We get asked this question all the time: “How can I get my music posted on KevinNottingham.com?” The answer is actually a lot more complicated than one may think. Though there are various writers who contribute to the success of this site, there are only 3 of us (Justin, Thomas, and myself) who go through the hundreds of requests we receive on a daily basis. And because we receive hundreds of requests a day and none of us mans the site 24/7, it’s impossible for every request to get posted.
Personally, I understand your frustration. As a promoter for my artists on HiPNOTT Records, I know how frustrating it is to try to reach out to various blogs to get music heard and/or posted. So Justin, Thomas and myself put together a few tips that will help you get your music posted right here on our site. In addition, we will tell you how NOT to get your music posted. I know some of you are ultra determined, but we don’t take kindly to stalking… lol. Of course, none of these tips will guarantee anything, but it will make things easier on us and give you a better chance of getting your music posted. Obviously if the music sucks, there’s not much we can help you with.
Tips to get your music heard and/or posted on KN.com
- Remember this email address: music@kevinnottingham.com. This is where you submit music to be considered for posting on KN.com. No need to send an email to myself, Justin or Thomas directly; all three of us receive all emails sent to music@kevinnottingham.com.
- In your email, include a few sentences about yourself (or the artist you represent), as well as a few sentences about the music you are submitting.
- If you are submitting a single song, upload it to usershare.net. This is the file sharing service that we currently prefer. Usershare is fast and efficient and allows us to preview the song before downloading.
- If you are submitting an album or mixtape, please consider using Bandcamp. I can’t tell you how much I love Bandcamp and how easy it is to use. Bandcamp also allows us to preview your album or mixtape before downloading. I don’t know of any other service that does this.
- Attach the cover of the album or mixtape to your email in JPG format and make sure it is at least 500 pixels wide. If there is a back cover, attach that as well. If you do not have a cover to your music, attach 2 photos of the artist (to give us a choice of which to put up). These must also be at least 500 pixels wide. If you REALLY want bonus points, crop your image to 470×280 pixels. This is the size of the images that we use in our posts.
- If you are submitting a video, send us a YOUTUBE link. No need to send the embed code, as we use a plug-in on our site that does all the embedding for us. You can send other links, such as Vimeo, but YouTube is preferred.
- In addition to everything above, it doesn’t hurt to include links to your myspace, facebook, twitter or whatever other web sites you have. This will help give us a better idea of who you are.
- Presentation with the email is key. Enough detail about you and your project, but noting too long. Short and concise.
Tips on how to NOT get your music heard and/or posted on KN.com
- Sending your music to us via Twitter or Facebook. I rarely respond to people I don’t know on Twitter and Facebook. Even if I know you and you send me a message this way, it will get lost and I will probably forget about it.
- Sending your music to my personal email address. My personal email address isn’t that big of a secret and of course I don’t mind getting requests there from people I know and deal with on a daily basis, but if I don’t know you and you hit up my personal email, chances are the email will just get deleted. Ways you can get your emails banned and sent directly to my spam folder: subscribe my email address to your newsletters without my consent, include my email address in the TO field along with 100 other email addresses. People really need to learn to use the BCC function.
- Spamming our inbox with multiple requests weekly. If you’re releasing music daily or more than 2-3 a week and we haven’t posted it yet. chances are we probably have no plans to.
- Sending us an email and addressing it to Shake, Legend or any other blogger. Trust me, I understand the need to make emails personal to get multiple blogs to post your music and I understand the need to recycle emails to save on time. But double check your email before you hit send. Nothing against other bloggers, but we don’t like to be confused for one another.
A lot of these requests may sound petty, but they’re only requests. I mentioned before that timing plays a big part as to if someone’s music gets posted or heard… and this is something no one can control. If you happen to hit us up at a time when we are not busy and there’s nothing in our inbox, chances are you will get heard. Obviously, we have to like the music that’s being sent, but if you follow some of the tips above you’ll have a better chance of getting us to listen to your music and having us post it if we dig it.
Stay tuned for the next post in this series where we will give you tips on how to get your music heard elsewhere, as well as promotion tips and how you can build a fanbase and get people checking for your music!
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
No comments? Interesting.
Thanks for posting this man…I know yall do your best to give some shine to dope artists who don’t necessarily have a big backing, & your site gets enough hits that it really does help to be featured here.
I mos def have some music I’d like yall to check out, so I’ll be sending that through shortly.
Quick question tho; say I work w/an artist & they’ve had their project featured on another site (2db/some random blog), should I include that in the email? Like “here’s the other folks who’ve shown this one some love”.
can’t hurt but not necessary
One thing I’d add. don’t think whatever you sent has been skipped over if it’s not posted immediately. Especially if you send a full album or mixtape, I usually like to give it a spin before I end up posting it. Example – Rebellious who I posted today. Got this email a few days ago, enjoyed it & posted it today
http://kevinnottingham.com/2010/01/23/rebellious-the-carolina-blueprint-soundtrack/
yea, i was gonna ask about that too. How long should someone wait before following up? he mentioned sometimes yall just happen to overlook some stuff cuz it’s busy…how do we know when that’s happened or yall heard it & decided not to post?
It is about timing for me. Having a single attached to usershare where I can d/l and listen to it is great. Bandcamp or any site like that were I can stream and/or download the project is a plus. The Raid had a dope set up for me to listen to his album http://kevinnottingham.com/2010/01/12/introducing-the-raid/
What about the Soundcloud?
I hate when cats put “This is the hottest shit out!” in their email headings. Those emails make me add them to my blocked/junk mail list immediately. Sad thing is, their material might be really dope… but just because of that introduction, you wouldn’t be hearing how dope it is from me.
I wasn’t expecting too many comments on this post, but I appreciate the questions. To answer briefly:
@Myk: honestly, I don’t care if something’s been posted at another site. Just because they like it over there doesn’t mean we’ll like it over here. But like Justin said, it doesn’t hurt. I t just won’t be like, “oh, other blogs dig it, so it must be hot!”
@Myk: I would say give it a week. Normally if something isn’t posted within a week that we receive it, I will actually delete all old emails (even if I haven’t even opened them). Hit us up a week later. If we still don’t post it, then yeah, we probably don’t dig it. I used to email people back and tell them that their music is not my cup of tea, but then that would open up a whole load of questions and people asking why, etc.
@Nasty Nyne: yeah, Soundcloud seemed promising at first but then I realized I couldn’t keep up with all the tracks that were being submitted. The Inbox was another great idea, cuz it pretty much made sure everyone was getting posted. but it was so time consuming… taking 3-4 hours every Saturday morning to get the posts together. I just started going with the attitude that we simply can’t please everyone and can’t post everything we receive.
@Kid Captain: yeah, I hate that too… lol
@kev thanks man…like i said, i appreciate you spending the time to highlight folks who dont get the attention other places (even if the music’s dope). when i saw you post the homies Jansport J, Uptown Swuite, C Plus, etc, it meant a lot to know i was helpin them a lil bit (by submitting it to ya) & it meant a lot to them since yall give so much exposure.
Runnin my lil blog, i get a few random folks sending in music & i try to check it out at least, but like you said, sometimes it just gets too time consuming to listen to everything.
i gotta tell my boy to send some shit in, would you guys want to hear some dope indy Aussie Hip Hop?
glad you posted this,makes it easier when wanting to submit music to you
love the work your doing with your label and your site!! If you ever looking for nother group for your we are in South Carolina on the grind!! 3G-SC