SubmitHub, Meta, and Experiencing Racism as a Musician
I never thought I would blog on Medium again, especially as a musician, but here we are.
On April 29th, 2022, I released the first single from my upcoming album, “Show Friends”
Show Friends is a song about making friendships and hoping for harmony in underground art communities. It is auto biographical in the sense that I am a solo singer songwriter who sings folk punk tunes across the US under the moniker A Day Without Love. The majority of the time I am doing this alone, as a black musician in majority white spaces.
Mind you my song is not about race, nor is it a critique of any race. There is a part in the song where I say “Music brings unity, it needs more diversity” however the song is by no means “racy.”
Like many indie musicians, I used a platform called Submithub to promote the song. I am not fond of Submithub as it often creates a lot of false opinions about your music. Many of my colleagues believe the platform to be a scam and the curators to be “automated.” Some musicians will get posts such as “your vocals are bad but your song is good” or “ you should go back to school to learn how to write lyrics.” In otherwords Submithub is a platform where most of the time you are paying to get through a gatekeeper to be approved by another gatekeeper so that your song can be heard or seen in a blog or a Spotify/Apple playlist.
I don’t like paying the pay to play game, but I really believe in this song and I decided to experiment with the promotion of this song by using the influencer feature.
This feature allows influencers to hear your music at a set budget and create content to help promote your song for new listeners to hear.
I don’t really like the idea of influencer marketing for music especially if it is not genuine, but again, I believe in this song, and I wanted to try out how this would work for me, an independent diy artist.
I submitted 10 Submithub credits and two influencers picked up my song. Here is where the hope and the horror starts.
As someone who is acclimated to rejection, you learn to not take things personally. The first influencer who used my song , made a low effort post via IG Reels not relating to my song with a boat on a lake. While the IG reel was seen 4,000 times, there were no comments to be made. I could not help but ask, does Submithub hold it’s creators accountable for the quality of it’s promotional posts? There is nothing very influential about a video of a lake for a song about making friends at a concert.
Now the worst happened, IG user @emilio_ortega ( “aged 21”) decided to post this image to promote my music.
Some of you may see a charcoal mask filter. As an African American I saw black face. What did this mean to me?
Did I just pay to be promoted so that I would have someone make fun of the color of my skin?
Did I pay to be harassed or have my music heard?
Is Submithub vetting the quality of its influencers, bloggers, and folks that are listening to music?
Why does Instagram/Meta/FB ( or whatever Zuckerberg calls it these days) have a filter that enables blackface?
When I was thinking of all of this, I reported it, I posted it on all my socials. Friends, family and fans of my music reported the page. The “influencer” harassed me in Spanish and called me closed minded and made fun of my peers.
I told submithub and at first I was gaslighted about my own perceptions of microagressions.
In America are we going to continually give the benefit of the doubt when marginalized people are being harassed or harmed?
Am I wrong for second guessing how to promote myself as an independent musician especially in a world where PR is often not affordable?
As the story continues, I was able to ignore Emilio, and finally be refunded my credits. Emilio was also blocked from being a curator via Submithub. I want to thank Jason for doing that despite giving the benefit of the doubt. Below is the message Jason sent me.
Also on the whole part about Emilio being a “teenager” his profile says he is 21? Which still doesnt excuse the microagression and makes me feel like I played myself for trying to put myself out there.
View profile below
To some this may seem petty. I could have let this all go and move forward. However I am still curious. I need to write this because, 1000s of musicians are facing microagressions and experiencing unfair practices with promotion. As I write this I am still bothered and wish to ask the following:
- Why does Facebook/IG/Meta have this feature where blackface can be used against darker skinned users?
- How is Submithub vetting the quality of feedback and effort for music promotion amongst bloggers, labels and influencers?
- How can we prevent racism and microagressions from occuring in music promotion and journalism?
- As creators are we powerless or can we use our ability to write and create to speak up against this?
I would love to hear your thoughts!
If you wish to hear the song click here
Brian Walker
A Day Without Love