Head to the Long Beach Press Telegram web site and read Fred Shuster's article.

Here's the lead:

"The struggle for autonomy in the pop world has broken out all over the map. While the corporate music machine grinds on, too big for what was once considered a street art, musicians of all types are shipping out to parts unknown to produce and market their own albums."

Other highlights:

- In the old days, the goal of most would-be music stars was to enlist with one of the dozen or so major labels that sold popular music to the masses. But with just five money-losing global corporations dominating mainstream music, self- sufficiency has become the mantra of performers who find they can live just as well or better setting up shop on the Internet, at gigs or through independent distributors.

- Minus huge budgets that cover radio, MTV and print exposure, self-motivated artists must depend on long- standing forms of promotion -- word of mouth and the quality of their live shows. That's how Jack Johnson, String Cheese Incident and No. 1-selling rapper 50 Cent gained early notice and Amazon and other Web retailers carried the self-produced work of each of these top-drawing acts before they became internationally known.

- Composer-musician Tesh -- famous for his 10-year stint as co-host of "Entertainment Tonight" -- records, books tours, manufactures and sells his music with the help of seven staff members based in a Sherman Oaks garage. While he uses a major worldwide distributor to get his records to stores, Tesh has complete control of his product, doing a healthy business through his Web site (www.tesh.com), where he also sells autographed copies of his albums.

"My biggest piece of advice to anyone who wants to do this is to play live," said Tesh, who normally sells about 1 million copies of each new title. "Play anywhere they'll take you. Look, I've played Nordstrom's shoe department at Christmas. When you do it like this, the overhead is really low. You don't have to pay radio promotion or hire a giant staff."

"Reprinted from Bob Baker's The Buzz Factor, featuring free marketing and self-promotion ideas for songwriters, musicians and bands on a budget. Visit www.TheBuzzFactor.com for details."