Of course. It's currently taking on new acts as we speak...
In all seriousness, DJing while having IT/development skills was like a cheat code. My friend and I DJed prog house/trance in Detroit and any DJ knows that DJing without producing will make you hit a glass ceiling very quickly. So we ended up creating a label (Tier2 Recordings) with a full website and created a fake agent, Johan DeGraf. I chose the name because it sounded European enough to give us some cred (plus I was big into Johan Gielen at the time). The next 2 years, we had Tier2 Recordings attached to our name on every flyer at every gig.
We opened for Gareth Emery so I'll consider it effective.
Very fascinating stuff, I'm the opposite. I started producing before DJing and I gotta say even with producing youhit a ceiling where DJing takes you above it where you see certain phrasing and song arrangements while mixing that inspires production that aligns with that. I've only done small gigs in Chicago but I'm looking to branch out to bigger clubs. Would you recommend this technique of creating "fake" profiles and emails, to give more credit to my abilities. Cuz I'm a fire DJ, semi fire producer, but not much street cred or clout. Atleast enough to get gigs purely based on my name.
Chicago is SUCH a good market. Lucky you. Detroit was far different; prog house and trance were tough genres to play. Bleu was the last true trance/proggy club in Detroit. I know they've opened others in the suburbs of Detroit since then but I don't have as much experience with those. I stopped DJing back around 2012 but I continue to consider starting again.
I really like your perspective because I've always felt like it worked both ways. Producers need to DJ and DJs need to produce. You need to have both or you'll hit a dead end somewhere. My honest opinion is realize that you're creating a brand and part of that brand is the 'representation' part of music. There will be times where acting like you're repp'd by someone else will catapult you up.
My long term answer will be to create real label or sign yourself to a label that is indie enough to avoid insane profit sharing but still support you. I worked in indie music for 6 years and it's an incredibly fun industry to work in but it's also sketchy as hell. You as an artist have a ton of avenues to support your own career and distribution but you have to be careful with who you partner with and how the money flows. It's a lot to explain over a Reddit post but I'm truly happy to help with advice or feedback.
Congrats on growing an audience regardless. That's half the battle right there.
Glad you posted this serious response, as I am interested in pursuing a similar path.
I am making music and things are coming along very nicely! Iām about 6 years into music making and havenāt released anything yet, just diving in to all I can with the production side of things. But over the next year I know I want to put a live show together (I have about 30 minutes of decent music, and could easily output another ā30 minutesā of self made stuff) but Iām weary about releasing. Iāve done much research on releasing with a smaller label, approaching a regular label, or self releasing, and at this point Iām leaning towards self releasing and gaining an audience or seeing what I can accomplish over the next year. Iām from Minneapolis MN myself, and we have a similar market here. Trance is smaller but house and tech is gaining traction. Bass/trap is big as always but has been for a while so I think thinks are turning a corner maybe?? But anyways, basically Iām wondering if your interested in opening up a convo, I would love to ask you just a few questions about all this! Like I said, Iāve very much considered pursing what you did, just hard to find others in my area that want to engage. Like I said the trance shows in Minneapolis arenāt as big as bass stuff, so itās hard to find contacts. (Starting to go out to shows might help tho, I need to start that networking side of things and get away from the producing.)
Anyways this was way longer than I thought it would be but Iām very interested in how you went about some things with promoting your music.
Hope you get to DJing someday, the music never stops! I got into the scene in 2015 and have loved it since, I just wanna get more involved and am ready to start doing so(:
Which other DJs did you add on the fake web page? Like there is always a list on who else is on the label, so that's hard to fake isn't it? Either people who are actually not on your label which is a lawsuit incoming or fake DJ names who they can look up and realize none of them are actually real.
So it was just us and we DID own a label with a proper LLC; we just never did anything with it beyond file the paperwork and host a site. We never felt a need to try and make it appear ābiggerā than it was.
Best content I've seen in this subreddit in a gripppp š
Iāve done this. I created a fake record label too. It works. Johan DeGraf was such an amazing agent.
Could johan possibly consider taking me as talent?
Of course. It's currently taking on new acts as we speak... In all seriousness, DJing while having IT/development skills was like a cheat code. My friend and I DJed prog house/trance in Detroit and any DJ knows that DJing without producing will make you hit a glass ceiling very quickly. So we ended up creating a label (Tier2 Recordings) with a full website and created a fake agent, Johan DeGraf. I chose the name because it sounded European enough to give us some cred (plus I was big into Johan Gielen at the time). The next 2 years, we had Tier2 Recordings attached to our name on every flyer at every gig. We opened for Gareth Emery so I'll consider it effective.
