Transcription
So, is this the best or the worst time to be an artist? It's both. It's both.
A million views today is like a thousand views in 2015. My sister accidentally got a million views and called me like, "What do I do?" I'm like, "Yo, nothing."
When I was coming up, you shot one music video and hopefully that music video did really well. Now, it's like, take that song and shoot 75 reels to it.
Bro, you're still making music. You're still managing successful artists. How do you do it all? I have whiteboards for everything. There's a Revenue Stream whiteboard. There's a Michael Manelli whiteboard. I think at the root of it, every artist has the same dream. I want to live off of my music.
On this episode of the One More Time Podcast, we're joined by Futuristic, an artist, a manager, a CEO who's literally turned millions of views into millions of dollars. Back in 2015, one viral video, Nerd Raps in Compton, took him from tiny little shows to selling out bigger venues to making $60,000 a week off a single song and eventually building a thriving and lucrative independent career. Back then, a million views changed his life. Now, a million views is what your little cousin accidentally does on Tik Tok.
In this episode, we get into how it's both the best and the worst time to be an independent artist, how to actually capitalize on a viral moment, the systems and whiteboards he uses to keep moving, and real strategies for turning attention into actual money. Cash, moola, cheddar. If you loved our Nick D episode for the content and execution sauce, or the L Russell episode for the high-level business game, this one sits right in the middle and it's a banger.
And now for the full conversation with the one and only Futuristic.
So, is this the best or the worst time to be an artist? Cuz I feel like I hear like arguments for both sometimes. I have my own opinions, but like I want to just get, you know, uh, yours right off the bat.
Yeah. Best or worst time to be an artist? It's both.
Kind of how I feel, too, though. I mean, I get it.
There's no there's no right answer because it's easier to have a moment but it's harder to maintain that moment and it's harder to monetize that moment like we used to because I mean just to jump into it you asked me about finances or whatever but like I always go back into when I popped off in 2015 1 million views changed my life and made me a millionaire where now everyone's cousin has a Tik Tok with a million views. Do some grandpa got a million views. You know what I'm saying? It's just like a million views doesn't mean anything. A million views today is like a,000 views in 2015 where it's like anybody can get a million views. My sister accidentally got a million views and called me like what do I do? I'm like yo nothing.
You don't do anything. Go back to your job is what you did.
Inflation has really hit everything. It's ins.
Yeah. Yeah. So I would say like it's dope because it's easier. Everything's easier, right? Like you could film videos on your phone, you know, you could social media is just like you can go viral, but as far as like really building a fan base, sustaining, maintaining, and getting paid off of it, you really really got to do 10 times the work. Because when I was coming up, content didn't exist. It was you shot one music video and hopefully that music video did really well and that was the promotion to your song. You shot one piece of content, it was a music video in 200 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. And you hope that blogs picked it up, and you hope that people saw it on YouTube, and now it's like, yeah, no, take that song and shoot 75 reels to it.
I mean, yeah, we just interviewed uh the SVP of marketing uh at Create Music Group, a guy named Chris Hirs. He's been in the, you know, system for uh two decades. He started off at RCA Records, I think, and he was talking about how they used to spend a million dollars on a Christina Aguilera music video,
And beg MTV to play it for free.
Exactly.
That was the model.
But just in general, like now that just doesn't happen. Even at the major labels, they're not spending a million dollars on a music video. Like, no shot.
Absolutely not.
That's crazy. Yeah. Yeah. I figured that's what you're going to say. So, another thing I wanted to make sure I got your, you know, opinion on is I feel like the term independent artist gets very like loosely thrown around and I myself feel like there's different buckets of indie artists. Um, I want to get your take like how do you define an independent artist?
I mean independent artist is anybody that's not signed to a label. But even in that regard, it's kind of crazy cuz I feel like there's artists that are signed to labels that still call themselves independent artists if they're not on majors.
That's what I mean. Like there's cuz there's indie labels. So like that already, you know, disproves your definition. So
Yeah, there's so many indie labels. Like there's definitely is just tears. There's the there's the guy who shoots all his content in the bedroom that records himself, mixes masters, makes the cover art, does everything himself. Like that's as indie as it gets, right?
