Tumblr and Music

N128392166150_9893 MySpace has always been the social media destination for musicians and their fans. The rumored acquisition of iLike (new mgmt's first purchase), suggests that music and entertainment will be even more of a focus for MySpace going forward as it looks to differentiate itself from Facebook and other social networks.

But I am starting to see evidence that musicians and their fans are starting to embrace Tumblr as an alternative music destination. Most of you know, but for those that don't, our firm has an investment in Tumblr and I host my personal weblog there as well.

I've been posting and sharing music on Tumblr for as long as I've been using it. Here's my personal radio station that is auto generated from the music I post to Tumblr. I've got a group of about fifteen or twenty tumblogs that I listen to every day and share music with. So Tumblr has always been a place where fans talk about and share music.

But recently I've found a bunch of new Tumblogs that suggest to me that "something is happening here". Universal Music has set up shop on Tumblr. So has Colin Meloy, the front man of the Decemberists. And last week, Soundcloud started a tumblog.

So in a short period of time, we are seeing labels, artists, and new music services setting up shop on Tumblr. I think we'll see more of this activity.

Like MySpace, it is easy to post music to Tumblr and share it with your friends and/or fans. Through features like favoriting (called "like" in Tumblr) and reblogging, the music can move virally through the Tumblr network, just like what happens in a traditional social net like MySpace.

But unlike MySpace, Tumblr is at its core a blogging service. You get your own space that you can do most anything with. You can domain map your tumblog like I have done so you control the domain and the traffic that comes to it.

I've noticed as my girls have turned into young adults that they have started blogs under their own names/domains. They still use Facebook like they always have, but there is something about wanting your own place on the web that you control that is fundamental to who we are. And I think it's as important in music as it is in any media type.

So I'm thinking that we are going to see more musicians and the music industry at large embrace Tumblr. And when that happens, the blogs that are already on Tumblr will benefit because their will be even more content to view in the dashboard and like and reblog. It's a virtuous circle and excited to be a part of it.

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Comments (Archived):

  1. karen_e

    Very exciting, indeed. The ease of posting to Tumblr is unparalleled. I wish the Disqus add-on code for Tumblr was a bit more flexible. When using the Disqus add-on with Tumblr’s default theme – Redux – it really doesn’t integrate well, visually, to each post. Maybe Disqus and Tumblr could team up to offer a small set of options rather than just a single block of code.

  2. David Noël

    Thanks for the shout & link, Fred!We’d love to integrate Tumblr to our sharing feature and it would be great to be able to post SoundCloud shortcodes to the Audio/Video posts so that it doesn’t look like a video saying “Watch” when actually our audio widget got posted.David, Marco, Topher, Marc, John: get in touch with us 🙂

    1. meaghano

      David! I head up Outreach at Tumblr, I’m emailing you now 🙂

  3. markslater

    i agree – and having this mobile is even more important. and it needs to be completely programmable.

  4. Mark Schoneveld

    Fred – I’ve started a list of compelling music-related blogs on Tumblr here: http://bit.ly/G3Z5bAnd it occurs to me now that I forgot to add yours! Going to remedy that now…

    1. wearehunted

      Awesome Mark. Our guys will add the best of them to We Are Hunted. Enjoy!

    2. kirklove

      Way cool. Thanks much.

    3. fredwilson

      Great list!

    4. fredwilson

      Great list!

    5. fredwilson

      Great list!

  5. LD Eakman

    About time you figured out a music slant for one of your investments! Does this provide an excuse for you and David to attend SXSW? Hope so. LE

    1. fredwilson

      apparently David threw the best party at SXSW last year. for me to come, they need to run SXSW when my kids aren’t on spring break (or my kids need to go to college, which is starting to happen)

  6. kidmercury

    need to start seeing disruptive models in music. while i def think artist communities are at the heart of where value will be created in a world where music end to end digital, i don’t see how tumblr is going to get a piece of this. same problem i think twitter has/will have, although maybe tumblr is still young and small enough to deal with it effectively. ultimately, though, creating value and capturing it are two different things.myspace i think could’ve really done a lot more to give us the future of music, but they sold out and forgot about their niche roots, and tried to serve everyone. of course, when you try to serve everyone, you end up serving no one. fortunately murdoch is a lying chump, which will make watching downfall of myspace enjoyable.

