Musiquestria - Why is it having a hard time?

[Freewave]

So I am wondering why you think that Musiquestria is having a hard time meeting its goals?

In case you don't know what it is (and i could see that as they never seemed to make a thread on mlr according to the n/a search results)

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/musiq ... -tour-2013
http://musiquestria.tumblr.com/

"What is Musiquestria?

Musiquestria is a month-long pony music tour spanning the entirety of the United States, from Everfree Northwest in Seattle, WA to cities in the New England area. During these four weeks we hope to visit as many major cities as possible across the country, bringing incredible live performances of some of the community's most talented musicians to you.

The Musicians
•Replacer
•Mic the Microphone
•Silva Hound
•Tarby
•F3nning
•Poni1Kenobi
•Donn DeVore
•Automatic Jack
•Bejoty"

They debuted the fundraising project awhile back but it's always had a problem meeting its $15,000 touring goal. Why do you think it (compared to the other brony fundraising projects) is having such a hard time? Too lofty a goal? Bad choice of perks? Did it miss out on essential word of mouth and support from other musicians? Live brony music doesn't translate well? Competition from bronycons themselves? Brony music scene to small or cluttered with pay albums to support such a project? A less then essential artist list? Missing Denver and going through the south (yeah i went there, sob )?

What are YOUR thoughts and what's the takeaway?

[ganondox]

I think at least part of it is lack of word. People haven't really talked about it much, and that's a shame. As for why there has been less talking about this than other projects, it's probably a mix of the things you said.

Anyway, I think Musiquestria is a great idea, but it looks like it doesn't look like the fandom was quite ready. We'll see, I hope the tour ends up being a success for whatever size it ends up being, and it will continue in future years. I also think they should try to vie to get actual media coverage of the event, I'm sure some one will think fans of a show actually going on tour in newsworthy, I don't think this has ever been done before.

[Wisp]

I think it's having a hard time because a lot of people don't live in those major cities and don't want to travel to there. Especially when they could travel to a pony convention where they get live music AND all the features of a con instead. Like me, for example: on the proposed tour route they have, they include New York, but I don't live in the city and I don't really want to travel all the way up there. Especially when I'm planning on going to BronyCon and would much rather save my money for that instead of booking a hotel in NYC for a night.

[vladnuke]

This is the first time I'm hearing about this.
They should advertise more if they want moneh.

[ganondox]

I think it's having a hard time because a lot of people don't live in those major cities and don't want to travel to there. Especially when they could travel to a pony convention where they get live music AND all the features of a con instead. Like me, for example: on the proposed tour route they have, they include New York, but I don't live in the city and I don't really want to travel all the way up there. Especially when I'm planning on going to BronyCon and would much rather save my money for that instead of booking a hotel in NYC for a night.

Well you could argue the same thing about conventions, why go to a convention when you can go to a local meetup, and I'm pretty sure this tour is hitting several places where there are no conventions. The people living near those places would be the target of this. I think there is a big critical mass thing going here, it needs support to hit more places, and if it hits more places it will get more support. It needs a certain level of support to work at all. The same thing goes with conventions.

[Freewave]

Well i agree that if they're hitting the 3 coasts and the same places that have decent size conventions this summer already. Maybe they are kind of double hitting the same places music-wise (not sure if some of those dates coincide with those bronycons)? If i was gonna travel west to see a show i'd hit everfree northwest or really save up for bronycon down east. If they aren't coming through town i likely wouldnt travel as they are missing the midwest and up north. Incidentally I think most of the small cons ARE essentially meetups. there's like 4 conventions in Texas this summer alone but size may be small.

[Viricide Filly]

Because not every brony lives near to where they're going? Or even in the same country for that matter.

[HMage]

Keep in mind that music part of the fandom isn't that big -- people don't go to cons only for music, and having a music-only brony event is bound to have attendance issues.

Plus I see that it's not mentioning much what the backer gets -- theres more about what artists get.

[CDPP]

Plus I see that it's not mentioning much what the backer gets -- theres more about what artists get.

^

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

Because musicians aren't that important to people?

Also I agree with what HMage said. Even IF I lived anywhere near where this was, why would I pay $300 to go have dinner with a bunch of people I don't know? Why spend $600 to collab with someone when I could...I dunno, get to know them and do it for free? $900 to play one song that I like?

none of these are good intensives for me to do anything.

[the4thImpulse]

Keep in mind that music part of the fandom isn't that big -- people don't go to cons only for music, and having a music-only brony event is bound to have attendance issues.

Because not every brony lives near to where they're going? Or even in the same country for that matter.

Because musicians aren't that important to people?