And then you start to get a little traction and now maybe you have a manager and then now maybe you have social media person now maybe you have an indie deal. But yeah, most people are are signing indie deals and getting even getting advances and having a team but they're still independent artists if they're not on Universal Republic, Atlantic, Sony um on the major scale. Like basically if you're not Cardi B, JCole or Drake at this point, you're still claiming you're an indie artist.
Yeah. Well, and I feel like
Definition is different.
Yeah. And I feel like some people define it as like, you know, master ownership, right? And but then it's like but some of those people literally have distribution deals with major label distributors. So it's like they're distributed through a major but they're indie because the major doesn't, you know, own any of the records. They're just participating in the distribution of the records and obviously royalties from that. So I don't know, man. I just like feel like it's a messed up term at this point. I like to think it's more about like what level of work are you having to put in yourself? You know, do you have a machine that is doing a lot of the heavy lifting for you? I think that makes you a little less independent. Whereas
The crazy thing is I I think why why the uh definition has changed a little bit too is because when people do sign, they're still expected to do everything themselves for the most part until something pops. So, what I've noticed is like, you know, I've managed a lot of artists that have signed deals and at no part were we like, "Yeah, let's announce our deal and let's let's, you know, it's like no, they still wanted to claim independence." And even within that label structure where there might be an advance, where there might be a marketing team, the marketing team is calling us and asking us what we want to do and then we're doing it and then they're just spending money where they feel like they should spend the money to market what we've already done as the independent team. So I think that even when people have the machine, the machine ain't really machining, you
So yeah, it's very it's very tough. Everybody that signs still feels like they're independent because it's not what it used to be in any regard.
Yeah. Honestly, the clip that we just posted from the from the L Russ Russell interview, someone in the comments had a very good point about like even if you're indie and then you get signed, nine times out of 10, you're going to have to continue to do all the work basically from like at least a social media content creation, marketing perspective that you were doing pre getting signed. Like none of that really falls off of your plate, you know what I mean? Which is super frustrating if I'm being honest.
They expand what you're doing. They clearly have an infrastructure and people, you know, globally, if you're with a major that can add fuel to your fire, but
But it doesn't actually take anything away. It's like you have to keep doing what you were doing. They just can do more. But it's like you still have to do exactly the same amount of work. I mean, ideally, right, that you were doing cuz that's what got you to the point
Have to do all all the same work. It's just a matter of like once you hit a certain threshold now, they can open up the doors to get you to the next level, right? They can get you the looks that you want to get. They can pay the publicist to get you on every platform. They can pay now for clipping and have everybody talking about you. They can get you on radio. They can get you TV appearances. They can get you on Kaisenat's live stream. Things that you might not be able to do yourself. But most of those things you still can do yourself. It's just you need an influx of money and you need an influx of resources and the right people to believe in you that have those connections. So, there's actually been a lot of people that have left major labels that are now servicing indie artists and taking them to those levels. Um, but I think no matter what, there'll always be a little bit of an of a monopoly to get to the top tier. And these artists that you see at that top tier, a lot of them do have old label people that have left labels to now work for them.
So, you're such an interesting like case study, man, if I'm being honest, right? Because you you mentioned already kind of alluding to the fact that you've managed artists. You still do manage artists today, right?
Yeah. So, you you manage artists, you are yourself an artist. You are involved and like have started, you know, other companies and businesses, right? Um I I you know, I just I'm trying to understand like how do you really characterize yourself, right? Like if someone asks you like what you do, you know what I mean? Cuz it's like if you're just an artist, it's very easy like you're at like a dinner party to be like, "Yeah, I'm an artist." But it's like how do you even self-describe like what you got going on?
What room I'm in, right? Like I just I just got back from Hawaii where I was managing my artist Michael Minnelli.
Love him. Oh my gosh.
