me: hey Dimitarhow are you?

dimitar.klaturov: yes

me: how are you?

dimitar.klaturov: hey

dimitar.klaturov: OK I’m ready!

me: Ok what is your shoe size, do you like the color yellow?

im joking

dimitar.klaturov: lol

you got me there!!! hahaha

I was thinking how to asnwer this question, lol

me: First question, what made you start this blog/podcast?

dimitar.klaturov:

Well, I love music so much and I used to sing in a choir for more then 9 years and I always wanted to have my own band, but since that didn’t work out I wanted to do something with music and I started to do this podcast 1 year ago. I’m very happy with what we we have done so far.

me: Do you do this full time or part-time, do you work somewhere else?

dimitar.klaturov: I do the podcast just for fun, its actually my hobby as I’m working full time in our family company, its a printing house, actually. So, that’s why i think its very important for me to give it my best.

me: How do you choose which artist you want to interview?

dimitar.klaturov: Well, that’s a hard question to answer, as I don’t want to offend any artists that I haven’t interview yet. Basically, they contact me when they have a new EP, single or Album coming out. There are other artists like The Concretes, Lampshade, As In RebekkaMaria and Camera Obscura which are examples of artists I just wanted to the interview, because in my opinion they are some of leading indie bands out there today!

me: How did you get your first interview? and with whom? and how did it go?

dimitar.klaturov: Hehehe, my first interview was with one artist from NYC named Paul Holmes. It was my first and last interview I did with webcam. It was a lot of fun. He was really nice and friendly. He even played a song live for the podcast and it was really great!

me: Did he contact you or did you contact him?

dimitar.klaturov: You really got me there. I really cant remember. Maybe i did

me: What was the worst interview you ever had? what went wrong ?

dimitar.klaturov: The worst interview i did was with one band from England called Dogtanion and the lead singer is call Matt. I prepared the interview for week or so and was really happy when we did it, but when I started it to listen to it I found out it was a total disaster! He’s voice could barely be heard due to the set up I had. There was no way I could have included this interview in the podcast. A few days after that he was on BBC Radio 1. Shame really, because since then we didn’t repeat the interview.

me: Waw that sucks!dimitar.klaturov: tell me about it

me: What do you see as biggest challenge that artists face today?

dimitar.klaturov: Well don’t feel very confident in answering that question as I’m not an artist myself, but since I talk to many indie artist I can say that its very hard for an artist land a gig/concerts/show what ever you want to call it. I think today artists are blessed , because of the sites like groovetap.com, where artists can upload their music and people can listen to it from all over the world and enjoy it! That’s real big advantage!

me: :), remind me to pay you for that endorsement :P.

dimitar.klaturov: hehehe

me: Yeah its really exciting and a lot is going to happen in the next 6-8 months.

dimitar.klaturov: I’m sure.

me: I see you have celebrated you’re 50th podcast recently and have been doing this for one year. Could you tell me roughly how many artists you have interviewed to this day?

dimitar.klaturov: Around 15 artists, but there are more to come. In the very begging it was very hard for me to do all these interviews, because it took a lot of time to schedule and manage the interviews with the bands, what day, hour and so on. But since Maria joined the podcast she has been managing the PR side of things and scheduling the interviews with the bands. Now all I have to do is just go and do the interviews, which is much easier. I have 3 interviews for example for this weekend.

me: Cool, so one needs to ask what is your selection process you use to select the  music to include in your podcasts and when?

dimitar.klaturov: In the beginning i had a lot of artists I wanted to play, but since the idea of the podcast is when you play one artist in one podcast you cant play them again. Because of that in the beginning I played many artists I knew and I liked, but now the the artists just find me and I am constantly amazed at how good they are.Finding the music is my little secret actually , but 90% of all the bands I found are through myspace. The whole process its very complex and I really can’t go into how its done. However, I can tell you that now I have more than 500 artists that are waiting to be played in the podcast!

me: So where do you see Music Is Power Podcast in 1 year, 3 years or even 5 years?

dimitar.klaturov: in 1 Year I see Music Is Power Podcast or as i call it MiPP played more then 1,000 artists and having 10,000 subscribers. in 3 years - 5,000 artists and 50,000 subscribers and in 5 years - 10,000 artists and 100,000 subscribers. That’s the future of Music Is Power Podcast!

me: That sounds great and very exciting. You mentioned that you have someone helping you with the podcast. Can you tell me a little more about this person and what they do?

dimitar.klaturov: As I said she handles PR for the podcast, her job is to contact the bands and manage the interviews. She also helps out with a lot of other things as well. Her name is Maria Mihneva and she is actually my girlfriend, so I’m very lucky to have the full support of the person I’m sharing my life with! I’m really thankful and i must say I don’t fell this podcast is my own,  she plays a big part in it!

me: There is a lot going on in the music industry now. People are not buying CDs, mp3 sales are up but still not high enough. Different business models are being proposed and used, from music subscriptions services (Napster, eMusic) and even possibly music paid for by ads. How do you think music will be distributed in the future?

dimitar.klaturov: That is really a hard question to answer. My opinion is that the music will be more and more accessible to people in a user friendly fashion. What I mean by that is that more and more people will have access to there favorite bands and artists. There are so many music websites out there trying to take on the music industry. I think that music is made for the people and if someone likes a song or artist they would pay for it with pleasure, but to give money to the huge record labels is something I don’t agree and cant accept it. I support the small bands after all!

me: cool

dimitar.klaturov: That was it?

me: Yup

dimitar.klaturov: It didn’t hurt I must say, lol

me: is there anything else you want to add? This is my first interview btw.

dimitar.klaturov: Of course I want to thank you for doing this interview and the interest you have of Music Is Power Podcast! Thank you! And if you allow me I want to greet with one of the most exclusive artists that MiPP has found so far Bear Cat with there song Red Panda Blues!

You did a great job!

me: I really appreciate your time and answers and wish you the best of luck with the podcast. I’ll definitely check out Bear Cat.

dimitar.klaturov: You already know… myspace hehehe

but its hard to find them even there, lol