My death metal album got 4,400 streams on Spotify in one week and here's how I did it

[CLAYSHAPER]

I consider the release of my debut album "Vampiric" a success. I am a bedroom musician working alone, as many of us are, writing, recording, producing, releasing and promoting music all by ourselves. The tips I've read about promotion are rarely that good or simply outdated. That's why I want to share some concrete advice everyone could have some use for.

The stats
During the first week my album got 4,400 streams on Spotify and 2000 streams on Bandcamp in the app. 61 fans decided to purchase the album for a price they found fair and 171 downloaded it for free. I earned around $200 just from sales.


Pictured: Spotify stats.

The hard truth
Nobody gives a shit about you or your 'new' music. Making good music is just the bare minimum of getting any attention at all. 2022 people are very, very, focused on the visual aspect of whatever you're trying to promote. Pure music is neither visual nor easy to access as most people on their phones won't put in headphones or start the sound just for some random guy. Good music can spread by itself, but it's so rare it's almost a myth at this point. But there are ways getting around this.

Social Media presence
My main channel of communication is Instagram. I've found that by using hashtags, following and talking to interesting people and releasing simple videos of me performing my music is the best way to reach out. Battling the algorithm is much harder on Twitter and Facebook, even though sharing links is easier on those platforms. I focus all my energy on Instagram, cross post everything on Facebook, copy paste and shorten for twitter and release longer, high quality content for Youtube to promote my music. If I have vertical video of a performance I will post it on IG Stories, TV, Reels, Youtube Shorts and TikTok.

Getting around it
If people want visual, I give them visual. I started sharing my own photographs and curated contemporary/old art I like (always got permission if it wasn't in the public domain) and transitioned into posting my own art alongside videos of me performing my music. Now people stay for the art and may give my music a chance. I've been doing this for four years and are near 22,000 followers on Instagram. Cross platform I have around 29,000 followers (Bandcamp, Spotify, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok). I put no effort into the other ones, but they keep growing there too because of the cross posting.


Pictured: Facebook reach and Instagram reach.

Growing a fanbase
* Every platform wants to keep it's users on that platform, so I rarely use links just to see my YouTube views get inflated by a couple of clicks, for example. Build a fanbase by grinding on that platform, and call to action down the line when it matters. Don't expect to grow by spamming links.
* Content that's purely music is hard to pierce the buzz, especially extreme music. Are you a streamer? Artist? Videographer? Photographer? Do you like to cook? Lifestyle enthusiast? Dancer? Working with clay? Literally anything else that's visual can be used to boost your music. But this is just how I like do it.
* Releasing singles keeps the attention of your fans. Releasing an album creates a bigger buzz. Don't bother sending singles to journalists and reviewers, but absolutely make an effort to promote an album.

Chronological: The release
* Completed the album and put it up on a music distribution service. Distrokid is popular and has a monthly cost but unlimited uploads. I use Emubands to keep all royalties and do album uploads with one time lifetime costs.
* Claim my Spotify artist page and pitch a song on the album to their editorial theme. My song didn't make the cut, but if accepted it's huge. Do this at least a month prior to release.
* Began posting short snippets of me playing the new songs to create a hype.
* Filmed and released a music video all by myself. Posted this on Reddit and submitted the video to YouTube channels like BlankTV and Black Metal Promotion.
* Ran a small giveaway (band patches) for people who pre-saved the album on Spotify via smart.url.
* Looked up reviews of bands that sounds like me, gathered the email addresses of those blogs and news outlets. I gathered around 150 of them and blasted out a press release consisting of album art, pictures of me, the songs, a private album stream, some information about the album and my band and quotes by me about the album. This got me featured on MetalSucks and a couple of other sites. Make it easy to write something interesting about you. Bloggers love fast and easy content.
* On release I put out one more music video done with a single camera and me in the woods.
* Submitted my music to 17 metal playlisters on submithub. Was accepted by half of them.
* Ran Spotify ads on Facebook for $50 for great results. I followed this tutorial to set them up.

Ending
I have made over 30 demos on compilations and EP:s since I started CLAYSHAPER back in 2018. I know 4,400 doesn't sound like much, but seeing actual people listening to your music in real time on Spotify's dashboard is a cool feeling. Receiving comments about AOTY is also humbling. I hope you as a reader got something out of my little write up.

