Yes, yes, another one. This time it’s personal. No, scratch that, actually this time it’s business. All business. Matthew Ebel Entertainment is the official business name for pretty much everything I do. It’s who my clients make the checks out to and it’s the raised lettering on my business Visa.

So, I guess, it’s about damn time this sucker had its own website. If you’ve ever logged into either matthewebel.com/webdesign or matthewebel.com/worksforhire, you’ve figured out that not everything I do is related to albums and new singles. In fact, I do a lot of stuff behind the scenes that really keeps the food on the table. This site will be the new home for all my non-artist business.

Non-Artist Business?

I consider every piece of music and every graphic design I conjure up to be an artistic endeavor, so to say that a theme song I wrote is not part of my “artist” stuff might confuse some. In the music business, though, “Artist” is actually a term unto itself.

When I lived in Nashville I discovered the caste system that creates Country music, all centered around the “Artist”. There are thousands of songwriters out there working on new tunes for the Artists… but they are all artists. In the studios they bring in session players to lay down guitar parts and drum tracks for the Artist’s album, but they are all artists. The men and women that design album artwork and ads and posters for the Artists… they are all artists as well.

So Matthew Ebel Entertainment, you could say, currently employs only one artist- me. My Artist stuff, all the things that pertain to my albums and the music that I make as a means of self-expression, can be found in two places that bear my name: matthewebel.com and matthewebel.net

What’s Going Here, Then?

Honestly, it’ll take me a while to figure that out. I intend to be a lot more personal, thoughtful, and musical with matthewebel.com. Matthewebel.net won’t change much since it is a living album by itself, not really a communications center or a storefront.

This will be the place for everything else, starting with two main ideas:

• Tubetracks – A collection of royalty-free music available in Garageband format (or just regular old audio, too). This is something I have a lot of excitement for since, for the first time, I’ll be offering something all my podcasting friends really, truly NEED.
• The Dining Room Studio – I’ve been giving sessions on Audio Production at Podcamps and other conventions around the country. Most of the people I talk to have NO idea what to do, but they want to set up a podcast studio or start recording demos of their music. Sometime soon I’ll be putting together a DVD that will help anyone turn a room of their house into a studio. I ought to know, I’ve released two full albums and, to date, 18 singles in my own project studios. From a basement to a bedroom all the way back to the original Dining Room Studio that made Beer & Coffee.

So there you have it. Plans, ideas, organization, and a whole new website to go with it.

Consider this the Hello World post for the business blog.

July 19, 2009