0:01

Hi there . This is Gill at Roller Blue . My

0:03

favorite inside the mix podcast recently

0:06

is number 121 with Don Moly

0:08

. It was interesting to hear him talk about automation

0:10

, which I think is an often overlooked part

0:12

of the mix process , and how it

0:14

can be used for fine tuning . He

0:17

also highlighted some useful tips on

0:19

how to approach compression and EQ . You're

0:21

listening to the inside the mix podcast

0:23

and here's your host , Mark Matthews

0:26

.

0:27

Hey folks , welcome back to the inside the mix

0:29

podcast . As always , welcome

0:31

to the new listeners . Make sure we

0:33

hit that follow button on your podcast player of choice

0:35

and returning listeners , a big welcome

0:38

back . So before we dive into this episode

0:40

, I just want to let you know that the podcast

0:42

artwork is set to change

0:44

. I have settled on a final design and

0:46

a huge thank you to all the listeners out there

0:48

who helped me choose out

0:50

of the top six . So look out for that

0:52

. The exact same podcast is just

0:55

a change of artwork , so you can expect

0:57

the exact same quality of content , but

0:59

the artwork is set to change . Folks , exciting

1:01

times right . So in this episode

1:04

I am joined by J Gilbert

1:06

of the your Morning Coffee podcast and

1:08

newsletter . So in this conversation

1:11

we are discussing the new music

1:13

industry and 2024

1:15

predictions for independent artists and

1:17

producers , and we cover a lot of ground

1:19

. We start by reflecting on the past , so

1:21

I asked Jay to tell us about what he has

1:24

seen in terms of release strategy

1:26

changes over the last two decades

1:28

. We talk about the idea that we've moved from an

1:30

ownership model of music to an access

1:32

model . We talk about engaging the audience

1:34

and content versus being an artist ? Are

1:37

we content creators or are we artists

1:39

or are we something in between ? We discussed

1:41

navigating industry shifts and

1:43

, with the continuous rise of streaming platforms , how

1:46

should independent artists adapt their

1:48

release strategies and how can they stand out

1:50

in a crowded landscape . And

1:52

Jay actually goes through his seven top

1:54

things that he looks for when he's talking

1:56

to independent artists musicians , record

1:59

labels , a&r so look out for

2:01

those . I'm not going to give that away now , but they are

2:03

amazing tips seven top tips

2:05

, or rather seven things that you should be focusing

2:08

on as an independent artist or producer

2:10

. We also dive more into release cadence

2:12

, and Jay actually mentions a technique that

2:14

I'd never heard of before , which is called water falling

2:16

. Again , I'm not going to give it away now , you're going to have to listen

2:18

to the episode , but this is a really interesting concept

2:21

when it comes to release strategy , and it's

2:23

something that I think I'm going to do in the future

2:25

. We then look forward to 2024 . And

2:27

Jay discusses any emerging platforms

2:29

that he believes will play a pivotal role

2:32

in shaping how artists release

2:34

their music , and we also discussed the concept

2:36

of don't bore us , get to the chorus , which is quite

2:39

poignant for me , having released an EP last year

2:41

. We then wrap things up with Jay telling us about

2:43

the your Morning Coffee podcast and his

2:45

vision for the future with regards

2:47

to supporting independent artists . And

2:49

then we close out with Jay telling

2:51

us his one key piece of advice

2:54

for artists navigating

2:56

the evolving landscape of music releases

2:58

. And before we dive into this chat , make

3:00

sure you go over to your morning coffee

3:03

and sign up for the your Morning Coffee newsletter

3:05

and make sure you subscribe to the podcast

3:08

and follow the podcast as well . Let's dive into this

3:10

episode . Hey , folks , in this episode

3:12

I'm very excited to welcome

3:15

my guest today , jay Gilbert

3:17

of the your Morning Coffee

3:19

podcast . Hi , jay , Thanks for

3:21

joining me today .

3:22

How are you ? Hey , Mark , I'm doing great . Thanks

3:24

for having me .

3:25

No , it's my pleasure . I know we . I think we put this

3:27

together probably about six months or something ago . If

3:29

I remember rightly , it was quite a while ago

3:31

, but the time soon does pass . And

3:34

I'm looking at the pictures you've got behind you there and

3:36

it's much more inspiring than what I've got behind

3:38

me for the audience listening . You've got some great pictures

3:40

on the wall there . Yeah

3:42

, fantastic stuff . So just as a

3:44

quick summary of who Jay is , what

3:47

he sort of achieved over the year . So he's a seasoned

3:49

music industry expert . He's navigated

3:52

the ways of change over the past two decades , with

3:54

experience of major music groups like Warner Music

3:57

and Universal Music , and has

3:59

witnessed the industry evolved from

4:01

the CD era to the disruptive

4:04

forces of Napster I've got written here and the iTunes

4:06

introduction I remember

4:09

that I was one of the Napster users . In

4:11

2015 , he embarked on his entrepreneurial

4:14

journey , launching label logic consultancy

4:16

and curating the widely respected your

4:19

morning coffee newsletter , which is how

4:21

I found you . From a humble

4:23

email to a few hundred friends , the newsletter

4:25

has now grown into an influential publication

4:27

with 15,000 readers over

4:30

, offering rather insights into the music industry's

4:32

nuances . So in this episode

4:35

we're going to be exploring sort of music

4:37

release , strategies for independent

4:39

artists and what that might look like in

4:41

2024 . So I thought it'd be quite

4:43

good to start , because you mentioned that , about two

4:46

decades worth of experience and

4:48

maybe just a bit of reflection on the past

4:50

so maybe you could talk about the music industry and

4:52

how you've seen it sort of change and strategies

4:54

change over the last two decades , and then what

4:56

we're seeing at the moment . Yeah , thanks .