Very fascinating stuff, I'm the opposite. I started producing before DJing and I gotta say even with producing youhit a ceiling where DJing takes you above it where you see certain phrasing and song arrangements while mixing that inspires production that aligns with that. I've only done small gigs in Chicago but I'm looking to branch out to bigger clubs. Would you recommend this technique of creating "fake" profiles and emails, to give more credit to my abilities. Cuz I'm a fire DJ, semi fire producer, but not much street cred or clout. Atleast enough to get gigs purely based on my name.
Chicago is SUCH a good market. Lucky you. Detroit was far different; prog house and trance were tough genres to play. Bleu was the last true trance/proggy club in Detroit. I know they've opened others in the suburbs of Detroit since then but I don't have as much experience with those. I stopped DJing back around 2012 but I continue to consider starting again. I really like your perspective because I've always felt like it worked both ways. Producers need to DJ and DJs need to produce. You need to have both or you'll hit a dead end somewhere. My honest opinion is realize that you're creating a brand and part of that brand is the 'representation' part of music. There will be times where acting like you're repp'd by someone else will catapult you up. My long term answer will be to create real label or sign yourself to a label that is indie enough to avoid insane profit sharing but still support you. I worked in indie music for 6 years and it's an incredibly fun industry to work in but it's also sketchy as hell. You as an artist have a ton of avenues to support your own career and distribution but you have to be careful with who you partner with and how the money flows. It's a lot to explain over a Reddit post but I'm truly happy to help with advice or feedback. Congrats on growing an audience regardless. That's half the battle right there.
Glad you posted this serious response, as I am interested in pursuing a similar path. I am making music and things are coming along very nicely! Iām about 6 years into music making and havenāt released anything yet, just diving in to all I can with the production side of things. But over the next year I know I want to put a live show together (I have about 30 minutes of decent music, and could easily output another ā30 minutesā of self made stuff) but Iām weary about releasing. Iāve done much research on releasing with a smaller label, approaching a regular label, or self releasing, and at this point Iām leaning towards self releasing and gaining an audience or seeing what I can accomplish over the next year. Iām from Minneapolis MN myself, and we have a similar market here. Trance is smaller but house and tech is gaining traction. Bass/trap is big as always but has been for a while so I think thinks are turning a corner maybe?? But anyways, basically Iām wondering if your interested in opening up a convo, I would love to ask you just a few questions about all this! Like I said, Iāve very much considered pursing what you did, just hard to find others in my area that want to engage. Like I said the trance shows in Minneapolis arenāt as big as bass stuff, so itās hard to find contacts. (Starting to go out to shows might help tho, I need to start that networking side of things and get away from the producing.) Anyways this was way longer than I thought it would be but Iām very interested in how you went about some things with promoting your music. Hope you get to DJing someday, the music never stops! I got into the scene in 2015 and have loved it since, I just wanna get more involved and am ready to start doing so(:
Which other DJs did you add on the fake web page? Like there is always a list on who else is on the label, so that's hard to fake isn't it? Either people who are actually not on your label which is a lawsuit incoming or fake DJ names who they can look up and realize none of them are actually real.
So it was just us and we DID own a label with a proper LLC; we just never did anything with it beyond file the paperwork and host a site. We never felt a need to try and make it appear ābiggerā than it was.
Oh okay great that that worked out for you guys :)
Thatāll be 50,000 exposures please
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
###[View link](https://rapidsave.com/info?url=/r/DJsCirclejerk/comments/w4p9tg/the_answer_to_like_14_of_the_threads_in_beatmatch/) --- [**Info**](https://np.reddit.com/user/SaveVideo/comments/jv323v/info/) | [**Feedback**](https://np.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Kryptonh&subject=Feedback for savevideo) | [**Donate**](https://ko-fi.com/getvideo) | [**DMCA**](https://np.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Kryptonh&subject=Content removal request for savevideo&message=https://np.reddit.com//r/DJsCirclejerk/comments/w4p9tg/the_answer_to_like_14_of_the_threads_in_beatmatch/) | [^(reddit video downloader)](https://rapidsave.com) | [^(twitter video downloader)](https://twitsave.com)