Releasing music online - advice needed

I've no real experience in doing this kind of thing, so I'm hoping someone here might be able to lend some advice...

My band have been in the studio and we're looking to release a two-track single once all the mixing and mastering has been done. Experience tells me that getting a run of CDs pressed up is not only a risky venture in this day and age, but I'm also conscious it's massively wasteful and a rather boring way to get our music out to people at gigs.

What I'm thinking instead is to come up with an alternative method - something that involves a physical object but not a CD that people will just rip and then file or throw away, and not just giving people access to a download, which kind of feels value-less to me.

We hit upon the idea of making up fortune cookies to sell at gigs. In the fortune cookie would be a download code and some "scavenger hunt / geocaching" instructions on how to get to a local public place. The idea is when you get to that place, there's a QR sticker which takes you to a secret website, you enter your code and download the tracks and possibly some other shite. Just a bit of fun, mostly to stick out from the rest of the local scene and to make people feel as though they have "worked" for their music ;-)

I'm not web-programming savvy and only have limited knowledge of things like Soundcloud and Bandcamp. I'm wondering what the best way of going about this might be? Is it even feasible without having to mess about with loads of complicated coding? Also - if people are scanning a QR with their phones, how would they get the files to go on their computer at home?

At this stage it's just for local gigging audiences. I guess later on we'd like to get it out to more people using iTunes &c. so if anyone has any tips on doing this, too that would be cool.

We hit upon the idea of making up fortune cookies to sell at gigs. In the fortune cookie would be a download code and some "scavenger hunt / geocaching" instructions on how to get to a local public place. The idea is when you get to that place, there's a QR sticker which takes you to a secret website, you enter your code and download the tracks and possibly some other shite. Just a bit of fun, mostly to stick out from the rest of the local scene and to make people feel as though they have "worked" for their music ;-)

i'm the opposite of a pro at this, but my gut tells me that while your intentions are good, this kind of thing will result in fewer people listening to your music.

yeah if your band's name is anything other than 'radiohead' I am pretty sure you will not get very many people going on that treasure hunt

even just explaining it to people might be difficult in a live setting. people are going to the bathroom, making passes at people that they'll regret in the morning, trying to order a drink, checking their phone, and they glance up and someone's in the middle of a description about fortune cookies and QR codes.

and sorry! i'm not trying to be harsh, i just think you might look back and wish you had made it simpler for people to access your music.

bandcamp and soundcloud are both good - bandcamp is better for "albums" and soundcloud better if you want to release music in dribs and drabs, imo. i'm pretty sure bandcamp allows for download codes but you couldn't really make it "secret" in the way you're describing, anyone would be able to find your album by searching for your band on bandcamp (though you could restrict them from listening to it without the code).

i don't want to pile on but yeah cute ideas like that are probably just going to reduce the number of people who actually listen to your music

dog latin's brian is a treasure. it should be studied.

xposts really, this is going to be for people who are mostly our mates, nothing else. i'm under no illusion that if released on a wider scale it would have to be done another way, although i appreciate your concerns

and we wouldn't need to explain it on stage, the instructions would be in the cookie itself.

that is a big-ass cookie

Should be a fortune calzone.

http://www.giant-fortune-cookies.com/v/vspfiles/assets/images/giant%20fortune%20cookie%20thank%20you.jpg

"dog latin's band is the best!"

dan that is actually a vajazzled chocolate vulva

We're called D1SCO ZH1VAG0. We're gonna make millions BILLIONS!

dl, I think Tracer is onto something here if you REALLY want to set yourselves apart

I'm all ears. Anyone got a good recipe?

i don't know about the scavenger hunt idea at this point but i'm all about attaching the digital download to some sort of physical object. no one wants cds and download cards are way boring.

Well, I do like the way the Hacker Farm released their music on Rubik's Cube. You have to solve it before you can scan the QR codes on its six faces and get access to tracks - so this was inspired by that idea.

