Information about myself.

There are some negatives and pitfalls that I fell into that I feel inclined for anyone wanting to get out there and start performing:

1. Treat yourself like a commodity and put a price on your time and work. I tiered it with the standard place value system, where:
   
   • Greater-than or equal to: $100 will get you a great live set with originals,
   • Between $10 and $99: will get you a great live performance and creating some remixing of favourites, and
   • Less than $10: "i play .wav files in a multitrack."
2. It might take more than one try to find the right music scene or the right label. I fell into a bad crowd the first time, but I tried in a different area and found the right crowd on the second try. This has happened to a lot of musicians I've talked to so don't feel discouraged.
3. Hardware is overrated and an excuse for music companies to sell you manchild toys. Computers used to suck with audio but they're fast enough now that you can do pretty much all the necessary stuff on just a computer alone.
4. Pirate all the software you can. Only purchase stuff if you start making money on your work to the point where you are going to be taxed on it.
5. You *should* invest in a good pair of flat-response headphones and/or monitors, depending on how you expect your audience will listen to your music. Cheaper ones cut out frequencies on the lower end and boost in the vocal ranges to compensate for their shortcomings, making them unreliable for music making. I recommend anything in the $200-300 range for most people.
6. Also invest in a good recorder or microphone that'll record in a 44,100hz sample rate (or higher) and 32bit. I use a Tascam DR-05.
7. Make music you want to listen to over and over and over. If you find you are growing bored of it, or some parts sound too samey, go back into that track and change it up!
8. Re-arrange your loop music as much as possible. It's worth spending days or even weeks on, if needed.
9. Budget your albums for the amount you expect to sell, and divide that in half for music art and mastering (put a cap at $500 for each). If you expect to sell 50 copies at $10 a piece for $500 total, spend $125 on art and $125 on mastering, mixing and physical production. After the label or webhost gets their cut (usually 25-30% if you are lucky), you will be left with a small amount left over. This is good for gas money.
10. Be controversial and radical. Art that is self-evident is ephemeral at best and boring at worst.
11. Waaaayyy too many pedos, sex-pests and rapists in the music scenes. Coupled with the audience being on drugs that make the mind open to suggestion, they flourish in the environment created. The only people worse are the ones who are silent and protect them. If you are a woman, stay on your guard and don't put up with harassment from anyone. I witnessed some horrible behaviour in my time that I neither want to be a part of nor associated with. Usually the husband/wife or brother/sister artist combos are sheltered away from the worst of it. It might be a good idea to work with that if you can.
12. Don't give up! If you don't quit, are able to learn from your mistakes, and take criticism well from others, you'll probably, eventually get good... Though this isn't 100% guaranteed and there is a tiny chance that it may not be for you. There's always the noise genre!
13. Really just do the music you want to do and enjoy. If you don't like a current trend or a particular genre, don't feel like you have to for the sake of fitting in. Be yourself, even if you are a huge asshole.