4:58

Mark , it's quite excuse me , it's quite

5:00

dramatic If you think about

5:03

it , because it wasn't that long

5:05

ago our business was a business

5:07

of ownership . Now it's a business

5:09

of access , and those are two

5:11

totally different things , although

5:14

you know we do have premium vinyl

5:16

today , and that's ownership and fandom

5:19

. But you know , from what

5:21

we read , you know , half of the vinyl

5:23

that's purchased today is purchased by fans

5:25

that don't own a turntable , right

5:28

? So it's not how they consume

5:30

their music , it's the way that they show that they're

5:32

a fan , that they're a big fan

5:35

, a super fan . So it's

5:37

evolving and changing while we're having this conversation

5:40

, but I will say

5:42

that it's some things

5:44

are exactly the same . You

5:47

still want to engage

5:49

an audience , right . You want to grow your

5:51

audience and you want that audience to be super

5:53

engaged . You want them to

5:55

come see you play live . It's

5:58

, it's challenging for musicians and

6:00

any artist today , because

6:03

it used to be a little simpler . You

6:05

would get popular in your city , maybe

6:07

you get popular in your region

6:10

, you might get a little local airplay

6:12

. If you were lucky open up for a national act

6:14

, then maybe you might get a

6:16

recording contract . It's . It's

6:18

so much different today , right

6:21

? Because if you put out music . Today you're

6:23

up alongside of Drake

6:26

and the chain smokers and Bad Bunny

6:28

. You have to be buttoned up musically

6:30

and and with your visuals , because

6:33

now your music's everywhere

6:35

. It's become so easy to

6:38

put your music up globally

6:40

. There used to be a huge barrier

6:42

to entry . You had to basically go into a recording

6:45

studio . That was very expensive and

6:47

you had to pay big dollars to get your

6:50

music recorded , and then you

6:52

had to find a label that

6:54

would sign you . Today you can record

6:56

something on your iPad and have it up on SoundCloud

6:59

and YouTube within hours and

7:02

have that global impact . So

7:05

the last thing I'll sign that point

7:07

in sort of the differences is

7:09

that not only are you up

7:11

alongside of Drake and the chain smokers

7:13

, but now you've

7:16

got sort of mental health implications

7:18

, right , because you not only are you

7:20

writing , recording

7:23

, playing live and hopefully doing

7:25

some interviews from time to time , but

7:27

you've got TikTok , you've got

7:29

maybe you've got Twitch , maybe you've got Facebook

7:32

, twitter , instagram , youtube

7:34

. There's a lot more to

7:36

do if you're an artist today and

7:39

you really have to be careful to not try

7:41

to do it all yourself that

7:43

you bring in sort of a street team

7:45

to help you .

7:46

Yeah , it's all really good stuff what you mentioned there . So unpack

7:48

that a bit . You mentioned that about vinyl , buying vinyl

7:51

and not actually having a turntable , and

7:53

I will hold my hands in there and say I'm one of those people

7:55

I don't . Well , I tell

7:57

a lie . We do have one , but it's a very cheap

7:59

one . My girlfriend bought it and she's

8:01

not really into audio and I was like I can't

8:03

listen to vinyl on that thing you go ahead

8:06

. But I've got this collection of vinyl and

8:08

it's just records that I love and

8:10

they're kind of just sat . Maybe maybe I do need to get

8:13

one . But yeah , it's like you said . It's that he's shown that

8:15

super fan noose , isn't it

8:17

. And yeah , as soon as you said that

8:19

, I was like yeah , that is me right off the bat

8:21

. I like . And also what you said about

8:23

engaging an audience and then con and

8:25

how you're having as an artist

8:28

now , whereas before you could just write

8:30

, I say just , but you would write your music

8:32

record label and everything that goes with it

8:34

but now you're also having to be a content creator

8:37

, absolutely . And juggling those

8:39

two is so hard . And I was having this

8:41

conversation with someone the other day another

8:43

interview actually and she mentioned

8:45

about how it's almost like when

8:49

going viral on social media , whether

8:51

you sort of want to make that decision . Are you a content

8:53

creator or an artist ? And

8:56

you mentioned there about mental wellbeing and then

8:58

juggling all of that , because

9:00

, I guess , because you can do it all yourself

9:03

there are so many facets

9:05

to it that you're having to juggle . It's

9:07

really really tricky , like the barrage of territory

9:09

is so low so you can do it , but there are so

9:12

many things that you have to do . So

9:14

, with that in mind , sort of what sort

9:16

of strategies would you sort

9:19

of like recommend to an independent

9:21

artist if they're just getting off the ground ? With regards

9:23

to all of what we've just mentioned , yeah

9:26

, it's .

