Check out our first post ever a year ago!
When I started this website a year ago, I don’t think I realistically expected it to be where it is today. After running the website for a couple of months hits were staying steady between 25-50 a day and I was really trying to figure out if it was worth it. I started the website in late June, because I needed something to do. Work was slow and I felt like I needed to get more involved in a promising music scene where I thought artists weren’t getting the exposure that they deserved. What I didn’t imagine was the amount of time it would take up in my life. Last October/November I was working 50-60 hour weeks at my day job. Finding time for Scene SC was getting harder than I ever imagined it would be. It seemed like every time I would be close to thinking about letting the website fade away, something would happen to make me realize people were paying attention.
The first person to say the words that I needed to hear to keep the website going was Mike Rogers of All Get Out in Charlotte, September 5th of last year. In August I wrote a post about how there is a good and bad side to the music scene in South Carolina and about how some people out there are trying to take advantage of bands. The post was really harsh, so I pulled it down within in an hour of posting it. Mike told me that night that he really liked that post and that he reads the website daily. He even showed it to me on his Google Reader. At that point I decided to stop worrying about how many hits I was getting a day. If one or only a handful of people are reading the site and it means something to them, I decided that it was worth it to keep going.
So let’s look at the numbers.
- July 2008 we had 291 unique hits to the site.
- June 2009 we had 3,873 unique visitors to the site.
- About 80% of our hits come from our home-base of Columbia. We are working on changing that.
- We currently offer over 100 videos of bands including full sets.
- According to my bank account there has been over $3,000 invested in this site including video equipment, hosting fees, banners, getting into shows etc.
- The most hits we ever got in a day was 871
- Our most commented story was The Dino-Mech Vs. Blake Lewis Saga. The Free-Times broke this.
- 5 of our favorite bands have broken up.
- 885 Twitter Followers
- 338 Posts
- 1,826 Comments
- 1 Full Time Scene SC’er and 4 Part Timers
- Over 200 shows attended.
- We’ve hooked up at least 2 couples
- Made Countless Friends
- Created 1 Music Community
I am going to attempt to make a list of people to Thank that really helped me with this website and it being where it is today. I know I’ll leave someone important out.
Adam Fogle (Palmetto Scoop) The site wouldn’t exist without him, My sister Meredith Stringer for editing every post on the website and going to more shows than me, Bentz Kirby, Pat Wall (The Free Times), Our Staff Stephen Russ, Bakari Lebby, Sarah Kobos. My brother Jeffrey for investing in me and my parents for supporting me. Our fans from the get go Kevin Morrissey, BK Kennedy, Will Armstrong, Steven Niedringhaus, Seth Birkes and Ben Dimond. Homemade Genius and Ian!
Specific Bands that have really reached out to us including Marry a Thief, All Get Out, The Fire Tonight, This Machine Is Me, Kill Anties, The Decade, The Reverie, The Restoration
These people Erich Skelton, Colin Brown, Brandon Kean, Brandon Wilks, Jeffrey McMicken, Nathan Hussey, Grayson Venters, Mel Washington, Mike Rogers, Chad Rochester,Marcy Bozek WUSC, Otis Taylor at The State, Randy Borawski at WXRY, Austin Crane, Nate Puza, Ashleigh Lancaster, Will Flourance, Daniel Machado, Cayla Fralick, Blake Arambula, Nick Bays, Michael Crawford, Kevin Oliver
David:
Thanks for the shout out, it’s much appreciated. More thanks for helping support and promote our music scene here in SC. It’s a great thing you are doing and appreciated by lots of folks. Take care,
Bentz
David,
It seems just like yesterday that all this was just starting up, and that me and you had first met each other at the Headliners show where you not only introduced yourself to me, but also to members of the Reverie and the Bourbon Brothers, all of whom were really nice people and, as I found out, very supportive of what I did as well.
I think in a microcosm of sorts, that show symbolized exactly what you strive every day to do. It’s not really the reporting on the happenings of the scene that makes scenesc special, — because someone can always read the playlist or the state for that — It’s your willingness to actually go to shows and connect the people that make up the music scene, and to help keep it thriving with fresh ideas, spreading the conversation between artists. Where a journalist has to have a certain disconnect in order to report objectively on events going on, you submerge yourself deep within the scene to comment on the things that really tug at your own strings, and that’s something only SceneSC can do.
That dialogue doesn’t have to be physical, of course. Online networking like facebook, myspace and twitter have continued the dialogue between bands even when they can’t meet face to face, but many of the times you have been the matchmaker.
I really didn’t know what I was out to say when I began writing this, but after 3 years of being in this band, I can say that no one has written more about our journey or documented it on video like you have. Even down to the small things like printing fliers to promote and devising plans to offer the site more content, you’ve always been open to doing whatever it takes to support us.
For what, I and the rest of the band thank you wholeheartedly for doing what you do. We know it’s not a lucrative job, and takes alot of your days and nights up, but we know it means as much to you as playing music does to us.
Here’s to SceneSC, in whatever form or name, lives on to see many more birthday celebrations.
Blake Arambula
This Machine is Me
Thanks Blake. That really means a lot. What you just said is what keeps us going.
congrats!
I’m glad everything is going well and I’ve discovered a few new artists in my own backyard thanks to y’all.
i <3 scenesc.
I would be sad without it!