In my twenties I was in two bands - with each, I was spending a huge proportion of my life writing, performing, spending every last penny on rehearsal studios and sound gear, and saving for the next recording session.
Having our music played on local radio gave us an incredible feeling - the fact that someone heard our music and invested their time to play it to thousands of listeners. It didn't even matter that it was local radio and not Radio One - the buzz was huge and gave us the confidence to write more, and aim even higher.
The next step for us was trying to get the most experienced industry people possible to hear it and give their feedback. This seemed like a virtually impossible task. I used to send our CDs off to people and spend a whole heap of money putting the press pack together and making it look interesting, but we never heard anything back. With my first band we finally got spotted by an A&R bloke when playing at a random festival and were put in touch with a pretty high profile manager as a result. He loved us and before long we were working together on writing new material and formulating an action plan to take over the world with our music. Turned out the manager tried it on with our female singer which ended our relationship and all was lost. I accepted that it wasn't going to be and got into media instead as a career whilst still doing music in my spare time in a much smaller way.
I think this disappointment got embedded in my core, and whilst on my journey within the world of media and marketing I learned the skills and a mind-set to develop into a business that helped artists to get feedback from trusted industry people. The idea was - ad funded unique content focussed at bands and new music fans. Having an ad funded model means that artists can trust us - and the fact that all our industry people who give feedback on the site work within a reputable company or are part of our extended network provides quite a family vibe and reduces the chances of the artists getting f*cked about. The nice thing about REAL people is that they are actually able to turn their feedback into an opportunity when relevant because they are either a manager, A&R person, radio DJ, or producer who has an immediate interest in new artists and is currently working in the industry.
Four years on and masses of artists have been able to get feedback from industry people on the website, and loads of opportunities have allowed them to get their buzz. My favourite example of where an introduction has resulted in an eventual success story is Juan Zelada. I met him and his manager when I first started UBR in 2008 and he was the first band to sign up on the website. We managed to get loads of industry reviews for him, did a style shoot where we gave him photos to use on his website and social media platforms, a feature in WIRED mag, and a gig at the Station Sessions at Kings Cross St Pancras station. One of the industry reviews that we facilitated was from Simon Gavin (Universal label MD) who I met at the Orange Unsigned Act launch. Simon reviewed him on UBR, and I did not hear anything more, and now three years on and Juan is now signed to Universal (Decca) the label that Simon Gavin works for. Obviously Juan has a fantastic manager who has been committed to him and has done amazing work to get him to where he is - but it is a good feeling to know that UBR may have been a part in helping him to get from A-B.
EMERGING ICONS CURATED ONE WEEK OF SHOWS AT THE STATION SESSIONS FESTIVAL 2011 WHERE JUAN PERFORMED. See the video here:
WIRED ARTICLE 2011
http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2011/11/play/almost-famous
As a result of all the incredible talent that has come through UBR we are starting to focus on presenting these to fans directly through a brand called Emerging Icons ™. We see a lot of sites that cater for unsigned bands and fans as a combined offering. I feel that we need to separate these - and offer one product for bands (advice and opportunities) and one product for fans (great quality new music). Over the next few months you'll hear me talking about great new Emerging Icons acts to look out for as well as some of the opportunities and success stories from UBR. We'll be going more into live gigs as well as developing our radio opportunities, and we have launched a new label under the name of Emerging Icons - to keep things nice and simple.
To hear about some of the best new artists that we come across you can LIKE us on Facebook/emergingicons.
You can pre-order the first ever Emerging Icons album of unsigned artists using this link: http://itunes.apple.com/preorder/emerging-icons/id519664262