I know so many bands who've shelled out for CDs which they've ended up just having to give away for free in the end. Def don't want to go down that route. And just giving people an MP3 download is a tremendously uninspired way to get yr music out to "fans". I could even imagine people buying the download on a whim but forgetting to download it the next day. So in that respect the idea of a treasure hunt among local music fans is appealing to me.

honestly you should just put it up for free (ie no download codes or QRs needed) and promote the shit out of it

create confetti with the URL to the download location on it and shoot/throw it at the audience at the end of your set

xp why though?

but even that is pretty boring these days. :/ i'm coming around to DL's idea, making music less available & harder to get stands out more than another free dl.

xp

loads of people are doing shows where you can either buy a ticket £5 to get in or buy a record £7 to get in.

maybe they've been doing this forever, but i hadn't noticed it till recently. GOOD IDEA

dj ruptur3 released a new mix that's only available at a taco shop in manhattan.

i guess it depends on what your goal is - making an impression vs. just getting your music heard. if this is really just something you're doing for your friends, you would probably know best what your friends would be willing to put up with.

more interesting / crazy / goofy format ideas pls ! :-)

You can set Soundcloud tracks to private; it gives you a non-searchable URL with non-guessable special characters. It's the same URL for everybody, so the QR code could open it. The tracks are playable on iOS devices. You can also make them downloadable.

xpost: I'm going to a gig next week where advance purchasers can exchange their ticket stubs for a free vinyl 7-inch.

n/a makes a good point, honestly this might be a better idea for a second EP or something where you're trying to get some coverage.

Print T-shirts with download codes on the tag.

download code inside a quail inside a chicken inside a turkey inside a pig inside a cow

copiturcken

n/a makes a good point, honestly this might be a better idea for a second EP or something where you're trying to get some coverage.

xposts i'm 32 years old and live in a small town. i'm pretty certain i've missed the boat as to becoming some sort of rock star and our music is far too dorky to gain any sort of mass appeal anyway. i'd be sort of embarrassed if it did. i am interested in seeing what it can do, though, and having fun with the way it's presented to people. testing people's patience and making them work a bit is a big part of it. for our first gig we just randomly smashed our instruments around for the first few minutes as we watched half the audience leave. we're playing our second gig in a record shop this weekend and we're going to start the set by just doing that croaky soft palette "arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr" noise into the mics for about 2 minutes before playing any proper songs. maybe that's pompous, but i've seen so many boring local bands just get up and play and then walk off with a tray full of cds to sell.

Print T-shirts with download codes on the tag.

― 誤訳侮辱, Tuesday, 19 February 2013 16:47 (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I like this

xpost fair enough!

a friend's band released a t-shirt that came with a download of their ep, it worked out well as far as i know.

you know how people don't buy records at shows because they spend their limited $ on drinks? it would be amazing to release a home-brewed beer that comes with a dl code (of course you could only do it at house parties/diy spaces).

I like the idea of fortune cookies with download codes inside. The idea of a scavenger hunt to get to the site, not so much.

testing people's patience and making them work a bit is a big part of it

But if this is genuinely part of your 'thing', then go for it.

fortune calzone

btw I am v interested in this dicussion but fortune calzone

you know how people don't buy records at shows because they spend their limited $ on drinks? it would be amazing to release a home-brewed beer that comes with a dl code (of course you could only do it at house parties/diy spaces).

This is actually an amazing idea.

agreed

I've seen that done - dl was on the bottle label or something iirc

testing people's patience and making them work a bit is a big part of it.

you should attach the download code to something really impractical for people to take home, like free weights or heavy chairs. scrap metal.

hipsters

can you set up a station in a corner of the venue where ppl can get the QR code tattooed onto the backs of their necks?

You should press up a vinyl copy, break it into pieces, put the pieces into the fortune cookies with a place and date for the purchasers to meet up, glue the bits together, and play the record.

sell USB sticks containing a single mp3 of 'never gonna give you up', which has the url for the real download contained in the metadata

play more than two shows

oooooh, playing off of Jordan's idea, you could take the digital cover art for your release, convert it to a .txt file, replace a bunch of the crazy letters/numbers/symbols with the url for your release and any other sort of message you want, then convert it back to a .jpg. it'll look really glitchy.

Download code on unset photographic paper

i've always thought a good idea would be to get a really cool screenprint artist to do a cool poster for your release show and actually have the download codes on the back of the poster

also these type of download cards are at least a solution for selling downloads at shows:

http://www.copycatsmedia.com/downloadcard/paperandplasticdownloadcards.html