Musicians’ Resources

Below is a list of website resources that I’ve depended on over the years as a musician, band member, band manager and audio engineer.

General

OneMusic – A well rounded informational site from BBC that includes tons of useful tutorials on things like band promotion, buying a PA, designing a website, recording, etc. I’ve spent a few hours reading a bunch of their articles and got a lot out of it.

Sound On Sound – An online magazine that covers all things audio. It has reviews on all the latest equipment and articles on mixing and master as well as other things. It’s a “must read” for anyone serious enough and wants to keep up on the industry.

Taxi – Helps unsigned bands, artists, and song writers get record deals, publishing deals, and placement in films and TV shows.

Music Gear Retailers

Musiciansfriend – The extensive online musical and audio equipment catalog on line. This is the first place I check for gear and for gear reviews. I’ve gotten various products here and they’re real quick with delivery.

zZounds – A competitor to Musiciansfriend that sometimes has lower prices.

Music123 – Another online music store like Musiciansfriend.

Sweetwater – Good products and good prices.

Audio Depot – A decent variety of equipment at low prices.

Cheap Band Gear – Bottom of the barrel gear when you just cant afford the higher quality stuff. Good prices for the starving musician.

Ebay – Used gear is still usable gear. I’ve gotten several of my studio odds and ends through this rout, including my M-Audio ProjectMix, Epiphone Les Paul Bass, MXL 3000 mic and more.

CraigsList – A great place to find stuff for dirt cheap, but you need to keep searching regularly to find the goods. I picked up a set of 4 10″ PA speakers for $100 this way.

Audio Engineering

Tweakheadz Lab – This is a great resource that I used when I was first learning audio engineering. Tons of great articles on a variety of different studio related subjects.

Drew’s Equalizer And Frequency Equalization Tutorial – The website is one of the ugliest I’ve seen, but the information on EQ is golden.

Desktop Music Handbook – A great guide written by the makers of CakeWalk, but pretty universal for audio recording.

Guitar Effects FAQ

Band Promotion

Reverb Nation – One of the more popular music websites communities that let you build a page and promote your music. You can also get a widget for your FaceBook page.

PureVolume – For promotion, advertising, and posting mp3’s.

SongVault – Based on a multiple tier system that lets listeners vote on their favorite songs. Once you get into the final tier, your song becomes archived and part of the SongVault online radio catalog. We’ve got a few songs on there doing very well right now, 2 of which are in the finals.

iMeem – Another music community to show your stuff. It lets you build your own page and use imbedded players on other websites.

SNOCAP – Provider of digital licensing and copyright management services for digital music.

MySpace – They have setups specifically for bands. Networking is key here. You can put together a playlist of your songs so visitors can listen to your music.

YouTube – The easiest way to to this is to just upload an audio file and a picture to represent the song. You can be more creative and do some low budget videos and edit them up for the songs. I did some filming in my basement for a couple of songs and with some creative editing I created some pretty decent videos. You can use movie editing software such as iMovie or Final Cut Express.

iLike – Another way to get your music recognized with listener votes.

Garage Band – Lets you build your own page to feature your music. The focus is on music community where artist review each other.

BandName – Register your band name. I don’t know how this validates you other than putting your band on a list, but why not?

Music Communities

iComposition – This was the first place I featured my music back in 2004. It’s a community of Mac using musicians who post, listen, and comment on songs.

MacJams – Very similar to iComp and has been around for just as long.

MacIdol – Post, listen and comment on music.

Logic Pro Help – Essential message board and resource for any Logic users. I visit at least once a day and post every once in a while. Don’t expect much feedback on songs though. This is mainly for aspiring to pro audio engineers.

Sonic Garden – Post, listen and comment on music.

Music Mates – Classifieds for musicians.

BandMix – Classifieds for musicians with a nicer layout, but you can only contact people if you upgrade to paid membership.

Building A Home Studio

FoamByMail.com – Decent prices for sound treatment and offers more colors than the standard boring dark gray.

Green Glue – The industry standard in soundproofing.

Super Sound Proofing – More sound treatment solutions a reasonable prices.

Live Preparation

The Studio At 55 – This specific of my area only, but you can do a local search for similar facilities.

Writing

Quick Guide to Song Structure – Know the rules before you break them. There are standard song structures and this site breaks it down into distinct categories.

Thesaurus.com, Dictionary.com, Rhyme Dictionary, and RhymeZone – These are all absolute essentials to lyric writing. They’ve gotten me out of a bind to many times to count.

CD Duplication and Distribution

Disc Makers – The one stop shop for mixing, mastering, CD design, duplication, packaging, and merchandise. Very affordable prices for limited printings and package deals.

CD Baby – An online distribution for CD’s and digital downloads. There’s a whole band community atmosphere with ratings and free websites to promote your band.

TuneCore – The place to go to get your music online in stores like iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody and more.

Custom Merchandise

VistaPrint – A online printshop that lets you upload designs and create t-shirts stickers and more. The initial printing can be expensive, but second printings are less. This is where I had window stickers made with our logo on it.

Zazzle – Print shirts and other products with a custom logo on it.

CafePress – Lets you set up shop online with custom products like shirts and hats with your own logo or design. You can mark up the already high prices to make some profit or leave it be to get advertising out in the public.