Scared To Share Your Music? Use These Tips To Overcome

In order to combat the apprehension of releasing new music, you must first find out what exactly is causing these thoughts inside of your head that are ultimately stunting your growth and success as a musician. It may be self-doubt, perfectionism, anxiety, laziness, loss of interest  — or it may be that you're not necessarily afraid, but you just don’t have the proper knowledge or tools to do it properly. 

Whatever the reason may be, this block stems from your psyche and ends up inhibiting your career and development as an artist. If you have radio ready music that hasn’t been released yet—today is the day to change that. It starts with reforming your way of thinking and understanding that the benefits of dropping new music highly outweigh whatever uncertainties or thoughts you may have that are provoking you not to. 

We are going to discuss some common thought processes that prevent artists from releasing their music, and rebuttal them with an explanation as to why you should release your music. Defeatism and complacency can lead to the death of your career, no matter what industry you are in. So I encourage you to read through this article with an open mind and willingness to learn so you can truly advance in the music industry. 

There has always been an ongoing debate with music professionals about the proper time to release music. Many will say “hold onto your songs until the time is right to release”, or you may have heard “save up more music and release a compilation later down the road”, or maybe “wait to release the song when you have the budget to promote it”— the list of excuses goes on. 

Though some will disagree with me, I believe wholeheartedly that this is terrible advice and mere excuses that are toxic to your career growth. This type of mindset and submissive thinking will ultimately fail you as an artist. As a matter of a fact, artists should actually be dropping as many songs as possible in order to compete with the overwhelming saturation of music in today’s industry. 

To give you a real life example— rapper, singer, songwriter, and producer, Russ credits his career success to his strategy of dropping one song every week for about two and a half years. In an interview with Gary Vee, Russ explains that it was around the release of his 98th track when his career began to finally pop off. 

He goes on to explain that it took patience combined with persistence and quality combined with quantity in order to achieve his goal of becoming a famous artist. This example is the perfect point as to why musicians should always be releasing more music than not. If Russ’ results aren’t enough to convince you to start releasing more music, then hopefully some of these other points mentioned below will be....

This formula coined by Russ basically explains that those who produce and distribute the most music have the better chances of making it big. It boils down to simple math and percentages — the more content you have out, the more likely you are to be seen or heard.   

I’m not saying you should aim to put out one song per week like Russ did for 2+ years, but I am saying you should come up with a reasonable release schedule and growth strategy that you can stay committed and consistent to. Artists who want to excel in the music industry should be putting out no less than one song every three to four months.  

This is a pretty simple concept: The more music you put out, the more streams you will have. The more streams you have, the more fans you will make. The more fans you make, the more publicity you will get. The more publicity you get, the more fame you will receive. 

It’s extremely rare to find an artist who became successful with only one or two songs out. Also, you never know which song will be your big make or break hit until you put them all out there for listeners to decide. If you increase your quantity of song releases while maintaining the quality, I can guarantee that it will increase your chances at success.

If your goal is to have a sustaining career in music, then there is no time for fear of failure. As we know, the music industry is extremely competitive and you need to use every second to your advantage in order to become noticed.

Many people will tell you to hold on to your songs until the time is right — but the right time is NOW. In this fast paced music industry, trends are constantly coming and going. A song you created a year ago, or even a few months ago may not be as popular today as it would’ve been right when you made it. 

There are also new artists emerging daily, which ultimately means more competition for you. The quicker you get your music out, the more leverage you will have on your competition. Since there is so much music being released every day, artists who spend years between releases run the risk of being forgotten.

In order to succeed in the industry, you have to act quick and adapt to the constant changes and competition. Releasing new music frequently and consistently will help you stay current and more prominent in the music scene.

Don’t you hate it when your favorite artist takes forever to put out new music? The anticipation of a long awaited album or EP can be antagonizing to fans. At the end of the day, your entire career lies in the hands of your fans, so you should be doing whatever in your power to keep them happy and engaged. 

Fans want to constantly hear new music, that’s just a fact. When you give your fans what they want and continue to engage with them through new releases, they will continue to stream and support you. But if you haven’t released anything new in years, you take the risk of your fans losing interest and tapping out of your music completely.

Artists should always strive to give their followers something new and exciting to listen to — this shows that you are still creating and evolving as a musician, and that you actually care about your fanbase. 

New music will get fans starting conversations about you, which will lead to increased social media traffic, that could lead to press releases, that ultimately could lead to you getting the placement or deal of your dreams. It’s important to keep as much buzz around you as possible and the easiest way to do this is through your fanbase organically hyping you and your new music up. 

Most serious musicians are their own biggest critics, by far. Artists often revert from dropping their new music because they think that it isn’t good enough, or isn’t quite finished, or that they have to make it perfect first. The fact is — perfectionism doesn’t exist and even if it did, it’s not what makes for great music.

Yes, you want to set high standards for yourself and yes, you want to continue pushing your own envelope and creating at your best. However, you do not want to be a perfectionist or someone who obsesses over the final outcome of a song to the point where you choose to not even release it. Critiquing every little part of your music will only inhibit your creative process and lead to procrastination, frustration, and exasperation.

“Don’t get so stuck in the details that you forget the goal” and ultimately your goal should be to release new music as much as possible — to the points we’ve mentioned above. When you don’t release music because you think it’s not good enough, it can cause you to miss out on opportunities, positive feedback, potential collaborations, new followers, and many more valuable experiences.

It’s important for artists to get out of their own heads and set realistic and quantitative goals for themselves when making music. You cannot be a perfectionist 24/7 and it’s okay to put out music that you are not 100% in love with. 

When you learn to embrace your imperfection you will find that you become more creative, more inspired, you’ll finish more music  and commit to actually releasing it. releases. Which in the end means growing as a creator and getting closer to becoming a successful artist. 

The ability to create your own music is a gift and a gift that should be heard with the world. Fear and self-criticism is a normal part of the music making process, but it shouldn't be a part that paralyzes your chances of success. 

We hope that after reading this article you will analyze the points we made and find a new level of confidence in yourself and your music. Don't let your amazing songs go heard, continue to push them out and reach for the starts of success!