Forwards...but nothing else...

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dabresk
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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by dabresk » Fri Jul 20, 2007 12:07 pm

Gotta chime in here……………I have been with Taxi since April. I have submitted eight songs and four were forwarded. Now I sit and wait. That’s what I expected. Maybe six months, maybe two years. Taxi has allowed me to explore areas of creativity that I have not explored before. I have expanded my catalog BECAUSE of Taxi. If I get a deal, GREAT. If I don’t, fine, but I am writing more now than I have in the last ten years (and having fun!).Now think back to when you started something new in your music career. Maybe joining a band, hitting the road….whatever. Did you have instant success? NO! You had to feel out the situation and BUILD your music based on the needs of the particular market you were in. That’s what ya gotta do here.I have done a lot in my career, made a decent living but never got rich. I don’t expect that from Taxi either. I do believe that I can make a dent somewhere and make some money. And I will have fun doing it. We all do music because we love it. So be thankful that you have an outlet like this. Write your tail off! Have some fun! Learn from it! All of my critiques were great learning experiences.Study these forums, and you will learn a ton. These folks here are great, and the people at Taxi are great as well.Later on…..off to write some more

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by matto » Fri Jul 20, 2007 1:28 pm

Quote:Now, interestingly, I've submitted those same compositions to Pump Audio and they were promptly signed. Interesting...no ?Just a little note here, Pump is well known within the industry for having very low standards and signing almost everything that's of a decent quality. Most of Taxi's listing companies have standards that are quite a bit higher than that. Not knocking Pump here, they have a business model that obviously works for them.I've had many many forwards that never resulted in a call back or deal. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with either Taxi or my music. I know this for a fact because I'm one of the people who makes a very nice living from music, largely as a result of my Taxi membership.I can't say for sure if it will be "$50,000-$100,000 per year because of leads through Taxi" this year (as per Mr boxingrhythm's query) but only a person very unfamiliar with the inner workings of the music industry would make this strange distinction anyway.I can say that Taxi has been my main pitching tool for the last 10 years (that's right, this business is not for people with short attention spans) and I've done very well. Much better than I could realistically have hoped for, IMHO. And I know that year after year, the income I make as a result of Taxi leads is gonna increase significantly, because I cultivate these existing connections carefully in addition to making new ones.As any successful professional in any other business would.matto

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by rgserenitycd01 » Sat Jul 21, 2007 9:08 am

Thanks for the above note.I am started my third year with Taxi. The one thing I have come to appreciate is the clarity of direction the descriptions in the listings are written with. After working with the "I'll know it when I here it" school of thought, I can return to Taxi and have a much better grasp of what is being asked for. As Dave mentioned earlier, it is wiser for now to focus on those listings that have a greater chance of forwarding. And I would like to increase my percentage of forwards(currently 55%). In my second year I spent all my time with the one deal I did get and I neglected Taxi. I am changing that so that it is more of a balance.

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by boxingrhythm » Mon Jul 23, 2007 5:34 am

Matto, thanks for the reply. I think I just assumed (incorrectly) that ML was refering to Taxi when he made the comment that you could make $50,000-$100,000 per year. Upon re-reading his post I see that is not the case.Good stuff to read on here though and glad to know that some folks are having some success.

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by matto » Mon Jul 23, 2007 11:37 am

Quote:I think I just assumed (incorrectly) that ML was refering to Taxi when he made the comment that you could make $50,000-$100,000 per year. Upon re-reading his post I see that is not the case.You're right that he never said just from Taxi, it was more of a general statement about music library work.Having said that, it's still possible to achieve that ballpark from Taxi connections only, in fact my latest projections for this year have my Taxi related income getting inside that range. This is my 11th year with Taxi, so even if the statement "if you keep that up for 10 years, you could very well get to the point where you are making $50,000-$100,000/yr. on that stuff that you got into the pipeline during the previous decade" was taken in Taxi context only it's still pretty accurate. The key word in there is 10 years. It simply takes a while to build a large enough catalog to where you reach that critical mass.And remember this is talking about music libraries only. I'm sure the guys who wrote "Buy Me A Rose" or "I Loved Her First" or "Beautiful Soul" made a decent little penny from their own Taxi leads .The one thing to emphasize though is Taxi doesn't exist in a vaccuum. To quote myself from another post (cause I'm too lazy to type this again):Years ago I wrote a few cues in response to a Taxi listing. They got forwarded a bunch of times but I was never offered a deal, so later I pitched them myself thru some other avenue, and the result of it was one of the most lucrative connections I've ever made (which is still ongoing btw). Now I could've been bitching and whining about the companies that didn't call me, or about Taxi...but as a music business professional I'm instead grateful for the Taxi listing that made all of this possible. Unfortunately most people don't "get" this. They don't get that the music business is an interconnected network, and you have to get yourself plugged into that network to be successful. There are many ways of doing that and they all work in concert. It's not: I spend this much money on Taxi so I must get this much money out of Taxi. That's like walking around with blinders. Every connection you make, no matter how you make it or how insignificant it might seem at the time, gets you more plugged into the network. And for most people, Taxi can get you plugged into parts of the network you couldn't access yourself.Unfortunately, too many people are too impatient and too easily frustrated and won't let the process take its time.Btw, just as a disclaimer: I'm not counting the income from the above mentioned "connection" as being "Taxi related", even though arguably it IS. Cause it's not the direct result of a Taxi listing, more of an indirect result...which is kind of my point actually. HTH...

