In the roughly two months that I have been following any lead I can find about music and the music scene in Pittsburgh, I have made a few observations worth noting:
A. Initially, I thought the organization of Pittsburgh’s music-related resources (bands, venues, fans, production companies, etc.) would be the key to reaching a more active and mutually prosperous music scene. Although I have not entirely abandoned this goal, I have found that there is a fair amount of organization in place already. Bands and venues have intricate web pages and resources. There are thorough listings for shows in the area – these are slightly harder to find but mostly logical and accessible. Surprisingly, I have found at least a half dozen blogs already and some of them are very good.
B. There are a few things I’m beginning to realize do not work. Myspace can still be used as a way to network with other bands and venues, but fan traffic and motivation is not promising to say the least. The same can be said about the blogs (…the other blogs, of course). Another thing is that most venues in Pittsburgh, although well organized, care about money not music. They want to know that a band is going to bring in people because those people will buy stuff. A new band looking for exposure cannot appeal to their sympathy. Being able to make a fan commitment (around 50-200 people in most cases) is what venues want.
For the time being, I will continue to search for resources. However, I will be looking into anything and everything as long as it is related to understanding the Pittsburgh music fan. I need to find out what they read, where they go on the internet, and the venues that draw a devout following.
2 comments:
Have you tried looking at this site: http://www.acousticafe.org/ It's not terrific, in that the discussion board and "tip jar" (link that was supposed to give you tips on the music industry) looked more promising than they actually turned out to be. But there's a good list of venues, magazines and other media that focuses on music in the area.
As I probably mentioned before, I don't know a ton about music venues in Pittsburgh. But I did a little research, and this production company looks pretty cool:
http://www.jokerprod.com/index.html
The guy who runs it went to Pitt, and was a D.J. at WPTS. They seem to have a decent company.
The process of finding of representation and places to share your music must be so arduous. I imagine it's a real pain compared to just creating and playing the music you want.
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