Ari Herstand

I got a an email from one of my favorite singer/songwriters yesterday. I've been on his email list for a couple years now and I go to his shows whenever he plays in town - which is often because he lives here. In this email he discussed that he had all the songs written for his n...

I just released a music video (see above). It cost me exactly $0 to make and it looks pretty darn awesome if I do say so myself. Well, I can say so because I didn't make it. I kind of had nothing to do with it - other than writing and recording the song of course (and showing up...

I'll admit it, I'm a Facebook junkie. Hopelessly addicted. If I don't get my daily (hourly) fix I start to have withdrawal. It's pathetic. I fully admit it. But alas, this is the world we live in.I was invited to a friend's record release show Event today on Facebook. I had seen...

A lot of musicians want to play colleges, but most don't really know what that means. As someone who has played over 100 official university sponsored shows around the country, it's a field I know quite intimately. From the schools surrounded by a hundred miles of corn to the tho...

So as many of you know I was off the grid last month in New Orleans on a (book!) writing retreat. As much as I love LA, it's very difficult to block out all the distractions of my daily life and solely focus on a creative pursuit. Meetings and (acting) auditions come up and it's...

On December 28th, 2015 long-time streaming foe, David Lowery, who runs the Trichordist blog and fronts the bands Camper Van Beethoven and Cracker, filed a class-action lawsuit seeking at least $150 million in damages against Spotify. The lawsuit alleges that Spotify knowingly, wi...

I'm a 'curator' on Fluence. That means, if you want to pay me to listen and review your music (with the possibility of sharing it), you can pay me to do it. 80% of the submissions I get are not very good, 15% are good, but not great and then occasionally I receive something so st...

Giving away song downloads used to be the standard incentive to get people to sign up for your list. Now that fewer and fewer people want to download music, you have to come up with other incentives to get them to sign up. It's best to list on your website what the fan will get i...

I just finished playing mediator between two of my good friends. To protect the innocent, let's call them Jeremy and Jamie. Jeremy had shot a video for me and Jamie a couple years back. On shoot day there were about 10 people on set. We all had a long, albeit fun, day and the vid...

I got back last night at 5am. It was one of those special evenings that only happen once in a long while, but is so inspiring that it changes the course of your life. The night started off at Genghis Cohen. My buddy from Minneapolis (now in Nashville) Elliott Blaufuss (Eric Hu...