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by eightyeightkeys » Wed Jul 25, 2007 3:43 am

You're saying that Pump Audio has "lower standards." So, therefore, my compositions were not signed by "Taxi" related publishers because they have a "higher" standard. Hmmm....firstly, I don't know about these "lower standards" and secondly, I don't necessarily agree because I have been signed by DSM and other "Taxi" related publishers in the past, but, anyway...we're posting our replies to the original thread - "Forwards....but nothing else"...I'd like to ask Matto about the bulk of his successful work. Are they "songs" in a pop/new country or country..etc... genre or instrumental works in the electronica, classical, new age vein or both ? It might be instructive to know what kind of music is successful through Taxi related listings and signings. This might get to the core of the matter. ie. why some of us may not be getting signed and why others are.

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by davewalton » Wed Jul 25, 2007 4:18 am

Quote:You're saying that Pump Audio has "lower standards." First, Pump Audio places a lot of music. I always watch the end credits for just about every show I watch and Pump shows up quite a bit in all kinds of things. That's the up side.The down side is that they have SO many tracks that getting your music placed through them is easily statistically harder than getting a Taxi deal. One section of their site says that they have a catalog of over 75,000 songs. Think about that relative to Taxi. How much harder would it be to get a Taxi deal if every listing had 75,000 submissions? I've sent music to Pump and it's been accepted, etc but since my tracks are mixed in with 75,000 other tracks, I'm not pre-ordering my new Maserati based on my royalty expectations from Pump. On the flip side of things, some of the successful "boutique" libraries make tons of placements with maybe only fifteen or twenty CD's of music... a couple hundred tracks. Naturally, these tracks are the cream of the cream of the crop and so they really have to be something special to be included into a unique group like that. A library like that would have "higher standards". And of course, a musician with tracks in that kind of library could expect frequent placements and a lot of good activity.It's not that being in Pump is a reflection on my music but just that their business model is based on having a huge selection of tracks, therefore it's easier to get into Pump than a library like I mentioned above.Regardless, diversity is really the key so if you're in one library, Pump or otherwise, that's a good start toward being in a nice collection of libraries.

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by matto » Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:04 am

Quote:First, Pump Audio places a lot of music. I always watch the end credits for just about every show I watch and Pump shows up quite a bit in all kinds of things. That's the up side.One thing that's important to know is that Pump has a two tiered system. There's the "Pump Box" of highly select material, delivered to a multitude of clients on harddisk. Then there's everything else. It's quite difficult to get on the Pump Box, but easy to get accepted into the second tier. I would venture a guess that a high percentage of Pump placements comes from Pump Box tracks, as these are both of higher quality and constantly in clients' faces. If your stuff in in the second tier, chances for good placements will be far lower. But like I said, this business model quite obviously works for them, so more power to them. And to their credit, they do make full mention of this two tiered approach on their website.Quote:I'd like to ask Matto about the bulk of his successful work. Are they "songs" in a pop/new country or country..etc... genre or instrumental works in the electronica, classical, new age vein or both?To answer your question, it's probably about 20-25% vocal songs, 75-80% instrumental.Among the vocals, there are only very few "pop" songs (in the widest sense of the word), fewer than 5 in English as a matter of fact, the majority is world or latin or even stuff without lyrics (e.g. pah-pah-pa-da-dumm ).Among instrumentals, there is traditional ethnic stuff, "underscore" music in a variety of moods and styles and ranging from solo piano to "band size" to full orchestra, percussion oriented material with little tonal content, and more conventional instrumentals ranging from pop to rock to urban and electronic. There's really no style that the "bulk" of my instrumental music is in, although I would say I have more traditional and crossover ethnic stuff in my catalog that the average composer.I've posted links to some of my music before, you should be able to find those if you do a forum search. I'm planning to upload some stuff to my taximusic page soon, so hopefully there will be stuff there to listen to before too long.HTH,matto

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by ddusty » Thu Jul 26, 2007 4:24 am

Bringing this thread back to the "Forwards, but nothing Else" motif, i must update my prior post of having some 45 forwards and nothing else.There are a few more forwards to add, but more importantly I just got a "something else" contract in hand, awaiting lawyer appointment.Off to post in success story for the full story!

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Re: Forwards...but nothing else...

Post by liamkelly » Thu Jul 26, 2007 5:59 am

Great news. Two high fives from across the pond!Damn, the only thing that comes near your own success is that of your peer group! Congrats.

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