    1. Carl Rahn Griffith

      Hey, Kid – don’t pull any punches there, lol 😉

    2. fredwilson

      creating value and capturing it are two different thingsnow you’ve turned into a philosopher on me kidand a sage one at that

      1. willwhutson

        creating value and capturing it are two things – without a doubt, you’re onto something, but I think a great deal of that falls into the artists and the communities lap. in the case of myspace, generally that was labels and a mass mob of uninformed users. in the case of tumblr you have a hyper involved community that is pretty vigilant about policing itself and artists that are incredibly interested in lowering the barriers of entry for people who might like their music, in my opinion that’s an ideal scenario.imagine if people viewed blogging the same as they did museum curating or magazine editing? that’s what so many tumblr users feel they do with music/photography/writing/videos etc. have galleries and museums helped art? yes. will tumblr and #tags, channels and real time search help tumblr users find more content they want? yes. and in doing that will they help artists? absolutely.here’s what makes tumblr truly different, the ease of sharing that curated experience – commentary and intent all in tact – instantly with everyone that you influence. tumblr does that quicker and more effectively for an artist (of any sort, have you seen all the comedians flocking to tumblr lately?) than anywhere else.myspace did this initially by allowing users to add an artists song, then allowed them to eventually add a playlist, but it was still a destination first – community second – not an experience that was curated and created – just for them – by them and the curators they look up to.tumblr is in many ways an ideal “disruptive model in music” ask allison weiss and any number of independent artists that have used tumblr/twitter almost exclusively to ramp up serious traction within the industry, other artists, and of course people that want to hear music straight from the artists that created it. the community support and the ease of use will only lend itself to more growth within artists and curators alike.

        1. David Noël

          That’s a great comment, Will.I agree. MySpace was and still is a destination. Now it’s about getting your work/art out to where your fans are, as fast and easily as possible.

          1. willwhutson

            thanks David!

        2. fredwilson

          Curation is the key activity on tumblr for sure and that’s why it is such a powerful way for artists to connect with fans

        3. fredwilson

          Curation is the key activity on tumblr for sure and that’s why it is such a powerful way for artists to connect with fans

        4. fredwilson

          Curation is the key activity on tumblr for sure and that’s why it is such a powerful way for artists to connect with fans

  7. Carl Rahn Griffith

    I need to find some time to look at Tumblr in more detail – I have had an account for some while but not really played with it. In the past I didn’t find it particularly intuitive, I have to say. Love the design of it and what I think it is trying to do, so hopefully will get on with it better when I spend some more time playing with it.

    1. David Semeria

      I’m glad you said that Carl, I was beginning to think it was just me who didn’t get the interface.

      1. Carl Rahn Griffith

        Lol, ditto. I tried again last night, David. Same feeling.Fred, the whole UI/UX ‘Calls to Action’ seem confusing, still, frankly – which is even the more frustrating/odd as the aesthetics of the design itself is rather splendid.

        1. fredwilson

          I’ll pass that feedback on carl. Thanks

  8. Bruce Warila

    Nice puff piece. Beyond just being in another place where fans could perhaps be, how can Tumblr make a difference to artists or fans? Not trying to be snarky, I’m just looking for information before the herd shifts.

  9. Edwin Khodabakchian

    Fred. I did a little bit of research on a few weeks ago. You are right that most bands/Musicians are no longer as active on MySpace but the data shows that they have mainly migrated to Youtube+Twitter (not Tumblr). Go to MySpace, take the top 3000 artists on the music section, do a Bing search for that artist for Artist Name + Twitter, Artist Name + YouTube, Artist Name + Facebook.You will see that 85% of those artist have a Facebook account which is similar to their MySpace account and is used mainly for PR type announcement.You will see that 70% have a youtube channel.More interestingly, you will see that 65% of them have a twitter account and 50+% of them are *active* on twitter. The content on twitter is the most interesting one because it is really personal (not just some PR announcement). I think that there is an interesting opportunity in taking that core twitter content, aggregate youtube+flickr and some news feed and create an interesting music experience.Twitter go it right: the 140 character format is great for non computer savvy users to stay in touch with their fans, specially when you combine that with a mobile device. Anything more completed than that is only usable by the band manager and looses a lot of its flavor.(This does not mean that Tumblr is not great)

    1. bijan

      Edwin,Completely agree, Twitter is wonderful for bands. one of my favorite artists is on twitter @benkweller.but i think tumblr is a perfect compliment to twitter for bands. I loved Ryan Adams’ tumblelog. His homemade videos & songs were a thing of beauty – raw and authentic. Sadly he took it down.Colin Meloy’s tumblelog is off to great start.And I’m also following Ra Ra Riot at http://rarariot.tumblr.com/.the vibrant music scene is one of the my favorite things about tumblr.i need to publish my favorite music tumblelogs soon.

