First Yorkshire Musician’s Social Media Surgery

Last Wednesday 4 of us went along to the Round Foundry in Leeds for the first Yorkshire Social Media Surgery for Musicians.  The event had been arranged by John Popham and Rich Huxley of Hope And Social and had been sponsored by Ctrl.  Between us we learnt a great deal from the people we spoke to.   One of the best things was how willing people were to share their knowledge; people like John, Rich, Helen Harrop and Graham Richards.  John has written his own summary of the event on his blog.

Although we’ve already got ourselves spread well over the internet (see sidebar links on this blog), before last week’s session we didn’t actually have…this blog!  It was after speaking with Helen, Rich and John about different blogging platforms that we opted for this one.  So, thanks to them for all the advice, and also thanks to Rich for inviting us (as well as Gary Stewart and David Henshaw) to do a few acoustic songs at the end of the evening.  Here are our 3 songs, as captured by John Popham:

Wilful Missing on Bandcamp / Pay What You Want

We are now offering our music to download in a new way. Well, new for us anyway. Our friends Hope and Social have been doing this for ages and we have been inspired by them to follow suit. On our new Bandcamp site, you can set the price for downloads. In fact, you don’t even have to leave this blog; you can simply click on the Music tab above, where you can get our music via an embedded Bandcamp music player.

You can also choose your preferred digital format as well (e.g. 320kbps mp3, FLAC and other formats are available).

For us the most important thing is that people hear and enjoy our music. Our desire for our music to be heard is greater than our desire to be rich. We are immensely proud of the music we make, and the real reward for us is in people listening to it.

If you feel our music has some value to you, then please do pay us what you believe it to be worth to you, and what you can afford to pay. If you’re skint, then have it for free, but if you can afford to give us some money for it, that would be highly welcome.

You can be sure that what you pay via Bandcamp comes straight to us, and will be put towards the next set of recordings, travel money to our gigs, or musical equipment. Any money you can pay is always greatly appreciated.

We have not abandoned CDs and put all our eggs in the digital basket.  If you prefer to actually hold a CD in your hand, you can still get these from our official website.

If you believe in an artist and the music they make, please find a way that you can help support them. This might be financially, or might be by spreading the word among friends, or you might have your own ideas about how you can support us.  If you have any thoughts on this, please do get in touch. We, and our fellow musicians out there, really do appreciate the support our fans give us.

If you think any of your friends might like Wilful Missing, please do click on one of the Sharing options at the bottom of this page, so they can read this and see why we do things the way we do.  Alternatively, you could send them straight to our official website.

Thanks for reading, and more so, for listening.

The Duke & The King afterthoughts

I had thought about suggesting a band night out to go and see The Duke & The King when I heard they were coming back to Leeds. Instead, I got the chance to ask the rest of the band if they were available to support at the gig!

And what a good night it turned out to be. The Wardrobe was packed out for The Duke & The King, and there was a reasonably large crowd there early enough to see us. Thanks a million to those of you who were there to see us, and who gave us such a warm reception. If you left the gig with our Vast Atlantic EP, I hope you enjoy it. The Duke & The King were, as expected, marvellous. They do really have something unique going on there.

We came out of hibernation for this gig, as we are currently hard at work recording our album. Our present goal is to complete recording by the end of 2010. We won’t have any more gigs until February 2010 as we draw towards the end of the recording process.   You will, however, be hearing from us again before the end of 2010, because we have something else lined up for you…