Best WordPress Themes For Bands

Posted July 17, 2009 | by irene | in Web Design | 34 responses

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Here are what I think are the best WordPress themes for bands, musicians, rock groups, chamber orchestras or  anyone else involved with music that needs a web site.

Amped for Genesis Framework by Studiopress.

My latest* favourite theme is the Amped theme by Studiopress (*updated June 2011). This is a premium WordPress theme made by one of the most established and revered WordPress theme development teams.

As you can see, Amped is made for bands – and their fans.

 

WordPress plays nice with all Social Media tools too, so you will be able to integrate with Twitter, Facebook with just a few plugins.

Here’s how to easily customize Amped for your band:

• Just put your latest video, or a video of your band performing at a gig, or rehearsing in the top spot.
• Swap the background image
• change the colour of the links.
• upload your logo

Want repeat visitors?

• Change your video often, and invite fans to submit their videos of your band in concert.
• Throw a contest and tell them that you will feature their video on the home page – that will get them spreading the word. Do this once a month and you will have many happy fans! Promote this weekly on your facebook page and watch your fan numbers grow!
• Update often. The more often you do, the better. Remember that. You can update your site quickly and easily, because it’s WordPress.

BTW, here’s why I think you should you use a Studiopress theme using Genesis:

• The Genesis framework means your WordPress theme is built on rock solid code and excellent built in Search functions. You will have very little problems with this one – no headscratching errors or hours wasted troubleshooting.
• Great support via a members-only forum. If you do have questions, you have access to the support team 24/7 – included in the price of the theme.
• Your theme will work in the future. The Studiopress team continually updates their themes and that means they will still work with every WordPress update, and will be up to date with the latest security fixes, browser and CSS changes.
• Using child themes, like Amped for Genesis, your theme customizations will be safe whenever you update Genesis to the latest version. Very important.
• All the upgrades to the theme or Genesis are free and included in your original price. That makes it a super deal.
• Upgrading is super easy. It takes just one-click to update the themes  in your Dashboard.
• If you tire of the theme, you can use any of the other Genesis child themes available, or get one custom made.
• the price can’t be beat.
• Not only have they continued to upgrade their WordPress themes, but they have upgraded their services and conduct business in the most honourable way. I have been a lifetime member for years, and think they are tops.

Is that enough gush? No – here are more themes you can try:

Lexicon, or Platinum themes.

 

StudioPress Church .

* Update June 2011 – Studiopress is now eliminating the Church theme and replacing it with Life – a child theme for Genesis. This theme has the same design as Church did, but now has all the latest bells, whistles and security updates.

Don’t be fooled by the name, the Church theme is a very cool theme and makes  a great band web site. Designed by StudioPress, formerly called Revolution Themes,  Brian Gardner and his team continue to make clean WordPress premium themes with beautiful code and great Search Engine Optimization (SEO.)

Automatic thumbnail maker!

Tribal Music

By Gorilla Themes will get you a cool site with built in music player from Mixpod so that you can stream your music.

This theme will need some graphic work to swap your own logo and background into the design, but once you do that, you will have a super cool site which places your music upmost and centre.

 

 

WordPress Remix

Remix is simple, clean and comes with la choice of 10 different home page layouts and 20 different single page layouts, which make customization super easy.  Try style 4 or 5 , which feature images and are a bit less corporate looking. I like the featured text areas which also are great places for you to publicize upcoming gigs or special events.

This premium theme has some extra functions that are useful for band web sites like integrated Photo Galleries and Events pages, so it makes it super easy for your band to keep your fans informed with the content that they keep coming back to see.

You can use the theme as is, or change the colours via an easy theme options page.

Woo themes

Aperture Theme

By Woothemes. This WordPress theme is actually for a photography blog, but will work great for a band web site who have lots of pictures.

Don’t have lots of pictures yet? Ask your fans to send them. They’d be uber proud to see their pictures on your site.

Use one of the photo sidebars for your GigPress or Gig calendar plugin.

Abstract by WooThemes

In order to make this theme your own, just change that background image and go wild.

Ideas: Match your background to your current CD cover.

Want fans to keep coming back?

Change your background every week to match your posters.

Tell your fans to collect the series of backgrounds, or allow to download as wallpaer.

Do a contest and get your fans to design you a background.

Do a contest and feature a super fan every month on your background.

See how fun it can be?

Why do I think these make the Best WordPress Themes For Bands? Let me tell you:

• these are image heavy – people want to see pics of you when they come to your band site. They also want to see NEW pics of you when they come, so keep on adding pics. That’s why WordPress is cool. It is easy to update. Update your band’s web site often, and your fans will come by more often. And they will love you more.
• the sites are easy to customize – for the StudioPresss themes, just switch the background for a totally new look. Switch is so that it matches your most recent CD (you’ll actually need to also change the CSS for some of the themes, so they display an image vs a colour only, but it’s not that difficult – most web developers can help you with that.)
• StudioPress sites have great Search Engine Optimization capabilities. That means Google love.
• Sign up to our mailing list right up top. That is numero uno. Get your fans’ email addresses so you can send them news. They want it. They want to hear from you. They want to hear from you often.
• they’re more than a blog, allowing you to control your home page so it looks more like a traditional web site.

Have I missed any? What do you think are the best WordPress Themes For Bands?

To see some of these WordPress themes in action or why I think WordPress makes excellent sense for musicians, check out my article where I rave about WordPress Blogs For Bands.

And help me out. I am currently designing a WordPress theme for band sites. What other functions do you think would be cool for WordPress themes to have for band sites?

Last updated June 2011.