Back in the old days, we had a local paper that allowed musicians to connect from a classified section, and boy was it scary meeting some of the strangers that posted in there to jam.
Back in the old days, we had a local paper that allowed musicians to connect from a classified section, and boy was it scary meeting some of the strangers that posted in there to jam.
I considered having MP3 uploads or even video uploads, but didn't seem worth it building a transcoding/streaming system, when someone could still upload things that is not them playing.
Another idea is to "verify" linked Spotify accounts by having the artist place a short random code in their Spotify bio, to prove they are actually the artist.
You want people to be able to have a low quality video of them noodling or playing along to something for 30 seconds.
And again, most drummers and bass players don't create complete tracks on their own, and they're the main thing people are looking for. And honestly, a lot of drummers and bass players don't want to come into a band where the guitar player has already decided what the bass and drum parts should be. You can get a lot from listening to sketches / noodling. (By noodling I mean mainly improvising something unaccompanied, not necessarily trying to win the gold medal at guitar gymnastics.)
I'm a bass player. A younger version of myself lived from playing bass for a couple years. I still play quite a few gigs. I very, very rarely produce tracks (one every few years), and there's very little of my bass playing online.
As a bass player, I want to hear if the singer can sing, and if the sketches of songs are good.
I can also play all of the standard band instruments at varying levels of competence, but I'm not much of a songwriter. What people expect from bass players and drummers is that they are good at catching things quickly and writing interesting parts.
You’re acting like young people wanting to join a band don’t know how to post things on the Internet.
My comments are literally based on the disappointments in using similar sites in the past. Most people don't add audio. Profiles without audio are useless. Making (and possibly providing minimal vetting?) people post audio would already be a big step in the right direction.
Anyway - great call on the song requirement, for a lot of us, it’s important to know that the people we work with can operate a daw and solve their own problems and care about creating a finished product. Unless they’re incredibly talented instrumentalists (usually not the case, they find bands) at a certain point it becomes either a jam sesh (not interested) or you become a producer for someone who isn’t very good.
For the case of instrumentalists finding bands -- the times I've used sites like this in the past are right after a move or considering stepping out of the music scene that I've been in (going from techno back to bass).
Also I feel like the Tinder-like mechanics would be suited to cities with big music scenes. You're right that it's easy to just stumble into everyone in smaller places. What I've enjoyed some on musician-finding sites is the ability go genre shopping to some extent. Sometimes I run across stuff I think I'd enjoy playing that probably wouldn't have popped out of my social network.