Thousands of bands have them. Even more have one for each member of a band. Whether backstage at a show or on the bus headed to a new city, musicians across the country are tweeting.
Purevolume was the perfect way for bands to put their music out there and be discovered. Myspace was a to way to stream music, blog and post tour dates. Facebook was the new Myspace. But Twitter? What exactly does Twitter have to offer the music world?
Twitter is an interesting concept. It gives bored people a way to feel more connected to the world by sending and reading statements of 140 characters or fewer. It combines the smart-phone craze with the obsession of social networking — all while keeping the short attention span of our generation in mind.
For bands, it’s a way to connect to more fans than even seemed possible. John Mayer, for example, has over 3 million followers. The “Recording/Sandwich artist” (according to his Twitter bio) made headlines recently for some rather risqué comments he had made in an interview, but rather than wait for another interview to clear things up, he just tweeted his apology mere hours after the fact.
Pop/country princess Taylor Swift comes in just behind her friend John with more than 2.7 million followers. Armed with this tool of mass connection, Swift shares important pieces of information with her fans. For example, on Feb. 18 she tweeted, “I just used a Sharpie as eye liner in the airplane bathroom.”
But while these artists are some of the most talked about Twitterers, they do not, in fact, have the most followers. Comeback queen Britney Spears tops them both with just under 5 million followers, making her one of the most followed people on Twitter to date.
But what is Twitter really good for when it comes to the music industry? Clearly, as evidenced by John Mayer, it can be a great public relations tool — or a PR disaster. Some, like Pete Wentz (formally of Fall Out Boy) or Martin Johnson (Boys Like Girls), have used it to share photos of their faces just after being beaten up.
Other bands, however, have found more creative uses for the Web site.
Take Jack Barakat of All Time Low, for example. The guitarist was said by the MTV Buzzworthy Blog to have “one of the greatest celebrity tweets of all time” back in December. The tweet went as follows:
“Some people may want to ask me ‘Jack, due to your crazy lifestyle do you get a lot of diarrhea?’ The answer is Yes I do.”
Twitter can be a great tool to connect bands to fans. It allows them to warn of presales, announce new tour dates and just generally share pertinent information with those who would most like to know it. However, it is arguable that bands go too far when they start to Tweet about bodily functions.
No one could have predicted Twitter would become such a fad or that it would have lasted as long as it has. But with new social media being created every day (ChatRoulette, anyone?), it’s difficult to know if it has the staying power it needs to become a real staple in the music industry.
Then again, without Twitter, how would we know exactly what the musicians we idolize are doing at every hour of the day? What a sad world that would be.
You can reach this writer at thescene@theeagleonline.com.
