Thursday, May 31, 2018
Mortgage with a Chapter 13 bankruptcy
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How to buy a home in 2018 after a short sale
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Mortgage after bankruptcy: How soon can you buy a home?
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Kendrick Lamar Accepts 'Beautiful' Puliizer Prize At Colombia University Ceremony
At a ceremony at New York City's Columbia University on Wednesday, Kendrick Lamar accepted his Pulitzer Prize for music for his album "DAMN." He is the first rapper to receive the award.
"It's an honor," he said on the official Facebook live stream of the event. "I've been writing my whole life, so to get this type of recognition - it's beautiful."
In making the presentation, Columbia President Lee Bollinger described Lamar’s album as a “virtuosic song collection unified by its vernacular authenticity that offers affecting vignettes capturing the complexity of modern African American life.”
The full Facebook Live stream:
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Spotify Is 'Cash Flow Positive,' says CEO Ek, Admits Hate Policy Handled Badly
Spotify CEO Daniel EK has now publicly admitted that the company handled the implementation of its new "hate content and hateful conduct" policy badly. More surprising was how the founder and CEO says that he views profitability at the music streamer.
Though intended to offer transparency, Spotify's new "hateful conduct" policy has drawn criticism as censorship, with some artists, including Kendrick Lamar, threatening to pull their own music off the streamer.
"The whole goal with this was to make sure that we didn't have hate speech on the service. It was never about punishing one individual," Ek told the Code Conference audience last night. "We rolled this out wrong and we could have done a much better job," adding that there was "too much ambiguity" in how the policy was communicated.
The founder and CEO also talked about the company's cultural differences and why they chose such an unusual path to a public offering.
"We've been cash flow positive for a bunch of quarters."
When asked about how Spotify can ever become a profitable company, EK responded that he viewed success at the company differently. "I think about cash flow as one of the primary metrics, and we've been cash flow positive for a bunch of quarters."
"As long as that's the cash, we don't have to go back to the markets to keep funding the company," Ek continued. Adding that since "we're in the early innings," Spotify would continue to invest in growth.
Here is the full interview:
image via YouTube
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How to improve credit score: 5 ways to raise your FICO score today
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What credit score do you need for a mortgage? Complete guide to credit for mortgages
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Jack White Plays Surprise High School Gig [VIDEO]
Jack White completely surprised more than 200 Washington D.C. high school students with an outdoor lunchtime concert on Wednesday afternoon.
According to WTOP, the show had been a well-kept secret. Only Principal Kimberly Martin and another school official knew about it. White, who was in town for two sold-out shows at The Anthem, reportedly only reached out to her a few days ago.
You can checkout a clip of the performance below:
Jack White & Woodrow Wilson High School Students. Photo By: David James Swanson.
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Does Your Brand Awareness Need Improvement?
The importance of branding is becoming increasingly important, and an artist who's on top of their branding game will surpass their competitors every. In this article we provide the tools to identify if you have a brand awareness problem.
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Guest post by Jeanette Kats from the Symphonic Distribution Blog
Branding is becoming increasingly more important as an artist with each passing day. An artist with clear branding and great awareness will quickly surpass an artist who doesn’t have a clear sense of self.
As an artist of any kind, you should know who you are, what you stand for and how you want to present yourself to the world. Many DJs attempt to create brand awareness through social media, sponsorships, logos and more. It’s crucial to recognize brand image and awareness as an important aspect of career development.
Not sure if you have clear image and good awareness? We’ve put together some signs that you may have an issue.
Here are 10 signs that you may have a brand awareness problem.
1. Your social media following has declined
2. It is difficult to find your pages on search engines
3. You can’t describe yourself and your image clearly
4. You know all of your followers personally
5. You are being overshadowed by your competition
6. Your emails aren’t being opened
7. Nobody dislikes you
8. Your fans are not engaging with your posts
9. You aren’t staying consistent
10. You have to continuously explain what you do
If you answered ‘yes’ to many of the points listed above, then chances are that you may have a brand awareness problem.
Here are some steps to take in order to increase brand awareness.
First, don’t panic! There are steps to take to increase your brand awareness and get your music heard.
First, you’ll want to sit down and figure out what make you unique. Why should a booking agency choose you over someone else? Find out why you do what you do, and what you’re all about. Once you have that figured out, it’s time to present yourself to the world.
Make sure your social media channels are updated, you’re posting consistently and your usernames are similar across all platforms to help with SEO. Fans should be able to notice a clear aesthetic across any of your accounts.
If you know all of your followers personally, work on reaching new demographics and a new audience. Boost posts to other areas and share your music in unique places, such as Facebook groups, reddit and more.
If you’re being overshadowed by your competition, find what makes you stand out and run with it. Make sure people know why you should be the first choice.
No matter what, stay true to yourself and your fans. Engage with them regularly and keep going! The more you work at it, the better your brand awareness will be. Good luck!
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Looking For Good Band Photos? Don't Do This
While your band photos may technically have anything to do with your music, they are nonetheless part of your brand, and having a solid set of band pictures is important. Here we look at how to avoid ending up with pictures that are cliché garbage.
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Guest post by Patrick McGuire of the ReverbNation Blog
Photography has nothing to do with music, but the pictures that represent you or your band are hugely important. Imagery, along with the written narrative you use to describe the story behind your music (your bio) is an integral part of getting people interested in your project. But while solid and engaging band photos can help draw in the attention of potential listeners, poorly executed pictures can do just the opposite. Here are some things you’ll want to avoid while taking band photos:
Taking pictures on railroad tracks
In addition to making for boring, cliched photos, taking pictures on live railroad tracks is incredibly dangerous. According to the Federal Railroad Administration, deaths from walking on railroad tracks are up nearly 10 percent in recent years, with 483 fatalities reported in 2014 alone. But even without the massive risks you’ll take should you decide to do the whole train track photo thing, the pictures you’ll end up with will look dated and uninteresting because it’s been done so many times before.
Brick-walling it
Taking a few pictures in front of a brick wall is fine, but not if that’s the only setting for your photos. Brick walls are predictable and boring, and you’ll run the risk of people associating your music with those ideas if all of your pictures are in front of them. It doesn’t take that much time and effort to find a wall with some sort of color to pose in front of, so taking the extra step of shooting at a setting more interesting than a brick wall will definitely pay off.
Looking disingenuous or unnatural
Most musicians aren’t models, so the skill of posing in a natural and engaging way isn’t something that comes naturally to most bands. But rather than trying hard to look cool or tough, you’ll be much better off by trying to appear as natural as possible. Unless you’re working with a highly experienced photographer, the sorts of photos that will work the best are the ones where fans and press outlets are able to catch a glimpse of who you really are.
Over-posing
Things like having your lead singer stand at the front of a picture or forming your band in a “V” are examples of over-posing that runs the risk of ruining your photos. Again, unless you’re being posed by a professional photographer, it’s typically better to try to look as natural as possible while being photographed.
Shooting photos without a concept or plan
Here’s the thing. Most of the things I just said to avoid in pictures can be done as long as there’s some sort of plan or concept in place. Rather than just going out on the street and winging it, you’ll probably get the best photographic results if some sort of planning is involved. The only rule here is that the feel of the photos should match the music you’re making. This means you’ll need to have a conversation about what your music means and how to best visually represent it.
Patrick McGuire is a musician, writer, and educator currently residing in the great city of Philadelphia. He creates music under the name Straight White Teeth, and has a great affinity for dogs and putting his hands in his pockets.
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