Are you making a music website but don’t know where to start? Or are you thinking about giving your current website an overhaul? In either case, this comprehensive guide will show you how to create an effective music website that will impress both your fans and industry professionals.

Here is how to make a music website:

1. Choose a music website template

2. Create the color palette

3. Choose your fonts

4. Organize the navigation

5. Create the pages for your music website

6. Create an EPK

7. Sell your music online

8. Choose a domain name

9. Optimize your website for Google search

10. Promote your music website online

Why should every musician have a website?

You might be asking yourself whether musicians still even need a website in the age of social media. The short answer is: Yes. 

It makes a much better impression than supplying just a social media profile. A website shows that you’re serious about making music and getting booked.

In fact, it’s more important than ever to have a professional music website that you own and control. Here’s why:

You own the experience

With your own website, you have complete control over the design and branding. Unlike social media platforms, there are no design limits, no sudden changes, and no distractions like ads and links encouraging visitors to click away. 

Someone is there because they want to be there. It’s up to you to direct their attention, and make their visit a useful one.

You own the website address

Your fans and the industry will always be able to find you at your official website address. It’s a little slice of the internet that is owned by you.

You make more money

If you’re selling music or merch, having your own website is even more critical. You get to keep more of that revenue by selling directly to your fans.

Plus, your fans can join your mailing list when shopping from your online store. You can then let them know about new albums, tours, crowdfunding campaigns, and more. 

You own the data

The best way to get in touch with your fans is your email list. Your music website allows you to collect that data, and maintain direct communication with your fans.  There’s no “export list of fans” option on social networking sites because they own that database.

You also get detailed analytics data on your website visitors. This can help you understand your target market, decide where to book shows, and more.

How to make a music website

Now that you know why you need a website, you’re ready to start creating it. We’ll look at everything you need to make a professional music website, from template design to promotion. Let’s get started!

Choose a music website template

When choosing a template to create your website, you’ll want to consider a few things:

Artist header image

Before you dive into designing your music website, you’ll need a great image. You will use this image in the header area of your website template. Make sure it’s on brand – it should convey a sense of who you are, and what your music sounds like.

Tip: Find an image that is high-resolution and landscape-style, with some room around the edges. This will help you to be flexible when you create the rest of your music website.

Menu layout and position

Think about how many pages you’ll need to add. A good rule of thumb is 5-8, to keep things simple. This number will also fit nicely into a template with a horizontal menu bar. This bar is ideally set above or below your header image, where your visitors will think to locate it. 

If you have more pages, you could try a website template with a vertical sidebar menu, or add sub-pages. 

Content layout

If you plan to add a lot of content (bios for all of your bandmates, or your entire back catalogue, for example) choose a template that offers a clean content area. 

You may want to choose one with a full-width content area to lay out all of your text, images, and photos. Or you could select a template with pre-set sections in different colors, then add your content within those. 

One-page website templates 

One important consideration when choosing a template for your website: are you building a site with multiple pages, or a one-page website that has all of the content on a single page? 

This might affect what kind of template you choose, because with a one-page site you’ll want a nice wide content area and the ability to add sections and section background images.

Mobile-friendly website options

To make sure mobile visitors get a good experience, you’ll want to choose a mobile-responsive template. That means that it will adapt to look great on any screen, including desktop, tablets, and mobile devices. This will also help your website’s Google search engine results.

All of Bandzoogle’s music website templates are responsive, so there’s no need to build separate versions of your site for desktop and mobile.

Make a mobile-ready music website in just a few clicks. Build your website with Bandzoogle today! 

Create the color palette

Now that your template is in place, pick your colors to go with it. These tips will help you choose colors that will work for your website:

Choose a few colors only

As a general rule, you’ll want to stick to 3 main colors to keep the look consistent and professional: a primary brand color, a secondary color, and an accent color.

To start, get out your header image or your newest album cover, and choose a few colors from those. This will ensure the rest of your website flows well together, with a coordinated look. 

Make the colors match your brand

Choosing the color scheme for your website can be a lot like choosing the colors for your album cover. You’ll need to make sure that your website’s colors work well with your music and your brand.  

You could choose one color that sums you up (maybe a punchy pink if you’re a pop artist,  soothing blue for an indie band, or a golden yellow for a folk musician). Then check out a color wheel like Adobe Color to help you find complementary colors.

All of our website templates come with a color palette in place, so you can either go with that, or customize those colors to match your own.

Choose your website fonts

Your website is going to have a lot of text on it, from your musician bio page to your electronic press kit. Your website font choices will need to be clear and easy to read. Consider these points when choosing your fonts:

Make it easy to read

To make sure your text is legible, choose a color that stands out from your website’s background. Black on white is the classic example, but any dark color on a lighter background will be good for legibility. Try using a serif typeface that’s clean and simple.

Use a fun font for accents

Love the look of a curly or handwritten font? Use that one for your site title at the top, or your heading titles throughout your pages.

Keep fonts consistent

It’s important to keep the typography on your website consistent. Choose one content font and use that throughout all of your pages. That’s especially important if you’re using different font colors in your sections. 

