Having a cause attached to your musical act is not a requirement.  But it should be.

Because in today’s landscape of disposable music, you can’t just rely on your music to convince your fans that you are an entity they want to support, or even buy from.

I’m not saying your music doesn’t have to be good.  In fact, it has to be remarkably good.  Mediocrity is not allowed anywhere in your operation.  You can’t go out there and promote a turd.

But even if you are astonishingly good, new, and different, that still may not be enough for you to sustain your career.  You need to offer an identity that your fans deem worthy of owning.

One of rock’n'roll’s perennial mantra is anti-establishment.  In the early days of Metallica, all the kids wearing the black Metallica T-shirts were making a statement.  Metallica was their voice of anti-establishment, the middle-finger to the big and the bad.  (Now that Metallica itself has become big and bad, they function less as such a symbol)

Cloud Cult’s thing is their environmentalism.  An extreme one.  Their self-owned label is a non-profit organization, designed to promote and educate change.  Their music?  Amazing.  But the fact that they champion a cause dear to some of us really clinch the deal, in terms of their supportability.

Vista Print is a good online printing company.  I’ve had business cards printed by them, because they are cheap and easy.  Then I just learned about Parisleaf.com.   I haven’t done business with them yet, but I intend to.  Why?  Because not only do they print and take orders online through attractive user interface, but they’ll plant trees for me.  Similarly, I enthusiastically promote AcornHost, the company that runs the server hosting this web site, because they are green hosting — they buy renewable energy to power their servers.

But don’t just make up a cause to make yourself look good.  It’s not a ploy to validate yourself.  It has to be authentic, it has to come from the heart.  And you include that aspect of your being in your public persona, primarily so that your audience has something on top of music to latch on to.  Something to relate, something that represents their voice, desire and worldview.

Here’s how to do it: use your music to make a change.

It’s not that your music has to be about the change you want to create.  But the change you want to create has to be an integral part of your artistic creation.  Perhaps you play benefit concerts, perhaps you make donations, perhaps you write a song or two about it.  It can be anything, but make it a part of your conversation with your audience.  Make it clear what change you want to create.  Again, don’t get all phony and conjure stuff up you don’t truly believe in.  But find something that you wholeheartedly desire, and be transparent about it.

I can see an argument saying, well, I don’t want to appear manipulative, I don’t want to give an impression that I’m trying to make myself look good.  Those are understandable concerns. When I make donations, I don’t need to tell the world how I did a good deed.  I made donations because I wanted to help, not because I wanted that act to serve myself.

But look at it this way: it’s a win-win scenario for everybody.  So you have a change you want to contribute to.  By talking about it regularly, you are promoting your cause.  Your music becomes an agent of promoting that change, and perhaps play a small part in gathering people to get behind it.  And the bonus part is, it’ll help you be a supportable act.  Your cause gains, the audience gains (by finding a change to contribute to), and you gain.

I agree that there is a fine line, you don’t want to cross it and appear self-serving.  But you can avoid this if the desire for the change is authentic.  You live that desire.  You’re working for that change, when in public view and when not.

So in short, find a bigger cause to serve through your musicmaking, and let that be an integral part of your authentic artistry.  And you get to be an agent for change, and benefit your musicmaking at the same time.  Really, there’s no reason not to go about it that way.