Yeah. So, anytime somebody asks me like, "What do you do?" I'm like, "Yeah, I manage this guy." You know, so that's my answer for the for the five days I was there. And it's always interesting because the people that know me know me and the people that don't don't. So, as I'm like taking pictures for him at his meet and greet and taking pictures of all these fans with him and stuff and selling merch and doing whatever else, people are coming up to me and asking me for pictures. And then the people that don't know me are like, "Why are they taking pictures with the camera guy? Why are they taking pictures with the merch guys?"
That is messed up amazing. The picture in my head is beautiful right now.
Yeah. It's a very interesting dynamic, but I think for me it's like when you can remove the ego from things, you can do anything you want. Do you think do you think artists should like most artists should have some other aspect beyond just making music and releasing it?
Not necessarily. I think that the reason why I was able to blow up was because of my business brain. Um, and because of like the ability to try new things and not feel weird about it and not feel corny or whatever anybody may say, right? Like at the time the things that I was doing hadn't been done before. Like when I blew up off doing nerd raps in Compton, like that was the first rap prank. And a lot I remember I was talking to labels and telling them that this is what I want to do and they're like, no, that's not cool. That won't work. And then I'm like, okay, stupid. Why? And then
Now they got egg on their face,
You know? And then I'm like, yo, cuz I realized early on YouTubers at that time they were Vine stars. Like I was there was Vine stars that were getting a lot of views and then they started to convert to YouTube and I started realizing like yo these YouTubers are getting more views than rappers even the biggest rappers in the world. So I'm like how can I it's a way easier to try to be cool with a YouTuber than two chains. So let me start hitting these YouTubers and try to infiltrate that world. And then that's when everything blew up and the labels didn't get it. And then even after I had the case study of making a lot of money doing it and a lot of sales and a lot of fans doing it, I presented them like, "Okay, my next album is going to be called As Seen on the Internet and every video is going to have all these famous YouTubers. I'm chilling with Logan Paul every day and Jake Paul and Amanda Cerny and King Batch and all these huge people." I'm like, "Look at the numbers." And they're like, "No, we want to get you a feature with Wall and Waka Flocka." And I'm like, "You guys don't get it." You know? So, um, yeah, I think it's just to do other things, I guess, to go back, right? To do other things, you have to kind of be, you have to have the open mind to do it. You have to know what your skill set is, and you have to think about what you want for your actual real life. And I think for me, I always helped artists from the beginning of my career. Before I was anybody, I was throwing local showcases. I was booking bigger artists to come out here and I was opening up for them. I was putting my homie Devon on or I was helping Kyle's manager submit to blogs in 2010 and 11, you know? So, like I've been always helping other artists and being able to remove my ego and see when another artist is dope and is probably going to be bigger than me and just be like, "Let me help you get there." Um, but for some people who are meant to be superstars and are meant to, you know, and they love that lifestyle and that's what they want to do, then do it. I think any decision that you make should be based off what makes you happy. And so for me, I think that my life is just kind of I've had these really cool seasons of my life that have led me into the next season of what I wanted to do. So I knew when I wanted to stop touring. I knew when I didn't want to be famous. I knew what I wanted to do next. So it allowed my decision-making to be easy to kind of like shift lanes and use what I created as a case study to help others. Um, but I don't think every artist should do that because you'll spread yourself thin if that's not what you want to do. If that's not the goal, cuz there's no real such thing as a side hustle. Everything takes a lot of time to make it be great. Your side hustle, if you give it too much time, will become your main hustle. And then the thing that was your main hustle will now be the side hustle, which is where I'm at. Music is a side hustle, and educating is my main thing.
So, you got to be careful with that. And if your goal is to continue to get bigger as an artist, then you should present yourself as an artist and only be an artist.
But how do you do it all? Right? Because yeah, music's your side hustle, but like, bro, you're still making music that still is streaming and selling and people are tapping into it. You're still managing successful artists that have a lot going on. You're still launching universities, like membership universities to educate and empower indie art. Yeah. Like how do you do it all? Cuz I think a lot of artists that are just doing artist, they have a lot going on. They get overwhelmed just with that.
Yeah. You got to make the music. You got to shoot the content. You got to do the admin stuff. Register your song. You got like how do you give us some sauce, bro? About like how you manage it all.
Uh I live off of my to-do list.
