Spotting trends

Man, this is difficult. Basically you have to live and breath the music to know it. Then you have basic feel on what is new and different. This is not 'nuff though. You have to be almost a magician to spot successful trends. Some say that it is impossible to teach it, but I say that you can practise your skills and there some guidelines come in handy.

• It is never something totally new that grabs media attention and becomes popular - follow the mainstream and lurk on the fringe.
• Make friends with everybody on the field and you will get lot of underground information about what people are listening.
• Don't narrow yourself on one style, if you are able to see beyond borders, you will be able to fuse tastes.
• Listen to the mainstream stuff to get an idea what people like.
• Never trust something overproduced that stuff is just mathematics - pour in the marketing money X and out comes record sales Y.