Trying to find a family event on the island this Christmas?
Get your tickets now for Cookeilidh – Making Spirits Bright
Saturday December 17th at 7:30 pm.
We will be playing a variety of celtic and festive songs of the season in this beautiful theater. We will also be joined on stage by the world class O’Brien Irish Dancers so get your tickets today and mark your calendar!
Tickets are available now at…
http://marywinspear.ca/event/cookeilidh-making-spirits-bright
Cheers,
Tom
😄
We are so excited to finally announce August 26th 2016 as the debut for Ollie and Emma – The Webseries. This has been such a huge endeavor and its still not over! Tom and Cheri would like to thank all our loyal Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram followers…keep liking and share with your friends!! Ollie and […]
Can people find you? Imagine getting an online readership of over 25k!
One of the things I have been working on this morning, due to the fact that I am now full time self employed, is the whole world of self promotion. This of course takes a myriad of forms, but what’s interesting is how there are bloggers out there that make over 25k in just WordPress followers. That number is amazing and from what I’ve seen it isn’t entirely impossible to do.
Here’s one link to kind of wet your appetite, or maybe even give you some immediate insights with identifying your target audience…
That said, I have been working with a number of newer companies and artists over the past few years and one thing that I find myself saying all too often is…
“Ahh! What are they doing!? I’m really looking for them and I can’t find them! If I can’t find them, how can there be an audience!?”
This is not a place I think you want to be.
The Social Media creator pitch
(I don’t know about you but I hate those posts out there that lead you down a garden path and then after hours of your time hit you with “I can tell you for only 49.95!” Ugh. So here we go…)
I am absolutely happy to help anyone set up there social media platforms for a competitive cost. I am not a massive Html and Java slinging pro designer who worked for Apple or Google any time recently so my costs for this would be relatively low.
However I have had success in my work, and I can easily assist someone outside of the Greater Victoria Area as well, but it will take some emailing back and forth to set up things such as a Twitter platform which typically requires a text message conformation from a unique phone number (your cell). This is because, well, I can’t afford to buy dozens of cellphones.
The nice thing about me doing it for you is that you can get on with what you do and leave the social media setup to me. As an example, I set up the entire http://www.westsoundmag.com campaign of website, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and email all in about three hours with images and content. Some of it was from the back of a friend’s car.
My background with all this came slowly, starting with my earliest music projects and just running around with posters. Posters are still in my world, but we have other people who do that sort of thing these days. Still, the basic advertising theory is essentially the same.
A show, an event or whatever that’s going on in real time isn’t about the show in itself. Any event is a reason to put the name out! With something coming you have suddenly a great reason to advertise the name and then it becomes about repetition. They say it takes about five years to really lock down a brand in people’s minds. You don’t expect anyone is going to see your poster, or whatever and suddenly take out a notepad and start jotting things down. It’s all about seeing that name one more time so that they later on say “Oh yeah! I’ve heard of them!” We move towards what is familiar. Familiar seems way more reliable and enticing then “Never heard of those guys.”
Hiring me or not is totally up to you and your project, but the main thing is to make yourself visible. Everything is converting to online activity. Despite all this tech I’m older than I look, and I have had younger folks ask if I dyed my hair this way (It’s grey). I remember when if you wanted to seem like someone who puts in initiative for work, you would show up with a resume in a shirt and tie. I have been informed more recently that no one wants you to do that. They prefer emails.
Emails!? What a different world this is! I can distinctly remember a friend in the nineties saying how if a resume and cover letter were faxed they would throw them to the, let’ just call it, “less interested” pile as fax=lazy!
But that’s the thing, and it covers everything these days. If you want to find the next bus do you use the bus schedule book? No. You google the location and it tells all. Order pizza? I don’t even know where my classic phone book is right now. I use the Yelp or Zomato App.
The point of this side trip in the direction of memory lane is that if your product can’t be found online, your product has a problem. You don’t want to spam people as that has a reverse effect of course, but you do need to at least get visible.
You know what the last thing most people will use their smartphone’s for these days?
As phones.
Telling someone to just give you a call might just have you sitting there listening to your Hootie and The Blowfish album, and that’s about it.
Cheers,
Tom
I’ve mentioned before about my love of mornings which I know makes me weird straight away. I actually woke up far too early on this one even for myself but I had set myself this rule of getting out each morning to do some kind of exercise. I have been struggling with a digestion issues since last October so this is one of the many ways I’ve have found myself fighting back. I honestly don’t know if it works or not, but I’m just not willing to find out what would happened if I stopped!
One of the great things about getting out there is the exploring side. This morning I finally, and this is nuts I am, but after going for about a half hour walk I finally took a route 1 bus out to its furthest end. Some more walking and a different route home and I am completely reading to get out there and start my regular work. If I hadn’t become so enthused by all this desire to be outside each morning I never would have done such a nonsensical thing. I admit I felt a bit too self conscious to get on the 1 route home, because I was fully expecting the driver would have looked at me funny.
I’ll work on that one.
