​If you are a musician who creates content to please the social media platform owners and the algorithms, don't worry. You can probably keep posting garbage. I am sure they will find a way to make it seem impressive. After all, they have a proud history of fudging stats to manipulate users. These are the people who counted video plays of 2 seconds with the sound off in a section of the screen you were not looking at as "a view." 

And if you are a musician who creates content for actual music fans, then you were never playing those games anyway. Let others go insane trying to please the tech dictators (human narcissists) and the algorithms (digital narcissists). 

They try to hide your material from us music fans, but we find it anyway.

So don't waste your time with gimmicks, trends, and ticks. Instead, as writer Neil Gaiman advised, "Make good art."

How I develop content with clients that resonates with the social media algorithms…

I don’t. I develop content that resonates with people, specifically music fans. Based on the comments people make in person at concerts, it is working.

If you are a musician who would like help creating content that resonates with music fans, message me. 

Cris Cohen: What drew you to the drums? 

Michael McDermott, drummer for Joan Jett and the Blackhearts: When I was a little kid, there was a music store right near this Italian restaurant we would go to. We'd get done with dinner and my two sisters and I would always run next door to A - Z Music. And the drums just always did something for me. My parents encouraged that, nurtured that. I got a practice pad and sticks. From that I just started building. I had buckets and tin cans and things. They were like, "Wow. He's a little more serious. Let's get him a drum set."

Last night with Haircut 100, who are touring with Adam Ant and Squeeze. I hope to publish the interview in the next week or so. In the meantime, check out their new album, Boxing the Compass. It is really good. 

"It's hitting the nerve, hitting something that's on the public's mind somehow, or being in the right place at the right time. It's the Muse. It's magic. And it's wonderful. We strive to have this wonderful, synergistic thing happen. The words are good. The music is good. But when you put them together, the combination is amazing." - Huey Lewis (client) 

Cris Cohen: There are some really interesting instrumentals on this album. Besides the obvious difference of lyrics versus non-lyrics, for you, how is it different the way you approach an instrumental versus a song with lyrics? 
 
Dennis Atlas: Wow. That's a great and deep question to start with.
 
It's funny. I kind of approach it the same way. Because to me instrumental music has just as much meaning built into it as something that has lyrics. When I'm writing a song, I'm asking myself and I'm asking the song, “What are you trying to say? What is it that's trying to be expressed here?”
 
And where is this coming from? What was the experience that is causing this emotional outburst, which we call a song, which we call music and art?
 
With the song “Surprises From Within,” that title came about really quickly. As soon as I heard those themes, as soon as I heard those melodies and the energy of that song, I kind of heard the words, “surprises from within.” That perfectly envelops that concept of when music comes out from within, is a surprise, and teaches you what you've been thinking about.

I spoke with Dennis Atlas about the making of his new solo album, Principle. We discussed writing instrumentals with the same intention he brings to lyric‑driven songs. Dennis talked about collaborating with the album’s special guests that included his Toto bandmates Steve Lukather, Joseph Williams, and Warren Ham, as well as drummers Marco Minnemann and Shannon Forrest. We also delved into the role of metaphor in expressing personal struggles, and the optimism that threads through even his most conflicted lyrics.

Dennis Atlas website: dennisatlas.com

​"I think selecting the song order is one of the most important steps in making a record. It completes the artist’s vision, so it needs to be right." - client John Papa Gros. Check out his new album, Giants!

Cris Cohen: I came across this really cool quote of yours in another interview where you said, “I used to write songs that had a lot of autobiography in them. Now, I write more in hallucinogenic metaphors.”

Andrew Morse of The Tasty Kings: (Laughs) That's true. Yes. Sounds like I was on hallucinogens when I said that.

Cris Cohen: What led to that change?

Andrew Morse: Sometimes by coming up with weird images or weird ideas or just making up stories, it winds up being more truthful than the actual truth. You know what I mean?

On this record that we did with Blondie Chaplin, there's a line from that song “Maybe I'm a Queen” where it goes, “Maybe I'm the moon shattering the sea.” 

I'm like, “Jesus Christ, I'm out of my mind now that I wrote that.”

But then I was talking to my friend who is a great singer / guitar player. His name is Kevin Trainor. 

I said to him, “See what I was going for there? Monet, the instantaneity?” Because he's a painter. 

He goes, “Yes.”  

I'm like, okay, well, we're off. “Maybe I'm the moon shattering the sea.” What, have I lost my fucking mind? But that's how it came out, so that's how it came out.

That was one of the first songs I wrote (where) I felt like I cracked the code. Because there was a point, I was really stuck and I was looking up “what are the most common objects in the English language?” And so “maybe I'm a matchbook, maybe I'm the match, maybe I'm the toaster, maybe I'm a piece of toast, blah, blah, blah.”

It was driving me crazy for a couple of weeks. 

Then I got to the point where it went, “Maybe I'm the kindness / Maybe I'm the greed / Maybe I'm the limit / Maybe I'm the speed.”
 
And I was like, okay, and now we're off.

“Maybe I'm the bridge / Maybe I'm the wall.” Those are all obviously metaphors, but it makes a little bit of sense, the subtext of that.

These songs take you to places where you really never thought you'd wind up. It's a big thrill. It's an adventure. I think Bob Dylan once said that it's an audacious thing to write a song.

I think that kind of depends on the song. A lot of people just write stupid whatever. They don't care. You can tell. 

But to write songs that have taken you somewhere, I think people can tell. Some of the really good Dylan songs, obviously they took him places.

It's kind of an adventure.