Building His Career From The Basement Up
Every week for 90 minutes indie musician Mathew Ebel performs live from his basement on the iinternet via UStream. During this performance, captured by WBUR in Boston, Ebel has about 300 viewers spread across the globe who interact with him and each other during the set.
Ebel has used his show to sell albums and about 70 subscriptions that range from $5 a month to a $150 V.I.P. pass which includes a bbq at his house. It's a humble beginning born out of frustration with more typical ways of building an audience. “It wore me out after a while,” he admitted, trying as the WBUR reporter Andrea Shea wrote, "to get the
attention of people who really don’t have that much attention left."
Is this success? While Ebel's audience is modest so far; it's a beginning and shows, at the very least, that there is no single right way to star building a career.
Here's Ebel updating his fans about his recent activities on a short video:
It’s success if that’s what he wanted, definitely. If not…then no, he’s still got more work to do.
My guess? Dude still has a lot more work to do.
It’s the start of success. He’s not done yet, by any stretch of the imagination.
He’s proven that it’s possible. The next step is to get enough fans buying his stuff and subscribing to his Dot Net site to reliably cover all his expenses; he’s not quite there yet, but he’s close, and getting closer with each new fan.
My wife makes fun of me for living in my basement too. I teach guitar online and have a membership site as well. I’ve never been into the typical gigging/touring selling t-shirts scene. Not a huge number of students yet but I feel it is a success, and I bring in revenue from other sources as well (adsense, affiliate products, etc).
Hell yeah it’s success. He’s found a way that works for him. All he has to do is keep building on the foundation he laid and it will only get bigger. If nothing else, the wealth of information he’ll garner from doing this is invaluable and very worth it. Success is not a destination, it’s a process.
UK artist Sandi Thom started broadcasting shows from her basement 5 years ago and landed a deal with RCA as a result which produced a No.1 single.
Good luck to him but there are 1000’s doing the same vying for attention. Ultimately, killer songs will find a huge audience, anything less won’t.
While his fanbase might be somewhat modest, his music collection is already filled with a range of “killer songs”. Some of his stuff has already been really popular in the past around various podcasts. Songs such as Drive Away, and Every Colour are a testament to that.
I’m looking forward to see what he’s able to come up in the future. As a subscriber to matthewebel.net, its great to hear brand new music from an artist on a fortnightly basis. Its something which is impossible from any other artist I know of.
Also, its a great thing to be a part of. To know that you’re helping an artist who’s capable of some fantastic music, take off, and branch out, and hopefully achieve his goal of touring the country / world.
For anyone who hasn’t checked out his music yet, its definitely worth doing.
Is it succesful? That depends entirely on your goals.
It’s certainly 100 times better than playing in your basement to no one at all.
IMHO, It’s a cheap and hassle free way to get performance experience and get started on building your audience.
Double thumbs up from me.
another good attempt at marketing creativity. kudos to mr. ebel!
Let me tell you a story.
I’ve known Mr. Ebel for a decent amount of time. I went and saw him perform back when he was working a 9to5. He performed at an open mic night at a popular “discovery” bar here in Nashville, Tn.
It was decent dive, with decent food. He got on stage after three guitarists had a round table type group. They sat down, and watched him.
Of everyone at the bar, there were about four tables of Matthew Ebel fans. Everyone else was playing in the open mic night, serving beer, or something similar.
Matthew put his concert online, where it was picked up by thousands of fans. The rest of the people there stared blankly as he said things like “online production” and “available to the world.”
I’ve lived in Nashville for over a decade. I’ve been to many bars, and watched many open mic nights. I’ve never seen anyone get “discovered” in this town. I’ve rarely seen anyone even AT the open mic nights who wasn’t there to perform.
If that’s what performance is.. if that’s what living your art is.. getting up in front of other people and performing to people who don’t care what you have to play or say.. then I think it’s clear Matthew’s going the right way here.
Because it’s obvious. The people at that open mic night who were there because he invited us cheered. Everyone else could care less. They just wanted THEIR turn.