So you have a band and you want to get noticed. You've got the MySpace page with your album perpetually playing in the background, you have the Facebook fan page to which you've sent a link to all your friends and you've plastered flyers on every telephone pole, mailbox, windshield wiper and Doomsday prophesier with a sandwhich board you can find. Despite all that, you still can't seem to draw people to your shows.
What is an underemployed musician to do? Make a music video, of course!
“But we’ve made plenty already and posted on YouTube,” you may retort. “And no one’s watching them! How much harder can we try?” Perhaps you shouldn’t be trying harder. Perhaps you should be trying cheaper. Doesn’t make any sense? Perhaps you should check out 99 Dollar Music Videos.
99 Dollar Music Videos, as the website will tell you, is “an independent music network dedicated to merging low-fi, cutting-edge videos with the best of today's music scene. Every week, we feature a debut music video from independent bands who've teamed up with local filmmakers to making (sic.) a new, original music videos.” In essence, the process is simple. There are four rules submitted music videos must follow in order for them to be posted on the website:
- It must (obviously) be made for $99 or less
- It must be shot in one day
- It must be edited in one day
- It must be a collaboration between the band and the filmmaker.
“But wait,” you might now be saying. “Collaboration? Filmmaker? This doesn’t sound like it behooves my band at all.” Admittedly, the 99 Dollar Music Video title doesn’t necessarily mean you and your band can make a video for free in your garage, submit it and see it posted on the main page the next day.
In fact, chances are good that unless you’re a filmmaker who collaborates with one of the site’s featured bands or a band who collaborates with one of its featured filmmakers, your video won’t be posted.
However (and this is a big however), it is actually possible to make a video for free in your garage, submit it and see it posted on the main page the next day. Keep in mind that the words “cutting-edge” were mentioned in the website description and a vivid imagination may be your ticket to getting your work noticed.
If the folks at 99 Dollar Music Video like your stuff, they’ll post it and there’s your foot in the door to connect with one of their eight featured directors. The site will then bestow upon you the hallowed $99 and give you and the director two days to complete your video.
But if you’re more the cautious type (and you’re a New York City local), then why not try connecting with one of the featured bands or featured directors first?
We live in the age of the Internet where people are trying to proliferate their content as much as they possibly can. It’s practically a guarantee that these bands have MySpace pages and that the directors have official websites.
Drop them a line. Go see a show. Buy them a drink. Mention you have some interest in 99 Dollar Music Video. An aspiring band can do a lot worse than Matthew Semel or Sherng-Lee Huang and an aspiring filmmaker can do a lot worse than getting behind the camera for NYC-based musicians like Savoir Adore or anti-folk singer/songwriter and comic book artist Jeffrey Lewis.
