Musician's Artist Bio: Everything You Need To Know

An artist bio is one of those things that, in all honesty, should be describing why people should care about you. Due to overload of information, despite being present on social media all day, the average Joe is notoriously picky in what he chooses to read or scroll through on social media platforms. 

Your artist profile is essentially your story. Or if you’re dropping, say, a new album, then it should tell what’s the album’s story. It has to reveal what sets you apart from other artists, and what are the points that fans might relate with you at. 

In ascending order of size, you need an elevator pitch, a short bio, and a long bio. Let’s dig in.

 

The Long Artist Bio

Your long bio is definitely going to make its way on your website. Here’s what great long bios usually consist of:

 

A Quote

Kick-off your artist bio by quoting something which is indicative of what your new project is about. This quote can be from a press outlet, from a band member or it could also be a lyric from one of your songs. Your aim with this quote is to properly set the tone for the rest of the artist profile and be relevant to your new project.

 

The Hook: Your Story

Everything that makes you unique, goes into this section. The hook is where you put on your storytelling hat and narrate what sets you apart from everyone else. However, don’t go overboard with this. An ideal hook has a maximum of 2 paragraphs. 

This hook will keep changing over time, especially whenever you make a new release. So whenever you sit to write an artist profile hook, ask yourself: What is the biggest thing about you that stands out right now? What do you want people to know about you, the artist? Why is your project special, or different from your previous projects?

If you’re still confused about what to add in the hook, think of it this way: This is supposed to be the first thing that your listeners will tell their friends when they introduce them to your music.

The way you test this hook is whether or not it goes well with your music. It should share the feel and energy of your new project and generate curiosity. 

One simple yet super effective strategy you could use is “Headlines.” 

It is when you don’t just focus on your upcoming release, you also focus very deeply on the narrative that will surround your upcoming release. 

It’s based on a simple principle—when you sit to chart out a marketing campaign for your new release, make sure that the events in your marketing campaign are headline-worthy. 

Let’s take an example of the marketing campaign for Kanye’s “Donda,” for which Kanye had been staying at an Atlanta stadium for over two weeks. At the end of the second livestream listening party of Donda, Kanye went the theatrical route and levitated above the Atlanta stadium. 

And what do you know, he made so many headlines the following day, specifically talking about the levitation. He made his marketing event particularly easy, or even appealing, to be written headlines about. 

Before you even start your marketing campaign, you need to be able to easily write the kind of headlines that people will use while sharing your work. This way, you will get an accurate idea of how headline-worthy your campaign really is. Because if it’s difficult for you to write down headlines for your own campaign, it’s definitely going to be difficult for others to do so. 

We, as people, have so many different stories. But ask yourself—what is the story about your project that you want everyone to be talking about? That’s your hook. And the hook is to be used in your press release and literally everywhere else. If they know your song, they must know the hook.

The hook is perhaps the most important part of your artist bio, something which needs a blog post of its own. So we wrote one. 

 

Your Accolades

After your hook, straightaway dive into discussing your various accolades. This just gives off a little credibility to assure the reader that your music is indeed worth listening to. The hook raises the curiosity, and the accolades make sure it stays. 

 

Your Newest Project

This section directly talks about your newest release. Throw in a few lines about the new project, and if you have any tours or music videos coming up, this is where you mention it. 

 

Bonus Layers 

This section is for super fans or journalists researching you. For this, you can include interesting (but relevant) information about how the band members met, how the band was formed, and other highlights of your musical career. Feel free to throw in your music influences, stories behind songs and anything else noteworthy or intriguing. 

 

The Short Artist Bio

Once you’ve made a long artist bio, writing the short one is going to be a copy-pasting cakewalk. All the elements you need in your short artist profile are:

> The Hook

> The Accolades

> The New Project

The short artist bio will be used in your Spotify For Artists or a few media outlets that might specifically request one.

 

The Elevator Pitch

 

While the elevator pitch is nothing that needs to be sent out anywhere, or even actually be written out, it is for situations when you need to quickly and effectively describe the kind of music your band makes. 

Think about this for a second. If you were sharing an elevator ride with somebody influential, and they asked you about the kind of music you make, what would you say in those crucial 10-15 seconds that leaves an impression and strikes curiosity? Tricky, right? This is why you consciously prepare an elevator pitch. You don’t want to be clueless about what your own band does. 

 

But an elevator pitch doesn’t have to be too elaborate or flamboyant. Keep it short and easy to remember. Select a few musicians that your fans say you sound like and use that. Something like “Doja Cat meets Tim Henson” or  “David Bowie meets Bob Dylan” might paint a nice yet intriguing picture. As it goes without saying, for this to work, you need to make sure you use very well-known names. 

 

You may think your sound is unlike any which came before and that you shouldn’t be pigeonholed by referencing one or two artists or genres, but trust us, this is going to drastically help your (potential) audience by giving them a frame of reference.

 

Your artist bio is one place where you don’t want to shy away from showing off. A lot of artists like staying low-key because there’s just something very off-putting about tooting your own horn. But in certain cases, it is what will make or break your discovery as an artist. Here’s why marketing your music isn’t optional.