

Despite the almost unbelievable access to the globe at the click of a button there are obvious ‘hazards’ to be taken into account prior to ones’ first gig at Madison Square Gardens a week after discovering how to switch the computer on.

Firstly if you are able to do this, with your limited background in computing skills, then so can a rather large amount of others.

Many artists seem almost overwhelmed to the point of gluttony when presented with these new avenues of reaching a global audience often to the point of completely losing their musical focus only to find themselves several years later with rather a lot of internet aquaintances, an awful lot of internet music site addresses and three songs that are “in pre-production.” …….whatever that is!

In my case I was guilty on the first two counts. Any music site that was free, I signed up to. Any ‘friend request,’ I accepted. Towards the middle of 2008 I decided & announced that I was going to ‘centralise’ my music to ReverbNation.

There were reasons that I chose ReverbNation. It offers very specific and in-depth statistics; who’s listening to what & from where, percentage of song-plays, who’s reading your messages and so forth. It also offers outstanding internet promotional tools. In addition the site is transparent in that it can’t be ‘rigged’ by the artist (why one would want to, is beyond me).

Without a great deal of effort on my part I soon rose to the dizzying heights of #63 in the rock charts there in a field of close to 30,000. Very soon I inadvertently discovered the ‘knack’ to it. It is heavily dependent on communication with supporters and their participation. This discovery came when I didn’t visit the site for a few weeks and discovered on returning that I had dropped to position # 500-plus in the rock charts.

I was & am well-satisfied with my previous #63 ranking there I decided that, as they do say on the site, ones’ rankings are no guarantee of success.

Since then I also started up the adventurously named “Bob Findlay Music Page” on Facebook. Although primarily a ‘social’ site, after some investigating I discovered that it offered some handy functions as far as promotion, feedback and recruitment.

From the “Bob Findlay Music Page” on Facebook I am able to link directly to my previously neglected iLike account. From here I could post my songs directly onto my ‘personal’ page on Facebook and send songs to friends and supporters. My updates on iLike were also automatically transferred to the “Bob Findlay Music Page.”

I have found this to be a much easier and, more importantly, less intrusive means of communicating with those who choose to listen as opposed to sending out updates partly in order to maintain ones’ rankings. (Fess-up, we’ve ALL done it at some point). There are no rankings involved. It also allows a much easier, more direct and more personal avenue for supporters (and critics) to leave a comment.

A short time after this I went back on my word of a few months earlier and parted with a small amount of cash in order to release my first digital album ‘Blind Horse’ in late December, 2008, on iTunes and Amazon. Purely as an experiment I have released four singles through different distributors. I am yet to track their progress however it is much more financially ergonomic to release albums as opposed to singles.

My second album, ‘Renegade,’ was released a few weeks later.