You should also avoid using all caps for body text (don’t shout at people!) and use bold and italics sparingly, to keep text looking neat.

Organize the navigation

When you’re making your music website, you’ll want to decide what menu options to have, and how to organize them. Here are some key points to keep in mind when mapping out your website navigation:

Make navigating your music website easy

When deciding on your menu options, it’s important to make navigating your website as easy as possible for everyone who visits your site. Remember that a lot of your visitors will be there for the first time, and you’ll need to present your pages clearly for them.

Clear page names

Keep it simple when naming your main menu buttons. People have very short attention spans, and not a lot of time. If they have to guess at what content might be in a certain section of your site because the name is fancy or cute, chances are they’ll skip it altogether.

To accomplish this, it’s best to limit your main menu options to about 8 choices. More than that, and it starts to get messy. Having 5 or 6 main menu buttons is fine. Any less, though, and you’re likely leaving out key information and content from your site, or some of the pages will end up being too cluttered.

Sub-menu pages

If you have more content than you can fit onto your main pages, add a few sub-pages to keep things organized. These will slide out or pop down under a main menu page in your navigation. So if you have a lot of albums, each with a great story to tell, give those their own page under your main ‘Music’ page. 

Create the pages for your music website

While it’s fun to be creative and add all kinds of information to your website, start out with the essentials. These pages will help get you started as you make your music website:

Homepage

Your Homepage is arguably the most important, and most visited page on your website. This is where you can guide visitors to the information you want them to see, and what action you want them to take.

An effective Homepage should start with a great header image. Next, add a relevant call-to-action to buy your latest album, or watch your newest video.

The next thing to add to your Homepage is an introduction to you. Use an image + text feature with your picture and a short bio to make sure all of your website visitors, be they fans, music bloggers, or bookers, know that they’re in the right place. 

To set the tone for the rest of your website, you should include a music player with your best tracks. Make sure it’s obvious and easy to click play. You could also add a recent video on this page.

Be sure to place a mailing list sign-up form on your Homepage too, either within your call-to-action header, or somewhere high up in the content area of the page. 

Then add your social media links, so that people can check those out quickly as well.

If you’re making a one page website, then you won’t have a Homepage because all your content will be on the same page. In this case, you should still have a great header image with a call-to-action at the top, followed by your most important bit of news or content. 

For a more detailed look at creating an effective Homepage, check out How to Build the Perfect Homepage for Your Band Website.

About page

Next up is your About, or Bio page. This is an important place for potential new fans to get to know you through your background and accomplishments. It’s also a good spot for media and industry people to read your story.

On this page, you can include several versions of your bio.  Conferences, festivals and media outlets have different needs for artist information – so make it easy for them to grab. It’s also a good place to add a different photo of you or your band.

For some tips on writing a bio, check out How to Write an Effective Musician Bio (with examples!)

Music page

When you’re making a music website, having a sitewide music player or embedding a player on your Homepage isn’t enough. Your website is your main hub on the Internet. Your fans should be able to find all of your music, lyrics, and album info on your own website. 

Dedicate a page to all things music, then arrange it into columns, or sections, so that your music is easy to find and listen to. Don’t forget to include some text about your music as well, and give options to listen and buy.

Make your music page stand out with these suggestions: How To Create a Perfect Page to Sell Music on Your Website

Store page

If there’s any place online that fans should be able to buy your merch, it’s through your website. 

Selling merch directly to your fans means you not only get most of the money (100% using the Bandzoogle Store Feature), you also get their email addresses to keep in touch with those fans over the long term.

To keep your Store page organized, set up your products with images. Then describe each item, explaining why your fans will love it.

Make sure to add a clear way to contact you on this page. When people are shopping online, they want to know that they can easily reach the seller if they have any questions.

For merch ideas and more details on setting up your online store, check out The Ultimate Guide to Selling Band Merch Online.

Photos page

It’s no secret that fans love to look at photos of their favorite bands. If you include a Photos section, it will keep fans browsing your website longer. This is also a good opportunity to show off different angles of your personality, and to show that you’re active. 

To help organize your photos, create different galleries to show off your promo shots, live shows, important gigs, or musical collaborations.

Videos page

Rather than sending your fans off to YouTube, focus their attention on your videos, embedded directly onto your music website. This allows you to curate which videos people see. There might be hundreds of live videos filmed by fans on YouTube that might not best represent your band.

Place your most recent, or most popular, videos at the top of your Videos page, and rotate things out to keep the content fresh. 

Events page 

If you perform live, another essential element to have on your website is an Events or Shows page. Make it easy for fans to get info about your upcoming gigs, with details on show times, cover charges, opening bands, and the venue.

This is also a great page to showcase one of your best live videos so fans (and bookers) can get a taste of what to expect if they come see your show.

If you want to sell tickets to your shows online (and commission-free!), you can do that with the Bandzoogle Calendar feature. When a fan buys a ticket to your show, they’ll get a printable ticket by email, and you’ll get a guest list to give to the door person at the venue.

You can also use multiple calendars on your Events page, if you want to include a local shows list plus a touring list, for example.

Contact page

Finally, make sure to include a Contact page on your music website. As the last page in the menu, make it easy for site visitors to get in touch with you – especially considering media or industry professionals.