      1. David Noël

        Pete Yorn has been tumblelogging from his current tour sharing setlists, behind-the-scenes pictures. It’s really entertaining to follow, even when he’s on tour on a different continent:http://peteyorn.tumblr.com/

        1. Edwin Khodabakchian

          Divid. Pete Yorn is an interesting use case: a great tumblr blog (do you know if he is editing it himself?), an active twitter stream http://twitter.com/peteyorn (700K+ followers), a facebook fan page (14K fans), a Youtube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user… and his own PR centric website.Tumblr and Twitter offer the best experience. It would be interesting to ask him if he sees a big difference between those 2 channels if they are both edited by him. May be tumblr can work with twitter on the music angle and become a richer publishing back end for twitter.

          1. David Noël

            Yes, I agree. Great findings you have there, Edwin. I wasn’t aware of his YouTube channel and haven’t been following him on Twitter. It quite looks (feels) like he’s also behind the Tumblr account (or any other band member for that matter) as it appears to be instant and ‘unedited’. I really like that he (they) are sharing pictures, behind the scenes, setlists etc. That gives a whole new spin and is fun to follow.As I mentioned in several comments in this post, an artist needs to want to do it. Hardware and services are there, you can easily embrace them and offer a great experience for a fan.

      2. Edwin Khodabakchian

        Bijan, you are right: going forward being able to share pictures, live video stream (Qik) will definitely enhance the experience. It will be interesting to see if anyone can use that shift to unlock twitter’s momentum. Facebook has the users, the pictures, the videos and more but do not seem to gain much traction.

        1. fredwilson

          We don’t want to do that. We just want to boost tumblrs

        2. fredwilson

          We don’t want to do that. We just want to boost tumblrs

        3. fredwilson

          We don’t want to do that. We just want to boost tumblrs

    2. David Noël

      Edwin, all valid points.Even if you don’t see a massive amount of (popular) bands using Tumblr yet (Bijan mentioned few exceptions), the activity around music on Tumblr is massive. It’s still less of a push-channel for bands but rather a great way to have a track/band/video spread virally in no time.Just have a look at any track Fred posts to his Tumblr. Last time I checked, just about every track has 900 plays and more (just saw a track with over 2,000 plays). That also counts the plays on tumblelogs of users that have reblogged Fred’s post.The reblogging feature is such a great one to push a band/track/video and I think bands haven’t seen the potential yet. Imagine The Shins announcing their tumblelog, the boost would be gigantic followers and reblogs would skyrocket.

      1. fredwilson

        The thing that’s interesting about those play counts is they are larger than the daily page views on fredwilson.vc

      2. fredwilson

        The thing that’s interesting about those play counts is they are larger than the daily page views on fredwilson.vc

      3. fredwilson

        The thing that’s interesting about those play counts is they are larger than the daily page views on fredwilson.vc

    3. kirklove

      Music discovery is incredibly splintered now. It experienced its big bang when it went digital, expanding outward across the universe of the net at an insanely fast rate. While that’s a great thing for music fans, the net still lack a single kick-ass repository and are left to mine multiple (and growing daily it seems) sites. It becomes too much work and eventually many will die off.It’s even harder for musicians (I know a lot) to keep up with the MySpace, Facebook, iLike, Pandora, Slacker, Last.fm, Spotify, WeAreHunted, HypeMachine, personal blogs, link sharing, and now, yes, Tumblr. I mean when do they have time to make great music? And how do they pick their poison so to speak as to which site(s) they’ll focus on?I’ve been involved in independent music for quite some time, and no one has done it exactly right yet on the web. And while I love Tumblr, and think it’s the slickest, easiest, most bad-assest blogging tool out there, I don’t think it’s necessarily a great place to discover music with ease. I hope that changes.

      1. harpos_blues

        Kirklove,Yeah. The fragmentation is a real issue. There’s only so much time an artist can spend with online communication, before it begins to compromise your “job” — creating and performing music.At some point, it requires separate personnel. The online thing has has become quite a bit different from old-school “street-teams”. We’re all still learning…And we live in interesting times… 😉

      2. fredwilson

        When tumblr let’s me listen to my dashboard in a stream, they’ll fix one big issue on the discovery side

      3. fredwilson

        When tumblr let’s me listen to my dashboard in a stream, they’ll fix one big issue on the discovery side

      4. fredwilson

        When tumblr let’s me listen to my dashboard in a stream, they’ll fix one big issue on the discovery side