9:27

Some of it is the same

9:29

as it's always been . Some of it's a little bit

9:31

different because we have new technologies and

9:33

tools that we didn't have even a few years ago

9:35

. But I always

9:37

start with seven things . When I sit

9:40

down with an artist or

9:42

a manager or someone in a label distributor

9:45

, the first thing I talk about are like what

9:47

are your goals ? Because everybody has different

9:49

goals . If you talk

9:51

to an EDM artist

9:54

, they may want to play

9:56

bigger festivals . If you

9:58

talk to a singer-songwriter

10:00

, they may want to have better

10:03

streaming numbers . But if you talk to

10:05

a jazz artist , it's really

10:07

more about they want accolades , they

10:09

want a Grammy , they want to be on the cover of

10:11

Downbeat Jazz Is Jazz Times , they want

10:13

to play the Village Vanguard . So every

10:16

single artist has different goals

10:18

and you have to start there with

10:20

the goals . Okay , so now we've locked

10:23

down the goals . Well , what's the narrative

10:25

? Well , what's a narrative ? Well

10:27

, that's why should anyone care ? Right

10:30

, what is it about you as an artist or your

10:32

music that's compelling ? Did

10:34

you overcome adversity ? Is

10:37

this some political statement you're

10:39

making ? Is it women of color

10:41

? What is it about this ? And

10:44

it's so important now that when you release music

10:46

and you put it into , let's say , spotify's

10:48

submission tool . You have

10:50

to include the narrative , and

10:52

we encourage the artists to have

10:55

a narrative about who they are as an artist

10:57

, and also a narrative for every album

10:59

and every focus track

11:01

. What is this about ? Why should

11:03

anyone care ? The third thing

11:05

is crucial and it's who

11:07

is the audience ? Not only

11:09

who your audience is today , but who do you

11:12

want it to be Right ? Are you

11:14

looking to open for certain artists

11:16

? Would you like certain artists

11:18

to open for you ? Would you like to have

11:20

a collaboration , a co-write with

11:23

a certain artist or artists

11:26

? Who is that tribe ? You

11:30

need to find who your tribe is

11:32

and you can look at , let's

11:34

say , a DSP will tell you other

11:37

people that like your music , listen

11:39

to these artists . Well , you

11:42

can see that sort of in some of these data

11:44

platforms as well . Find out who those

11:46

artists are , reach out to them

11:48

, collaborate with them . You know what I mean

11:50

. You need to grow and find

11:52

your audience and

11:55

we call it base swapping . When

11:57

you open for an artist or when you collaborate with

12:00

an artist , you know it's a community

12:03

and it's crucial that you find

12:05

your audience . The next one in

12:07

the seven is release cadence

12:09

Pardon

12:11

, the dog's barking in the background . The next

12:14

one is release cadence , and

12:16

that is you have to have a plan . You'd be

12:18

surprised how many artists just drop music

12:21

in the marketplace without a marketing

12:23

plan , without any kind of strategy , and they wonder

12:26

why it's not reaching an audience

12:28

. So you're methodical about

12:30

how you release your albums or or EPs

12:32

or tracks and you space

12:34

them out . We like to say that

12:36

this is an always on music

12:39

industry . When I was

12:41

growing up , my favorite artists would release

12:43

an album and then maybe a year , a year and

12:45

a half later they'd release another album . That

12:48

doesn't really happen . It's so much . Today . There's this

12:50

constant flow . Every you

12:52

know , four to six weeks with some

12:54

artists , maybe it's twice a year

12:57

with other artists , but there are focus tracks that lead

12:59

up to an EP or an album . The next

13:02

thing is the strategy sort of

13:04

having a strategy and just

13:06

making sure that everybody on your

13:08

team is on the same page . And look , you may be

13:10

a developing artist and you don't have a team

13:12

, or you don't think you have a team

13:15

, but you do have a team . We

13:17

call it the street team . It could be your

13:19

friend , it could be your mom

13:21

and dad , it could be your girlfriend or boyfriend

13:23

, it could be a buddy of yours that

13:25

knows how to edit short form video

13:28

. Whatever it is , you surround yourself with those early

13:31

believers

13:33

first . That's your street

13:35

team . Put together a strategy

13:37

and make sure that you have roles

13:39

and responsibilities early on so

13:42

you're not stepping on each other's toes and the other two really

13:44

quickly . One is just making

13:47

sure that you're planning everything and

13:50

the last one is

13:52

making sure that your

13:54

creative is

13:56

. I mean such a big part

13:58

today with short form video and all these . You

14:00

know shorts and stories

14:03

and ticked . I mean there's so many different ways that you can chop up

14:06

videos . But if you're

14:08

planning and then you have sort of a

14:10

creative person and that could be you

14:13

you

14:15

have to make sure that you , what you're putting

14:17

up we're all visual beings right that

14:20

that it sort of pops , and

14:22

remember that your album cover or your

14:24

single track cover is now going to be

14:27

seeing the size of a postage stamp . When

14:29

I was growing up it was 12 inches by 12 inches , like

14:31

vinyl , and it was beautiful

14:34

and big . Today it's

14:36

this tiny little thing and it's

14:38

really got a pop at

14:40

that size .

15:03

Yeah , I know exactly what you mean . I'm going through a similar

15:05

process at the moment with a podcast artwork and

15:07

it's like that with a podcast as well . You need that artwork

15:10

to really , because it's so small . It really

15:12

needs to capture what it is that you're trying

15:14

to convey with that artwork . I

15:17

love all those seven points as well . So , just to

15:19

recap , for the audience , we had goals . You

15:21

have narrative , the audience slash

15:23

, tribe , the release cadence , strategy

15:25

, planning and creative . That's right . So really

15:28

, yeah , really , really good stuff in there . I

15:30

love the idea of a street team as well , and I think it's important

15:32

what you mentioned about having

15:34

a team and then , like you said

15:36

, artists might turn around and say I don't

15:38

have a team , but if they actually really do think about it

15:40

, they do have a team

15:42

. And I noticed this when I started the podcast as well

15:44

. I think actually I need some people

15:46

around me to help , and then I realized actually I

15:49

do have a network of people that

15:51

are willing to help me . You just got to reach out to them .

15:53

Absolutely .

