EP3 - Why Your Best Songs Might Fail in Music Licensing

If there is one thing that stops music from getting a sync placement… it’s likely the same thing that will make you quit listening to this podcast I shot for you.

Find out why AND what it means for your recordings you are trying to get into TV & film.

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If you want more tips and ideas on how to get your music into tv and film: https://syncsongwriter.com

For my free cheatsheet that shows you how to connect with the right people in licensing: https://syncsongwriter.com/guide

To join the Art Of The Song Pitch - a proven step-by-step process that shows you exactly how to license your music to TV & film successfully in precise detail, where we personally introduce you to top music supervisors: https://artofthesongpitch.com

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Hey, it's Chris, and you know how I love using metaphors, examples, analogies, for things I'm talking about. Today, I got this crafty idea to come out and go on a windy day here in the Sea of Cortez and have the wind blowing into my microphone to give you an example of bad production. Because today I wanted to talk about production and sync.

I also am staring more or less into the sun squinting away. And maybe my hair is all messy from the wind. I have no idea. But the bottom line is, I want to give you an example of what music supervisors... their reaction when they hear your music, if it's not produced properly.

It's so critical that your music be produced right. And I'm gonna talk about why. And I'm also gonna talk about ways to actually make that happen even if you're a beginner.

So the bottom line is that when you first submit your music and a supervisor puts it on and listens to it, the very first thing they listen for is the production value. And I'm talking about within the first few seconds of playback.

If the production value is not above the threshold, if it doesn't sound like everything else getting into TV and film, it goes into their version of the trash and they move on to the next one. They're very busy people. They don't have time to get back to you to explain, here's what the problem was, or here's what I would fix, or here's my impressions. They simply don't have time for that, so you have to get it right the first time.

In order to get that right, a lot of people think, well I'll just spend more time in my home studio. If I spend a certain amount of money, maybe under $5,000 for your computer, your interface, your microphone and your guitar, whatever instruments you've got. Then all you gotta do is just spend time until it's right.

The problem with that approach is you're not ready yet. You're not there. When I first started out recording my friends for beer, I listened back to those recordings. I spend a lot of time on them, and they still make me cringe.

So all I'm trying to say is, don't waste the great songs that you're writing now on mediocre production. As you're getting better at what you do, the solution to that is to hire somebody else who's better than you at certain things and let them bring what they've got to the table so that they can make your music great while you're learning from them.

So you're working with them, right? Allow them to kind of produce or engineer or do whatever they do, and learn from them about how they're doing what they're doing on your music. Pull the sessions into your computer, get better and better at it, and before you know it, you'll be producing your music above that threshold.

Now, this is something that I do at my own studio, Sundown Sessions Studio. I have an online recording studio. I went out and hired some of the best of the best. These are world class players, engineers, programmers, composers, whatever you know, all the roles that we have. And we work as a team and a lot of these people are better than me at certain things.

I spent a lot of time producing records. Over 20 years, I've won awards doing it. And I'm not saying I'm the brightest crayon in the box. I recognize that. That's S