  10. harpos_blues

    Fred,I’ll have to re-visit Tumblr, when last I looked, it was lacking in some basic features for music distribution/dissemination.Here’s my largest quandary: online music distribution has become increasingly fragmented. The most frequent complaint from performers in my client base is “where to focus” their marketing efforts.A couple of caveats here:1) I work with “mature/veteran” artists, so they’ve mastered traditional music marketing long ago;2) All are tech savvy, and have embraced the Internet as a medium for communication;3) All have watched Internet music distribution carefully, and have first-hand knowledge of high-flying online entertainment companies that have quickly crashed;4) All are far more cautious than they were 10-15 years ago.So if I were to recommend Tumblr, what make it stand out from the pack? Ease of use? That’s debatable.Reach? Again debatable?I think the primary responsibility of a musician is to create and perform music. As I mentioned above, the avenues for distribution and communication have become far too fragmented; that was the beauty and efficacy of old-school recording contracts that included “marketing” (it’s optional). Once an artist reaches a certain level of recognition and/or success, there’s a team of folks to off-load day-to-day marketing operations.Almost all of the artists I work with have made a personal retreat from the Internet. The demands of one-on-one communication with their fan-base became overwhelming, and was intruding on their personal lives (not always in a good way).The result? Re-implementing “marketing operations” with an additional emphasis on online and social media. Hiring IT personnel, hiring personnel to handle “social media”. But the question remains the same — where to focus?Just my .02

    1. David Noël

      Difference is, you don’t *do* marketing anymore, you *are* the marketing.I don’t understand why an artist loves to create music and perform it but wouldn’t want to go out there and inform about it. But I guess that depends on the person. You’d really need to do it because you choose to do it, not because it’s your ‘job’.Here’s a great success story about an artist (Amanda Palmer) going out there to engage with fans. Result: $19,000 cash earnings. Label cut: $0http://mikeking.berkleemusi…

      1. kirklove

        David,Two points to this:1. The vast majority of musicians have a passion for music precisely because it is *not* marketing. It’s creative, loose, free, and not a 9-5 job so to speak.2. The Amanda Palmer story is a great one, but the reality is at that rate, 19K makes it a hobby, not a long-term profession.

        1. David Noël

          Kirk, thanks!1. I understand that to a certain point and I probably should talk about artists I see around me. Friends playing in that band never really embraced the internet and were rather smiling at what was going on until they all started commonly use the Twitter account for their band (their manager started too). Within a day they had over 1,000 followers that were actually *real* people/fans they could interact with – if they wanted to. Now they’re addicted. My point is, technology and services (both hardware and software make it easy to do it while you’re on the road and while deciding . But you have to choose/like it, if you don’t, it will not work.2. Good point. I was trying end the comment on a positive note and show this one little success story that could be seen as the cherry on the cake besides merch & touring compared to what she has earned via her major label/record sales.

      2. harpos_blues

        david,19K?! woo-hoo, okay good for Amanda. As I said above, I work with veteran/mature artists, so they’re well-schooled in self-promotion — long before the interwebs.As I said above, participation online can be a good thing, up to and until it begins to disrupt an artists personal life. First and foremost, “fan” is short-hand for “fanatic”. One thing that’s clear about internet audience participation (again for the veterans) is that the Interwebs imbues a level of intimacy that doesn’t exist in the real world. Good for the artist, but not necessarily good for his/her family.Artists are entitled to “work/life” balance just as much as regular folks. And again, it will take more than “one bad apple” as Fred mis-quoted above, before the artist will make a decision to limit personal interaction with the online audience.But you’ve still neglected my primary argument, with so many online venues — where to focus? There is no common format for online posting and/or uploads, so each of these properties becomes a one-off. Yes, it’s important to create customized content for each online venue (like any real-world night club), but it’s become an incredible challenge.And how many of these online venues will exist 3-5 from now? The artists I work with have passed the 20-25 year mark and still going strong.

        1. David Noël

          Totally agree with and understand your point about fans/fanatics and how it can affect one’s life and cause frustration.As for what venue to choose. The first question to answer would be to identify where those fans are. Are they on MySpace, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr or do they primarily visit the artists own website? That’s important to know to best channel your resources. I’d say right now: Facebook, Twitter & music blogs covering your artists’ genre but that really depends on where your fans are online.When you look at MySpace and how it appears to be fading, it’s hard to tell who will be around in 3-5 years. You’ll need to keep an eye out about what’s coming up. A year ago, geeks would have probably shaken their head when someone would have told them that in a year, Twitter will get used by such a wide array of people, let alone all the different use cases and apps built on the service.If you like, we can move this conversation to email and I’d be happy to tell you a little bit more about SoundCloud, the company I work for. Maybe you’d see some value in trying it out: david at soundcloud dot com

          1. harpos_blues

            David,I’ll take a look at SoundCloud; thanks for the referral and contact info. I find it interesting in this discussion that none of the commenters has mentioned the true online winner here: Amazon.For the mature artist, Amazon has the most of the full-package: well-established technology platform that can easily support streaming, e-commerce for digital and physical goods, hard-core consumers, collaborative algorithm filtering (recommendations), on-demand compact disc creation.All that’s needed are more tools to build “community” focused on Arts and Entertainment. The basics are there, but AMZN seems to following their tried & trusted model for slow, but steady growth.

