Everything I Needed To Know About Blogging I Learned When I Was In A Band

There are many parallels to being a starving musician and a blogger…mainly that you are both starving…

When you live in Los Angeles, like I did for 30 plus years, “everyone” is in a band. The servers at your favorite restaurants, the baristas at your local caffeine emporiums and even your babysitter…they play guitar, sing, write songs, record from their home studio, or some variation of the required skills for rock and roll stardom.

I was one of those people. Started playing the piano when I was 4 or 5 and kept right on through until high school when I gave up the keys for my uncle’s Schecter bass guitar (little did I know how metal I was). I started playing bass because the U2 cover band I was in didn't have anyone to play Adam Clayton’s undulating four-chord bass line to With Or Without You.

So fast forward ten or so years and I am playing gigs, making phone calls, booking tours, schmoozing with the hippest groups and I begin to realize. You don’t actually have to be good to make it in this business. Of course…you have to have some talent…and of course there is the whole performing thing…but in my experience it was a combination of perseverance and luck.

I saw plenty of talented groups fall by the wayside because they could not “get their $#!* together” and just show up when they were supposed to.

Fast forward another ten years. I started blogging in 2012…and while I would love to have you visit my site and see what it is all about…that is not why I wrote this post. The reason is because of the similarity of skills you have to have to be a successful blogger to being a musician. So…if I have not lost you already…here are a few points to chew on.

Show Up

You have to start somewhere. One of the scariest things I did was plop down the fees to my hosting service and rights to my domain for two years. My immediate thought was…what if nobody reads it. Like being a musician…no one is ever going to hear the brilliant song that you never get around to write.

Find Your Scene

On the site, I write about disability rights and inclusion. What this meant for me when I was in a band was to find my “scene”. Here is where you are going to find the people most passionate about your cause. It is also the most natural thing for me to do…because I want to be there. It is hard to fit into a scene you have very little in common with.

Promote Your Friends

This seems like common sense…but find other people that are doing what you are doing and tell everyone about them. It is almost guaranteed that once you start doing that…the traffic to your site will increase...it is the gift that keeps on giving. Really, it is about being authentic. You are more likely to read something if someone you know tells you about it. Everyone wins when we promote each other’s endeavors.

Be Patient

When I began this emprise of words last year, I was wondering if anyone could really make money blogging. Now…all I can do is laugh when that thought crosses my head. Like a starving musician…you cannot expect to make money from writing a blog when no one has read anything you have written and you don’t know any other bloggers. At this point…I am just waiting for my Google AdSense account to creep past $100 so they can cut me a check.

Yet…as with my musician days…I am not writing because I want to become rich and famous. I write because I still believe I have something worthwhile to say. Perhaps you do too. And if you do…I would love to hear about it.