Artists you have become MORE of a fan of due to social media or personal interaction

When I'm a fan the music comes first and the personality comes really not at all.  I listen to music for good tunes, not new friends.

Temple of Blood wrote:When I'm a fan the music comes first and the personality comes really not at all.  I listen to music for good tunes, not new friends.

The music always comes first....but the artist can make someone an even bigger fan by interacting with them in a cordial and respectful manner. 

Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, forums,  etc etc

Most bands have come to realize how important it is to cultivate that connection with the fans.

Only one, but seeing the posting and personality of a musician on another board several years ago led me to specifically avoid a band that I may have otherwise enjoyed.  I just wouldn't have enjoyed it at all, and didn't want to support the guy.  I know, it's more my problem than his, but it was a reality still.

Above The Storm - Justis, Eric
Agonal - Jon
Aletheian - Alex, Joel
Ashen Mortality / Seventh Angel / My Silent Wake / Century Sleeper - Ian
Blood Thirsty / Whisper From Heaven - Derek
Century Sleeper / Visionaire / Ikarian - James
Eversoul / GRIM / Hguols - Thomas
Forsaken / Nomad Son / Sacro Sanctus - Albert
Four Star Revival - Benny
Hesychast - Scott, Ethan
Sardis - Sean
Warpriest - Robert

To name a few with whom I've had good personal interactions with.  Having that connection definitely gives me that much more appreciation and enjoyment for the music.

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Temple of Blood wrote:When I'm a fan the music comes first and the personality comes really not at all.  I listen to music for good tunes, not new friends.

The music always comes first....but the artist can make someone an even bigger fan by interacting with them in a cordial and respectful manner. 

Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, forums,  etc etc

Most bands have come to realize how important it is to cultivate that connection with the fans.

Sure, for some that works.  I'm not saying folks don't try it and have success in general with it.

I'm saying I don't care if someone is a nice fella and gives me daily updates if their music is dull and uninspired.

I still listen to SLAYER after all.  Also other artists that I have had personal interactions with that were rude to me.


But at some point when people are pondering "Why is music today so much worse than yesteryear?" maybe they should consider "We were bamboozled by their charisma and ignored quality control".

Temple of Blood wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Temple of Blood wrote:When I'm a fan the music comes first and the personality comes really not at all.  I listen to music for good tunes, not new friends.

The music always comes first....but the artist can make someone an even bigger fan by interacting with them in a cordial and respectful manner. 

Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, forums,  etc etc

Most bands have come to realize how important it is to cultivate that connection with the fans.

Sure, for some that works.  I'm not saying folks don't try it and have success in general with it.

I'm saying I don't care if someone is a nice fella and gives me daily updates if their music is dull and uninspired.

I still listen to SLAYER after all.  Also other artists that I have had personal interactions with that were rude to me.


But at some point when people are pondering "Why is music today so much worse than yesteryear?" maybe they should consider "We were bamboozled by their charisma and ignored quality control".

Well, of course, if someone's music sucks it doesn't matter if they are nice..lol

I actually do have some bands I talk to and enjoy interacting with but I don't like their music. 

I never liked a band's music SOLEY because of their "charisma"......but when I like the person(s) involved with a band I like it makes the experience that more enjoyable.

But there are degrees in between "sucks" and "fantastic".  I think some OK groups get boosts from their fan interactions.  They're considered to be great because of a combo between their OK music and their fantastic social media presence.  In the final analysis people won't say their music is superior to the metal of yesteryear.


This is just what I feel like I am seeing from my Facebook feed and message boards.

Temple of Blood wrote:But there are degrees in between "sucks" and "fantastic".  I think some OK groups get boosts from their fan interactions.  They're considered to be great because of a combo between their OK music and their fantastic social media presence.  In the final analysis people won't say their music is superior to the metal of yesteryear.


This is just what I feel like I am seeing from my Facebook feed and message boards.

I understand what you are saying...

My view is as a fan, not a musician. So let me say that the bottom line to me is that it is entertainment. If the entertainment level is enhanced by the fan interaction, then that is all that matters since being entertained is the goal. It is ok for me to "think" a group's music is better than what it really is just because I like interacting with them.

I can understand that.


I'm just always thinking about why today's secular and Christian metal scene is so much worse than before and what needs to be done to reverse that trend.

The angry grandpa in me thinks it's because we've moved to digital production and a post-metal world...

Temple of Blood wrote:I can understand that.


I'm just always thinking about why today's secular and Christian metal scene is so much worse than before and what needs to be done to reverse that trend.

I have one theory for at least maybe a small part...

Oversatuation

Good musicians are being spread too thin across the music landscape because there are too many bands and too many genres. 

It used to be you had country, metal, rock, pop, easy listening and a couple of others. Now there are more genres than I could even list.

And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

That's an interesting theory that I hadn't considered.

I could write a book on all the reasons that I think it has happened.

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Staybrite wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Thanks

And I agree, cheap home recording is another issue. While on one hand it is great because almost anyone can record an album, on the other hand it is horrible because almost anyone can record an album.  

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Staybrite wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Thanks

And I agree, cheap home recording is another issue. While on one hand it is great because almost anyone can record an album, on the other hand it is horrible because almost anyone can record an album.  