          2. ShanaC

            easy…Turn the art community, especially the “high art” community onto tumblr as an art object, or a thing where one can make fun of art, ect.

          3. fredwilson

            They need something like tumblr actually

          4. harpos_blues

            Fred,Tumblr integration with AMZN web services could be very useful. I’d like to take a look at that if you can make something happen. Aren’t you the Magic Man? *giggle*For now, I’ve made a strong recommendation for Donors Choose; it worked well in my tests this month. Thanks for the tip!Happy Birthday!

          5. fredwilson

            Magic man no. But I’ll make the suggestion

        2. fredwilson

          You are right about work life balance. Its something that impacts me tooI’ve found a way to make it work and so can artists and it doesn’t have to mean hiring someone to represent you onlineI think twitter plus a blog is the way to go in the long runAnd for musicians, I think that blog should be on tumblr

        3. fredwilson

          You are right about work life balance. Its something that impacts me tooI’ve found a way to make it work and so can artists and it doesn’t have to mean hiring someone to represent you onlineI think twitter plus a blog is the way to go in the long runAnd for musicians, I think that blog should be on tumblr

        4. fredwilson

          You are right about work life balance. Its something that impacts me tooI’ve found a way to make it work and so can artists and it doesn’t have to mean hiring someone to represent you onlineI think twitter plus a blog is the way to go in the long runAnd for musicians, I think that blog should be on tumblr

    2. fredwilson

      Great points and insights. I operate a blog, a tumblog, a twitter, a facebook fan page, and a facebook personal pageOf all of them, my tumblog takes the least time and I can communicate a lot with itEase of use might be debateable but in my experience its a slam dunkAnd the simple reason is the tumblr bookmarkletI don’t post long form to tumblr. But I find stuff on the web and post it to tumblr all the time

    3. fredwilson

      Great points and insights. I operate a blog, a tumblog, a twitter, a facebook fan page, and a facebook personal pageOf all of them, my tumblog takes the least time and I can communicate a lot with itEase of use might be debateable but in my experience its a slam dunkAnd the simple reason is the tumblr bookmarkletI don’t post long form to tumblr. But I find stuff on the web and post it to tumblr all the time

    4. fredwilson

      Great points and insights. I operate a blog, a tumblog, a twitter, a facebook fan page, and a facebook personal pageOf all of them, my tumblog takes the least time and I can communicate a lot with itEase of use might be debateable but in my experience its a slam dunkAnd the simple reason is the tumblr bookmarkletI don’t post long form to tumblr. But I find stuff on the web and post it to tumblr all the time

  11. davidporter

    Agree, Fred. I think Tumblr is an excellent alternative to Myspace.I wish the Tumblr crew would (1) increase the file size limit for daily uploads, as I often cannot post tracks, and (2) offer a way for users on other services to post music to Tumblr in an integrated fashion (e.g. 8tracks, SoundCloud).

    1. fredwilson

      About three or four times a week, I find myself wanting to reblog music from hypem or wearehunted to tumblrThat single feature would be a homerun for me

      1. davidporter

        I’ll fwd to Anthony. Agree a great idea.

    2. fredwilson

      About three or four times a week, I find myself wanting to reblog music from hypem or wearehunted to tumblrThat single feature would be a homerun for me

    3. fredwilson

      About three or four times a week, I find myself wanting to reblog music from hypem or wearehunted to tumblrThat single feature would be a homerun for me

  12. GraemeHein

    Any reaction to the valuation or the volume of conversation saying that this shows music is a bad investment, especially for VCs?$35M spent and a $20M buyout – one hell of a down round! $35M is the number being batted around, with comments saying that the official numbers were far too low.

    1. fredwilson

      to quote the late Michael Jackson “one bad apple don’t spoil the whole bunch girl”

      1. harpos_blues

        Fred,The “One Bad Apple” quote is from the Osmond Brothers — not the Jackson 5 :). You can hear the track at:Last.fm: The Osmonds – One Bad Applehttp://www.last.fm/music/Th…

        1. fredwilson

          Oops. Got my childhood music backwards!

        2. fredwilson

          Oops. Got my childhood music backwards!

        3. fredwilson

          Oops. Got my childhood music backwards!