Once home though I started planning out some really nice ideas for some other walks involving quieter bus routes I could do. A simple one (no pun meant) would be to take the same route to the café at the end, walk the beach to Gonzales Park and then hop a quiet #3 home again. You can’t beat breakfast with a million dollar view can you? As someone who already has one of those bus passes the only thing that cost you was some time and maybe whatever you picked up at Delish. Not a bad deal!
In the theme of exploring, and this is weird too because not only was I thinking about this subject this morning but my friend Kevin Lintern wrote about the same thing so I hope I’m not borrowing that too much, but people should not be afraid to explore possibilities within their own worlds. This could be anything from boating to model making but naturally my focus is creativity.
There is a mentality out there which states that only really talented people should even think of walking into a music store…and art supply store……ok, writer’s don’t have the same thing (a pen store?!) but…setting up a blog, and I am here to tell you it’s just not true. Creativity is a place you can simply explore with whatever fascinates you. You don’t have to be serious and think you have to play guitar or paint at a certain level with so many hours a day in order to try it.
I just recently started doing more visual arts thanks to the spurring of a book called “The Trickster’s Hat” by writer Nick Bantock, which I definitely recommend. One of the ideas he comes up with is the idea of just setting out without big goals or expectations in mind and just freeing yourself to try and make mistakes. As far as I’m concerned, in creativity, there is no mistakes. Ready for this…?
There is no bad art.
Whoa huh? Now you might say I’ve crossed a line there as you can probably quote me a list of names of people who you think have no talent and should stop. I’ve been on some people’s list with that one! But I stay stand firm on this. The very doing of creating is wonderful in itself…the simple act of stepping out of the things you have to do to explore what could be and creating from nothing. The Artist’s Way series is also great for breaking through this. I still try (and fail sometimes but what the heck?) to do my morning pages first thing every morning along with my other routines. I’m at the point now where I actually can’t imagine my life without that or the morning exercise. Also started doing meditation with a great app for the meditationally challenged like myself called “Calm”. There’s other things I like doing first thing like practice and drinking lots of water but that’s more specific to me. The process does take a while. Mornings work for me but whatever you find best for you, that’s the best time.
Thanks for reading!
Happy exploring J
Tom
This is something I’ve just started playing with, along with my more localized Westsound Magazine project. It came from listening to some Coast Salish drumming on YouTube which lead me to this really interesting Coast Salish Suite produced by Bravo Fact. In the video you hear a mix of First Nations music with a full orchestra, resolving with the work of the conductor.
From being a fan of music and watching those giant crowds of people to my own experiences playing before crowds, I can tell you that there is definitely something going on under the surface of our songs.
From the simple power of an drum song to gatherings of music across the world something connects straight into us. Its like synchronicity. Or that could be me just being a Police fan.
Anyways, I already had a SoundCloud channel, so I started putting together a playlist of music from around the world.
It isn’t finished (in fact I don’t think it logically could ever truly be) but it’s got eleven already, mixing some traditional music with some more contemporary.
Cheers,
Tom
Fear is the biggest hurdle in poverty. This is not only because a sense of lack, something perpetually put to you as evident, makes you act in ways that push reason.
But there are those that know of this fear and are only too determined to make the most of it.
They come at you with their ads and bargains, their dollar stores and discounts, their news events and threats upon the nation.
They push you and pull you and tell you that all you need to really do is go under their wise wings and everything will be alright in the end. They put pressure on you at just the right moment. Time is their greatest weapon against you. You don’t want to miss out do you? You don’t want to miss the boat! After all, these chances don’t come along often.
Bull. Can you imagine someone saying that to a salmon? You’re both creatures. You’re not missing anything.
It does cost a little more to steer away from where they want you to go at first, yes. But as people we are not that complicated. One thing I have noticed just this morning is how much better my day started by just going out for a walk. Came home, started writing into my notebook (I write on their before going digital) and had some oatmeal with blueberries. Coffee. Nothing you would really think to Instagram (some might, I know I’ve gone there too!) But like the salmon that I sort of plunked down into this little ramble, we are not that complicated a creature.
No one has all the answers. If they say they do, tell them you’re just browsing.
It is very easy to get locked into a specific pattern. The image above is an example of that. I was working three jobs at the time, trying to finish a film project, going to university and watching things in these and personal places fall around me. For some reason I had time that afternoon and went for a walk with headphones for the first time in ages. Not all that much of an escape but something as simple as that is well worth it. Take time and get out. On your own.
