Working Post: Provo bands and social media

Working Thesis:
Provo has a thriving music scene, and one of the biggest reasons for this is the way the bands have been using social media to gain fans. How exactly have they been using social media, and how have some of the bands gained international notoriety?

Preliminary Exploration:
I have been interested in the Provo music scene for quite some time now, and for a number of reasons. I like a lot of the music that they are creating, but I also like watching the bands develop followings and try to "make it". It is definitely an extraordinary accomplishment for a band to gain a big enough following to allow them to make music for a living. But ever since taking this class, I have been looking at these same bands in different ways. I am interested in what they are doing in the digital realm to try and make a ripple in the music world. Indeed, I believe the digital world is the only way for a band to become big anymore. But how are they doing it? I have explored in a blog post how fans have a large impact on the bands music, but i want to delve into how they are gaining these fans in the first place. I have also looked at another issue confronting bands: copyright and the need to make money from there songs , indeed copyright has become an issue that might be worth exploring as changes in the laws could make it easier for bands to get exposure. This was explored in a book a did a video review on. But as i go forward with my research, I need to look directly at a number of provo bands and see how they have gone about gaining fans through social media.

Relevance:
This is where the revolution is happening in the music world right now, and I don't see any other way for Provo bands to get wider recognition if they are not having social media successes. They need to be creating an image, getting music up, and finding exposure.

Format:
I would like to create something a little more digital than a paper, and appropriate for the audience I am trying to reach. Perhaps a blog.

Outlet:
I have not crystalized any particular outlets. Perhaps I would create an article which I would then submit to newspapers, or perhaps I would submit the blog to prominent music blogs, showing the world what Provo is doing. In any case, the ideal is to reach people outside of Provo who don't know about the music scene, but it would also be desirable to have those in the Provo scene see it. For that I could share it around twitter. I have found some people there that are involved in the music scene, such as @provomusicfacts, @thefakecoreyfox, @velourlive, etc.  I have also found some websites that talk about provo bands, they are all quite surface level stuff though, that is why I want my blog post, or whatever I end up doing, to really get into the details of the scene. The Micro rather than the Macro.

Curation:
I have been curating a soundcloud list of provo music. I might look into curating on Youtube as well.  As mentioned above I have found a few places on twitter, and some websites that are talking about provo music. This would be crazy but maybe I could make a remix a video for a song for a provo band and put it on youtube.

Social Proof:
I have been talking to people in bands as I have gone to the Velour (a musical venue in Provo) to see bands play. I have gotten great information from teammate Danielle. I have been following the progress of a number of Provo bands via there facebook pages. I would like to search google+ communities for anything, but because this is so new I am not sure I will find anything.  Maybe I should create for part of my project?

Next Step:
I need to get a few more blog posts up on all the information I have found/know about provo bands and social media, as something to work off of. Perhaps I could get some interviews with people involved in the seen. And I might even consider narrowing my focus to tracking the path of one band, seeing what they have done and are currently doing to gain a wider audience. There are a few provo bands that are doing a lot in this area. That would be cool cause it would be more of look at the growth of a band in real time rather than looking at the bands from provo that are already famous.