On this page, include info on how best to reach you for booking, media inquiries, and fan correspondence. Use a custom form with fields requesting specific information to be filled out, compiling the details into a neat email to be sent right to you. 

You can also add your social media links, and a mailing list sign-up form, to this page.

Create an EPK for your music

If you’re actively promoting a new album or looking to book more gigs, you can create a specific EPK page, or Press Kit section to centralize information for media and bookers. With an EPK page they can quickly find all the details they need in one spot.

Here’s what should be in your band’s EPK:

Bio: Media and venues have different needs for bios, so it’s a good idea to include a short and a long version of your bio. That way, they can easily use the bio that works for them.

Photos: Include your official promo photos, with vertical and horizontal options, as well as black & white versions. You can also include your album cover artwork for music reviewers if you’ve put music out recently.

Music: Have your latest music available to listen to, with links to Spotify or Apple Music so they can also listen to your music on their preferred streaming platform.. In case a reviewer wants to download your full album, include clear information on who they can contact to get a copy.

Video: Embed one of two of your best videos. If your goal is to get more bookings, add high-quality live videos to show what your show is like. If you’re looking to get press or reviews for your music, embed your most popular music video, or the video for your latest single.

Press/reviews: Include quotes about you and your music, with links to your best reviews and interviews.

Notable achievements or recent highlights: If you’ve won any awards, charted on radio, had your songs placed in movies/TV/ads, or performed at noteworthy festivals or conferences, include this information in your EPK.

Contact: Include detailed information on how to get in touch with you, your publicist, or booking agent. You can also add your social media links so bookers and media can quickly check out your social profiles.

Book more shows with a professional digital press kit integrated into your own website. Create your EPK with Bandzoogle now!

Sell your music online

Now that your pages are all in place, focus some attention on how you’ll sell your music online.

You should have ecommerce set up on your own music website where you can offer digital downloads for purchase. This could be on your Homepage, Music page, and Store page.

Add a call-to-action to your Homepage before you release a new single track or a new album, to drive traffic and pre-sales.

Then be sure to offer lots of options to listen and buy your music. You can bundle your albums, offer singles, or let your fans pay what they want. 

With online music sales, you get to keep the majority of the revenue, plus collect their email addresses to keep them in the know about your future projects and shows. Your sales will also be reported to SoundScan, which can generate buzz for your album.

You should also include physical options like CDs or vinyl, and offer signed versions for those items for your super fans. Using Bandzoogle’s Store feature you can sell physical items commission-free, put items on sale, track inventory, and more.

Another option in addition to selling your music online, is selling fan subscriptions for access to your music. With subscriptions, you can set up tiers at different price points, giving your fans the chance to pay monthly in exchange for sneak peeks, access to your full catalogue, and other perks.

Selling your music successfully online is a huge topic, so if you want to learn more about this, check out The Complete Guide to Selling Your Music Online.

Choose a domain name

Now that your music website is created, complete with design, pages, and content, you’ll want to choose the website address, or domain name. Having a custom domain name means owning a little slice of the Internet for your music and your brand – so choose your name carefully. 

Even with other domain extensions available, registering a “.com” is still the clear standard. Ideally you can find yourbandname.com, but if it’s not available, you can consider yourbandnamemusic.com, yourbandnameband.com, etc.

If you already own a domain name – great! You can always keep that with you, and point it to load your website.

Optimize your website for Google Search

Once your website is loading under your chosen domain name, you’re ready to get it listed in Google search results. To help drive traffic to your website you’ll need to make sure that fans can find it easily. This is where SEO (search engine optimization) comes into play.

SEO is free, and is a very effective tool used by millions of businesses to drive traffic to their websites. For musicians, it’s a great way to get more fans engaged, listening to your music, and exploring your content. 

If you’re interested in optimizing your website for SEO, we took all of our SEO advice and created this quick checklist: SEO Checklist for Musicians

Promote your music website online

Your website is finally complete. As the main online hub for your music, you’ll want to make sure everyone knows about it. Post your url far and wide: add it to all of your social media profiles, venues you play at, on your business cards and posters. You can also create a custom band email address with your domain name.

Make it central to your music marketing strategy when you release new music or book a big tour. Focus your attention on promoting your music website in a handful of places where you are most active, and keep coming back to regularly update your website pages with new content.

We hope this guide to making a music website helps you work through the steps to creating a website that showcases your brand, and your music, in a professional way online.

Then keep your website close at hand as you venture out and perform at showcases, apply for festivals, teach music lessons, or write more music.

So you want to be great, huh? Yeah, me too. 

I want to be a great songwriter, producer, and musician. Am I currently great? No, but I’m moving that way. 

And you can move toward greatness too. That’s what this post is all about.

What is greatness?

We all want to be great at what we do. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be reading this article. So what is greatness? How do you get there?

I’m not the first to say this, but greatness (or success) is subjective. What you define as being great may not match someone else’s definition. 

So to achieve greatness, you have to first admit that you are not great already, even if some people say you are. Because really, your view of greatness will always move. You get better, people call you great, but you still have this hum within you that says you’re not yet great.

