Apathe

[Apathe]

Hello Marty,

My name is Austin Paolillo. Longtime fan and fellow musician of the band called Apathe. My question for you is this. Obviously, you are a rock star. No arguments there. So... What route should my we take as an up and coming grunge/hard rock/progressive/experimental band trying to attain stardom? We have great original material, a web page on myspace, and talent. We just need some sort of exposure or something. A manager maybe? Please help Marty! "It's a clinic, and I'm in it.
Is it a race, am I winning?"

Austin Paolillo-Apathe

[martinxavier]

Hey Austin! Wow, a question from a dude. We don't get many of those over here on the "ask marty" page and I'm glad you took the time to stop by the message board.

This is a great question. Pretty much the same question that we (Lovehammers) had as we were coming up in the Chicago music scene. We made our first record in 1997 (Ultrasound) for one simple purpose: to make music for ourselves and our friends. At the time of that recording I wasn't really thinking about record labels, superstardom, playing Madison Square Garden or being in a "Behind The Music" special.... Simply put, we just wanted to document the music we were doing so we could jam it at parties and give it to the people that came to our shows. We gave 1,000's of copies of it out for free. We just wanted to be heard. That goes for t-shirts also. If we made 1,000 we probably sold 100 and gave the rest away to friends and fans. That's just the way we liked to operate. We just wanted to get our name out there and have people dig what we were doing.

When we were growing as a band and considering a producer for the new songs we had written I think our mindset shifted a bit and there was this drive to get signed by a major label and become Rockstars. As we started drawing bigger crowds in Chicago we figured we could do that everywhere else in the country also. Why Not!

I think the shift in our purpose of making the music put us in a slump for awhile. Now there was this goal of a record deal and manifestations of stardom. The live show even changed a bit as a result. We used to jam on tunes for up to 10 minutes just having a blast. We were usually a little buzzed up there drinking beer. It was all for the fun of it at the beginning. When we considered labels we made the songs tighter, the shows shorter for the purpose of being more potent and the songs become less risky and a bit more normalized. At some point relationships in the band were dramatically intensified because of questions about what we were doing or trying to do. We were all trying to figure out a path to this "Stardom". It took us some time to get back to our purpose of writing songs and how we performed them. We learned alot thru it all.

I tell you what. It was always the most fun when the single purpose of making the music was to jam it out for our friends at parties. After the show we would head to someone's house and hang out full of energy after a cool performance and those are remembered as some of the best times of my life. Those long nights of celebration and talking about all the dreams that we had. That was something special and unforgettable.

All of the great moments did not have a thing to do with celebrity or being Rockstars. It seems that when the drive is to find "Stardom", the foundation falls out of the creativity and you will possibly end up lost.

So, Austin, the route to take in my understanding of music, creativity, the music business, success, "stardom" would be: 1. Get a few of your guys/girls together that can work as a group and have a similar vision of what you are trying to create.....2. Get together and spend lots of time writing songs together (hopefully you find you have a great songwriting relationship with one of the peeps in your band)..... 3. Find a friend to record a 3-4 song EP for you so you have some music for your friends/fans to hear (hand out cd's and share MP3's on myspace, etc)......4. Put together a great showcase of all your talent and songwriting and start booking some local gigs (any money you make you should put right back into keeping the band going)........5. Enjoy the ride and let your fans know how important they are to you)..........6. Quite simply, these days of the starting of the band and the development of a career and affecting people with your songs and shows is what it is all about. If you spread around enough good energy the "Stardom" will find you. It's gonna be easy to find you, no matter where you are, when you shine so bright.

There is no race to the top and as long as you keep being creative you always win. That's what it's all about, sharing your creativity and affecting one another.

All the best to you Austin. Keep us in the loop as your great project develops. We'll support ya!

Marty Casey