Branding Our 3rd Album - Part 2

Cover art is just as important as the time you put into writing and recording your music. Packaging your work is critical to the eye of your potential customers. If visuals have anything to do with the decision-making process, you'll want the visuals to stand out.

How often is artwork unrelated to a recording project and doesn't reflect the message of the music? Music is considered an art and you are considered to be an Artist, why not correlate art to your music? Art should be thought provoking or maybe just fun, but at the very least, it should be attractive. You've taken considerable time thinking about your music and how the listener can identify with the music you perform. Your admirers may want to look at the art while listening to the music. Your artwork provides a gateway to visualize your music.

After much consideration, the path that we, Spooky Kool, are taking for our album art, is to engage our audience and create a call to action so that people in our audience can become involved in the decision-making process, by choosing the final album cover.

Artist Gregory Lee has submitted several sketches for Spooky Kool to review before creating the final draft artwork for the album, "I AM." We have placed as much energy into defining our design for this album cover, and now we want your input. We've decided the final decision should go to you, our fans, friends, family, and followers. Final sketches are due Friday, June 14th, and Spooky Kool will hold a contest to vote on your favorite graphic.

Just as important as Recording and Packaging, is the Branding of the music; however, Branding and Packaging have little meaning if the recording is problematic.

Phil and I experienced the classic differences between the writer and the engineer. The Writer (that's my role) hears in his mind how music should be presented and frankly, it is all subjective and right brain. The Engineer (that would be Phil) is considerably more left brain and considers things like "Phasing Issues" and "Harmonic Frequencies" that clash between voices and instruments within the same frequency range. The engineer is typically unhappy when there are areas of cross waves that distort and cause phasing issues. How do you resolve differences between what you hear and what you see? Obviously, the engineer is correct because the most important quality of the song (I call it the SHOUT SECTION), is being scrambled and lost in the mix. Although there maybe value in keeping distortion to present to the listener, unless intentional, inharmonic frequencies that tend to produce pitch discrimination and risk clarity should not be choosen.

Needless to say, as happy as I was with the title track to "I Am," it could not be sent to a mastering studio with the engineer unhappy. Recognizing that our intent is to present our best product, it was back to the studio to re-record the trumpet tracks utilizing a different microphone (The Manley Reference Cardioid Tube Microphone) to eliminate the conflict (with the frequencies that is) in the music! I wasn't prepared, but Phil pushed me through the section so that he would have enough good material to present the Shout Section with quality.

Back to Branding! Reaching out to our fans and communicating our activities, where do we find the time? Back in 2007 I wanted to build our fan base one fan at a time. I wanted to have a personal relationship with everyone who reached out to Spooky Kool, but I discovered that I was burning the candle at both ends, juggling my time between composing, rehearsing, recording, communicating, booking, performing, and maintaining several social media sites daily. My day began at 9:00am in the morning and I worked until 4:00am the next day. People were waking up and getting online as I was going to bed.

Over time, I've been solicited to use a media services to manage Spooky Kool social media sites. At last count, Spooky Kool has 17 different social media sites that should be maintained, but honestly I maintain the major ones which include: ReverbNation, Facebook, YouTube, BandCamp, Twitter, and Instagram. Instagram and Twitter not so much, but they receive feeds from ReverbNation. Bandcamp gets my attention only when I release new music and YouTube only when we have video to post. I mention this only to illustrate the amount of time social media asks of us to stay current. There is a wide spectrum of commitment artists have to their social media presence. Many artist choose one or two social media sites and spend various amounts of time being active on them.

You have to be active if you want to keep today's audience engaged. You can't just reach out sometimes, you must be consistent about your visibility. People are bombarded with things vying for their attention, so you need to keep up with your social media presence so you're not forgotten.

I'm happy to announce the partnering of Spooky Kool with Sundial Media Group. I mentioned that I have been approached by several web designers and social media companies, but it was by chance that I was attracted to Sundial. Sandra Bassett, the lead vocalist for Spooky Kool, has been working feverishly to elevate her career, and she has. Working Festivals, Night Clubs, Traveling to major music centers, recording with other artists, and even touring in Japan, Sandra, who is both beautiful and talented, has the hunger to do well in the industry.

I had been receiving email invitations and announcements of every activity Sandra was engaged in, including social media, and without a thought, I presumed she was working harder than I was. Last month, I took the time to read her email address, and to my surprise discovered that the message wasn't from Sandra. So, as I ofttimes do, I cut and pasted the web address of the email and discovered that Sundial Media Group was managing Sandra's post as well as many of my favorite artists. Sundail Media Group was generating announcements, shows, and hosted websites for all of them and if only to be in the company of my peers, Sundial appeared to be a great home for us.

I reached out and had a very comfortable conversation with the owner about my goals and expectations. With an understanding of the terms, and the knowledge of the owner's love for music, I made the commitment to let go of my Internet activity.

I still want to know my fans, but the job of outreach and communication has become overwhelming. There is still hope for my objective to know who the fans of Spooky Kool are. The light at the end of the tunnel comes in the form of a young man named Robert McLain, who shares the same passion for music that I do, and he owns Sundial Media Group. I look forward to his help and involvement in the orchestration of our Branding for the early release of our title song, "I Am," and the launch of our new website, www.spookykool.com.

These are indeed exciting times and I hope that this series of articles concerning the release of my 3rd album proves useful. In my next article, I'll cover the Mastering process and the difference between Plugins (which sound pretty amazing) and a true Mastering Studio experience. I will discuss the use of ISRC codes, digital distribution, and announce the album cover chosen by you for our upcoming 3rd album, "I Am."