15:54

You mentioned something interesting there about the release

15:56

cadence and this is a bit of a tangent

15:58

here and you said that you may release

16:00

a song in the lead up to an EP

16:02

or an album . And , with

16:05

regards to releasing music , what would you say

16:07

is the preferred sort

16:09

of amount at the moment

16:11

? Is it singles , is it EP , is it

16:13

albums ? Which way do you think it's going at the moment

16:15

? Or is it at the moment , what is the

16:17

preferred , or rather recommended route

16:19

?

16:20

Yeah , it's a track based economy , for

16:22

sure , and you need to release

16:25

tracks because Spotify

16:27

, for example , not to pick on them , but as

16:30

a DSP , they're focused on keeping

16:32

you on their platform and as

16:35

long as possible and keeping you engaged

16:37

, and they do that by playlists . And

16:40

with a lot of these playlists , whether they're user curated

16:42

, dsp curated , they're based

16:44

on songs and hopefully that will

16:46

lead you to an artist's

16:49

page and you can explore

16:51

their catalog and you'll get involved

16:53

and maybe you'll go see them live

16:55

, maybe you'll buy their merch . But

16:57

I'd like to show you one release

17:00

cadence just to sort of open up people's

17:02

minds as to what you can do today , because

17:04

it used to be years ago

17:06

that you would release an album and it

17:08

was like this solid rocket booster

17:10

, right Once you lit that fuse . It's

17:13

going to happen , it's happening on that street date

17:15

. Your tour is set , your publicity

17:17

is set , you may have some sync licenses

17:19

, everything's sort of locked and loaded , but

17:22

today you can do whatever

17:24

you want to do . I would just recommend

17:27

that you do it in a deliberate

17:29

fashion and I'll use one example An

17:32

artist that I absolutely love , that I've had the pleasure

17:35

of working with . It's called Vintage Trouble , and

17:37

Vintage Trouble . Think of you

17:39

know , james Brown fronting the stray

17:42

cats , right ? They're just amazing . Their slogan

17:44

is arrive dressy , leave messy

17:47

, and they're just a great

17:49

band , anyway . So they

17:51

wanted to put out a new album . They had

17:54

10 songs . Okay

17:56

, a lot of artists would just drop that

17:58

as an album . We

18:00

broke it up into two five song EPs

18:02

the first five songs . We

18:05

actually did a second EP

18:07

of those same five songs , just reimagined

18:10

a bit , not just stripped down

18:12

, but maybe a reggae version or a blues version

18:14

. So now you've got for EP number

18:16

one . You've got 10 tracks . So we

18:18

had a couple of focus tracks that were released as sort

18:20

of singles leading up to EP number one

18:22

, couple of focus tracks leading

18:24

up to that reimagined one right

18:27

. Then for the second five songs

18:29

that was going to be the next EP

18:31

, we did the same five songs

18:34

recorded live Again

18:36

focus tracks leading up to that second series

18:38

of EPs , another couple of focus

18:41

tracks leading up to the live

18:43

, and then at the very end of

18:45

that , we combined them for

18:48

vinyl and for CD . So

18:50

now you've got two album releases

18:53

at the end of that , right . So you've got

18:55

, instead of dropping something and having

18:57

maybe a month of activity surrounding it

18:59

. This went for nearly

19:01

two years , so it

19:04

sort of reengaged their audience

19:06

. It gave us something to talk about on socials

19:08

, it gave us something to talk about with

19:11

publicity , and that

19:14

is just one way of releasing

19:16

music . There's a thing called

19:18

water falling that a lot of artists

19:20

do right , where you'll release a

19:22

track and then , when you release a second

19:24

track , you release it with the first one

19:26

. Then you release the third track and you release

19:28

it with the first and second one , and

19:31

again it's another bite

19:33

at the apple .

19:34

Interesting . I've never heard of that water falling one before

19:36

. I like the sound of that . It's really

19:38

interesting . And

19:40

I also like what you mentioned there about

19:42

how you split that into two

19:45

separate EPs , which I thought was really interesting because

19:47

it's sort of segued

19:49

on nicely to the question I was going to ask and you've pretty much

19:51

answered it in that one there which was the guard

19:53

to release strategies , and then there was another

19:55

on my notes again I was going to say so what

19:57

is the sort of how long can

19:59

you , how long can you promote

20:02

and use the same music

20:04

? And you mentioned there about two years . But

20:06

what do you look for when

20:08

you , I suppose what are the

20:10

signs you're looking for when a musical piece

20:12

has had its moment and you need to

20:14

move on to the next one ? I mean , I don't

20:16

suppose there is a definitive time .

