You might have seen Carl Hitchborn’s ads for this eBook (and his other offerings) from December 2018 until now. A baker turned music business professional, this book is something he wrote as an introduction to his other projects including something he called the Artist Perfect Academy.
This 40-page eBook documents Carl’s thoughts on the current music industry model and his vision for an alternative music industry. Essentially, it describes his experience developing a UK-based band called The Hunna and how he build their audience until the band managed to have two sold out nights at the Brixton Academy – a 5,000 capacity venue in London.
Carl’s shares how his experience as a baker taught him lessons that became applicable in his later work in the music industry. He felt that there were concepts in his former work (as a baker) that would work well in the music industry. He discusses the traditional roles of a record label (both major labels and independent labels), A&R person, talent managers, booking agents, music publishers, merchandisers and lawyers. He also explains how research and development plays out in his new music industry model.
At this point in the book, he shares a play by play account of how he developed a band called Coasts. This detailed account is an interesting read on how he approached the music industry, coming in as an outsider.
After that section, Carl goes into his work with the UK band called The Hunna and how he built the band’s reputation and following. There’s a lot of detail here about the process as well as how he utilised advertising, Spotify and different promotional ideas to sell out their shows. There’s a lot to unload here content wise but the book covers their journey together up to a point when the band decided they wanted to part ways with Carl.
There’s a lot of questions that might come up from reading the book especially since it’s an entry level product to qualify potential audiences who might be interested to sign up for Carl’s Artist Perfect Academy. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with this (this is a smart business savvy thing to do). However, some might wonder how much value someone might get from just investing in this book alone as a standalone purchase.
Personally, I think this book is worth a read for anyone interesting in Carl’s thoughts – especially if you’ve seen his Facebook ads that have been running since late December (an impressive online marketing campaign). How much mileage you might get from reading this depends on what you intend to do from Carl’s experience which he’s documented in this book.
Pros: Interesting ideas, fun to read and some food for thought for musicians, band and music industry professionals interested in an outsider’s point of view of the music business.
Cons: The variable pricing depending on when you get the book means you might pay anything between from USD$5.60 to USD$19 depending on when you purchase the book.
TLDR: As a standalone book, this is an interesting read for anyone interested in developing a career in the music industry.
You can get the book directly from Carl here:
https://carlhitchborn.com/
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