being a TAXI Member since January 2020, I still consider myself a Newbie here… I think I’ve learned a few lessons so far, including that it’s no good idea to pitch a pop ballad for country music requests or SciFi-Lab instrumentals for an Irish folk request and vice versa.
However, in the last months I have submitted a total of 27 tracks, resulting in seven forwards (no deals yet), which, I think, might be a good rate, or maybe not – I don’t know.I’ve always seen myself as a typical singer/songwriter, but about ten years ago I started writing and producing instrumentals in various genres, at the moment it is at a rate of 50/50 between instrumentals and songs; this rate is also displayed in the pool of tracks I’ve already uploaded to TAXI. When I analysed my feedbacks on both returns and forwards I found it surprising that six of my instrumentals had been forwarded, but only one of my songs with vocals. I’m still wondering where this discrepancy may come from – maybe it’s the quality of my lyrics (I’m not a native English speaker), though they haven’t been criticized in the feedbacks. For the moment, my conclusion to this is I will probably upload more instrumentals in the future since - in my case - they seem to have a better chance to get forwarded.
Anyway – in the last half year some questions arose and I wonder if some fellow TAXI passengers with more experience could help me here…?
- First of all: When uploading a track there are several fields to fill in, of which one is reading “Tell us more about the genre”. I must admit I still don’t know what to put in here – I mean, I could tell them more about the specific piece of music, o.k., but “about the genre”? So mostly I’m describing the individual track here, e.g. “Piano driven ballad in six-eight time with sad lyrics “. But I doubt that’s what this field is for. - Can someone please tell me how to handle this field correctly?
- Second: I still don’t understand the difference between an “instrumental” and a “cue”. I know that’s been discussed in several posts elsewhere on this forum, but the answers I’ve read so far still left me a bit puzzled – in the end, for me it boils down to the following: an “instrumental” somehow seems to be more “developed” than a “cue”, i.e. it has a more complex melody and / or rhythmic structure while a “cue” should be more “reduced” in these aspects. And sometimes (but not always) a "cue" seems to need a kind of "loopability" and possible edit points... Can you confirm that or add other points to this very basic try of an explanation?
- My last question is (and this may be a really stupid one, so please promise not to laugh): Is it recommended and / or even crucial for TAXI members to join a music rights organization (you promised!!)? I mean companies like the BMI or (here in Europe) the SUISA or the GEMA to get royalties as an artist / author. Does it depend on the kind of deal, on a case-to-case basis… or is there an advice in general?
- Addi
