{"id":2207,"date":"2009-09-01T17:38:52","date_gmt":"2009-09-02T01:38:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/?p=2207"},"modified":"2009-09-01T17:38:52","modified_gmt":"2009-09-02T01:38:52","slug":"jill-sobule-responds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/2009\/09\/01\/jill-sobule-responds\/","title":{"rendered":"Jill Sobule Responds"},"content":{"rendered":"
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From: Jill Sobule
Subject: Bob, I love you too. But a response to your last letter. Hey, wish you had your radio show<\/p>\n

Bob, I love you too, but I am surprised you would have thought my fan-funded record was to "break through to the masses". I am quite aware that I am not, nor will ever be, a pop sensation. The idea of my fan-funded site came about three years ago. I had a bunch of new songs that I was proud of, however I didn’t have the personal funds to record and put them out. The idea of a label seemed pointless and… who was going to sign me anyway? I sent out a letter to my fans asking them if they were game to help me out. They were. As Marillion, this endeavor was foremost for them. A year later, I put up jillsnextrecord.com. Also, this was not just about this one record or… marketing. It was also an experiment on how I could survive in this murky but promising landscape as a musician. One of the prizes I offered was house concerts. Since then, they have been a regular part of my touring schedule. Don’t laugh, but the writing of personal theme songs was a semi-big hit. \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

I will give to you that I probably spent a few dollars on old paradigm stuff, as well as new useless scams- $1,500 for a company that helps you with your social networking and your "brand". What a bunch of bullshit. By the way, as the news of my website made the press (and not by my doing), I was bombarded by emails from "new paradigm" companies. Now probably 3\/4 of them don’t exist. This may very well be my last record-in the traditional long playing way. Who knows? But, in the meantime,I am having fun trying to learn and maneuver in this new world. <\/p>\n

Oh, as I am touring a lot these days, I had this one idea: instead of money, asking my fans for… their extra unused airline miles or upgrades. Good or dumb idea? <\/p>\n

Also, I will add, that the model has been repeated by other deserving artist -not just Josh Freeze. Linda Thompson Kenis and Amy Correia have been in contact with me and have raised money. And not everyone has to raise as much as I did, mind you. If someone gets donations, from their friends and 10 fans, enough to buy pro-tools or a guitar, well, what’s wrong with that? I think the model can work at all levels. Plus, it does keep you close to your base. However, like you said, to think you will be playing stadiums, is delusional. <\/p>\n

Right now I am happy to please my fans, and if by chance I gain new ones -by either touring, public radio, or old timey word of mouth – that would be even more swell.<\/p>\n

Bob, I had a revelation a couple of months ago. I’m a lifer. I hope that, like say Les Paul, my old guitar teacher, or even Kitty Carlisle – who still performed in her 90s – I am still going at it at a ripe old age. I also hope that columns like yours will help to show me the way to keep doing it.<\/p>\n

cheers, jill<\/p><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From: Jill SobuleSubject: Bob, I love you too. But a response to your last letter. Hey, wish you had your radio show Bob, I love you too, but I am surprised you would have thought my fan-funded record was to "break through to the masses". I am quite aware that I am not, nor will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-zB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2207"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2208,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2207\/revisions\/2208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}