    2. fredwilson

      Are you talking about ilike? I wouldn’t read too much into that

    3. fredwilson

      Are you talking about ilike? I wouldn’t read too much into that

    4. fredwilson

      Are you talking about ilike? I wouldn’t read too much into that

  13. soundinvestor

    Looks like a Great Idea…. Don’t like these types of Restrictions….You can upload one audio file each day.MP3s only (WEAK)10 MB maximum.Don’t get me Wrong I just signed up based on Freds Blog and it looks like a Great tool.. Just not a fan of the restrictions..

    1. David Noël

      Personally, I like the restrictions. It makes posting a song special. Every day I look forward to be posting just that one track. The limit of filesize is debatable (maybe Tumblr could add 10MB to the existing ones) but I wouldn’t want to listen to a hour-long DJ mix on Tumblr anyway. Adding 2-3 more formats wouldn’t hurt, I guess (but that’s tied to the size limitations).First I hated only being able to post one track. Today, I cherish that.You can still find tracks posted by other users and reblog if you liked what you hear.

      1. soundinvestor

        Again I have not tried the service yet as I was just drawn to the Website today..I may enjoy the 1 Track every 24-hours as well.. (Ill give it a try for awhile and see)My major problem was with the 10MB and the MP3, but it is a great start and looks like a great Service and can’t wait to give it a shot tonight..

      2. fredwilson

        Exactly right

      3. fredwilson

        Exactly right

      4. fredwilson

        Exactly right

    2. fredwilson

      Constraints are powerful. I blog one song every single day on tumblr and have done so for almost two years. Why? Because that is the limit

    3. fredwilson

      Constraints are powerful. I blog one song every single day on tumblr and have done so for almost two years. Why? Because that is the limit

    4. fredwilson

      Constraints are powerful. I blog one song every single day on tumblr and have done so for almost two years. Why? Because that is the limit

  14. bombtune

    I think musicians will gravitate to the blog atmosphere but not necessarily Tumblr. They thought artists and labels would start up blogs on Ning because it made it so easy but there wasn’t much activity.At the end of the day, the home of the artist will be his or her website which will be in social media blog format. Facebook, Myspace, Tumblr, and Ning will simply be the hubs around the artist website spoke. But an important one. You have to hit all ends to make sure you’re grabbing all the eyeballs.

    1. David Noël

      Ning is more-or-less a walled garden and artists would need to keep on directing their fans there. Totally agree with the second point you make.Looking at many band websites I always ask myself: why do they still host and run an own website? Tumblr makes it super easy to customize design, it lets you add widgets of all your other profiles, you can add your own domain, people can follow, reblog, like (instant back-channel).Old band websites mostly run on CMS’s and they are often out-dated and a pain to update (especially while on the road). Also, you always need your ‘webmaster’ to make any changes.My point is that today, you can do so much with a high impact and at the same time spend a reasonably amount of time doing so. The only decision an artist has to make, is that we will play an active role.

      1. bombtune

        I just set up a tumblr account myself and agree with you, it’s free, it’s easy to use, it aggregates, and it’s very visually appealing. I’ll have to get my own label Saguaro Road Records on this. Thanks guys.

        1. David Noël

          Great news!

        2. ShanaC

          I agree about visually appealing. I really wanted to use it as a source of stuff I collected for school. For certain people (ie me people) It needs to be totally mobile. I would love to turn it into “My mobile place” where I don’t think, but feel. It has that going for it, becaus eit moves so quickly…Of all things I want to see an app for, it would be that.

  15. Andrew Zarick

    There are some inherent problems to using blog-style publishing platforms for pure music consumption. A platform dedicated to music playback that filters blogs and content heavy sites for content (a more customizable hypem that puts more power in the fans’ hands) will be the true winner in this area.

    1. Graham Siener

      Hype Machine is certainly a great start. It’s funny how an online group tends to favor a certain genre — I find myself wanting to filter out the electronic music from hypem more and more.

  16. justjosef

    Once KEXP starts a Tumblr, then I think you are on to something.Individual artists using it as a share platform is nice, but massive aggregation & recommendation is how music promotion works. Another platform for an artist to share ideas, sketches, information, etc. will lead to fatigue. I personally enjoy Tumblr the most – more than FB, MS, Twitter, etc. – I just don’t see another ‘wave’ coming.

  17. mled

    I’d like to see Tumblr add more for podcasting, like Posterous has done with the itpc:// protocol. I’m glad the streampad bar is used by so many people on Tumblr, you can get a better understanding of the person behind the blog while you read.It’s such an engaging platform. I can easily lose 30 mins scrolling down the never-ending Dashboard, using Tumblupon or finding new blogs in the Directory.I wrote about the community quite a while ago on the Telegraph, all that has changed since then is I now believe the platform has gone mainstream: http://blogs.telegraph.co.u…I’d love it if more musicians showed up, but ultimately you can’t ignore everyone else. Now that those tags we’ve all been adding to our posts actually feature in the Dashboard, I hope more conversations take shape through reblogging that explore specific topics in greater depth.I can’t help but notice the SoundCloud mention in the comments here. If SoundCloud and Tumblr make something special, I really hope that those who know SoundCloud (through musichackday.org and so forth) like PeoplesMusicStore and Gigulate also get involved.