20:19

What are your thoughts ? You're right . There's not you

20:21

. It's not a cookie cutter approach . It could be four

20:23

weeks for one person and 12 weeks for another

20:25

artist , but I will tell you that

20:27

that opens up a great

20:29

discussion in measuring everything . So

20:32

we talked about the big seven , and

20:34

the first one was goals . So how

20:36

do you know if you're overperforming

20:38

or underperforming ? So you set these goals

20:40

. I want my social media to grow a little

20:42

bit . I want my streaming to grow . I want my

20:44

merch sales to grow . I want to put more

20:46

butts in the seats , whatever that is . But

20:49

then you measure it . Well

20:52

, how do you measure it ? There's lots of

20:54

free ways and inexpensive ways

20:56

to measure how you're doing

20:58

, and then , especially , when you're

21:00

releasing tracks . So you have Spotify

21:03

for artists , Apple music for artists , Amazon

21:05

music for artists right . There are data

21:07

platforms out there like Viberate and

21:10

Chartmetric and Spot

21:12

on Track and Soundcharts , and there's lots of different

21:14

ways where you can measure

21:16

your success . And

21:19

you look . It sounds pedantic , but you do more

21:21

of what works and less of what doesn't . Right

21:23

, If you see that something

21:25

is overperforming with your social

21:27

media or one of your short form videos

21:29

are overperforming , then try to

21:31

do more of that . There's an

21:33

old joke in advertising

21:36

that half my advertising doesn't

21:38

work . I just don't know which half . Well

21:40

, today you do know

21:42

, because you can look at the data almost

21:45

live and say , oh my gosh

21:47

, that thing that we're doing is overperforming

21:49

. Let's do more of that . So

21:51

, on top of that big seven , you just opened up

21:53

a very good conversation about make

21:56

sure you're measuring everything , and I

21:58

like to tell artists carve out an

22:00

hour , just an hour , each week . It could

22:02

be Monday morning when you get up and have your coffee

22:04

and take a look at your

22:06

. You know YouTube analytics , for

22:08

example . A lot of people don't use

22:11

that tool and they should , because you

22:13

can go into YouTube analytics , look

22:15

at any video that you have out and

22:17

there's a line that goes down this chart

22:20

at 30 seconds , because that's what you get

22:22

paid on . If they don't listen up to 30

22:24

seconds , you don't get any ad revenue for that

22:26

. What you're going to find when you go

22:28

into YouTube analytics is that

22:30

once you get to about 30 seconds , you've

22:33

lost at least a third of your audience . Nobody

22:35

has attention span anymore . Sometimes

22:37

you've lost 50% of your

22:39

audience , so don't

22:41

bore us . Get to the chorus . You see

22:44

these videos where they have these title

22:46

cards . This is Mark Matthews

22:49

and this is his new song and this is

22:51

who produced it . No , nobody

22:53

cares . Get right into the action

22:55

and you'll lose a lot less people

22:58

.

22:58

Yeah , I was going to mention what

23:00

you said there about Don't Bore's Get to the Chorus

23:02

, because this is the conversation I've had on the podcast

23:04

before with other artists that

23:06

I invite onto the podcast , and we

23:08

had this conversation about do you have long

23:10

intros to your music ? And these are when

23:13

you're at that independent level and you're trying

23:15

to get new listeners in . I suppose it's okay . If you're

23:17

a legacy act , you can have these really

23:19

long intros because you've got that audience

23:21

, but if you are a new artist or content

23:24

creator , you need to get in there straight

23:26

away and have them hooked and if you have these

23:28

big , long , grandiose

23:30

introductions , like you say , you're going to lose them

23:33

pretty quick . To be fair , I probably

23:35

need to do that Some of my content on YouTube

23:37

, thinking about it now , and I've done

23:39

that . But , yeah , I

23:41

love what you said , that phrase Don't Bore's Get

23:43

to the Chorus and I remember I was working

23:45

with an artist and he was going to

23:48

yeah , that was it . He was going to provide some lyrics

23:50

for a song of mine and he said that he's like

23:52

Mark , you just need to cut this intro because

23:54

it's way too long . You just need to . We need

23:56

to get to the chorus quicker and he was right to

23:58

be fair and yeah , I learned that

24:01

. So that's really good stuff , amazing stuff for the audience

24:03

to hear . I think and I

24:06

say Segways on nicely , it kind of does

24:08

in a way . But this one next question is going

24:10

to be kind of like looking ahead to I

24:12

say ahead to 2024 , we're already in it , really

24:14

we're in February . But are there any

24:16

emerging platforms that you believe will play

24:19

a pivotal role in shaping how

24:21

we release music ? Is there anything you've seen

24:23

sort of bubbling under the surface that's going to make an

24:25

appearance in 2024 ?

24:26

Yeah , I see a lot of this

24:28

stuff Because of doing the

24:30

your Morning Coffee newsletter and podcast

24:32

. We're constantly looking

24:34

at new technologies and trying out new

24:37

technologies within our business

24:39

. I'll give you a couple of them

24:41

. One I

24:44

would encourage your audience to take a look at BandLab

24:46

. Bandlab is

24:48

a beast . It is sort

24:50

of the place to go for artists

24:53

. It's a community , it's a place

24:56

to learn , it's a place to

24:58

write , collaborate

25:01

. It is just an amazing , amazing

25:03

platform . Bandlab it's

25:05

I think last time

25:07

I read it was like over 60

25:09

million monthly active

25:12

users , which is incredible , and

25:15

it uses all sorts of technologies

25:17

. It uses AI , which is sort of

25:19

the huge buzzword this year artificial

25:22

intelligence but they have a way

25:24

of using it to help you create songs

25:27

, sort of on the fly . So

25:29

I would definitely look at BandLab

25:31

. As

25:33

far as artificial intelligence , it's

25:35

been around for years . I interviewed Martin

25:38

Clancy , who wrote a book about AI and

25:40

music eight years ago . We

25:42

were at the Music Tech Tonics conference five

25:44

years ago and there was a discussion

25:46

about AI and music . We just didn't know

25:48

it was going to come across this

25:50

fast , right ? So

25:53

for people in your audience that

25:55

hear AI , artificial intelligence

25:57

, machine learning , generative

26:00

AI , all these things . I would highly

26:03

recommend that you check out this book

26:06

by Bobby Osinski , called the

26:08

Musician's AI Handbook , because

26:11

Bobby went through and tried all

26:13

of these things and used them . And if you

26:15

don't know Bobby , he's written , I think , 25 books

26:17

on engineering

26:20

, producing the music business

26:22

. I

26:25

looked to Bobby for sort of that cutting edge look

26:28

at what's going on and

26:30

that handbook . We did an

26:32

episode with him where we just sort of broke it

26:34

down how he did it . But it's not

26:37

all just generating lyrics and generating

26:39

music . It could be as simple

26:41

as noise reduction in the studio . It

26:43

could be as simple as mastering . They have a lot of

26:46

AI tools out there and

26:49

they're evolving really quickly . And

26:51

I like to say I like to use this quote

26:53

from my grandfather . He used to say an

26:56

idiot is someone who doesn't

26:58

know what you just found

27:00

out . And that's sort of the music

27:02

industry . Don't feel stupid that you don't know this stuff . It's

27:05

been around like a week and a half , right

27:07

. So just educate yourself

27:09

. And , yeah , check out that

27:12

book . I think it'll

27:15

help you a lot .

