Discoveries at the San Diego Music Thing: Nico Vega, Developing a Social Media Plan and Flavors of East Africa

This year's San Diego Music Thing, held last weekend, was again an impressive gathering of trade music folks, industry experts and up-and-coming musicians. Held again at the Lafayette Hotel in North Park, there were some changes from last year's event (then called the North Park Music Thing) that were disappointing (what happened to the free shuttle?!?) and some that were welcome (hello, Casbah!). No doubt, working musicians learn a lot from conferences such as this, and it helps to network with industry types who are much more likely to hear your music if you do go. Music professionals on the other hand have an easier time hearing your music if it's all in one place.

If you weren't able to go, you can still partake of all the knowledge that was shared at the various panels; check out the video of how to make social media work for you. You can also like San Diego Music Thing on Facebook for more videos.
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For us, the weekend's highlight (aside from eating Kenyan-inspired food from Flavors of East Africa across the street) was watching Nico Vega in the Lafayette's ballroom, which had a little seashell of a stage. It was probably misleading to see the band in such an intimate venue; all the other videos I'd ever seen of them showed a bombastic stage and light show at places such as the Roxy. But at their San Diego show, there were probably just a hundred people in the audience. Nevertheless, the band exploded with such primal energy onstage, despite technical difficulties and sound problems. Watch this video that I took of “Beast” to see what I mean: