

Show HN: local independent band discovery service - dreadsword

http://stagetrip.com/<p>Born from my frustration at finding good music and shows locally. This isn't a simple mapping aggregator, its (intended to be) a hand-curated local music discovery service.<p>Right now its really just a shell, as I haven't had a tonne of time to get music into it. The eventual vision is that navigating to a "place" (i.e.: your hometown) on stagetrip you'll be able to find local bands, download some of their music (free), and see when/where they're playing (via songkick api for now).<p>The other side of the experience is that it (in time) will provide a place for bands to connect with local fans and build traffic to their local shows.<p>For instance, there's 4 bands in LA:
http://stagetrip.com/places/united-states/california/losangeles
7 in california:
http://stagetrip.com/places/united-states/california
Etc.<p>Individual song pages include a bunch of stuff: 
http://stagetrip.com/song/dont-move_416
http://stagetrip.com/song/faces_645
Obviously the download link, but also voting, location, genre, concerts, etc.<p>Where available, concert listings show up:
http://stagetrip.com/artist/phantogram
http://stagetrip.com/song/dont-move_416
...as do links to their social networks etc.<p>You can browse by:
Location: http://stagetrip.com/places
Genre: http://stagetrip.com/genre
Popularity: http://stagetrip.com/charts.php
Artist: http://stagetrip.com/artist<p>Something tells me that there's already someone doing this out there on a better/larger scale, but if there is, they're still pretty fragmentary.<p>There's no business model implicitly built into this - its really a "scratching the itch" scenario. Over time, with traffic, I'd like to monetize it with paid promotion by location - i.e.: "Promoted bands in Chicago this Week" sort of thing - a low cost, targeted way of driving traffic to shows.<p>Thoughts? Comments?
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mcrider
I'd suggest automatically detecting location and display local content on the
frontpage. Also, I'd put some more focus on live events -- There is so much
music out there that I won't bother to listen to, but if a band is playing at
a local venue I'd be more keen to check it out.

Also, you spelled 'independent' wrong in your call to action at the top.

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fredsanford
Promoted anything would cause me to avoid your service. It is very rare, for
example, a promoted Youtube video to be relevant for my interests.

Figure out a way to efficiently crowd-source your content and place
unobtrusive ads on the pages. Google is good at not annoying me with their
search page ads.

~~~
dreadsword
Fair ball on "promoted" content, though I wonder if there isn't a balance
point that could be reached - i.e.: Reddit Ads. But that's a ways down the
road anyhow.

I regards to crowd sourcing: part of the value proposition of stagetrip was
always intended to be "curation" - i.e.: as soon as its opened up to the
internet firehose, I'd be worried about the quality of what's posted. In that
sense, the music selection is really my voice as opposed to an impartial
location-map of independent bands, which isn't a good thing - so I hear what
you're saying. That being said, my intent is that every song on the site
display some sort of instantly recognizable merit.

Perhaps fowkswe has the right idea - open it up to a select group, or require
a "membership application" or something.

~~~
fredsanford
I would love to see you succeed with this as the area I live in is really
lousy for live music if you're not constantly tuned in to the buzz.

I am a musician and have a fair number of musician friends who tell me about
shows happening locally but it tends to be a repetition of me going out to see
the same 3 or 4 bands all year...

Another trap to avoid is having someone that has close to a monopoly on
bookings in an area do your curating. There's an agency here in South Florida
that has bookings tied up for 90% of the good clubs in the area. If they're
curating, you only see their acts. :(

Again, great idea, I wish you success.

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dreadsword
I know what you mean about being tuned into the buzz. I'm a suit wearing
accountant, and about as far from the buzz as one can get. StageTrip is
supposed to be an end-run around the buzz, right to the music.

Thanks for the head's up about being selective about who gets involved.

South Florida, hey? Point me to some of your friend's bands (or your own) and
I'll start building up FL.

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fredsanford
OK, Thank you.

Here are some friends/acquaintances to get you started.

J.P. Soars - Boca Raton FL - Blues, 2009 International Blues Challenge winner.
<http://jpsoars.com>

Deecode - Lake Worth FL - Classic Rock/Rock/Alternative.
<http://www.facebook.com/deecodeband>

The Dillengers - Ft Laud FL - Eclectic Roots Music.
<http://www.thedillengers.com>

The Shakers - Jensen Beach FL - blues, rock ‘n’ roll, country, southern rock,
motown. <http://shakersrnb.com/>

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fowkswe
Do you intend to curate the listings? That seems like alot of work for a
single person. Have you considered reaching out to regional music bloggers to
give them a 'seat'? They could in-turn promote you with a embeddable widget
for their blog.

Nice work. I like where its going.

~~~
fowkswe
Oh, and a plug for a friend that has a regional blog - i know
<http://nocountryfornewnashville.com/>. I'd venture to say he'd be happy to
have one of those 'seats'.

~~~
dreadsword
Hey, thanks - I'll reach out to him! And I can add a "posted via" type link to
each song to drive traffic back to contributors as well. Do you think bloggers
would view stagetrip as cannibalizing traffic to their own blog?

~~~
fowkswe
I think show listings and contextual blog posts work in, ahem, concert :)