It’s a never-ending struggle. It’s like trying to hold smoke in your hand.

So if this is the life you’re ready to live — always pining for greatness but never actually reaching it, at least in your own mind — then read on.

As the title of this post says, being great is all about being good consistently.

Compare yourself to yourself

Before we jump into the “how” of being great, I want to point out that being great or successful isn’t a competition. It’s not about being better than someone else.

It’s about being better than yourself. 

Because your bar for greatness will always be getting higher, you should compare yourself to yourself. To really see how you’ve been moving toward your goal of “great,” look at where you were last year, three years ago, 10 years ago. 

How have you gotten better at your craft? What have you accomplished? What are you proud of?

Comparing yourself to a previous version of yourself not only keeps you encouraged, it helps you avoid jealousy and envy — two things that will kill your music career if you don’t keep them in check. 

This is super important, because staying consistent is hard enough on its own.

The difficulty of consistency

You’ve probably heard the phrase, “How you do anything is how you do everything.” The origin is unclear, but it’s most likely a saying from Zen Buddhism.

Wherever it came from, it’s a powerful idea. You could even make that your life motto. 

How do you create music? With meaning, care, and a mind open to feedback? Are you consistent?

How you create music today will mark your music career in the big picture. 

Instead of focusing on doing grand, great things, why not focus on doing the small thing in front of you the best way you know how? Then do it again tomorrow. Then the next day. 

That’s easy to say, but it’s difficult to do this day in and day out (or night in and night out). If you have a day job, your brain and body are probably exhausted by the evening. So it can be hard to drag yourself to your craft when you have nothing left. 

But I’m an advocate of baby steps. If you’ve seen the movie What About Bob?, you know what I’m talking about. If not, here’s the basic idea: take a lot of little steps each day and you’ll soon find yourself miles away from where you started. 

Spend 15 minutes working on a song before you go to work. Schedule social media posts over lunch. Knock one thing off your to-do list before you go to bed.

Little movements. This is the journey toward greatness, toward your success.

Pour yourself into your daily work — even if it’s just for 15 minutes — and it will translate into a lifetime of great work.

Volume over intensity

And that brings us to the gym. Stick with me here.

In some niches of the fitness world, there’s this ideology of “volume over intensity.” This means by doing smaller exercises, you can end up with a larger volume of workouts than if you were to do fewer, more intense workouts. 

For example, if you do seven push-ups every hour over a period of eight hours, you’ll have done 56 pushups that day. On the other hand, if you do three sets of 30 push-ups during one designated “workout time,” you’ll end up doing 90 push-ups for the day. 

The latter option seems more effective, right? More push-ups equals bigger muscles. 

Well, no. Not according to this “volume over intensity” idea. 

You see, if you do 90 push-ups in a single workout, it’s more likely your muscles need a day off to recuperate and repair themselves (which is where the strengthening actually happens). So you’d do 90 push-ups every other day.

But if you’ve done just 56 push-ups spread out over an entire day — instead of all at once — you can do the same thing the next day. Your body doesn’t need a whole day to recover. 

So if you do 56 push-ups every day of the week, you will have done 392 push-ups that week. If you do 90 push-ups in a single workout every other day, you will have done 360 push-ups that week.

It doesn’t seem like much of a difference, but just multiply that out for every week of the year. If you do 32 more push-ups with the “volume” method instead of the “intensity” method, you’ll end up doing 1,664 more push-ups in a year.

A little bit every day can lead to a greater volume of work. And the more time you spend on your craft, the better you’ll get over time.

Give yourself the gift of done

Eventually — after all these little movements over time — you’ll end up with some music you can share. That is, if you don’t let perfectionism get in the way.

We all have a bit of perfectionism in us, some more than others. And it’s very useful. It’s the thing that keeps us moving toward greatness. 

But, as author Jon Acuff points out, perfectionism, at some point, has a diminishing ROI. If it gets out of hand, it can actually hinder your next step toward greatness. 

Acuff says, “Give yourself the gift of done.” In other words, don’t let perfectionism keep you from making or sharing your music.  

It’s like a snake shedding its skin. That layer of skin was useful, but now it’s time to drop it and continue slithering along. We’re all just slithering toward greatness.

You have to leave behind your perfectionism after it’s served its purpose. You’ve got to allow yourself to be done with a project.

Instead of shooting for the impossibility of perfection, be good today and tomorrow and the next day. Pretty soon, you’ll look back and see you’ve done some great things. 

Further reading

I, by no means, am claiming these ideas to be my original ideas. So I’d like to point you toward some amazing resources that inspired me:

• “How to Be Great? Just Be Good, Repeatably,” an amazing, in-depth article on this topic by Steph Smith.

• Finish by Jon Acuff, a book all about finishing what you started, including practical steps to do so. 

• Even though Malcolm Gladwell’s “10,000-Hour Rule” has been disputed by the man who conducted the study upon which Gladwell based the rule, it’s still an inspiring idea. The basic concept is simple: the more you practice, the closer you’ll get to greatness. And I still recommend you read Outliers.

• Singer-songwriter Ari Herstand often talks about defining your own success, like in this article and in his book, How To Make It In The New Music Business. And I’ve fallen in love with this worldview.

