There are some pretty handy gig booking and promotion tools out there. However, none quite leverage fans in the same way as Emues does - and it is fans, after all, who are the most important participants at any live event.

Emues is actually a pretty genius idea - it all starts with the fans and the thought process goes something like this like this: What is the primary ingredient to get a packed venue? Fans. And what do fans want to see? Their favorite artists play. What do venues want? A packed venue (and a full bar).

By thinking along these lines Emues has put forward a compelling and innovative concert booking and venue promotion platform - one which will basically removes any chances of those depressing, empty venues.

In practice it goes down like this: Artists register on Emues (stating their availability, cost and minimum audience). When a fan suggests a concert the artist will be mathched with a suitable venue and the tickets go on sale. Now, once the required number of tickets are sold then the gig is on!

Its all very social too - once you sign up you can plug in your Facebook and MySpace and use these channels to get the gig requests and ticket sales rolling in.

For more details of how it all works head over to the Emues website where they will explain how it all works in more detail. It is still in BETA but what is clear is that Emues provides a great opportunity for you to leverage your fans and organize awesome nights of musical fun. Check it!

It is with sadness that we inform you that we will no longer be delivering music to Tunetribe store. They - like many other music services - have been battling the storm of recent years and have been making changes to how they run their operation. One way has been to trim down on the number of content providers delivering music to them - Record Union was one of many others who they were forced to let go.

In practice this means that Tunetribe and they will be removed from the list of stores your can distribute when you publish a new release. Any music you have available there right now will be take offline. Any royalties due to you will make its way back to you and be paid out according to our standard reporting schedule.

It is always regrettable when we remove partners from our list - however rest assured we are constantly looking for new music services to deliver music to. Input from our users is always appreciate here so if you have any services you think we should know about please get in touch.

To release cover songs commercially you need a license. This is generally a time consuming process which involves securing this license with the person or company who owns the rights to that song.

Those who have gone through this process must have at some point thought “Jeez, I wish there was a service which i could find a purchase this license within a few minutes”. Well, actually, there is - its called Limelight.

Limelight is basically a one stop shop for purchasing cover licenses - you simply specify the song you wish to cover, provide details about your own release and they will provide you with a price based upon this. It really is this easy and once you pay the fee your are cleared and good to go.

The only drawback is that the license you have purchased is only for the US territory and you will still need to clear it in other countries you want to sell the cover song in - nonetheless it is a great tool and will make obtaining cover license that much easier.

Happy new year to all! We would like to wish all of you a prosperous and productive new year. We have lots of things planned in the coming months - including some new partnerships and a range of new features and improvements to the Record Union service. We will as usual keep you updated with this here on the blog. Thank you all for your support in 2011 - lets make 2012 a great one.

Record Union would like to wish all a merry Christmas and a festive end of year.

“Today, Spotify becomes a music platform” said Spotify CEO Daniel Ek yesterday as he announced the arrival of Spotify apps - the latest major development to the Spotify service.

And a major development it is, for it will enable third party service to create customized applications which will integrate seamlessly into the Spotify client. So just like on your phone you will be able to add cool little programs which will enable you to cool things you can now do this on Spotify too.

But what kind of cool things do the apps enable you to do? Well the first generation of apps include offering from the likes of Last FM, Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, Tunigo and other which will facilitate music discovery through recommendation, sharing and editorial. Also on board are gig-finder Songkick which will enable you to easily find concerts and ticket to bands you are listening. TuneWiki will help you find lyrics to songs and Moodagent will help match the perfect music to your mood. This is just the start and there are more apps on the way - the idea is that it will be an open marketplace and anyone can create an App.

So, all in all a very exciting day for Spotify lovers. For the official announcement check the Spotify blog.

Once we have had some time to test and contemplate all the new things on offer we will get back to you with some ideas for how you can use these new apps to promote yourself and find new fans.

After years sitting on the sidelines, search giant Google yesterday unveiled their much anticipated music service - Google Music. Armed with their own social networking service Google + and the Android marketplace (where they will offer millions of tracks for purchase) Google Music aims to go head to head with major music services currently on the market.

One exciting aspect of Google Music is the Artist Hub - which (similar to iTunes Ping) will give artist and bands the possibility to create their own artist page  though with one major difference - here artists will be able to and sell their music directly to fans via the Android Marketplace.

With the service being launched just yesterday it is early days but rest assured we have plans to be to distribute your music to Google Music in the near future.

A little while back we rolled out a new little feature on the Record Union site which enables you to add “buy links” to the music you have published. We have been getting quite a few emails from people asking about how to set these up so we thought we would do a post on what these do and how you can use them. So, here we go!

The purpose of these links

It can sometimes be tricky to seamlessly display your music, track previews and links your albums locations on a range of different music services directly on your website or other online locations. If you have experienced this then linking to your Record Union profile with the “find music here” info filled it could be a good solution for you.

How to add them

Firstly, log in and head over to your “manage content” page - when you click on one of your releases you will see some information displayed. At the bottom you will see some logos and fields where you can paste the URL location of your music on these services.

Obtaining the URL links is pretty straightforward.

For a browser based services like Amazon MP3 you would just search and locate your music on the service - once on your album you can then copy the URL in your browser and paste it into the field next to the Amazon logo on the Manage Content page.

For client based services like Spotify and iTunes you would do pretty much the same thing - however, as the URL is not displayed in these services like in a browser window you would instead right-click on your album and then “Copy HTTP Link” (Spotify) or “Copy Link” (iTunes) and like before paste this into the relevant field on the manage content page.

In conclusion

So, we hope this will be a good reference for those who have not used these buy links yet. This is the first of a range of features we plan to add. We always welcome any suggestions you may have for new functionality so don’t hesitate to get in touch with us if you have some to propose.

You all know about Nomy right? He is the guy who without a record label, management company or advanced studio has delivered digital hits to all corners of the globe. His most popular song “Cocaine” has been on the Spotify global toplist for over two years – at its peak achieving over 3 millions plays a month.  He is one of the Record Union success stories and proof of what indie artists can achieve in the brave new digital era.

So, it is with not just a little excitement that we announce Nomy´s return with a brand new song which already has the makings of a new Nomy hit. “A dream for the weaker” has only been out a few hours and his fans are are going nuts - the “shout box” on his website overflowing with praise.

Also featuring on the release are some new versions of Cocaine – one of these a pumped up U.S. Edit which he will be using to cajole his expanding US fanbase.

“A dream for the weaker” is released today on digital music services around the world.

Click here to find it on Spotify.

Yep that’s right folks! All of you who have accounts here at Record Union and are situated in the US have just received a VIP Invite to Spotify.

This was not only to cater to the high amount of requests we got about this but also because we thought it was a pretty neat thing to do.

We hope that by getting out these invites you will be able to familiarize yourself with Spotify and what it can offer - be this as a revenue generating tool, a promotional tool or just a great place for fans to be able to enjoy music.

If you are a registered U.S. user on Record Union and for some reason did not get an invite, send an email to invites(at)recordunion.com and we will sort one out for you.