Chapter 154 154 - First Stream
Chapter 154 154 - First Stream
The first thing I did after getting everything set up was to make a post on Instabram Stories and the MeTube Community tab.
[I was thinking about doing a stream where I sing some songs and answer some questions, anyone want to join in? Just search for @BlackVelvet or click this link: xxxx]
As soon as I posted this on the two social networks, I clicked to open the stream in the streaming program, but left it on a "Starting Soon" screen.
It only took a few seconds for people to join the stream.
In just 10 seconds, the number that had been at 0 had grown to 120, and it continued to grow by the second.
The category I had set up the stream to take place in was [Arts], which wasn't the biggest category on the site, as there were gaming categories with over 500k viewers, but since this world valued art much more than my previous world, there were still over 200k people watching streams spread across the [Arts] category.
With such a potential audience, there were obviously thousands of streamers trying to carve out a space for themselves.
Only for streamers with less than 3 viewers was the amount monstrous, but the more viewers there were on the stream, the more that streamer was able to stand out.
From what I saw while analyzing the site, there were less than 50 streamers with more than 1k viewers, less than 15 streamers with more than 5k viewers, and only 5 streamers with more than 10k viewers, with only 2 exceeding 20k viewers.
To get into the top 100, I needed at least 500 viewers, which I surprisingly achieved faster than I expected.
In just two minutes I had 700 viewers.
All of them came from my other social networks, which helped me stand out quickly.
The problem was that these people weren't people who normally watch streams, meaning they might not stay long and would leave quickly, so I had to use the attention they would bring me to capture as much of the new audience as possible.
[This is BlackVelvet's stream?!]
[I'm waiting for BlackVelvet!]
[Are you going to sing Boyfriend today?]
[First time watching a stream, looking forward to BlackVelvet!]
[Will he sing in Spanish today?]
[I saw a clip of him singing in Spanish and I was curious!]
[Hope he reads our comments!]
[First time here, can't wait to hear BlackVelvet's voice live!]
Reading people's comments, an excited smile appeared on my face.
Looking at the nicknames of the viewers, I realized that at least 70% of these viewers were girls, which didn't surprise me too much since I was following this Thirst Trap path.
But there were still guys commenting.
After another 2 minutes, when the number of viewers finally stabilized at 911, I turned on my camera and smiled at the audience.
"Hi guys, thanks for coming to my stream at the last minute, I didn't think so many people would show up to interact with me."
As soon as I appeared, the comments changed to show the excitement they were feeling.
[Finally BlackVelvet!]
[Hi BlackVelvet!]
[Sing Boyfriend!]
[Sing 'Bailando'!]
[Who is he?]
[Say hello to me, BlackVelvet!]
With over 900 people in the stream, the chat was moving very fast with so many messages on my screen.
I tried my best to read every message and act as charismatic as possible.
At that moment, I realized that my [Stage Presence Lv 16] was extremely useful!
Instead of acting like a complete novice when dealing with the public, with this skill, I already had control of the stage and knew what to do to keep the audience's attention, even if I didn't do exactly what they wanted.
"To start the evening, I thought I'd take a vote on which song you'd like me to sing first. To decide which song I'm going to sing, all you have to do is vote, don't worry if your song isn't chosen now, it could be the next song I sing!" I said as I released the voting function with the names of 4 songs for them to choose from.
[Numb / Boyfriend / A Bar Song / 'Bailando'].
At first the vote was close between 'Boyfriend' and 'Bailando', but after 10 seconds the gap between the two songs started to widen.
To my surprise, even though 'Bailando' was theoretically my most successful song at the moment, Boyfriend was getting a lot more votes.
Which made me realize the possible reason...
While 'Bailando' was successful as a song for a wider audience, 'Boyfriend' was a song for a niche audience of younger girls who fall in love more easily with the artists they are likely to follow more intensely.
And at that moment, when I was streaming, something I had never done before, on a site I had never advertised, who but those kind of girls would follow me on that site?
"Looks like you really want to hear Boyfriend..." I said laughing. I said laughing. "Okay, no problem... to differentiate a bit from the two versions of Boyfriend I have on the channel, both the electronic version without video and the guitar version with me singing in the bar, both versions were still very lively, this time I'm going to sing a quieter and more engaging version with an acoustic guitar."
As soon as I said that, I started strumming the strings of the guitar and the melody of Boyfriend came out.
🎼🎶🎤
I can't believe we're finally alone...
I can't believe I almost went home...
...
Close
original
🎼🎶🎤
o
Just as I said, this version of Boyfriend that I sang was much ...
🎼🎶🎤
Just as I said, this version of Boyfriend that I sang was much quieter, with my voice lower, while I sang it in a much more confident and sensual tone.
At this point, my [Acting Mastery Lv 24] helped me a lot to play this role of the ultimate Thirst Trap, my facial expressions were much more confident and sensual, the way I moved and looked at the camera showed confidence and sensuality, but all while being very discreet.
I didn't want to look like a clown trying to be sexy, no, my idea was to use my [Acting Mastery] to make it look like all of this was something that came naturally to me, that I was naturally like this, and the music was just a way to express myself about it and let that side of me come out.
And I could tell from the comments that it was working.
[I'm dying here! He's perfect!]
[That voice... I'm in love!]
[This version of the song is even better than the original?]
[Who is this artist I didn't know until today?!]
[I can't believe he's singing 'Boyfriend'! Better day!]
[He's killing it! I can't stop watching!]
[Bruh, where have I come to?]
[My heart can't take it, he's so beautiful and talented!]
[This confidence is everything! BlackVelvet, marry me!]
As much as there were comments from some guys who didn't like it or felt uncomfortable or envious to see so many girls commenting on such things, I didn't worry about them.
I knew that if I decided to follow the path of Thirst Trap, I would eventually find guys who were jealous or didn't feel good about seeing someone like me, which I completely understood.
Whether I liked it or not, this awakened an animal instinct that we have when we compare ourselves to another man, and this causes other men's masculinity to be attacked.
Even if I didn't focus my career on Thirst Trap, there would still be guys who wouldn't like me just because I was good-looking, and there were a lot of girls who liked me, just like there were with JB in my previous world, so I was prepared for that.
When the people who hated JB in my previous world grew up, they also started to like him because he sang good songs, so I knew I wouldn't lose that audience forever.
So I kept singing, and when the song finally ended, I noticed that the number of viewers on the stream had increased!
From the 911 viewers I had when I first started, that number had grown to 1,173 viewers!
A huge increase for a short song and a few minutes of interaction.
From the comments, I noticed that there were a lot of new people who clicked after seeing the thumbnail of the stream with my face, but stayed after hearing my song.
"Uff, singing a song in a different key than you normally do is a lot more challenging." I said as I grabbed a glass of water and drank it to soothe my throat.
"For those of you who have just arrived and don't know me yet, hello, I'm BlackVelvet, currently an artist in the top 200 of the E Rank, striving to reach the D Rank in the next few days!" I introduced myself. I introduced myself. "This stream is something I thought would be fun to do today, and here we are. If you have any songs you'd like me to sing, you can ask in the comments, if there's something I like or that a lot of people want, I'll sing it."
So instead of continuing to take votes to decide the next songs, I started doing the playlist myself, because I wanted to cook up "Bailando" a little more to sing it later, since it was one of the songs they wanted to hear the most.
If I sang the best songs at the beginning, everyone would leave, so it was better to save the best for last, like I did in my bar gigs.
And over time, I got the feeling that I was performing just like in the bars, which made it easier for me to interact and decide on the next song.
What I didn't know was that among those almost 1.2k viewers were several people who knew me personally.