June 1st 2013

Hello everyone. As you can see, in spite of a strong campaign with pie-charts and pictures and rewards that give you value for money, as well as promotional support from major indie music organizations, the lack of support for indie artists has been staggering. 

However, while IndieGogo has not helped us achieve our goal, it has helped us to get noticed by the right people. During the course of our campaign, we:

- Were featured on IndieReign as a the Project of The Day
- Were nominated on IndieReign as Project of The Week
- Were written about in Max It Magazine
- Established new partnerships with several radio stations and music blogs (to be revealed soon). 
- Were written about by Lady Lake Music
- Were featured on an hour-long special on 'Late Night With Laura'
- Were picked up to be financially backed through an external source. We cannot reveal more about this yet, but we're excited!

So thanks to the above, we are happy to annouce that the film is now in production and will be finished by the end of June. 

We have had to rethink and restructure a few things, but these new changes are actually working even better than our original plan for the film!

To follow more news about the progress of 'Being Independent', please follow us at http://www.beingindependentfilm.com or via Twitter @BeingIndieFilm


So. What's This Film About? 

Being Independent is a documentary about the struggles, hardships and the ultimate triumphs of independent artists and bands in the music industry. Following 7 artists and bands - 3 in the UK, 3 in the USA and 1 in Germany, this film aims to educate people about the hard work and passion that goes into independent music, and the struggles these artists go through as they support themselves and their music career. This documentary could change the way people think about music, and could potentially help independent artists to get all their hard work noticed. Help us make a difference today!

Who's In The Film? 

We have some amazing artists and bands in this film! 

UNITED STATES

PAPAFISH 

  
Papafish came together in early 2010 when guitarist Greg Menjivar and vocalist Nancy Rae began hosting weekly jam sessions on the Cal State University Northridge dorm balcony. Hearing the live music above, students from the community would come and join the jam session. After a few months of experimenting a regular group formed and became what is now PapaFish. With influences in reggae, ska, and rock and being one of the only female lead bands in the California Reggae-Rock scene, PapaFish continuously goes full throttle, playing countless events and shows throughout Southern California. Click here to watch the music video for '1 to 10' by Papafish! 

DI LEE

MINOTI


Minoti is originally from Mumbai, India and moved to Los Angeles, CA six years ago. She has been singing and writing songs since she was 11 years old. She released her first album “The Fictional Truth” in 2010 and her second album “Secret Garden” in 2013. Minoti has also composed music for the film ‘Pastriology’ and is currently music supervising for two other documentary films. Her music video for her first single, ‘So Will You’, references three of her favorite T.V shows - Supernatural, Doctor Who and Sherlock - and contains many easter eggs for fans of those shows. The video already has over 50,000 hits. Click here to watch Minoti's music video for 'So Will You'. Can you find all the clues?

UNITED KINGDOM

ERIKS OWN


Erik was the lead guitarist of the Scottish band Ease. After the band broke up, Erik started making his own instrumental music and released it under the name of Erik's Own. Erik's music has been played at numerous events and his song 'The Dying Man's Dagger' has been included on the compilation CD 'Pick Wth Austin'. Erik also owns his own radio station called EDA Music Radio. He has been working tirelessly on behalf of independent artists and is committed to helping independents get their name out there. Click here to listen to some of Erik's Own's awesome music!

GARETH EVANS


Gareth Evans is an Experimental and Electronic Music Artist originally from the Manchester area. In 2010 Gareth managed to get to the regional finals of the UK Mic competition as well as writing some electronic music for Film Director/writer Joe Obyrne. In 2012 , Gareth released his album “Everything Relative”. 2012 would also see Gareth collaborating with Spanish DJ , DJ Randex and Erik McCall on the haunting and original song “No Coffee For Me”. Gareth is currently recording a new album. Click here to find out more about Gareth and visit his official website.

NORMAN LAMONT


Norman Lamont is an Alternative/Rock artist based in Edinburgh. His music sounds like The Doors, Leonard Cohen and The Kinks. Some of his songs are reminicient of The Beatles. In 2012, Norman released his album, ”Anywhere But Here” which features his best tracks from over the years. Norman has been in the industry a long time and continues to work towards making music and getting it heard. Click here to listen to Norman's amazing music. 

GERMANY

SIMPLISTIC


With a voice that gets under your skin, powerful drum beats combined with innovative bass playing and a melodic guitar, Simplistic is a band that quite simply - rocks. Sometimes melancholic, often loud, but always honest, the roots of this alternative rock band go back to 2006, where an enthusiasm for music combined with the desire of three friends came together to create musical fusion. In mid-2009, vocalist and guitarist, Roman got together with bassist Brit to search for a new drummer. They found Karsten and completed the band. In 2012 they released their first album, "Bradycardia". Click here to visit the Official Website for Simplistic.

Where Is It Shot? 

Los Angeles, CA

  


Dresden, Germany

    


Scotland, UK

  

What We Need

We have already started shooting our film. But we need your help to finish making this film. We have a lot of expenses including studio and equipment costs, paying our wonderful crew, and post-production costs like editing and sound mixing - not to mention application costs for applying to film festivals after the film is complete! Here is a breakdown of how we plan to divide our money: 



Of course, we need a lot more than $15,000. But even helping us get to $15,000 is going to mean big things for this film. Reaching our goal will help us get our film made and out into the world.

What You Get

Every contributor gets awesome rewards like: 

* Signed posters
* Signed DVD's
* A digital download of the film
* A digital download of the soundtrack
* Credit at the end of the film
* Handwritten thank you notes

We even have special reward tiers for independent artists and organizations that support independent music!

Other Ways You Can Help

Broke, but still want to help? SHARE our campaign via Twitter, Google+ and Facebook. Use the little buttons under our video to automatically share to Twitter, Google+ and Facebook. If you share our campaign on your own, remember to tag your tweets with #gogofactor. It costs nothing to share this campaign, and you're still helping us reach our goal. Everyone wins!  

Own a radio station, website, blog or organization that is in the interest of independent music? Become a partner! Partners help promote our campaign and our film, and in return, we give our partners screentime in our film and feature their logo on the back of our DVD. Our current partners are: 

   




We're really glad that you're considering giving to our project. We're going to try to make the best film we can possibly make, and we hope that you enjoy watching this film as much as we're enjoying making it!