• Austin Kleon has a fantastic little book called Keep Going: 10 Ways To Stay Creative In Good Times And Bad. And if that title and subtitle don’t make you want to read it, I don’t know what will.

Caleb J. Murphy is a songwriter-producer based in Austin, Tx., and the founder of Musician With A Day Job, a blog to help part-time musicians succeed.

Create your own website that’s mobile-ready and easy to update anytime! Try Bandzoogle today!

Getting a website up and running is easy, but it can be overwhelming to get the design just right. We’ve helped tens of thousands of musicians and bands get a custom look for their music website. The first step is choosing the best website template to suit your style.

We have dozens of music website templates which are all mobile responsive, and look great on all devices. Our templates are fully customizable, so you can choose your colors, fonts, buttons, and more.

Plus, you can change your template and design in just a few clicks without losing your content, any time you like. So rebranding your website just in time to launch that new album is easy and seamless.

Although we have many more to choose from, here are 16 of our most popular website templates for bands and musicians.

1. Ghost Note

A music website is an incredibly important way to have a professional presence online. 

The Ghost Note website template features trendy color palettes, and fresh font choices. If you’re looking to select a simple template and get going back to your music, it’s a great choice.

As the ideal template for bands, it features a wide landscape header space to show off all band members. In addition to a prominent menu, Ghost Note gives room for your content to breathe. 

With space on the sides and the option to add content in sections, this template focuses the eye to the center where all the important stuff sits. This is a great template to highlight your music, latest news, or videos.

Most of our templates come with four variations, each of which come with a color palette and fonts curated by our design team. The versions of Ghost Note range from minimal black plus red to make your buttons pop, to a trendy pink and cream color scheme.

2. Filter

There’s something familiar and comfortable about the Filter template. With a square image that plays up your profile, simplicity is the key to success here. 

Your main band image takes on a modern, blurred look, sitting stylishly behind a call-to-action created to direct your fans attention to your new single, video, or to sign up for your mailing list.

There are four versions to choose from with Filter, most of which feature whitespace in the content area, flanked by sections. 

The mint green featured in the elegant variation would work nicely with for a jazz artist’s website. Pops of red in the playful version would suit a songwriter or pop band well. The sombre version comes with olive and white hues. 

Finally, for a classic look, you can choose the black and white template version – perfect to capture the energy of a band with great live shots.

3. Frontier

Visual content and branding are arguably as important as your music when it comes to a first impression. Your website is no exception, and the Frontier template places this at the forefront. 

In addition to a huge area for a striking image on the Homepage, your content area can be as wide as you want, making lots of room for images within text, photos, and more media.

With smooth animation drawing lines along the page, it’s easy to see why Frontier is a favorite among the templates for musicians. Featuring four variations, this template shows off section styles ranging from subtle to star power. Think teal and white for some pizazz, or earthy browns for an authentic folky vibe.

4. Tonic 

The music website template Tonic is a branding dream. Playing up on modern design trends of whitespace and a big menu, this template gives you lots of room to work with. 

No header image on hand just yet? No problem. Your name in the center of the white space at the top makes it a focal point instead. If you’d like to feature your name in text, you can choose from tons of bold font options, or add your band’s logo.

This template also comes in four variations, with each one a bit different and fun in its own way. Choose either a large title, or a bigger than normal menu; give your website a sentence at the top, or leave everything in sleek black and white. 

5. Marquee 

Stacking sections under a standout menu is the name of the game with the Marquee template. Take advantage of this stylish web design trend by choosing from one of the four variations. 

The Sombre version features strong muted tones in its sections, perfect for a pared down duo. Choose the classic yet striking black and white neutral palette for a rock band.

To get more intense, check out the Elegant version which features an orange background set off by crisp white text. Or, try the Playful variation features with its contrasting yellow and blue tones.

The call-to-action takes on a distinct look in each variation, making your text and button stand out. You can set it to the left, right, top or bottom to be sure it flows well over your image.

6. Mezzo

If you like designs with clean lines and boxy sections, the Mezzo template is a good choice for you. It features a vertical menu and four color variations: Playful, Elegant, Neutral, and Sombre.

All of our templates are mobile friendly, but Mezzo turns it up a notch. It mimics a mobile display with a hamburger menu on your desktop site, if you’d like. This removes the navigation text so it doesn’t cover up your image – it’ll slide out stylishly when the menu icon is clicked. 

Mezzo is best suited for solo artists who want to display a portrait header image that runs the length of the page. 

7. Pulse 

You’ve got your fans’ pulse when it comes to your music; now get your website up to scratch with this striking template. The loading animation alone that sails in as the Pulse template brings up your artist name sets this one apart.

Follow that up with streamlined sections in coordinated colors, and you’ve got a winner on your hands with this music website template.

It comes in four different versions, each one featuring a full-width header image and unconventional font. Got lots of content? The inner pages have an adjustable header area height to allow for more space. 

Build a music website that’s mobile-friendly and easy to customize! Make your music website with Bandzoogle today.

