THE LONG ANSWER

In all reality, if you don't have some type of campaign strategy in place to help promote a release then you're disrespecting yourself.  How on earth are you expecting anyone to know the release is out if you don't promote it? Even if the project is absolute fire and it eventually catches some random search and gets passed along it'll never reach it's full potential, or even be mentioned when releases come up in a conversation.

​

If you don't promote the final product, two things will definitely happen:

1 - You won't be happy with the overall public reaction to the release, or lack thereof.

2 - You will have essentially insulted your own time and effort that it took to create the project.

​

Now, if you are literally making music just for yourself then of course this doesn't apply.  But if that's the case then why are you even considering putting it out?  (That question REALLY bothers the "I make music for me" types.)  At some point you're going to want a response to justify your efforts.  And if you want a response, people need to know it exists in the first place.  You can't just get mad at your "fans" and think they're sleeping on you.  Like they don't have better shit to do than be checking up on your daily happenings.  These people have lives... or at least you hope they do.  And your job is to make sure they know about this thing that you've been working on, because it took you some time to create and now you're ready to present it.  There's no presentation to make if there's no audience to receive it.  It's a rather simple concept that far too many artists seem to completely ignore.

​

One example of a good release campaign that recently popped up in my feed was for Tribe Chillin and their "Tribe Chillin EP".  These guys are very independent, and that tends to also mean low-budget or no budget.  But that didn't stop them from making a very committed, creative, and effective release campaign.  And what helped it become so successful was the fact that everyone on their team stayed on track with the overall objective, which was to promote their creative lead-up to the official release date.

​

They didn't just announce the upcoming release of the EP, they literally doubled down on the build up.  The project itself is only four songs; but they released four separate singles (one each week) to cleverly maintain the buzz for the entire month prior to the release.  These songs ended up getting passed around and soaked up by their fans with equal enthusiasm as the songs from the official EP.  So from a purely business standpoint, they cleverly used one project as bait to promote the other...  Brilliant!  They basically gave you four free appetizers in hopes that you'd come back and purchase the main course.

​

Sure, they could have dropped an eight-song EP instead.  Or had it be six songs and do the bait thing with only two singles.  We're talking art here, there are limitless ways to do it; but that's not the point.  These guys got creative with what they had and it passed off as legitimately as if they had paid an agency to do it for them.  And it's because of that kind of bold, independent spirit that I had to catch up with producer/emcee Wave MMLZ for a quick interview.

​

Here's what he had to say:

​

Q:  Does Tribe Chillin have outside management or is everything done internally?
A:  Everything we've done thus far has been all us, in house.  We don't have a manager, booking agent, or anything like that.  Just our collective resources.

 

Q:  Does anyone in the group naturally take lead as the active manager or does that role get shared among all of you?
A:  Chief has really been the most active as far as reaching out to venues and promoters and getting shows.  But I'd say we each bring something different to the table.  Everyone has, at one point or another, brought an opportunity to light.

 

Q:  I like how you guys did the lead-up to your new EP, with a new single each week leading up to the release.  Whose idea was that?
A:  I brought the skeleton of that idea to the group.  We knew we had singles to drop before the EP so we wanted to try and snowball the hype towards the drop!

​

Q:  Has the group had any talks about what you guys envision for the long term future?  Is this just for fun or do you plan on making it an exclusive career?

A:  Yea, we've had talks.  Mainly our long term focus is to stay independent and monetize how we can with a DIY attitude.  Continue to build, travel, and tour.  But at the core it's not about the money play for us.  We began for the love of the music.  Our first [gig] was a house show we set up ourselves for all our high school friends just to have fun.

 

Q:  I notice as a producer you've got quite a range both sonically and with regard to clientele.  Does producing projects for acts outside of The Tribe ever interfere with what the group is doing?

A:  Nah.  I think as a producer I try to turn the mirror on my clients and produce what THEY sound good on, rather than what my style is.  So it doesn't really effect our sound.  But as far as the abundance of projects I create, I think it does interfere a bit; even though some of those projects are with the individual members of the group.  I'm still always balancing my time.  [But] I work best handling a bunch of projects at once.