Also I agree with what HMage said. Even IF I lived anywhere near where this was, why would I pay $300 to go have dinner with a bunch of people I don't know? Why spend $600 to collab with someone when I could...I dunno, get to know them and do it for free? $900 to play one song that I like?

none of these are good intensives for me to do anything.

As for why I wouldn't personally donate, all of the above here. Me being in Canada I would miss out on just about everything except collabing online (which I don't even enjoy, gotta be in person).

I don't see how $15,000 could even get all those artists across the country, transportation, food and board are all very expensive and there's at least 9 people in need of all that. I also read they expect that to go towards venue rentals, hired sound techs and live gear?!?!? Its not planned well.

I don't know how much exposure their campaign got but knowing the brony community I don't see why they shouldn't have meet that goal of $15,000. Bronies seem to be very giving people, its one of my favorite parts of the community, I am thinking it just didn't get the right exposure and what not.

[Conchetupony]

This is the first time I'm hearing about this.
They should advertise more if they want moneh.

I'm not into the artists listed, but this.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

To be honest I think this whole thing is some people getting ahead of themselves. They told some other people about this idea, and of course they thought it'd be a great idea, but they've still aimed too high. Big things start small, tour maybe 2 or 3 states, get some attention, which would (hopefully) secure funds for next time and get bigger after you're sure it can be done.

Starting this big is kinda just taking a massive guess on whether it'd work or not.

[ganondox]

Keep in mind that music part of the fandom isn't that big -- people don't go to cons only for music, and having a music-only brony event is bound to have attendance issues.

Because not every brony lives near to where they're going? Or even in the same country for that matter.

Because musicians aren't that important to people?

Also I agree with what HMage said. Even IF I lived anywhere near where this was, why would I pay $300 to go have dinner with a bunch of people I don't know? Why spend $600 to collab with someone when I could...I dunno, get to know them and do it for free? $900 to play one song that I like?

none of these are good intensives for me to do anything.

As for why I wouldn't personally donate, all of the above here. Me being in Canada I would miss out on just about everything except collabing online (which I don't even enjoy, gotta be in person).

I don't see how $15,000 could even get all those artists across the country, transportation, food and board are all very expensive and there's at least 9 people in need of all that. I also read they expect that to go towards venue rentals, hired sound techs and live gear?!?!? Its not planned well.

I don't know how much exposure their campaign got but knowing the brony community I don't see why they shouldn't have meet that goal of $15,000. Bronies seem to be very giving people, its one of my favorite parts of the community, I am thinking it just didn't get the right exposure and what not.

I live in Indonesia, and if I had a means of paying (it really sucks when you know you are being payed, but you can't actually use any of that money, at least my job isn't completely pointless) I would have donated something, just a small amount. I'd donate because I want to see this succede, not because I want something personal out of it. Calling the incentives incentives is really a misnomer. They are bonuses, your incentive should be getting the final project going. Even though I won't be able to personally see this tour I still want to see the people behind this tour succede and the people who wanted the tour to get it.

As for how to tour with $15,000, well, it's probably going to be a stretch, but I'm sure it's possible. Technically speaking you can get across the US with no money at all. Anyway, Spinal Tap should serve as inspiration .

[Freewave]

If they had offered a night with Tarby for $1,000 (for all the ladies) they likely would have met the goal the first week But I agree the should have more imaginative and tried to get smaller perks and gotten more quantity of them. A lot of the bigger perks seem to be for other musicians to donate to them (pay to collab) or overpriced. We likely don't have the money to get to bronycon ourselves let alone spend $300 to get other musicians in that same neck of the woods. But the music community would support and reblog such a tour IF we were asked to support it. I'm not sure they ever really tried hard to let us know or get that support.

Maybe if they are smart they can make a live cd album or a documentary DVD with some footage on the road. I know De Lancie wanted all his money upfront for Bronycon Doc but he sure as hell made a ton AFTER trying to sell the dvd's. There are way to recoup during (t-shirts, signatures, cds, posters) and after a tour after all.

[RainSnowHail]

Probably cause the only musicians everyone knows in this fandom are Toaster and Tombstone. Neither of which are gonna be here.

[Nine Volt]

Probably cause the only musicians everyone knows in this fandom are Toaster and Tombstone. Neither of which are gonna be here.

...because neither of them live in the US. I doubt that's the reason.

[Freewave]

Probably cause the only musicians everyone knows in this fandom are Toaster and Tombstone. Neither of which are gonna be here.

...because neither of them live in the US. I doubt that's the reason.