8. Duet

The Duet template is for musicians who give equal weight to image and text. Most of our band website templates look best with landscape images (horizontal), but Duet celebrates the portrait style (vertical). The header image sits on one side with text on the other. And don’t worry, you can flip them left or right.

Duet doubles your pleasure in a few other ways. Menu inside or outside of the header image? Either is fine. Border or no border? No problem. Call-to-action at the top, center or bottom? You choose. 

Duet offers four unique variations: An elegant variation, a darker sombre version, neutral grayscale, plus a colorful playful variation.

9. Forte 

Two things make the Forte template stand out: the built-in animated scroll effects, and the full-width content area option.

When scrolling down, the header image fades into the background with a subtle color overlay applied on top, giving your website a modern look.

Once your visitor has scrolled down, they will also see your content stretching from side to side. This means extra room for your photo galleries, blog posts in columns, or site-wide footer.

All four versions of Forte include a clean design aesthetic, sans serif fonts, and room to play with the margins. 

10. Anthem

If center stage feels like home, then Anthem is a great choice for you. It features a wide open space up front, drawing attention to your band’s image.

This website template has a built-in frame that stays in place as you scroll. You can select different start and end colors so that as your visitor navigates down the page, the frame color changes. This animation adds movement to the site, making the content pop even while on the same page.

Just outside the frame there’s a spot for your band name or logo, menu, social media icons, and sitewide music player. You can customize the look with either a thin line around your image or a thick solid border that goes to the edge.

The Anthem template has four variations: Playful, Elegant, Neutral, and Sombre.

11. Limelight 

Focus all eyes on your image with the Limelight template. It features a unique shape plus a commanding call-to-action at the top. Since your website visitors will notice the circle, square, or triangle at the top, a video header is especially compelling with this template.

The four variations of this template will dictate the style of your website right off the bat. Go for a super colorful, party vibe for a cover band. Or try a clear, crisp look featuring a grayscale image combined with plenty of whitespace. You’ve also got the option to try a cream and brown version to give your website a retro vibe.

12. Echo 

For a double feature that incorporates the look of clean lines, our website template Echo is a popular choice. With 4 preset palettes, ranging from colorful (think: EDM or a DJ website) to neutral (perfect for a rock band), Echo gives your website a unique look based on your main image.

This template adapts well to mobile, and features clean fonts that are easy to read over your imagery. Use a call-to-action to mirror your band name at the top, then fill the content area with text and images. 

This template also includes a pop-up site-wide music player that displays your entire tracklist as visitors navigate all of your pages.

13. Spotlight 

The Spotlight template puts you at center stage. This template works well for solo artists and single projects. Whether you’re releasing a book, podcast, or announcing a tour, Spotlight will make sure you’re in focus. 

You can use the traditional round spotlight at the top, or choose a square, rectangle, or triangle to frame your main image instead.

After adding your image, you can set it on the left, center, or right side. You can also give the text a shake up with underline, strikethrough, or lowercase options.

The Spotlight template has four sleek variations: simple grayscale, an elegant white version, a more neutral blue, and a darker variation.

14. Resonance

This striking music website template caters to a couple of different genres, adding unique graphic touches along the way.

The template variations of Resonance include a large space for a wide image, plus a clear menu underneath. From there they diverge – the first version pops off the page with a wash of yellow and hot pink. With a clean white content area and a trendy thick content border, it’s perfect for a pop band, DJ, or beats producer.

The second variation is subdued and tranquil. It features cream and medium blue tones, with title flourishes. It’s the perfect singer-songwriter template.

Then to round things out, we have a neutral version, just right for rock bands, in black and white.

All of the versions include loading animation. Your image will fade in, then your band name and menu will load. It’s a subtle yet smooth effect that will wow your website visitors on first glance.

15. Surround

Surround is the template to use when you want to make a big impression. It features a full screen header image that gives fans some eye candy before they start navigating your site. And navigate they will, because the menu is laid out in a way to give each page name its own semi-transparent background.

With so much power in the header, you may think the content area will pale in comparison, but not to worry. You have the option to adjust the header image to display as much or as little of the image as you’d like. 

16. Encore

With so many templates and variations, to choose from, picking one that’s just right might be tricky. If you’re not sure which template to use, try Encore. This template features a large header image. Add a photo filter to make your image pop, then place a call-to-action to direct your visitors’ attention.

The menu has a nice clean border around the page name you’re on. As a nice touch, you can change the border and hover color to match your website color palette. The menu bar is customizable with color and opacity as well.

Encore offers four template variations as well, and each one is a great start to launch your design. Choose from Playful, Neutral, Elegant, or Sombre.

Bonus: Blank website templates

If you don’t want to be distracted with stock images or preset colors when choosing a template, we’ve got you covered. With our blank website templates, the template is a fresh canvas waiting for you to add your artistic touch. We’ve taken most of our popular website templates and minimized them. They’re each set up with a grayscale palette and no stock imagery. The fonts are clean and modern without any extra frills.

With the blank templates, you’ll still get all of the design customization options that you would with its fully styled sibling. You can add and move features, modify colors, fonts, and images, as well as add image filters, styled sections with backgrounds, social media icons, and more.

Your music website

Once you choose a template for your music website, that’s just the beginning. From there you can customize it to fit your personality, and the mood of your music. 

