It’s an interesting process: You write songs. “Bake” them in live performance for a year or so. Then spend six months in the studio recording them. (You also spend many wonderfully sleepless nights debating track sequences and deciding which songs need the mandolin and which would be better served with a harmony vocal.)
Then one day, just like that (hah), a thousand CDs arrive at your front door. You have your new baby and – if all went well – just can’t wait to share it with the rest of the world. So you begin reaching out to DJs who played your last record…and start trying contact folks who might not know who you are. At my level, it’s finding the indie shows on community and independent stations, Internet radio, and the occasional commercial Americana station who’ll listen to your new work and hopefully like what you do enough to share it with their listeners.
We finished the “Starlite Drive-In Saturday Night” last June. Here’s a partial list of the places the new record has been:
- KPIG Radio (Freedom CA) – The songs “Starlite Drive-In Saturday Night and “Good Souls” are both in rotation. The CD itself was the “CD of the Week” on “Fresh Pork Chops” (two cuts played each night with two giveaways) the week of August 6th, 2012.
- Other west coast airplay: KKUP (Cupertino CA), KDRT (Davis CA), KVMR (Nevada City CA), KLCC (Eugene OR), Jefferson Public Radio (Ashland OR)
- Other U.S. Airplay: WIUP (Indiana PA), KRCC (Colorado Springs CO) KWMV (Westcliff CO), WSCS (Concord NH)
- Internet radio: Longtown Sound/WLSO FM, KC Cafe Radio, Wild West Radio, WCPR Network
- And outside the US: SomerValley FM (Bath, UK), Songriver Radio (Netherlands), Wellington Access Radio (Wellington NZ), ECMA-Radio (Austria), Inner FM Community Radio (Victoria Australia)
Although I might not have the push and airplay that a radio campaign fueled by several thousand dollars would buy – and if I had that kinda money lying around, I’d honestly just put it towards my next CD – there’s something incredibly humbling and gratifying about having actual correspondence with DJs, getting airplay…and receiving comments like these from folks who play your music.
In other words, God bless all the real radio stations programmed by real people. 😉