In this piece Sunny Stuart Winter chats with UK based ‘ninja rapper’ Shaodow, a highly motivated musical entrepreneur who has found remarkable success in selling his album to fans, all on his own steam.
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Guest post by Sunny Stuart Winter
With thousands of new music releases every week, tens of thousands of bands just in the UK and ever-updating social media feeds feeding our short attention spans, it can be nigh-on impossible for bands or artists to stand out, to build an audience and to progress in the cutthroat music industry.
So many bands or musicians give up long before they start picking up momentum and attention from musical tastemakers and in all honesty, I really don’t blame them. Some, however, have such determination and vision that failure is not an answer.
Having connected on Twitter and seeing his name bandied about, I had the pleasure of meeting UK ‘ninja rapper’ Shaodow in London; a fascinating artist whose motivation knows no bounds and who is surely the blueprint for upcoming artists to follow.
An entrepreneur, Shaodow is an all-round creative, has supported the likes of Skepta, Stormzy, Tech N9ne, Wiley and Akala, has sold over 25,000 albums independently without a label and even won ‘Hardest Working Artist’ at the 2017 AIM Independent Music Awards.
In this episode, we discuss how he has managed to sell his music so successfully, we discuss new ways artists can get their music heard, his Manga comic series that furthers his brand as a ‘ninja rapper’ along with his appearance on Ninja Warrior in the UK and truly valuable advice for any artist who has the fortitude and enthusiasm to grow a successful music brand for themselves.
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I really enjoyed this chat. Always a pleasure meeting artists or professionals for the first time and going in deep on their experiences, their brand and their story.
If you’re a musician, regardless of the genre of music you create, you should take the time to digest this and think about your own brand of music. What can you do differently to everyone else that will make you stand out? How can you deliver or sell your music to potential fans?
Make sure you follow Shaodow on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to see what he is up to. His latest single ‘Kaio-Ken‘ has been blowing up, getting great radio plays, playlisted across Spotify and the video (watch it here) is a joy to watch.
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Until next time…