Ask any questions you might have, I'll answer if I can.

 

[DiezelMonster]

This feels like a pyramid scheme.

 

[sirbuh]

This feels like a pyramid scheme.

how many can we put you down for?

 

[DiezelMonster]

how many can we put you down for?

Put me down for 32 Tony Robbins.

 

[Emperoff]

Are you a streamer? Artist? Videographer? Photographer? Do you like to cook? Lifestyle enthusiast? Dancer? Working with clay? Literally anything else that's visual can be used to boost your music. But this is just how I like do it.

Chuck Schuldiner would be proud

 

[CanserDYI]

Aw fuck no didn't even make it past the title.

 

[Werecow]

So.... are you selling gummies or not?

 

[AwakenTheSkies]

This feels like a pyramid scheme.

Well he's not trying to sell you anything is he?

My friend who recently got into this social media promotion thing as well with his guitar stuff has told me the same advice more or less.

But I hate promoting myself, or trying to "sell myself" through social media. I hate it!!! It feels terrible and not genuine at all. Trying to write in a positive way, trying to act "funny". Euuuuugghh It is such a SHIT way to share your music!

And it just keeps getting worse , now you don't even see the users you follow, getting spammed with suggested posts. My friend uploads a video and after I view it it gets taken away and replaced with more "suggested posts". Ridiculous!

 

[nickgray]

It's a sort of a mix between melodic black and melodic death, imo at least. I wasn't prepared for this to be this good though, considering the post It's legit pretty good stuff, congrats on the release. Good production too, a tiny bit anemic maybe, but very clean and not fatiguing at all (I'll take this any day over brickwalled productions that make your ears bleed after 5 seconds). Parts remind me of Ihsahn's solo stuff.

Nobody gives a shit about you or your 'new' music. Making good music is just the bare minimum of getting any attention at all. 2022 people are very, very, focused on the visual aspect of whatever you're trying to promote.

Not sure if I agree. This music is pretty damn niche. Your statement is true if you had a more commercial kind of music, but yours falls more under the style of music for music fans (or even music for musicians, a little bit). Your biggest strength here is pure music because you are appealing to the in-the-know crowd, and we don't really care about flashy stuff. I mean, I'm still listening to it on the bandcamp in the backround as I'm writing this post. It's very rare that I find something new that's even remotely worth listening to.

If I were you I'd consider making tutorials/videos about the production, composition, and recording process. The way I see it, that's one niche that is yet to be filled, as typically big YouTubers (like Ola) are more focused on broader appeal videos, and the really in-depth videos from actual musicians are hard to find. Andy Gillion's videos on Mors Principium Est tracks are the closest related thing I can think of (different kind of melodeath than your though).

 

[Winspear]

Great post and rundowns, thank you!
Your visuals are excellent and are indeed so important. They shape so much of the perceived atmosphere around the act, which is to me at least, the most important thing by far.
Solid music. The instagram is superb - I love how uniform it feels even though it's not all original content, well done.

 

[BlackMastodon]

Pyramid-scheme title aside, I actually really appreciate the transparency and rundown, it shows the side of self-releaaing music that isn't often talked about and what's behind the sales-pitch posts.

 

[OmegaSlayer]

Congrats on the amount of streams

On the downside it depresses me a lot about releasing my stuff, as I'm sure I won't have your consistency in promoting

 

[ParanoiaEngine]

It seems that instagram is a good place to promote death metal

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

Well he's not trying to sell you anything is he?

My friend who recently got into this social media promotion thing as well with his guitar stuff has told me the same advice more or less.

But I hate promoting myself, or trying to "sell myself" through social media. I hate it!!! It feels terrible and not genuine at all. Trying to write in a positive way, trying to act "funny". Euuuuugghh It is such a SHIT way to share your music!

And it just keeps getting worse , now you don't even see the users you follow, getting spammed with suggested posts. My friend uploads a video and after I view it it gets taken away and replaced with more "suggested posts". Ridiculous!

I am a solo musician so social media is my only "stage" so to speak. I never post content I'm not comfortable with. You don't have to be funny or acting a way that's fake.

