Niche genres

[pklima]

My "main" band plays black metal covers of country and folk songs. It is as ridiculous as that sounds. There's enough demand that it's profitable and I have absolutely no competition.

The general idea of taking hits from one style and playing them convincingly in a completely alien style seems to be a good one... it's worked for everyone from Fairport Convention to Pastors of Muppets.

But I was thinking folk with violently emotional screaming is an even better niche market. The big fish in this very small pond are Kan Mikami and Kazuki Tomokawa. The only imitators I can think of are Shuji Inaba and maybe Syogo-Nari. All of them are Japanese. Rip them off, make the lyrics in English, and you can achieve cult recognition and sell a few hundred CDs a year with minimum effort, then probably a few thousand CDs a year a few years later.

With cheap recording technology and global marketing it's easier to exploit niche genres on a larger scale than ever before. Does anybody else have any niche "success stories", "failure stories" or ideas for good styles to exploit (humorous or otherwise)? Did I randomly get lucky or can this be a sound business strategy?

[Spinal Tapper]

Just because no one else is doing it, doesn't mean everyone will like it. It's a tough game - trying something different. Normal/non-musician type people want to hear what they know when they go see a band at a bar or something...

Not saying it won't work, but you'll have to incorporate things about your music that people can relate to. IMO.

[pklima]

It's possible you can't play it in a bar (I don't but it depends on the specific style) but you can sell CDs through distros on other continents without touring.

[lowenduser]

Reminds me of some orchestra decided to do a classical set of The Sex Pistols songs.... it's not that long ago and I think it was one of the big British orchestras. No harm is trying to mesh genres - just sometimes it doesn't work - it would make music quite bland to listen to if all styles sounded the same!

[Shroom]

I wanna start a string + drummer/percussionist quintet that plays classical-influenced rock/metal music, having it pretty well blended like Streetlight Manifesto, but fuller sounding and with a newer, more original sound, kind of like Muse. Preferably with acoustic/electric instruments where necessary, and with most of the guys in the band able to double on another instrument, like a guitarist/keyboard player, a double/electric bassist, 2 cellists/violinists, or something like that.

Am I crazy?