New Zealand Music Month in May has been running for seven years and is a big event in the Kiwi calendar. It's thirty one days of gigs, excuses for mid week parties and people from Kaitaia to Dunedin can be spotted sporting black t-shirts with hypnotic white circles on the front. Kiwi FM will have already crammed 31 Bands in a Box and it's not even the end of May yet. You can watch the live perfomances of NZ acts such as The Shrugs, DDub, Tahuna Breaks and Minuit online, all crammed into the Auckland studio where I do my live Ms Behaviour Files.

We are very fortunate in New Zealand that talented local artists can get radio airplay, as overseas it can prove far harder for indies to make it to the airwaves. New Zealand Music Month in May has been running for seven years and is a big event in the Kiwi calendar. It's thirty one days of gigs, excuses for mid week parties and people from Kaitaia to Dunedin can be spotted sporting black t-shirts with hypnotic white circles on the front. Kiwi FM will have already crammed 31 Bands in a Box and it's not even the end of May yet. You can watch the live perfomances of NZ acts such as The Shrugs, DDub, Tahuna Breaks and Minuit online, all crammed into the Auckland studio where I do my live Ms Behaviour Files.

We are very fortunate in New Zealand that talented local artists can get radio airplay, as overseas it can prove far harder for indies to make it to the airwaves.I agree with Cory Doctorow author, and Boing Boing blogger who believes that the greatest threat to artists is not piracy, but obscurity. So how can artists especially ones far from the international music 'scene' make those vital connections that underpin any successful career?

If you have a plan that relies on being 'discovered' by someone influential and signing a million dollar deal, then you may as well pin your hopes on winning the lottery or a reality TV series. Behind every 'overnight success' is usually about a decade of hard graft and networking. However, the web offers a range of new ways to bring musicians together. You can jam remotely or use creative commons licenses to remix tracks by people you may never meet In Real Life. It's not just about a making music page on My Space, you can now blog, twitter and develop a direct relationship with fans.

In fact Ken Kelly founding Editor of Wired Magazine thinks that you only need the micro-patronage of 1,000 True Fans to support a solo artist's career. "I am suggesting there is a home for creatives in between poverty and
stardom. Somewhere lower than stratospheric bestsellerdom, but higher
than the obscurity of the long tail. I don't know the actual true
number, but I think a dedicated artist could cultivate 1,000 True Fans,
and by their direct support using new technology, make an honest
living."

So what is my current pick from the webtop for indie musos to avoid the curse of obscurity? I have already covered some great tools and tips in my column Indie Music, and Mashable invites you to Rock on with 12 of the Best Music Social Networks. All offer new ways of artists to find new fans, with some offering to share revenue as well. The only one that I had heard of before was Last Fm which also feeds relationship music mapping TuneGlue which is fun to play with.

Bedroom musicians who want to collaborate in real time can go to JamNow. Artists who are looking to create a virtual group to collaborate with can visit Ultimate Band. The site calls itself a Musicians Marketplace with the sole purpose of helping your find artists for your creative project. Webtop musos can while away hours looking through the immense Go2Web20.net directory. Select the Music tag and roll your mouse over the logos for more music making and sharing tools than you can possibly get through in one sitting. I plan to spend a few hours soon in this Web 2.0 data mine.

The amount of connections and fans you make, will ultimately dictate whether you take the path to fame or the highway to obscurity. Don't just wait for a special time like Music Month to promote one big gig, you need to work at finding enough true fans to do what you love all of the time. Be proud to stand out of the crowd, and avoid obscurity by any means you can.

Read more MsBehaviour Files

As well as being TBI's strategist, Helen Baxter a.k.a. MsBehaviour runs dance-music label TMet Recordings, 3D animation company Mohawk Media and has a fortnightly slot on National Radio called 'Virtual World'.

29/05/08