Though, that would hardly matter if nobody bought it. There would just be an inaudible background of petty white noise from all the one-bust failures.

LemonMouse wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Staybrite wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Thanks

And I agree, cheap home recording is another issue. While on one hand it is great because almost anyone can record an album, on the other hand it is horrible because almost anyone can record an album.  

Though, that would hardly matter if nobody bought it. There would just be an inaudible background of petty white noise from all the one-bust failures.

Not when you factor in the 12 thousand people who annually start an "internet radio program" in the thinly veiled effort to get bands to send them free music.  In effort to keep getting free music from bands they need to play the music (horrid or not) on the "air" and now unsuspecting people are again subjected to poor music.
(now that I have alienated  half the people on this board I will shut up now) 

Staybrite wrote:

LemonMouse wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Staybrite wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Thanks

And I agree, cheap home recording is another issue. While on one hand it is great because almost anyone can record an album, on the other hand it is horrible because almost anyone can record an album.  

Though, that would hardly matter if nobody bought it. There would just be an inaudible background of petty white noise from all the one-bust failures.

Not when you factor in the 12 thousand people who annually start an "internet radio program" in the thinly veiled effort to get bands to send them free music.  In effort to keep getting free music from bands they need to play the music (horrid or not) on the "air" and now unsuspecting people are again subjected to poor music.
(now that I have alienated  half the people on this board I will shut up now) 

You said the kind of thing I always want to say, except that I don't want to alienate half the people

Driven wrote:

Staybrite wrote:

LemonMouse wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:

Staybrite wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:
And the number of good musicians has not grown at the same rate as the number of bands has. Far too many bands nowadays. So instead of a band having 4 or 5 good musicians, they have one or two and then a bunch of hacks (journeymen) filling out the band

Compare it to baseball. They keep adding baseball teams and thinning out the talent pool, so you only have a couple of stars on each team and more and more mediocre players filling out the roster. Whereas when you had fewer teams, each team would have 5 or 6 guys that were considered stars.

Just my opinion

Well said!  Also with the advent of cheaper home recording there also appears to be far too many bands recording music.  Many of those bands would never gotten a shot at recording in even the cheapest of studios (back in the day) because they lacked the talent to produce anything saleable.

Thanks

And I agree, cheap home recording is another issue. While on one hand it is great because almost anyone can record an album, on the other hand it is horrible because almost anyone can record an album.  

Though, that would hardly matter if nobody bought it. There would just be an inaudible background of petty white noise from all the one-bust failures.

Not when you factor in the 12 thousand people who annually start an "internet radio program" in the thinly veiled effort to get bands to send them free music.  In effort to keep getting free music from bands they need to play the music (horrid or not) on the "air" and now unsuspecting people are again subjected to poor music.
(now that I have alienated  half the people on this board I will shut up now) 

You said the kind of thing I always want to say, except that I don't want to alienate half the people

While we are at it, let's alienate the other half...

Because you also have 12,000 people annually who become music reviewers and beg for bands to send them free music so they can "review" it

NoOneIsHere wrote:Because you also have 12,000 people annually who become music reviewers and beg for bands to send the free music so they can "review" it

So you're saying all I gotta do is start an internet radio or review site and I get free stuff???  I am down!  Where do I sign up? 

Kerrick wrote:

NoOneIsHere wrote:Because you also have 12,000 people annually who become music reviewers and beg for bands to send the free music so they can "review" it

So you're saying all I gotta do is start an internet radio or review site and I get free stuff???  I am down!  Where do I sign up? 

Pretty much.

I know a couple of bands have told me how many requests they get from people asking for free music so they can play it or review.

It's crazy

I even see people hawking for free music in the comments section of posts by the band..

NoOneIsHere wrote:
......................

While we are at it, let's alienate the other half...

Because you also have 12,000 people annually who become music reviewers and beg for bands to send them free music so they can "review" it

GREAT, now nobody is going to talk to either of us! 

You say it like that'd be a bad thing...   

None of it made me a fan, or more of a fan, some really turned me off personally, but I try to distance that from the art they create...

NoOneIsHere wrote:Actually, I would prefer people NOT start listing who they had bad experiences with.

As I said in the OP, we all have had bad experiences.

This is supposed to be a positive thread.

Please don't start listing the people you have had issues with.

Yeah, I left the Christian music scene largely because of the people. I few musicians that seemed like real people. I've met a lot of musicians Christian and not and my list of the good ones is very short by comparison.

There were very few that I thought were kind and sincere. Of them, I remember Mike Pritzl of Violet Burning and Phil Kim of Raspberry Jam. All the members of The Clergy were nice as well as all the guys from Empty Tomb. Eric Peterson of Jesus Freaks was cool too.

Outside of that scene, all the members of No Doubt, especially Gwen Stefani and Tom Dumont were really nice down to earth people. I met them before they were big and they invited me to their show and put me on the guest list that day. After that they always put me on the list when they were in town until 95 when they exploded.

Another guy that always was nice to me and really seemed down to earth was Paul Bostaph. Although I didn't know him well, every time we met he was very nice.

Another drummer that was really cool was Michel Langevin (Away) although I only met him once. I saw him on the street before the show and we started talking. Later he put me on the guest list.

If I think of any more, I'll update.