What is Indie Music World?

I am willing to wager that the most challenging aspect of your life at this moment is interacting with and managing relationships with others. It’s a bet I believe I would easily win, as almost everyone faces this issue. It’s the bane of the human experience. A famous French philosopher with manic-depressive tendencies once said, “Hell is other people.” While that may be true, success is also found in our connections with others. What I’m trying to convey is that you need others, and they need you. How you handle these relationships can either make your life miserable or provide a smooth journey down Ventura Boulevard.

Recall the scene in the movie “School of Rock” when Jack Black’s character is kicked out of his band? He questions the other band members about why they didn’t communicate with him earlier, and they all try to shift the blame onto each other.

In reality, bands often break up due to conflicting interests. If you examine the biographies of famous musicians, you’ll see that the list of bands they’ve been in reads like a book. The Police disbanded. Genesis split up. Journey broke apart. I may not know the exact circumstances of each case, but even if the separations weren’t acrimonious, there must have been some disagreement or mismatched expectations. Even minor cracks in a group’s cohesion can eventually lead to a massive rift.

Here’s the bottom line: Whether you’re in an indie music band, starting a record label, or simply launching a website, you can’t escape the reality that you need to collaborate with others. It’s crucial for anyone starting a serious endeavor to ensure that all participants in any long-term or short-term project are on the same page.

Now, this may seem like common sense, but many people make assumptions about what their teammates think and feel without actually asking them. This often happens because they fear that discussing matters openly might cause disagreements that could jeopardize their objectives.

However, disagreement is part of progress. The question you should ask yourself is whether you want nasty disagreements far down the line, when everyone is facing significant challenges and has a lot at stake, or if you’d rather address disagreements early on when there’s less on the line. Ending a marriage after ten years is far more painful than after a few months. Maybe the marriage wouldn’t have happened if matters had been thoroughly discussed beforehand.

Another aspect of working with others, which I’m sure you encounter frequently, is the idea of trying new things. How do you introduce novel concepts so that people will embrace them? What if there are four people running a new indie record label, and you want to add a blog to your website, but the rest of the group isn’t on board? How do you handle a situation like that?

You tackle it by taking action. Create something. Produce a few blog posts and see what everyone thinks. If the idea falls flat, people will let you know quickly. However, at least they won’t be dismissing an idea that hasn’t been tried. Generally, if what you create is solid enough to stand on its own, people will consider it and may even support it. An idea alone can be criticized, but once it’s transformed into something tangible, people will see aspects they might not have considered had it remained just a concept. That’s how you introduce new ideas to those who may be resistant—by giving them a tangible form.

An indie music band or any similar group should be an open democracy where ideas rise or fall based on their merit. If you have an idea, take action on it. The world will respond.