Interview with JP Holesworth from Stratoblogster.com

JP Holesworth has been writing Stratoblogster Guitar Blog for 6 years. He is into Fender type guitars and a gear geek in general. His background is hazy at best. His blog features a random assortment of interesting Strat configurations, artist plugs and guitar trivia. And lots of gear pimping too! Beer money!

It’s all of those things. Blogging keeps me interested in playing, and vice versa. I’ve met, and network with interesting artists, writers and gear industry people.

The “state of music” is a very broad subject. Always has been and will be. There are always amazing musicians creating great music. You just have to find them.

Music isn’t “heading” anywhere. It always is. Music gets mixed and morphed, cycled and recycled. When a particular groove hooks up with other parts of a culture you get a genre. That genre may help define aspects of the culture or score it just like in a movie. Everything runs its course. Some music has greater lifespan than other music depending on how many facets of culture it can permeate and merge with, i.e. The Beatles vs 70′s Disco music. The Beatles obviously outlive the other, because that music made more connections overall, and can thus continue on. Good songs outlive those who wrote them. This is true for every genre.

MySpace was great because users could post their top friends. This made it very easy for an artist you knew and dug to introduce others to artists they liked. This specific aspect made MySpace invaluable for discovering musicians. Facebook should implement that feature for artist pages. Youtube is an incredible resource! As for music sites and blogs– they are just too numerous to mention. Fortunately everyone sets up companion Facebook pages, Twitter and Youtube channels which makes it easier to find and monitor specific niche sites. I list a few site links at Stratoblogster of specific sites I dig. Many of them are are folks who’ve been blogging awhile. My tip would be to get good at navigating Facebook and Youtube. And I think people are doing just that.

We all know that the internet and digital technology has destroyed the old music industry distribution model. Now it’s up to the artists themselves to promote their stuff via channels like Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud and the various music sharing sites. They need to put more emphasis on merchandising since selling CD’s is no longer a big revenue source, and downloads are just shared and pirated anyway. Sites like Cafe Press are just the beginning of merch. possibilities. Touring artists should get more control of ticket sales, and use social networking to build fan followings across the country and around the globe. This is happening. Ultimately though, musicians really need to perform live, and use the internet like crazy to promote touring. Before there was radio, recording technology and television, musicians played out and traveled constantly. What has happened to the old music industry should result in better performing musicians. Records, tapes, CD’s, downloads, video– whatever recorded media should just be looked upon as a preview or business card for live shows. Let’s get people out of their houses and cars. Handheld wireless technology helps this too, as it’s encouraging people to get out and experience events– and document & communicate them. The internet is a huge communication interface. Those who fully utilize it for communication as opposed just another form of television inflow, can build a valuable network to support and share whatever they create.