Allowing Superfans to “SUPERBLOOM”

I was inspired tonight. I scrapped all of my previous drafts and committed to publishing this new article to kick off this Superfans series.

I suffer from serious imposter syndrome so I’ve been struggling to start this article series about my thoughts on the music industry and my book, Superfans: Power, Technology, and Money in the Music Industry. Many of my drafts thus far resembled this post from artist manager Seth Kallen, who I interviewed for Superfans, so I felt like there was just no point to me writing it when he did such a phenomenal job (seriously, read his article).

Yet, these Medium articles aren’t all that I have struggled to share. I almost published Superfans under a pseudonym (if you Google “Emily Gumbulevich” you are sure to find me and I find that unsettling). I almost didn’t publish it. I almost didn’t write the book at all. I struggled to finish it. I struggled to share parts of it with my editors. I struggled to start it.

So what inspired me tonight to kick this off? Two things:

First, one of my favorite bands, MisterWives, released a new song, “SUPERBLOOM” this week after announcing to the public on Instagram that the singer-songwriter and drummer couple, Mandy and Etienne, were separating. The songs that MisterWives have shared thus far from their latest album Superbloom (due to be released on July 24th — pre-order here*) are deep and vulnerable, many of them having been written by Mandy during the dissolution of her marriage and through the experience of coming out on “the other side.” I am in awe of her and the band’s talents, and of her bravery in sharing these feelings with us. I am sure that her music is helping many experiencing heartbreak right now.

Second, a close friend that I interviewed for the book sent me kind and encouraging words after reading his pre-ordered copy of Superfans. He asked me how it felt now that the book is out and I answered that I wondered how songwriters, like Mandy from MisterWives, felt after laying their souls bare in their music. “I can’t imagine how artists feel when they release music because I feel so vulnerable having this out and I barely scratched the surface of my soul,” I replied.

I then realized that if Mandy can lay it all out there and write truly inspiring music by sharing some of life’s toughest emotions and moments, then surely I can write a few Medium articles to share thoughts on topics that I thoroughly researched and stories from an already published book, right? It sounds silly, but I was really struggling to muster up the courage to share this with you.

It is trivial compared to the destruction that COVID-19 has brought to so much of our world, but it also destroyed my book’s launch plans which effectively shattered my confidence in promoting the ideas and stories from within it. But if MisterWives can release some of its most honest and emotional music during this time, then why can’t I talk about the flaws in the music industry on Medium?

So this article series is officially kicked off and there is no turning back. I won’t commit to a cadence because I am a product manager by day which means at any given moment I am working in front of a screen, which makes it hard to do other things on a screen after the fact (evidence: my lack of social media upkeep in recent years).

I will commit to:

• being vulnerable and sharing parts of my book — even if it terrifies me
• providing my thoughts on how COVID-19 has impacted the lessons and advice in my book (and how it has not)
• explaining ways you can help artists amid this crisis (and after it is over)
• linking to awesome playlists, new music, or underrated artists (typically on Spotify because it’s easiest for me and because, as you’ll learn in my book, they pay artists more than YouTube/Google as far as we know)
• overusing parentheses

I hope you will find this series enlightening and fun to read (like my book) and that it moves you to support not only your favorite musicians but also new, emerging artists — and not just right now because they can’t tour, but all the time. We need music. We need to share our experiences and emotions, and music is a perfect conduit for that. It helps remind us that we are all vulnerable; that we are all humans in this shared, weird experience of life on Earth.

You can learn more about and pick up a copy of my book, Superfans: Power, Technology, and Money in the Music Industry on Amazon or Barnes&Noble. The Kindle EBook is temporarily promoted at $0.99 on Amazon because I really want you to read this book (that is cheaper than it would cost for me to mail you a free paper copy, and after reading this article, I don’t really want to kill more trees to get this message out there).

Stay tuned!

** This post was in no way sponsored by MisterWives, Amazon, Instagram, or Spotify.