    1. David Noël

      Where are you based? We have some music hack days planned on the US East Coast, India and Berlin. If you want to get involved, send me an email: david at soundcloud dot com. Happy to hear your thoughts about SC/Tumblr and beyond.

      1. mled

        I’m a Londoner. Music Hack Day (.org) is organised by Dave Haynes and James Darling from SoundCloud. The last event was held at the Guardian offices – http://www.guardian.co.uk/m…I’ve not met anyone from SoundCloud (tried to at Twestival), but I did meet the PeoplesMusicStore guys for coffee – great folk.I’ll be in touch.

    2. fredwilson

      Great comment. I agree that so much more is possible and tantalizingly close

    3. fredwilson

      Great comment. I agree that so much more is possible and tantalizingly close

    4. fredwilson

      Great comment. I agree that so much more is possible and tantalizingly close

  18. scottmag

    Something is happening indeed. In fact I browsed fredwilson.vc yesterday and then picked up some of those tracks on Emusic. I just this morning listened to the ramblingly wonderful Dylan track, “Lily, Rosemary & The Jack Of Hearts.” Thanks for posting that. Now this is all great if music discovery is serendipity and worthy of some effort. But there’s a component missing between the socialization of music and the acquisition. These Tumblr blogs you mention are fine for anyone who stumbles across them or spends the time to cultivate a list to follow, but there’s no good guide to discovering all that music. And there’s no good way for it to appear on my iPod without multiple intermediary steps. There’s a problem to be solved here.

    1. fredwilson

      Hypem and wearehunted are solving some of the ones you mention

    2. fredwilson

      Hypem and wearehunted are solving some of the ones you mention

    3. fredwilson

      Hypem and wearehunted are solving some of the ones you mention

  19. ajcronk

    As someone who works on a music+Twitter startup (http://bln.kr), I’m very interested in how and where musicians share. We have placed our bet on Twitter, but it is obvious that musicians are going to share everywhere to expand reach (similar to what harpos_blues said).If distribution is free and abundant, how do you win artist’s preference? I think part of it has to do with offering artists a larger audience than they have on their own. Mechanisms like the Reblog and the Retweet are the new street team. We find that around 50% of listens come from secondary referrals (not direct from artist). MySpace is just not built for that kind of word of mouth.Also important is that you help musicians get smarter. We are trying to support a direct artist to fan connection, and artists need information about how, when, and where to spread their message.It will be interesting to see which site becomes the next “king” of original music, and who will be the first Tumblr or Twitter act to make it, similar to the Arctic Monkeys on MySpace.

    1. kirklove

      Great post. And similar to my sentiment that music promotion and discovery online is very splintered at this point and is probably a trend that will continue, then fold back into itself eventually as the copy cats die off.Related to your Arctic Monkeys point, we’ve been discussing that topic a lot at the office (I work for Disc Makers, the largest manufacturer of CDs for independent musicians), and we felt there wasn’t a single act that has made it big (yet) solely on social and web presence. They’ve all needed record label support (and $$$) to get over that hump. At the very least from a logistical standpoint. Curious to see if you agree?

      1. ajcronk

        Yes, I think that today the best way for a band to be massive is to sign with a record label. It’s similar to letting outside investors in your company. You put yourself in a better position to go huge, but you give up control. It really depends on your goals as an artist. Do you have to be massive to make a good living in the emerging music economy?What I am excited about are artists that make the choice to go it alone, and seeing how far they can take it.

      2. fredwilson

        What is ‘big’?

      3. fredwilson

        What is ‘big’?

      4. fredwilson

        What is ‘big’?

        1. kirklove

          Big meaning financially successful to the point they can pursue music as a full-time profession and live a very good lifestyle doing so. Not Coldplay big, but is a number north of 250K a year for a band/artist with just a blog and twitter possible sans a label? I don’t think so.I suppose I’ve steered off topic from music discovery to success in the music business. Sorry about that. Perhaps it’s a post you’ll write about some other day. ; )

          1. harpos_blues

            Kirklove,I couldn’t agree more! 250-300K is an excellent financial target for musical success.

          2. fredwilson

            250k dollars per year per person or for the entire band?

