While the former music industry crumbles into a slow, self-inflicted suicide stabbing of itself, there is an opportunity for independent musicians/bands to form alliances with independent filmmakers. Recently, I read a story in TechDirt about a independent movie production, for a movie called The Graduates, that was going to heed SEC Bad Boy Mark Cuban’s suggestion of giving away soundtracks to movie goers.  Being a big fan of both independent movies and indie music (not to mention Mark Cuban), I was really intrigued by the idea of attempting to give away 1,000,000 soundtracks to an independent movie.  So I contacted executive producer of The Graduates, Ryan Gielen, for an interview to better understand this process and how it might benefit both independent musicians and movies in the future.

SMMuG: For the bands and musicians who are not familiar with the movie making process, how do Executive Producers find music for their films?  Is there a directory, website, association or service that helps movie makers find specific types of music?

Ryan: Many films have music supervisors who seem to have an encyclopedic knowledge of music. They’re like a Cinematographer in a lot of ways- they interpret the story and the tone and the textures and pick out music that expresses those things. On The Graduates we asked bands I already knew and loved, and we put out a call on several websites and blogs for music submissions. The soundtrack is a mix of both.

All told, Matt (my producer/brother) and I received about 10,000 song submissions and whittled that down to 24 songs. I didn’t particularly care where or who the music came from, I just wanted to find the perfect song for a particular scene. There are so many incredible bands looking for exposure that it wasn’t difficult to find those songs.

Ryan Gielen

SMMuG: It’s clear that your Free Soundtrack promotion would be beneficial to the movie, but what are the specific benefits that musicians would receive by participating in your project?

SMMuG: There are some good examples of strong soundtracks drawing attention to a movie, but do you seek out independent bands that have large followings in order benefit from their fan base?  If so, how did you determine what kind of following each band might have?

Ryan: For The Graduates, I never looked at the bands’ followings, because the soundtrack is not the product. The film is the product, so I wanted songs that made the film stronger. I don’t think I’ve ever looked at the MySpace friends or whatever bands use to determine their fan base because I’m not a promoter or a booker, I was just looking for pieces that would help this scene or that scene.

SMMuG: What are your plans for marketing and promoting this very unique offer in the markets where your movie will be screened?  Do have street teams or what local promotional efforts are you using to raise the awareness for your film?  Are any of the bands involved in your promotional efforts?  Maybe brief concerts before or after the screening?

Ryan: When our release schedule is in place we’ll work with the bands to schedule the kinds of events you’re describing, but in the meantime we’re doing tons of grassroots outreach- emails, phone calls, blog articles. When we get close to screenings we’ll have our street teams in place along with articles and other local coverage. We’ve gotten pretty good at this- we’ve had 7 or 8 standing room only festival and sneak preview screenings in five different states. I hope we can carry that over into the release, I know we’re working our asses off to make that happen!

SMMuG: Frequently, I’ll purchase soundtracks to movies prior to actually seeing the movie – Mark Mothersbaugh’s musical influence with Wes Anderson movies are a prime example.  Watching the movie, the familiar soundtrack increases my appreciation of the movie.  Is there any discussion about getting ticket sales up front so that the soundtrack could be in possession of the movie goers prior to the screening?

Ryan: We hope the free soundtrack will have this effect. We’re giving away the soundtrack in order to generate buzz, sure, but most importantly we want people to see the quality and entertainment value of the film. We’re not just competing against $250,000 movies, we’re competing against all movies, so how does a little tiny indie like us get attention, and show off the goods? We think this is a start.

Plushgun

Plushgun is a great example. Dan Ingala was making music in his room, but he started putting it out there and playing a little in Brooklyn where he had a dedicated following, and then he let a small little web tv show use his song “Just Impolite.” They put the song in a video on the web, it got hot because it’s a great song and people could easily pass it around, I stumble on it and loved it and put it in the film. Around that time he gets invited to SXSW, later gets signed by Tommy Boy, and now he’s releasing his first full album in two weeks, and “Just Impolite” is featured in a long, critical sequence in The Graduates. But it all started with him making his great music available online for people to pass around.

Regarding directors- IMDb.com is a great place to start (the Internet Movie Database). If you pay $100 per year you can join IMDb Pro, which has contact information and production information for most people in film. Filmmakers update the status of their project and you can search for projects “in development” or “in production” or “in post production.” I would contact every single one of those filmmakers with a link to your myspace or iTunes pages and mention two songs they might dig. Make a quick mention of why the songs are good for the film: “saw this is a family drama, you might dig this acoustic track.” If you don’t want to pay the $100, chances are you have a friend or acquaintance who has IMDb Pro, I’m sure they’ll let you hop on for a good cause.

This is also why it’s smart to produce your own music videos. If you post a job on Mandy.com looking for a Director, and you do three or four videos a year, after three years you have ten to twelve young directors who know and like you and your music. Chances are these guys are going to try and make another short or feature at some point, and your music will end up in the score.

I would also put all these videos, even if it’s just concert footage, on Youtube and Blip.tv. Blip is amazing because it lets you submit to all online video sites with one click, including podcasting on iTunes. If your band recorded every concert on camera and with good audio through the soundboard, and uploaded that as a podcast to iTunes and other video sites, you would be pretty groundbreaking. And the only investment is a $500 HD camera and a couple cables to connect your laptop to the soundboard.

I think tracking down filmmakers is a lot like tracking down your audience- if you don’t put content out into the world, nobody’s going to find you… I think this is attributed to Cory Doctorow, but I completely agree: “The greatest threat to an artist is obscurity, not piracy.” There’s a reason The Dead let people tape their shows. They wanted people to hear them whether you could make the show or not. The bottom line is we all want that great distribution or record deal, but the reality is that it probably won’t happen. So artists really can’t afford to sit on their art, you have to put it out there.

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Keyword: SMMUG

Beyond providing us with some great direction, inspiration and information, Ryan Gielen has also promised to give 100 SMMuG readers the full, 24 track soundtrack to The Graduates!  Visit the Graduates website. put the digital soundtrack in your cart and use the following code at check-out to get the whole thing for FREE: SMMUG.  Beyond getting the soundtrack for free, you’ll also be registering for an almost monthly SMMuG newsletter, from yours truly.

-pjc