Read our guide How to make a website for your music to help you build out your pages, and add features to create a Music page, About page, EPK, and more. 

For more design inspiration, check out some of the most stunning band website designs on Bandzoogle. 

These 16 templates are our most popular at the moment, but we add new templates consistently, so there’s something for everyone. 

You can quickly choose a template variation with a palette created by our designers, add your content, and head on back to rehearsing your music. When you have some time, you can also craft and customize your website to as much as you’d like.

As your online home for your music, your website template should reflect who you are, and we hope these options give you lots of choices to start from.

Guest post by Dustin Speckman

Making the decision to start recording your own music is an awesome choice. It gives you complete creative control, can save you a ton of money, and most of all, it’s fun! 

Before you begin, read through these four tips to make sure you get started on the right foot. You’ll be ready to make great home recordings in no time.

1. Recording gear and software

Minimalism

You’ll have to buy some recording equipment before you can begin creating radio-ready tracks. When you set out to find equipment, you may be scared off by the high price tags of some gear.

Have no fear! You don’t necessarily have to buy a ton of gear or even buy really expensive gear. Today’s “budget” gear is truly high quality and you can get a GREAT sound from it.

The most important thing is to buy only the gear you need and to stick with it. 

Consistency

You might be shocked to hear that you should limit yourself. Wouldn’t having a bunch of gear and different options give you an unlimited amount of creative potential?! Well, it can actually make your recordings worse.

It’s kinda like driving a car. You probably drive your car every day. You know exactly how much pressure the gas and brake pedals need for a smooth ride, you know how to turn on all of the features (gotta have those seat warmers on when it gets cold!), you know where all the buttons and knobs are for the AC and radio… you get the point.

Now think back to a time where you borrowed a friend’s car. You probably sped out of the parking lot since you weren’t used to the gas pedal, braked way too hard since the brake pedal acted differently than yours, had trouble turning on the windshield wipers without them going back and forth 2700 times!

So, how did you learn to use all of these tools in your car so well and effortlessly? The answer is consistency.

The more you use one tool or one process, the faster you will become comfortable with them and can get work done with more efficiency and better results.

With all of that said, pick what gear you want to use and stick with it. The results will speak for themselves as you spend more time with your equipment.

2. Recording priorities

You may not realize it, but a good recording is not actually the most important part of recording. 

In fact, the recording is maybe only the 3rd or 4th most important thing! So what could possibly come before it?

Your song

Here’s the thing…

You could have the most expensive equipment on earth, the best recording engineers, and the most talented musicians record for you, but if your song isn’t very good or is not finished yet, you would still be disappointed in the results.

A good song transcends any recording quality because if a song is well written and resonates with people, they won’t even be paying attention to the recording quality.

So before you even think about recording, make sure your song is the best it can be and is completely fleshed out.

What does that entail?

Obviously what someone considers a “good song” is subjective, but there are a few things all songs should have before they are ready to be recorded.

[How to build a website for your recording studio]

Is my song ready to be recorded?

First and foremost, your song should be done!

Don’t try to bring in one verse and chorus and half a bridge. You’ll find it very frustrating trying to complete your song while you fuss with recording equipment. 

Next, is the arrangement. An arrangement can mean different things for different types of music and genres, and you’ll know best what kind of arrangement works in your genre, but here are a few things to think about.

How does your bass guitar interact with your drums?

How many guitars are playing at once in your track, and what are you doing to make sure they are all heard?

What range do you sing in? Are you making sure no other instruments stomp all over your vocal?

Does the melody of the song come out as the main thing to listen to, or are there other instruments competing for attention? 

These are just a few examples of things you should think about before you decide to start recording your song.

Your instrument

This last one is simple. Make sure your instrument is in tip-top shape before you record it.

Change your strings.

Change your drum heads.

Get your guitar set-up.

Rest your voice the night before a recording session.

Fix that knob that has been making that awful scratchy, buzzy noise.

This may seem obvious, but it’s something to look out for. If your instrument isn’t ready to go or has issues, those problems WILL set your recording back. It could directly affect the sound quality or you could waste time trying to fix things during a tracking session. 

Let’s record

The more you have to think about while recording, the more your actual recording will suffer. Do yourself a favor and get all of this stuff taken care of ahead of time.

Taking care of your song, arrangement, and instrument beforehand can save you a huge headache.

It will also free your mind up to focus on getting the best sound possible and you’ll have more fun doing it! 

Doing these things before your session will set the tone for a great recording and a great final song.

Create a mobile-friendly website for your home recording studio. Try Bandzoogle today!

3. Reference tracks

Reference tracks are a great tool for every aspect of the recording and mixing process. They can really help you nail your sound and give you an idea of what you need to aim for!

What is a reference track? 

A reference track is simply a song(s) you choose to listen to to model or inspire your recording. Think about what the sound of your band or project is.

Then, think of 2 or 3 songs that encapsulate what you want your record to sound like. 

Be sure to choose something that makes sense! If you’re a bluegrass band, choosing a black metal track probably isn’t going to help you all that much! 

Unless you’re some kind of black metal bluegrass group? Hmm…

Anyway! 

