I’ve seen a lot in my days as an mp3 blogger. I’ve seen the rise of buzz bands, the backlash against bands, mediocre bands become ‘great’, and even bands that are ‘good’ get close to no coverage. Sometimes I wonder ‘how does the modern music industry work?’

If you were starting a band today, what would you do to make sure that you ‘made it’? Do you feel like you have to ‘make the best music possible’ and expect a solid network of followers to automatically warm up to you? Or do you feel like there is a ‘game’ which must be played in order to ‘make it’?

In our modern world, 99% of ‘bands’ could be defined as groups of people who created a myspace page and uploaded 1.5 songs. These people have no vision of the modern landscape, and do not understand what it takes to grow into a ‘band worth following.’ While the ‘live performance’ is eventually a critical element in a band’s rise to prominence, there is a game which can be played on the internet to achieve success.

Your band must invade the Perception Economy. Your Band must no longer be a band. Your band must be a meme. A Meme Which Generates subMemes. These memes must be compelling, intriguing, and interesting enough for people to ‘follow’ or at least think that you are ‘worth following.’

Your band is a meme is based upon these principles:

• A meme is a unit of information.
• A meme is consumed piece of information.
• Memes are exchanged from human to human.
• There are ways to tap into a meme economy in order to make your memes seem ‘more important than they really are.’
• Your band can be ‘good’ or ‘bad in a good way’, but it must be a followable meme.

The modern band is not just about ‘music.’ The modern band must successfully win over fans by finding effective methods to generate themselves into a meme-source worth following. You are more than just your music. You are an aesthetic. You are the news that bros every where need to read about. You need to picture a world where you have at least 20K twitter followers who are eager to follow your lifestream on a meme-to-meme basis.

How do bands get successful? Are they ’smart’? Is it chance/luck? Is there a general template, or steps towards success for creating a highly ‘relevant’ band in the modern world?

There is an opportunity for your band to do this. You must take each step slowly, remember above all that your band is a meme. Some of these steps can be interchanged, and not every step is for every genre of music. However, this is generally how things work in the alt-indie genre.

Your band is a meme, which slowly injects the meme economy with new memes that make your band seem ‘more important.’ While your band will always be a group of friends/bros, the perception of your band will grow as the memes which you generate continue to seem ‘more important.’

UNDERSTANDING THE MUSIC MEME ECONOMY

While the music meme economy may seem like a daunting place to enter, if you have confidence in your band’s product, and one hit single that syncs up with the current popular & respected aesthetics, your band can invade the Music Memesphere.

You must understand every force that impacts the music memesphere, and how these economies interact with one another.

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These are the Elements of the MUSIC MEMESPHERE:
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• BAND GENERATED MEMES - These are units of information which are generated by the bands themselves. Bands with more creativity and personality tend to create the best memes. However, bands have been successful being ‘cryptic’ and ‘weird’ in recent years. The bigger your band is, the less you have to do to create a gimmicky meme that people want to follow. The MP3 is pretty important, but not always as important for certain bands.
• THE TASTEMAKING MEME AGGREGATING & CONTENT FILTERING SERVICE INDUSTRY - These have replaced magazines and the radio as the optimal sources for music. These services & openly-biased news/meme sources are meant to build trust with consumers. Whether it is an algorithm to filter new music, a team of bros who love music writing about new bands, or just some bitter ass hole who ‘couldn’t make it as a band’ and decided to ‘cultivate influence’ any way he can, these are all providing a service to consumers. They all work together. While it may seem that they are covering ‘different niches’, they all sort of balance eachother out.
• MUSIC MAGAZINES AND RADIO - These make modern people feel sad and constraint. These put a bottle neck on consumer individuality, feeling like they only see a ‘limited snapshot’ of what is available. Minimal ‘personal relationship building’ means less authenticity and less trust. When a band is viewed as ‘relevant’ from these sources, people who like them are either ’stupid’, ‘just want to fit in’, or ‘ironically like the band/artist.’
• REGULAR PEOPLE/CONSUMERS - These are consumers like you or me. We want to listen to music and populate our iPods for different reasons. Some people enjoy ‘hunting for music.’ Others just get it from friends. Humans are at the tail end of the meme trail, but they do create a demand for memes which can sometimes force a band to exhaust their presence.

This is how the modern music industry works. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee for monetization. All you can do is become ‘followable’ and possibly ‘respected’/’critically acclaimed’, but that does not mean you have earned the right to ‘deserve to get paid for it.’

Music Memes are simple. If you are big/relevant/followable enough, everything that your band does is a meme that is worth being ‘covered’ by an outlet from the Tastemaking + Content Filtering Economy.  Your ultimate goal should be sustainability, and willingness to adapt to change and embrace new content filtering+aggregation services.

MUSIC MEMES IN ACTION

Every thing generated by a band is a meme. Whether it is deliberate or unintentional. Modern brand management means controlling the memes that your band/entity generates.

Ben Gibbard getting Stung by a Scorpion = a meme

Ben Gibbard getting Stung by a Scorpion = a HIGHLY BLGGBL MEME [via 'getting the opportunity to cover DCFC']

If your band is big enough, something as simple as ‘wearing plaid’ or ‘being kute’ can be a meme.

Photo by Gorilla Vs Bear

The name of the band NATALIE PORTMAN’S SHAVED HEAD, and this song that isn’t even good, and this music video that is ‘zany’ and seems ‘funnily bloggable.’

and convincing people that u r a ‘zany meme worth following’

Becoming a ‘Popular Song’/’popular blog’ on a ‘relevant’ mp3 aggregator that has more/less influence than people think

Posting pictures of the live performance of a relevant band in a relevant city

Having a baby/retiring/unretiring

Creating an experience on the internet that is more authentic than other experiences/memes that are generated+consumed on the internet

Your Band Must Keep These In Mind.

• Do not FORCE memes on consumers.
• Make sure your memes are either original, or do a good job of copying pre-existing memes.
• Know your band. Know your memes. Know your audience.
• Don’t feel entitled to anything. Your band’s existence is a journey.
• Do not rebel against the biggest news sources. You must embrace them/manipulate them. There is no other way. Become bros.
• Don’t waste your day friending tweens on myspace/random twitter followers. This is the illusion of progress. You are not entering into the heart of the Music Meme Economy by doing this.
• The tastemaking economy may or may not be more important/fun than bands themselves.
• Making+filtering memes = responsibility.
• Every one, every band, and every website is searching for authenticity on their own terms.
• Every one, every band, and every website is searching for a way to make money on any one’s terms.
• Memes can be simple or complex.  Usually the more ‘organic’ a meme-birth is, the more likely the meme is to help your brand.
• There are downsides to creating a fan base with a high demand for your memes, including lack of personal privacy and album leaks.

If you fully understand the music meme economy, your band can become 300-500% more relevant than it is now. It does not matter which city you live in, how old you are, or your level of education. There is a high demand for music memes these days, and as more people become ‘more passionate’ about music, the demand for memes will increase. You must capitalize on this.

We Are All Part of The Music Memesphere.

This post was written by Carles–a modern music critic, respected meme analysis guru, and alternative business expert. For consulting services and speaking engagements, contact Carles at carleser [at] gmail.com. Visit his weblog at www.hipsterrunoff.com