Victoria is a wonderful place for doing just that. Take a time each week where you intend to wander and take things slow. One of my favorite books is “Faster” by James Gleick. In this he talks about the number of ways we have tried to speed ourselves up, the multitasking and then fact that these things that were supposed to help have just given us excuses to need to go faster still. Step out of all that. It’s not real, you are. There is so much to be grateful for here as a human being that it staggers the mind. Literally anything you couldn’t think of is available for you to explore. Our city is a dream of little communities within communities. Go to a open stage night and listen to some of the musicians who have honed their craft alongside fellow musicians, some for decades now. Go to Imax and watch a show you never would have thought of watching. Explore the library for titles you never would have thought of. Get lost in the streets of Oak Bay with headphones (you can always use google if you get hopelessly confused) Twitter search #yyj to see what is going on in town today (and yes, you’ll probably run into yours truly on there. I’m @tomrambles. Hi! :D)
Does this all seem a little oversimplified and not in the adult world? Yes. But I’ll be honest. I’ve tried being an adult and I find it a mix of both stressful, kind of boring and not much in it. Mostly joking there, and the ironic footnote is that this blog was not written in one sweep. I don’t mean to run down the effort we all put in to be responsible but who the heck wants to make strata councils, finance and long line ups when we don’t have time our whole life? In the arts and even in the martial arts there is the concept of the child’s mind. It’s roughly related to the “from the mouths of babes” idea. It’s also, I feel, connected to the same concept of meditation.
You step out of your reality and accept that you only know the world from your perspective in the same way that I know mine from mine and the guy driving the bus (for instance) knows his from his. In creativity its like pretending you don’t know how to do your craft at all…now what are you going to do?
The best way to explore it all is with the sense of gratitude, which was the original spark that started this blog. Feeling that your actually lucky is one of the best things you can do for yourself. Being outside of your world and just exploring the city is one great way to discover how lucky you really are. So leave all of the adult world behind for a couple hours. Have the meeting tomorrow. Go play outside.
Interesting...
I actually was looking for that image of Richard Dreyfuss at the very end when he says those words (or close proximity to them).
I have really enjoyed keeping this on as a daily practice but the next few months are going to get really busy around here. I have a day job and then on top of that I have my band Cookeilidh which is going into a very busy festival season including shows at the Butchart Gardens, Bastion Square, Car Free Day to name a few. Ollie and Emma is also gearing up to go into it’s primary shoots which include our application to Bravo Fact and two mini shoots at least prior to that. I like to approach each one of these entries with care and consideration, despite how short they are and I don’t want to put out material that is literally “I have a few minutes…bang something out…”
Will stop occasionally for lunch...
I don’t know how much time I will have for the “Closer to Heaven” blog either, but I’ll see how that goes. There will be updates on the Ollie and Emma WordPress blog as that’s a necessary part of the show and I want to keep everyone updated on how things are going. We recently lost a member of not only our cast but also a friend and my girlfriends beloved cousin Wolf Rick Patterson so we want to make our next blog a tribute to him before we move on to other behind the scenes filmmaking writings.
I should probably be back to working on here regularly somewhere between August and September after principal photography is finished and festival season draws more to a close. Until then feel free to check out some of the links up above as well as some of the other parts of the site. There are links to a number of platforms which I have been using including my twitter site which I am probably the most frequently on (it takes the least actual time)
Follow on Twitter!
So I’m going on a bit of a WordPress summer vacation. If all the images aren’t a clue definitely rent Rosencranze and Guildenstern are Dead or take it in live. It’s weird but full of cerebral fun including the fantastic game of questions.
Have a great summer everyone!
Statement...
Created by TomPogson.com
I like the quote that Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode used to talk about the years he had already worked in the music business. He got the quote from Keith Richards originally but I don’t think it’s only true for rock stars…
“It’s five years of work and the rest is waiting.”
We wait so much of our lives and you just know for a fact that there is…oh lots more to go. As I write this (originally) I’m early for work and so I’m simply waiting as well. Some folks naturally don’t like to wait. I probably don’t much of the time as well as there is lots of things to do with creative work where it’s not one event after another. So much of what I do is scheduling (as my many employers can understandably talk about) and that naturally leads to those in between times when you are simply waiting on the green light to get going. But since we know that the waiting is going to happen I think that it’s almost empowering.
I mean, we now have these sometimes leash like mobile devices and if you “do social media” that is certainly one way to use up that time when we line up for a ticket, a coffee, purchasing a new shirt but there also just that opportunity to be more present in the moment.
This is one thing that is great about kids. They are utterly self aware and in the moment. They notice everything, and as we know, they are only too ready to tell you about it. Ok, this shouldn’t be confused with patience as spending any time at a religious (or otherwise) service can tell you but that’s just because they have been told to quell their natural exuberance. But as a busker, kids are awesome because they will often halt their parents who are cannoning from one very important thing to the next very important thing to pull at mom’s coat and exclaim…
“Mommy! Look! Guitar!”
I owe their union a lot of money for this. It’s about being relaxed that things will work out and just setting off early so you’re not late. Don’t line up if you can’t. Don’t take on more than you can. You don’t need to be perfect. You’ll have plenty of time to wait tomorrow too.
But then I’m probably just an early bird. Victoria is wonderful first thing in the early morning. Give yourself the time to enjoy those little details of her city because there is lots of them. That’s actually one thing I’ve really enjoyed about working on my own twitter and my project accounts…when reaching out to the city to tell everybody that we are here I’ve learned how much is really going on that you can get involved in. This city was founded on a Gold Rush and a sudden influx of people from all over the globe. With a background like that set on the Pacific Coast there is always another thing to see. So step out of your own blinders when you have no option but to wait. You could be surprised to find out where your really standing.
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Tom's Creativity Blog 