27:16

Yeah , excellent resources there . Band Lab I

27:18

have looked at very briefly in the

27:20

past but I didn't realize it's got 60 million users

27:23

. That is a substantial amount

27:25

of people . So

27:27

audience listening do go and check that out . And the

27:29

community and collaborative aspect is amazing as

27:31

well . Bobby Ozinski I'm a huge

27:34

fan of and I have been meaning to

27:36

reach out to him for the podcast . Actually , His

27:38

book , the Mixed Engineers Handbook , is

27:40

my Bible and it has been for many

27:42

, many years so I didn't know he did

27:45

one with AI in mixing . It's new to get

27:47

that . Is that probably

27:49

why , then and I need to go check out that

27:51

episode he was on your podcast with as well , Because

27:53

he , as I say , there's him and Bob

27:55

Katz in mastering . I like two of

27:57

these huge , huge idols of mine

27:59

.

27:59

So not only should the audience

28:02

.

28:02

Exactly exactly . Have you ever encountered

28:04

Bob Katz have ?

28:05

you ever I haven't .

28:06

Not yet .

28:08

I'd like to .

28:08

But yeah , bobby Ozinski , and yeah

28:11

, audience listening go and check that out and I will be

28:13

doing the same as well . It's some great

28:15

resources there , so I think it'd be

28:17

a good opportunity now to maybe talk a bit

28:19

about your morning coffee . So it's

28:22

growing significantly . There's would

28:25

be would be an understatement . Where

28:27

do you envision its impact in the future ? So you

28:29

mentioned a bit about there , how you're trying out new technologies

28:31

and staying at the forefront and introducing that to your

28:33

audience . Yeah , maybe if you could tell our audience

28:35

a bit about the newsletter itself and the

28:37

podcast and where you see it go .