Analyze your tracks

Once you’ve selected your reference tracks, listen to them very closely and figure out what you like about them.

Also, listen to how things are structured. 

Are the drums louder than the guitars?

Does the vocal have a ton of effects on it, or is it clean?

What kind of tones are they using on the bass guitar?

Ask yourself these types of questions as they relate to your genre and your type of music.

How to use this information

Once you’ve analyzed your songs, use it as a guide while you record to find out what types of sounds you should be aiming for in your recordings.

Take this a step further and continue to use it as you mix your music. Check back to see how your balance compares to the pro track. Let it guide you to make sure your track stacks up to a professional mix.

A reference track is one of the most helpful things you can use while recording and mixing, but be sure not to fall into the trap of trying to copy the song sound for sound, and level for level.

We simply want to draw inspiration and knowledge from the track.

If the guitars are distorted, don’t spend 9 hours figuring out what guitar, amp, pedal, and strings the guitarist used. Instead, just make a note that you should look into using distorted guitars. 

This will ensure that your track still retains your personal charm and touch, but also ensures that it can compete and sounds just as good as other pro-level recordings!

4. Setting deadlines

Before you even press record for the first time, commit to finishing your project! New recorders and mixers often get hung up on small details or areas where they haven’t perfected their skills yet. 

It’s okay if you haven’t mastered every skill after your first recording, what’s most important is that you go through the whole process and have something to show and release at the end.

The importance of finishing your songs

It’s important to power through and finish your songs for a variety of reasons.

As a band or musician, it’s great to have something to offer your fans and new listeners. Most people aren’t going to care if it’s perfect, or if that tambourine is just a little too loud. 

They want to hear your songs!

You’ll have more tracks to record and mix and you’ll get better each time.

As for developing your ears for recording and mixing? The more projects you work on, the more experience you’ll get and the faster you’ll improve.

Avoid getting caught up in one project trying to perfect it and make it the best thing that’s ever existed! I’m not saying to not care or be dismissive of it, but do your best work and then move on.

As you move through songs and new recordings, lessons learned from your prior projects will inevitably help you out with your new projects.

So really, it’s a win-win! More music finished and released for your fans and you get more experience to improve your recording and mixing!

Set deadlines

If you’re a DIY or independent musician, you probably don’t have a label breathing down your neck to tell you when to finish your record. You might be surprised to hear that a deadline can give you the motivation you need to finish projects and move on.

A deadline (even an artificial one) gets you in the mindset of getting the work done in the time you set for yourself.

If you set no time limit, you’ll just meander through each step and never really finish anything! 

However, if you set a deadline of 30 days to record your band’s next single, you’ll automatically start thinking about scheduling everything out.

How long will the drums take?

Guitars? 

How long to mix?

How long to create the artwork?

Now you can create a schedule. Stick to this schedule and finish your tracks! Treat the deadline like an important part of your process and you’ll find that it makes things much easier to finish.

If you’re feeling bold, plan a release party or show for your new project or announce the date for your new album.

This will give you a real incentive to deliver and will help you avoid procrastination and indecision.

Focus on the things that matter and get to recording! 

Wrapping-Up

There is a lot that goes into home recording, but if you keep these lessons and examples in mind, you’ll have a much easier time.

Take what you’ve learned and apply it to your next project and keep going! 

Dustin Speckman is an audio engineer from California. He is also the Operations Manager at Musician on a Mission, the place where musicians go to learn about home recording and mixing.

We’ve made some noteworthy updates in the past few months that we wanted to share. You may have missed them in between shows and writing and rehearsing, so here’s a recap! 

Put your website into maintenance mode

Are you getting started with your music website, but don’t want anyone to see it just yet? Or perhaps you’re redesigning your website to match your new album, and want it appear under construction in the meantime.

In order to hide your website from view, but leave your .com address active, you can put it into maintenance mode while you make quick updates. Just head to your site-wide settings area, and adjust the title, message, and colors. Then your website will be hidden from view until you’re ready to re-launch!

Add subscriptions seamlessly

If you’ve been toying with the idea of adding fan club subscriptions to your website, but aren’t sure where to start, we’ve added a setup wizard to walk you through the initial steps. Choose the ‘Help me set up my subscription area’ option to get started.

You can choose your rewards and have your text, and page navigation, pre-filled for you. This will create a simple menu structure that will organize your subscriptions area, andshould make it easier for you to get down to the real work – adding the subscription rewards for your fans!

Additional 301 redirect options

Moving over to Bandzoogle? You may want to check out our updated redirect options. A 301 redirect is used to make sure that search engines, and your website visitors, are sent to a specific page. Rather than wait until Google reindexes your site, adding a 301 redirect will make sure that your links keep working in search results.

You can also use a 301 redirect to create URLs that are different from the page-name structure. In your site-wide settings, you’ll enter in your old site link, and choose a destination to redirect that to – it can now be any url, a page on your website, or a file.

We hope one (or more!) of these updates will be beneficial to you as a musician. We’re always working on improving our platform, and there are many more things to come. 

Create a beautiful mobile-friendly website for your music in minutes. Try Bandzoogle today!