11 million fliers, no posting

During the time of Nirvana -- that’s Kurt not Buddha -- musicians were forced to spend inordinate amounts of time in copy shops to create fliers that promoted their gigs. At about a nickel a pop per page, this old-school marketing technique was an expensive line item for the artist on a shoestring budget.

But how music marketing has changed: Bands can now burn their own CDs at the cost of a spindle of discs. And websites such as the Boston-based www.purevolume.com and Santa Monica-based www.myspace.com have taken the Friendster mentality and technology a step further -- giving established and emerging artists an opportunity to take center stage on the Web.

“We used to make up fliers at Kinko’s, head down to local venues when good shows were happening, and pass out fliers promoting our upcoming shows,” notes Forrest Kline, vocalist and guitarist from Huntington Beach power-pop quartet hellogoodbye. “We don’t do that ever anymore, haha,” he writes in an e-mail. “I do much more Internet stuff like sending out news to our e-mail list and posting on our MySpace and our website.”

“Our original intent was to create a portal around a social network,” says Chris DeWolfe, chief executive and co-founder of MySpace.com. The site is serious about socializing -- everyone who signs up on MySpace.com is guaranteed at least one friend: President and co-founder Tom Anderson. (Yup, community members, that’s the “Tom” greeting you in your inbox with the 11 million friends.)

The website has also burgeoned into another animal entirely: It’s become the de facto place for bands and fans to meet. With an endless number of cyberfriends on MySpace, up-and-coming musicians can book tours, promote shows, get the down-low on venues to play and even find available sofas and floors when the tour money can’t cover the cost of a Motel 6.

Proven acts are also jumping on the Internet bandwagon. Last month, Queens of the Stone Age partnered with MySpace for an exclusive debut of their latest album, “Lullabies to Paralyze.” In the fall, R.E.M. offered the site’s community members a sneak listen of its “Around the Sun” release.

The website combines the features of other networking sites -- classifieds, friends, blogs, groups, games and forums -- and adds the dimension of free music at your fingertips. Visitors can listen to music and download without worrying about letters from the recording industry because the musicians control the songs that are available.

“With other sites, the novelty wears off and visitors get bored after a few weeks,” DeWolfe adds.

MySpace members, however, seem to keep coming back.

The MySpace.com site, which launched nearly 18 months ago, currently houses 190,000 artists on its roster; and, according to one survey, it was ranked the seventh-largest Web domain in February.

While MySpace.com doesn’t charge for musician listings (it relies solely on advertising), PureVolume.com takes a slightly different approach to viral Web music promotion. PureVolume generates much of its income from advertisements and enhanced listings (“upgraded memberships”) for designated lengths of time, ranging in price from $9.99 (one month) to $69.99 (one year).

According to founder and Chief Executive Brett Woitunski, PureVolume’s focus isn’t on social networking. The site is strictly “for artists to promote their music,” says Woitunski, “and [to find] music that people wouldn’t find elsewhere.”

Since its launch in December 2003, PureVolume.com has amassed more than 112,000 online artist profiles and offers its visitors more than 137,000 free songs to download.

Seth Schwartz, the founder of LA Music Scene (www.lamusicscene.com), a website that promotes Southern California musicians, says that, although guerrilla marketing on the Web has blossomed, the proliferation has made it difficult for some to cut through the clutter on the Internet. The Web “has created a harder market to differentiate bands,” he says. “Getting on a website is nothing. People need to see you repeatedly.”

But more than likely, if the music’s good and the band’s buzz worthy, the combination can set off a virtual wildfire on the Web. In fact, because so many emerging bands are flocking to the Internet, record companies and other industries are taking notice. By scouring My Space, Converse reps found the song “2 Hot 2 B Bothered” from the L.A.-based band Rocket for a shoe ad.

“Labels are all over My Space,” DeWolfe says, “and using [the site] as a mechanism to find new talent.”

Ditto with PureVolume. One of the site’s distinctive features is the daily rankings of top signed and unsigned acts (designated by the number of songs played each day). The Silence, an emo band from Orange County, was recently ranked one of the site’s top unsigned artists.

Vocalist Josh Silence says they’ve logged more than a quarter million plays on PureVolume (and more than 10,000 in one day on MySpace). Creating a buzz on the Internet, he says, “takes you to another level. Major labels can’t deny it.”

Though still shopping around for a record deal, the Silence has snagged a spot on the Ernie Ball Stage on this summer’s Warped Tour -- so maybe those labels are listening even more closely than we had thought.