28:39

Thank , you , yeah , it started by

28:42

accident . I'd like to say that I'm you know

28:44

, I had this brilliant plan

28:46

, but it I tripped and fell into

28:48

it . I had worked for

28:50

major labels most of my life

28:52

and I decided to strike out on

28:55

my own and I was trying to figure out what I wanted

28:57

to do . And a friend of mine

28:59

who had left the major label ecosystem

29:02

his name is Sean Rikowski . He was

29:04

the head of sales for ADA , which was part of

29:06

Warner Music Group . They had beggars , a

29:08

pop merge , great , great

29:10

distribution company . Anyway , he

29:13

sent me an email

29:15

and it had like a dozen

29:17

albums that he was listening

29:19

to that were really good . But

29:22

I noticed he copied like 100 or

29:24

200 people on this email and

29:27

so I called him up and I asked him why

29:29

he was doing that and he said that he was

29:31

looking . You know , he had left Warner ADA

29:34

and he was looking for something

29:36

new and he didn't want people to

29:38

forget him and I thought , hmm

29:40

, that's a great idea . So

29:43

what do I love ? I love technology and

29:45

music . I started your morning coffee

29:47

. I saw an email one

29:50

day from I believe it was a Wall Street Journal

29:52

and it was called your morning briefing and I

29:54

thought that's kind of a cool name , so

29:57

I stole that a little bit and called

29:59

it your morning coffee and I

30:01

just started sending it to a couple hundred people in

30:03

my contacts every week , every Friday

30:05

. This started almost , I think , about nine years ago

30:08

and I've never missed a week . And

30:10

then it started to grow and people weren't unsubscribing

30:12

and every time I would speak at a college

30:15

or a conference it would grow and

30:17

it would grow . And then this last

30:19

year , in 2023

30:21

, 2023 , it grew

30:23

73% . I mean it really

30:26

started taking off . And it's a word of mouth

30:28

thing because the music industry , although we're passionate

30:30

about it , it's a niche thing

30:32

, you know . So

30:35

it started to grow and

30:38

you know we've done the podcast . I think we're up to 167

30:44

episodes and

30:47

it's just been a joy . So the newsletter

30:49

drops every Friday and then

30:51

the podcast drops every Monday . We

30:54

recorded over the weekend , mike , Ed chart and I

30:56

, and we just we'll take three

30:58

or four stories that we think are interesting that

31:00

week . And you know , it's

31:02

not that we're the smartest people on

31:04

the planet . We bring in smart people . So

31:07

you know we had some questions

31:09

about Universal taking their music off

31:12

of Tiktok , so we brought in

31:14

an amazing music industry

31:16

attorney , chris Castle , and that will drop

31:18

on Monday , right ? So

31:21

we bring smart people in to help us understand

31:24

what's going on with all

31:26

of these things in the news , and

31:28

it's just , it's just been a joy to

31:30

do so . I'm hoping that it

31:32

grows . But

31:35

what it's really done was

31:37

unexpected and I'm sure this happens

31:39

with your podcast too is that because

31:42

it's out there and people are

31:44

listening or reading ? I

31:47

started getting a few years ago . I started getting

31:49

emails from people who were

31:51

writing those stories that I was covering

31:53

, thanking me for talking about

31:56

their stories . So we started bringing

31:58

some of them on to break down their stories . You

32:00

know Glenn Peebles , steve Knopper , you

32:03

know the folks

32:05

, the fine folks over at Midia . Well

32:07

, you know , then it starts taking on

32:09

this life of its own , and now

32:12

I've got people like some of the top executives

32:14

in the music industry who will reach out

32:16

to me on and off the record and

32:19

talk to me about this newsletter , and

32:21

one of my favorite ones was

32:23

, I don't know , two years ago , maybe

32:25

three years ago , I got a note

32:28

from Bruno Del Granado , who is

32:30

the head of Latin music at CAA

32:32

. He used to manage Ricky Martin

32:34

. I mean he's he knows the Latin

32:36

business better than anybody I know . And

32:39

this is like two , three years ago . He reaches out and

32:41

he says I love your newsletter and podcast , but

32:43

you're not covering Latin music enough . And

32:45

I said , bruno , you know , school

32:48

me , tell me what's going on . So

32:50

we got on the phone , we've had some zooms

32:53

, he's been on the podcast and

32:55

ever since then we follow not

32:57

just bad bunny but how

33:00

Latin music has become . You

33:02

know this beast in the music industry and

33:04

how non-English speaking

33:06

music , according to Luminate , is

33:09

now over indexing . And

33:11

we got that knowledge and

33:14

we got sort of . You know where

33:16

we should be going from , bruno , and

33:18

that that happens with executives across

33:20

touring . You know people

33:22

from live nation ticketmaster

33:24

. You know people from labels who will

33:26

call up and every once in a while we'll

33:29

get something wrong . And we

33:31

had a single music

33:34

on because we were talking about if

33:36

you want to have your music counted

33:38

for the charts and for Luminate , you

33:40

need to have the at venue

33:42

app for live and you need to

33:44

have , you know , shopify . Well

33:46

, our friend from single music

33:48

came on and said , yeah , actually you

33:50

use single music which is

33:53

attached to Shopify . So

33:56

you know we're not perfect , but we

33:58

have this dialogue and this communication going

34:00

with these folks in the music industry and that's where I'd

34:02

like to see it continue to grow

34:05

is to have conversations like this .

34:06

That's amazing . That growth is

34:08

incredible and it's that snowball

34:11

effect you mentioned , isn't it ? You sort of you

34:13

have that one conversation and then it leads on

34:15

to another and then you get people start to reach

34:17

out to you , and I've noticed that this year

34:19

it's a slightly different way with the podcast

34:21

and at the moment I'm focusing on

34:24

sort of answering the audience questions . But the

34:26

more questions I answer on the podcast

34:28

, the more that I'm finding that I'm answering

34:30

, if that makes sense in a weird way , and

34:33

because to begin with it was quite slow to

34:35

getting people to submit questions , but now it just

34:37

seems to snowball on from there . But

34:40

no , that's amazing growth . So that's

34:42

73% in 2023

34:45

. Do you attribute

34:47

that to sort of just word of mouth , people sharing

34:49

, or was there something , an event

34:51

or something that you ran in 2023 that helped

34:53

that ?

34:54

Yeah , I watched the data very

34:56

, very closely and one

34:59

of the things that I didn't

35:02

do on purpose but I learned really

35:04

helped grow the audience is when

35:06

I cover something in the newsletter , I

35:08

always copy the

35:11

author of that article and

35:13

say , hey , we talked about your

35:15

thing and sometimes they

35:18

will post that , especially with the podcast

35:20

. They'll say , oh , they covered my piece

35:22

on the your morning coffee podcast and

35:24

again , it wasn't meant to

35:26

grow the audience but

35:29

it really did . And then two other things . One

35:32

is speaking at colleges , which I do

35:34

a lot . I get a lot of

35:36

students that subscribe after I speak

35:38

at a college . And then the other

35:40

thing that sounds kind of obvious is

35:43

when I bring guests on that

35:46

have a large following , I

35:49

see my number spike , like I have

35:51

. Will Page . We've had him on

35:53

several times . We dropped an episode

35:55

just a couple of days ago . Will Page

35:57

used to be Spotify's chief economist

35:59

. He's written the book Pivot

36:02

. He is

36:04

well . He posted an article

36:06

recently called SoundCloud

36:09

Rockonomics , which is the second

36:11

of a series . He did one called Twitch's Rockonomics

36:13

and , with the help of

36:15

some smart people , he digs

36:18

deep into what are the economics

36:20

of SoundCloud . Well , we

36:22

had him on to explain it to

36:25

us and he's got a large

36:27

following . They start following

36:29

us . It's happened we had Merk Merkariatus

36:32

from Hypnosis on and our number spiked

36:34

. We had trying

36:36

to remember some of them . There's been so many

36:38

of these people who have come on Richard

36:41

Kramer from the Bubble Trouble podcast

36:43

. We

36:46

had the folks Jamie from Luminate

36:48

come on and break down their

36:51

mid-year report . So again

36:53

, we don't do that to grow

36:55

our audience . We do that because they're

36:58

great guests and it fits our

37:00

format , but it grows

37:02

our audience .

37:03

I remember I think I remember having that conversation

37:05

via email with you about the reach

37:07

out and reference . If

37:10

you do include somebody's , if

37:12

you reference somebody's work in

37:14

your podcast or newsletters , to reach out and

37:16

let them know I do remember that rings a bell now and

37:19

the guests with a large following . There is one

37:21

question off the back of that the conversation

37:24

do you have a conversation with them around

37:26

sort of will you

37:28

promote this for me or is it

37:30

sort of like an unwritten , not

37:32

ruled , but something that kind of like okay

37:35

, you're on the podcast .

