(...and what year is it?!? Creating a Blogger account in 2024?!?)
Yeah, I'm a solo musician. An amateur. A hobbyist. Took ten years off for reasons that are unimportant. Life happened, basically. I never stopped missing it -- never stopped thinking about it. Things just got hectic. But I'm back at it. Still self-produced, but I've slowed down and listened and learned a few tweaks here and there to get a little more of a cohesive sound.
But this website? When I was looking for a home base/one-stop for True Red online, I came up short for free/inexpensive options. (Everyone is trying to get paid, and I respect that. I just don't have the need for paid services at this time.) True Red is a passion that I plan to keep going until I am no more. That said, I don't expect that I'll have a ton of listeners or recoup much money from it. Not because the music is bad. No, it's great. I enjoy what I produce, but the market is saturated. More people putting out music than ever before -- and A.I. is, too, apparently.
Some people are trying to make it a career, and I'm thrilled for those who can pay the bills with their music. I don't think that is an option for me (or most of us!).
For me, I'm no longer interested in playing out or teaming up with others. I did that in years past, and it was fun but also aggravating. I guess where I'm at now, I'd just like to tweak and finish some old mixes I've had tucked away for years, make fresh recordings of old, unrecorded songs, and churn out a few yet-to-be-written songs as they come to me. I'll pay a little here and there to get them on the streaming services, and I'll buy new guitar strings, but I don't think I'll pay for a website. (From what I can tell, so far, Blogger should be the perfect host. I'll probably have trueredmusic.com redirect to it soon. Here, I can share the latest, as well as compile release info, artwork, lyrics, etc. For free! :) I'm honestly just doing this for myself and the person who may find it and connect with it.)
I was thinking Linktree might be perfect, and it is pretty great, but this is a nice platform too. I can say a bit more and share all the True Red links to the various socials around the web. (Speaking of, I'm just setting these sites up. They're pretty bare at the moment, but I'll add to them as I get some material finished and actually have something to offer. I may delete some of them altogether. Do musicians really need a Pinterest? Is anyone even on ReverbNation? Is twitter/X still an acceptable place to have a presence? I'll figure it out later.)
So, yeah, I'm a solo musician. An amateur. A hobbyist -- but I'd be completely lost without it.