The music industry used to be such a simple place. Aspiring artists would hone their craft, attract the attention of a record label, get signed, release singles and albums, tour to promote everything, and then run happily to the bank.

This system may have been simple but it was anything but fair. Money governed the music industry, not the music. Record labels would only sign artists who they thought would be easy to sell and turn into cash cows. Real musicians were left out in the cold and the public were given a limited choice, forcing them to buy what they were given. Of course, the record labels loved having this control and didn’t want to the system to change.

Although this is a somewhat simplistic look at the record industry in recent times it hopefully highlights the fact that musicians needed record labels in order to get their work in the ears and minds of the public. Musicians always held the talent. The record labels held the keys to the distribution and marketing networks. And that meant that musicians needed the record labels in order to make money.

The key to a musician, or any artist for that matter, making money from their art is making a connection with an audience. Once an artist has the attention of the public the hard work is done.

So, how does an independent artist achieve this connection with their audience?

Blogging. The personal kind.

I’ll give you an example of what I am talking about. Davy Lawrence is the singer songwriter with the band Enormous. He blogs under the nom de plume Napoleon Fantastic at napoleonfantastic.com. His blog is a very personal narrative of his day to day life and his adventures with his dog Audrey, written from the heart from his home studio in a small Derbyshire village.

Davy’s blog doesn’t try to sell anything, it is apparent from the graphics at the top and bottom of the page that Davy is a singer and his band website is just a click away but there is absolutely none of the hard sell that we are used to seeing from the major labels.

The music loving public are tired of being told what to buy. Tired of being force fed a diet of junk music from major label controlled non-musicians. They want to buy music that they enjoy from people who they like. And with blogging giving musicians the opportunity to connect on a personal level with the public the major labels are being left out in the cold and the music industry has changed irrevocably.