Witness Explains Why Life is Beautiful and Dope

Posted by Justin Boland on Jan 08, 2008 | 0 Comments

When I first met Witness, we had both showed up at a gig we’d planned 2 months in advance.  We had arrived to find out there was still no sound system for venue.  There had been no promotion, and the venue had submitted the wrong lineup and mispelled his name in both local papers.  It was probably the worst-managed, most-pathetic Music Biz Moment I saw in 2007.  Witness was completely unfazed and very kind about the whole thing.  It turned out his attitude worked: we wound up finding a sound system, an audience, and an actual venue all during the next 2 hours.  Witness and Unsung went on to deliver killer sets in front of a tough audience.  The toughest, really: the “I’m just here for pizza why are you rapping at me” demographic, notoriously hard to please.  Witness pleases everyone. He graciously answered some nosy questions from Audible Hype:

How long did it take you to clearly understand who you were and who your audience was?

I think it wasn’t until I got to be about twenty, that I realized that aiming for strictly traditional Hip Hop heads wasn’t the best course of action. Or at least limiting myself to that. As I got older, I watched so many people that I knew taking interest in other genres of indie music and I was no exception to that trend. So, I came to the realization that there was a certain open mindedness in indie culture as a whole that would be better suited to any artistic decisions I might make in the future.

In your experience, what is the ratio of booking contacts to actual gigs?

My cell phone has hit the point where I now have everyone organized by state. I find that very few of my contacts are actually involved in the booking of the show, though. Some of them are artists who were on bills with us, some of them are people who offered a spot on their floor. I think it’s a lot more comfortable going into an unfamiliar state with at least a few names under your belt, in the event things go wrong. And things go wrong more often than not.

What are the best tools you found to help you be more efficient online?

Myspace.

I’m not entirely sure how I’ve managed to build such a network online, but I find that I can get instant accessibility to questions that I normally would have to deal with a lot of trial and error to get answers to. In a sense, that kind of communication between fans has helped me further define their perception of me. I find that the best artists have created an image defined by their fans, in a sense of how their merch is designed and things of that nature.

Have you had a hard time defining your fan base?  Do you find they’re too diverse to generalize?

It does vary. But, I’ve found that the majority are in their twenties and that a good sized portion of them are female. I haven’t been able to figure out why this is, or how it happened, but again, I think that’s unimportant for an artist. As long as the art that you’re making is a reflection of self, what ever results is you were inevitably destined to get. Would I like to diversify my fanbase? Sure. But, I’m not sure that it would happen without unnatural changes in my music.

Compromising artistic integrity, for me at least, is not an option.

What would you like to see change in the music business this year?

The same thing I’ve always wanted to see in the music business, so needless to say, my expectations are rather low. Personally, I’d like to see more interest in product as opposed to marketability. There are plenty of artists, who were thought unmarketable, being brought to the forefront. Feist is a good example, she’s experiencing quite a bit of success at the moment, which is well deserved.

What would you like to see Audible Hype cover in 2008?

I’d be really interested in seeing some articles about CMJ, distribution and the importance of selective gigs. I think there’s something to be said about some independent artists who seem to spring to the forefront of the movement based on product alone, with very little heavy touring and such. Spending time working contacts in the right areas and playing the right gigs can do more for a musicians career than years of touring can, if the right moves are taken.

Audible Hype will definitely be examining what those “right moves” are. I’ve been studying a number of artists who work off that exact model: creating prolific and high-quality music to captivate the attention of the audience continually.  (You can see that kind of psychotic work ethic in Slug from Atmosphere and Lil’ Wayne-never. stop. making. songs.)

I hope this was useful to you!  If you haven’t already, definitely give Witness a listen.  Some beautiful tracks and some dope lines.