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

It's a sort of a mix between melodic black and melodic death, imo at least. I wasn't prepared for this to be this good though, considering the post It's legit pretty good stuff, congrats on the release. Good production too, a tiny bit anemic maybe, but very clean and not fatiguing at all (I'll take this any day over brickwalled productions that make your ears bleed after 5 seconds). Parts remind me of Ihsahn's solo stuff.



Not sure if I agree. This music is pretty damn niche. Your statement is true if you had a more commercial kind of music, but yours falls more under the style of music for music fans (or even music for musicians, a little bit). Your biggest strength here is pure music because you are appealing to the in-the-know crowd, and we don't really care about flashy stuff. I mean, I'm still listening to it on the bandcamp in the backround as I'm writing this post. It's very rare that I find something new that's even remotely worth listening to.

If I were you I'd consider making tutorials/videos about the production, composition, and recording process. The way I see it, that's one niche that is yet to be filled, as typically big YouTubers (like Ola) are more focused on broader appeal videos, and the really in-depth videos from actual musicians are hard to find. Andy Gillion's videos on Mors Principium Est tracks are the closest related thing I can think of (different kind of melodeath than your though).

Thank you. You're right, the niche group loves it! Of course it isn't AOTY, like I receive comments about, but maybe for this niche group it is. My point still stands though, you said it yourself: "It's very rare that I find something new that's even remotely worth listening to."
I'll consider making studio tutorials! I have a very simple setup like most of us do. Focusrite, GGD Drums, Fabfilter VTS:s in Cubase. But I don't fuck with amp sims in the DAW, I find that you can get decision fatigue pretty quickly. I have my presets in my Kemper and record them straight into the DAW without DI-tracks. That way I get what I get, if it sounds like crap, it's on me. This is why the mix is a bit anemic, I had removed a bit too much of the body in the guitar sound, but I had to go with that sound as I noticed in the mixing process. It's not the greatest, but it's unique at least. With DI I would just have fixed it and sounded like everything else out there.
Also: It was not my intention of coming of cheezy in the post. I genuinely want to share some advice I never got when starting out.

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

Great post and rundowns, thank you!
Your visuals are excellent and are indeed so important. They shape so much of the perceived atmosphere around the act, which is to me at least, the most important thing by far.
Solid music. The instagram is superb - I love how uniform it feels even though it's not all original content, well done.

Thank you! I spend quite a lot of time making my "brand". Fonts. colors, aesthetic, sound, etc.
PS. All recent content is original I do metal album art-esque digital collages using public domain imagery.

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

Congrats on the amount of streams

On the downside it depresses me a lot about releasing my stuff, as I'm sure I won't have your consistency in promoting

Thanks!
Yes, I was (and certainly am) in your shoes still. It's hard releasing music. It's your little baby and it hurts when it's ignored or get verbally abused
I stopped nagging my friends to get some inflated numbers on whatever platform I was focusing on and just went to the grind to get some results. However, these numbers and achievements will quickly fade into obscurity and I know that. I would say the most important step is not having a constant social media presence, it's doing some work the weeks prior to the release. Check out those blogs and save a couple of email addresses. Do a video with your phone. Generate some cool art with AI or hire someone. If you begin spreading the music after it's out you're at a disadvantage already, bloggers might not want to review it because it's considered old when the can get to it.

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

It seems that instagram is a good place to promote death metal

It actually is. It's gotten better over the four years I've been on there. It takes a while to find your crowd but after a while Instagram recognized your interests and begin recommending people who might like what you do/you like what they do.

 

[CLAYSHAPER]

Pyramid-scheme title aside, I actually really appreciate the transparency and rundown, it shows the side of self-releaaing music that isn't often talked about and what's behind the sales-pitch posts.

Yeah, it wasn't my intention sounding like that. I just had to get it all into the title
I was pretty bummed out for many years that I didn't get any attention at all, the music was so cool though! I thought.
I reached out to mid sized acts to get some tips, but they didn't even bother to answer, and I know now that I came of as naive. There's not a short answer to getting your music out to people and everyone can carve their own path. I would suggest NOT selling out and doing social media stuff you're not comfortable with. I don't.

 

[prlgmnr]

Are you a streamer? Artist? Videographer? Photographer? Do you like to cook? Lifestyle enthusiast? Dancer? Working with clay? Literally anything else that's visual can be used to boost your music. But this is just how I like do it.

Chuck Schuldiner would be proud

I bet Marco Pierre White has a good death metal album in him