Well to play devil's advocate:
http://bronymusiciandirectory.blogspot. ... cians.html

•Mic the Microphone #4th
•Silva Hound #21
•Replacer #41
•Poni1Kenobi #75
•F3nning #76
•Tarby #82
•Donn DeVore N/A
•Automatic Jack N/A
•Bejoty N/A (How long so you suppose these shows go on anyway?)

You have 5 musicians in the top 100 (but i can see where they might be a bit low). But i would hope you wouldnt need Glaze or Tomb to make such a thing work (if Glaze is that crippled by writers block he should join them) although a little more star power couldn't hurt.

I honestly do think it's an idea that could and should work (if not now, WHEN?) but as we've kind of pointed out there's been a few missteps along the way. Hopefully they can still get it to work.

[itroitnyah]

Personally, I think that the music scene in the fandom has really shrunken down. If you had done this at an earlier time, perhaps more towards when Alex S and Toaster and Tomb and Mic and Jackle and Mumble and PPS and people were releasing their great songs, this would get fundraising a lot quicker. Maybe even around when BP was released would have been a good time to do this event. But right now, Tomb is sorta gone nowhere doing whatever, Toaster is gone who-knows-where, Alex S is out of the pony scene, silva hound is only sorta known, tarby is partially known, and everybody else isn't known well. I guess it'd feel sorta like going to a cheesy high-school-garage-band concert type thing.

[ganondox]

Personally, I think that the music scene in the fandom has really shrunken down. If you had done this at an earlier time, perhaps more towards when Alex S and Toaster and Tomb and Mic and Jackle and Mumble and PPS and people were releasing their great songs, this would get fundraising a lot quicker. Maybe even around when BP was released would have been a good time to do this event. But right now, Tomb is sorta gone nowhere doing whatever, Toaster is gone who-knows-where, Alex S is out of the pony scene, silva hound is only sorta known, tarby is partially known, and everybody else isn't known well. I guess it'd feel sorta like going to a cheesy high-school-garage-band concert type thing.

1. Mic is the on the list
2. Are you really saying that Replacer, F3nning, and PK1 aren't well known? I'm pretty sure they are.

[itroitnyah]

Well regardless of whether they're well known or not, it's apparent that the brony music scene isn't what it used to be. BTW, Freewave, since you seem to be running this thing since I haven't read much into it, how long are you guys going to hold out asking for donations before you guys give up on the idea?

P.S. Mic hasn't made a song that he's posted since early February. Other than that, he mostly only posts dramatic readings. He doesn't really do music nearly as much anymore, it seems.

[Nine Volt]

I don't think Freewave is running it, as he referred to them as "they" rather than "we".

And yeah Mic hasn't really done anything musically from what I've seen. Although I enjoyed his dramatic readings...
I might return to them.

I have to agree with Ganondox in that Replacer and F3nning are fairly well known. No idea who PK1 is though

[Freewave]

Nah I'm not running it at all. I was just curious how many people were even aware of it and if people had brainstormed on what went wrong with the funding efforts. Guess we could always ask one of those guys (Tarby likely as he's the chatty one) what they might need from us to still rally support and what the current status of that tour is.

[ganondox]

Well regardless of whether they're well known or not, it's apparent that the brony music scene isn't what it used to be. BTW, Freewave, since you seem to be running this thing since I haven't read much into it, how long are you guys going to hold out asking for donations before you guys give up on the idea?

P.S. Mic hasn't made a song that he's posted since early February. Other than that, he mostly only posts dramatic readings. He doesn't really do music nearly as much anymore, it seems.

I'm pretty sure the music scene is actually growing, though I'm not sure if the growth rate has increased or decreased. Probably decreased as novelty used to fuel it. Anyway, I think the illusion of shrinkage comes from the fact that now I think the amount of songs in the fandom is growing faster than than the amount of new listeners. Also, most of the older artists have reduced their output whether or not they have actually stopped.

Nah I'm not running it at all. I was just curious how many people were even aware of it and if people had brainstormed on what went wrong with the funding efforts. Guess we could always ask one of those guys (Tarby likely as he's the chatty one) what they might need from us to still rally support and what the current status of that tour is.

Is it just me or does Tarby seem to be the De Facto leader for the randomest things?

[The HurricaneY]

What they should have done is made a small album to raise awareness and a bit of cash. And try to get people like Tombstone, Sim Gretina (people who make rather a lot of songs) etc. To make a song for that album to raise even more awareness. The musicians in Musiquestria are really good. Mic is basically a brony celeb to quiet a few bronies, Silva Hound is quiet well known, F3nning is amazing at Cons anyone who's been to a Con or seen one online would know. Replacer, Poni1Kenobi and Tarby are awesome but they're not as known, well Replacer is but not as much as the other Silva or Mic. And the other three, I have not heard of them.