The New Chapter

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Happy New Year, friends! I always look forward to the holidays but the New Year’s celebration always feels extra special. Some people hate the concept of a “new year, new beginning”, but I personally love it. It’s the perfect time to re-evaluate everything around you, make changes and dive into your life again with a new, fresh attitude and a ridiculously huge amount of enthusiasm.

As you might have read in my previous article, 2017 was quite a diverse year for me. It was definitely a rollercoaster with equal parts ups and downs. I struggled with identifying my own music and then I had to take some time off to find what felt right again. However, closer to the end of the year, when I finally felt like I was ready, I started making some preparations for the new chapter of my life and career: my new EP project.

The thoughts about releasing my 2nd EP had been in the back of my mind for a long time. I never really stopped writing new songs and every time I would come up with new material, I’d always assess it based on whether the song was good enough to be included in a new hypothetical EP. Unfortunately, those thoughts about a new EP had to be continuously postponed for a long period of time due to the personal circumstances that I will definitely address in my future articles. However, good things come to those who wait and in September 2017 it started to look like the new EP idea could actually become a reality.

The possibility of starting a brand new project was really exciting. Since my 1st EP I learnt so much about the different aspects of releasing an EP that I couldn’t wait to put that knowledge into practice. (If you’d like to read more about the lessons that I learnt from my 1st ever release, follow these links: Part 1 & Part 2. I had plenty of time to think my plan through and I knew that, if everything fell into place, my new EP could take my music career to the next level. However, there was still one more thing to take care of before I could say yes to the new project…

As a fully independent artist, I have total control over my career. I make all the creative and all the business decisions myself and I rely solely on my own capabilities. Most of the time this freedom is nothing but great, however it does come with one major downside: as well as being my own manager, I also have to be my own sponsor. And as you can imagine, funding a whole EP project can be difficult.

Previously, I managed to release music with little to no funds at all, which was exceptionally lucky. “Energy” was recorded as a collaboration with Andrea Adriano and the video for the single was shot at Bridgewater & Taunton College as part of Kerrie Slopper’s work experience programme. So, apart from some extra expenses that I had to cover like mastering the track and distributing it online, I was really lucky to be able to find people who were willing to work with me purely for the joy of creativity. But there is only so much you can do without a proper budget. Your resources and your reach are very limited and with my new EP project I didn’t want to settle for less anymore.

So, where could I get the funding I needed? The most obvious answer was to wait and try to save as much as I could. That option was definitely my safest bet, but I would’ve had to postpone my project for an indefinite period of time and, frankly speaking, after having been forced to wait for so long I just couldn’t bare the stagnation anymore. I was sick of waiting; I wanted to do something.

My next option was to seek funding opportunities. I reviewed multiple grants and schemes available for the independent musicians residing in the UK. As expected, the application process was very complicated, the requirements were quite often limiting and the timescales; way too drawn out. For various reasons my project seemed to be ineligible for funding. We’ll definitely come back to this topic and I’ll dedicate a whole article talking about my experience with the funding organisations and why I chose to postpone my application at that point.

Photo takeby Mar Reyes

So, I couldn’t find the right sponsorship programme for my project but I definitely wasn’t willing to give up on my ideas. I was determined to make it one way or another and that’s when I decided to take a huge risk and launch a crowdfunding campaign. Anybody who has ever had a campaign of their own or has followed one knows how unpredictable crowdfunding can be. You can have all the support in the world and still fail to raise enough for your target. People can be excited about the prospects of your new music but still refrain from jumping on board. There are numerous ways where your campaign can go wrong but there are also chances that it will go right. Only time could tell and I was willing to take that risk.

On the 21st of November I launched my very first crowdfunding campaign on pledgemusic.com. Despite having an obvious financial motive to sponsor the future EP the campaign had become so much more than just a funding opportunity. I designed it to build a community around my new music, which allowed me to invite my audience behind the scenes of every aspect of making this EP – from just an idea to the final product. The campaign has really transformed my relationship with the audience, making them an essential part of the project rather than mere observers. I’ve always been cherishing the connection I’ve built with the people who’ve been kindly supporting my music all this time but with the launch of the campaign this connection has grown exponentially, laying the foundation for the new chapter in my music career and, probably, the most exciting year of my life.

Please check out my campaign, browse through the exciting pledge rewards and if you liked what you saw, please let your friends know about its existence.

https://www.pledgemusic.com/riatimkin