          3. kirklove

            I was thinking 250K for a solo artist.It gets a bit harder for a band. Especially if you are Spinal Tap and you have to figure out what to give the drummer. As Nigel said: “Authorities said best leave it unsolved.” ; )

          4. fredwilson

            Kind of like splitting the founders stock in a startup

    2. fredwilson

      I’m thinking it is twitter + blog for most brands which includes musiciansAnd my point is that for musicians, blog should be tumblr

    3. fredwilson

      I’m thinking it is twitter + blog for most brands which includes musiciansAnd my point is that for musicians, blog should be tumblr

    4. fredwilson

      I’m thinking it is twitter + blog for most brands which includes musiciansAnd my point is that for musicians, blog should be tumblr

  20. alexwhite

    As the social media landscape churns I think there will always be new sites where artists need to create profiles. As Fred points out, there is nothing like having your own place on the web and the only sure-fire way for an artist to have this is through building and maintaining their own .com domain. Having their own site is the only way to control all the data and information about who is visiting their site and how they are interacting with the band as fans and customers. That being said, I do recognize that artists without the know-how or resources to develop their own site can come quite close skinning sites like Tumblr and Bandcamp.To use an analogy: an artists’ .com domain name is like a harbor and the social music landscape is like the ocean. While it is important to have a presence, measure and monitor the conditions of the oceans the real purpose should be to drive activity to the harbor where email addresses and demographic information can be captured and transactions can be made.Part of what I love about the Tumblr platform for music is the re-blogging feature as a sign of who is influential. I would love to see more visualizations of how music spreads throughout the Tumblr ecosystem. This could help artists identify who their early supporters are and perhaps help them establish relationships with those trendsetters during the critical early stages of their career.

    1. fredwilson

      Yup. So right

    2. fredwilson

      Yup. So right

    3. fredwilson

      Yup. So right

  21. groovedrm

    Fred — have you been exposed at all to MOG? It’s a music focused blogging platform at the core, but has expanded to include some other elements such as video, artist interviews, and etc. And, it allows you to post your own music.Definitely check it out. Curious to see what you think.

    1. fredwilson

      I have a mog but I don’t use it. It doesn’t feel sufficiently a part of the open web for my taste. I’ve shared that view with david (mog’s founder). He’s doing some things that may change that

    2. fredwilson

      I have a mog but I don’t use it. It doesn’t feel sufficiently a part of the open web for my taste. I’ve shared that view with david (mog’s founder). He’s doing some things that may change that

    3. fredwilson

      I have a mog but I don’t use it. It doesn’t feel sufficiently a part of the open web for my taste. I’ve shared that view with david (mog’s founder). He’s doing some things that may change that

  22. charliepinto

    Fred, I love this post. I feel that Tumblr allows me to feel a personal connection to those I follow, similar to Twitter. I especially enjoy when someone I am following on Twitter updates their status from Tumblr- it brings so much more creativity and personality to each tweet.There is nothing out there that can convey as much personality as Tumblr. Because of this, I feel Tumblr is going to be the majority-destination for not only rising solo musicians and music labels, but movie studios, celebrities and artists as well. Many are already using Twitter, but Tumblr-content would be the perfect compliment to many of their tweets.It is because of this connection that I think of Twitter and Tumblr as having a mutually beneficial relationship. Those that are not on Twitter, will sign-up once they have a blog that can convey much more than just a ‘status update.’ Those that are on Twitter (celebrities, artists, studios, personalities), will benefit from increased visibility by sharing content from Tumblr.Do you feel the same?

    1. fredwilson

      Yes I do

  23. ShanaC

    Now if only I could get the tumblr app I found from crackberry to work..I need to get my “stuff I am collecting for my portfolio” off my phone… Suggestions?

    1. fredwilson

      I email my bberry photos to tumblr. Each user has an email address to do that. You’ll find yours under account/goodies

      1. ShanaC

        http://hippocampsoftware.tu…Found some copies of this floating around. Mine won’t work. I might switch back to the old way, but I wish I understood the differences in support…

  24. Steven McClenning

    tumbler is an awesome platform for sharing

  25. jengroff

    Great post. Tumblr is indeed a great place to discover music. Do you see Tumblr and HypeMachine as competitive, or is hypem just a meta-layer on top of some Tumblr and other music blogs, grabbing them in its net? Thanks.

    1. fredwilson

      The latter. Very compimentary. I listen to music on both almost every day

  26. Jamie Kantrowitz

    musicians need a post once, publish everywhere home. by publish i mean media and content not music publishing. if tumblr could own this i’d love to see the race.

    1. fredwilson

      Topspin is building that but its currently targeted at the established artist market and the solution feels ‘heavy’ to me. But they are doing some great thingsI’ve often thought that tunecore could leverage its position as the place artists go to get on itunes to do this. But they haven’t yet