37:36

Yeah , it's the latter , not the former

37:38

. I don't require anyone to share

37:40

or post anything , but when

37:43

I cover them in the newsletter or

37:45

when they appear on the podcast , I

37:47

always send them the

37:50

description of the podcast and a link

37:52

and an image . And I don't even mention

37:55

share typically , unless

37:57

it's a friend of mine , and

38:00

I would say nine

38:02

times out of 10 , they're

38:04

very generous about posting

38:07

it . I wanted to mention one other

38:09

thing that really helped our numbers is there

38:11

was a book that came out last year

38:13

called Key Changes

38:16

and it was

38:18

by Bill

38:20

Rosenblatt and Howie Singer from

38:23

NYU and it is the best

38:26

. It's just the best book I've read on the music

38:28

industry , because our business is built

38:30

on disruption . Right , and

38:33

we try to avoid disruption . But

38:35

every time a technology comes

38:37

along and it doesn't have to be , you know , mp3

38:40

downloads or streaming , you

38:42

know , or short form video , it could be

38:44

just less Paul electrifying

38:46

the guitar , you know it could be anything

38:50

. And what Bill and Howie

38:52

have done is they've not only put all

38:54

of these disruptions together , but

38:56

then but they have sort of a how did we get

38:58

here A history of the music

39:00

industry , and I

39:02

just absolutely love that book . I

39:05

had them on the podcast a couple of times and

39:08

not only did our numbers spike

39:10

, but I got people who

39:12

hadn't heard our podcast before

39:14

say , hey , you know , howie and Bill

39:16

posted this . I saw this . This

39:20

is what I need to listen to or read

39:22

, because they deal with a lot of students . So

39:25

, yeah , you know you don't have to be

39:27

too silly about it , but , like

39:29

with your podcast or any of your listeners

39:31

viewers , if they are

39:33

, you know , doing something creative

39:36

, collaborate with other people and

39:38

it'll grow your base 100%

39:41

and wise words

39:43

.

39:43

And I've noticed that , having done the podcast now for

39:45

three years and getting the audience involved

39:48

and the artists that I interviewed it

39:50

primarily started out interviewing artists and

39:52

then in the last sort of 18 months I've moved

39:54

more towards other podcasters and

39:56

sort of these professional audio engineers and I

39:59

have noticed , yeah , the

40:01

snowball effect off the back of that , that hockey

40:04

stick curve , if you will

40:06

, with interest , which is , I don't like to

40:08

get hung up on it but it is quite nice to see . I won't lie .

40:11

Because I like you , I'm very much

40:13

metrics driven .

40:14

I like to look at metrics and

40:17

it's interesting . So , closing

40:19

thoughts , jay , because I realized we're approaching

40:22

the 40 minute mark , if you could

40:24

leave our listeners with one piece of advice

40:26

or key takeaway for

40:28

navigating sort of the

40:30

music release strategy right now , what

40:33

would your key piece of advice be ?

40:34

Well , there's a couple of quick things . One

40:37

is like I don't know if you can see my coffee mug

40:39

, but it says a playlist is not a

40:41

marketing plan , and

40:44

we stress that a lot . Don't

40:47

chase streams . What you need

40:49

to focus on is not only audience

40:51

growth , you know finding

40:53

those fans , because no matter

40:55

what kind of music you play whether it's reggae

40:58

, heavy metal , jet , whatever it

41:00

is there's an audience out there for

41:02

it , right ? So that

41:05

is crucial . Don't go chasing streams

41:08

and vanity numbers on

41:10

socials . I would

41:12

rather have a thousand

41:14

views of a video that has a thousand

41:16

comments than a million views

41:19

and no comments . I want

41:21

a smaller group of passionate super

41:24

fans . You know . That's probably

41:26

the main takeaway , and I'll

41:28

leave your listeners with this

41:30

great quote that I use

41:32

a lot because it's so perfect

41:34

for the new music industry . My

41:37

friend , jonathan Daniel , runs a company

41:39

called Crush Management and if

41:41

you haven't heard of Jonathan Daniel , his company

41:43

manages Miley Cyrus , sia

41:46

, green Day , panic at the Disco Train

41:48

. I mean , they're a beast , right

41:51

. So Jonathan has

41:53

this great quote that I stole from him . He

41:56

said if you give me

41:58

a great song , my job

42:00

is easy . You give me a good

42:02

song , my job is impossible

42:04

. And that's

42:07

the music industry today . You

42:10

rise above the clutter , you're alongside

42:12

of all of your favorite artists on all of these

42:15

digital service providers . You

42:17

start with a great song . Don't

42:20

start with a good song . Start with a great song

42:22

. Right and focus and put your

42:24

focus , all of your focus , into

42:26

writing , recording and performing

42:28

great songs . The

42:30

rest will follow .

42:31

Amazing . I think that's a fantastic way

42:34

to leave the episode there with that

42:36

advice . Absolutely brilliant stuff . Jay

42:39

, it's been a pleasure catching up with you

42:41

today . As I mentioned at the beginning , it's taken

42:43

a few months for me to for

42:46

us to get to this place , so it's been absolutely brilliant

42:48

, and I love these discussions surrounding

42:51

the music industry and I

42:53

know the audience are gonna get loads out of it . So , yeah

42:55

, a huge , huge thank you . Thank you

42:57

very much .