Okay.
I'll say that. Like I have a to-do list that every week I'm old school. Like, well, here I'll even kind of I don't Oh, I'm moving my It's It's on the camera, so I can't do it. I have whiteboards for everything. Every
There's literally a whiteboard here of like there's a revenue stream whiteboard, there's a Michael Manelli whiteboard, there's an Indie Amplify whiteboard, there's a release schedule whiteboard, there's a daily posting whiteboard, right?
A lot of whiteboards, bro.
Send us pictures of those.
Yes. So, we can pop them up right now.
Yeah, I I'll send those. Um, and then I have like my to-do list where it's like all the companies and the to-dos for that company. And um, I just live off of that and I go through I go through thing by thing. It's like as the boss, if other people have to go do work for you, you check in with them in the morning and you send them on their way to go do their work. And then anything that takes me just a little bit of time, like, oh, this is a 10-minute job. Bang out all my 10-minute jobs. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Go down the list. Right? And then when it's if it's a thing that requires me to like sit down and think or like an overarching idea of how I'mma do what or you know it's like let me go to my whiteboard and turn into you know DD and Dexter real quick and figure this out. Um but yeah, it's really just I think people waste a lot of time in their day. Long story short, people waste so much time. And I think once I had kids, I started to value my time so much that everything is micro focused time block where it's like I'm not taking meetings before this time. I'm not doing this at this time. I'm turning my phone off at this time and I'm I'm laser focused at this time. And then two, it's like batch recording. Find what works for you. For example, like the step to the mic series, we shoot 15 of those in a day. Totally. you know, so it's like
You have to figure out, you have to get ahead of yourself. You have to plan your work and work your plan. You know, that's that's one of my favorite quotes. Plan your work and work your plan. And if you do that, and if you batch film everything and you set your day up for success, you'll win. I think people like frown upon scheduled creativity, but for me, scheduled creativity is better than just leaving every door open and whatever floats in can come in. It's like, no, I have boundaries of this is when I'm doing this. Leave me alone.
I think boundaries force you to get more creative. I almost think it's harder to be creative when you could do it anytime with any tool. It's It's tough. But um I I wanted to add a little gem onto that from my dad. I want to pass this one along. He shared
Jim Jim's coming in the episode.
Jimbo's making the episode.
Let's go Jimbo.
He shared a book with me called Eat That Frog. And basically the core concept of it is every day you wake up and there's typically one very daunting task, right? There's one thing. It's like
The probably the most important thing you need to do today. It's probably the hardest thing. Might take the most time. And it's the one that we typically put off the longest. And people that can train their brains to wake up and just eat that frog, right? It's it's do the thing you don't want to do first, like get it out of the way, get it done, take just bite the head off. Um these people end up being like a lot more successful. So great book. I recommend checking that out.
Yeah. And honestly, man, I'm I'm so glad you said the thing about, you know, having kids because I feel like you've asked me so many times, how do I stay as productive as I am? Cuz I've got a lot going on, including two young children, 2 years old and three and a half
In a job.
Yeah. In a day in a full-time day job. And it's like, you know, just a lot of stuff going on. And I think it's it really does help you, man, like to just stay focused because it's like you these are people that rely on you. Like you can't not be I mean you can if you're a dead beatat but like if you're trying to be a good dad like you have to be there. So then if you want to do these other things like it almost does really like force you into that like super efficient mode where it's like I'm good systems. You got to have systems in place and I think that's where you excel a lot. You guys you seem like you have a lot of systems in place that just help everything run smooth.
No for sure. I mean even look at like a like a Connor Price and a Nick D. It's like both of them have kids and they're crushing, right? I would imagine they have crazy systems in place of how they're getting down, you know. So
Yeah. So, with the with the Nerd Raps and Compton uh series, that was your first time going stupid viral, correct?
Correct.
Okay. And so, was that a planned thing? Did you expect it to work or like Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah. No, we knew it was going to work. Um
Okay.
So, basically, I saw this dude YouTuber and I realized he lived in Arizona. this dude named Big Daws. And I think at that time he had like 800,000 subscribers. I saw him on the news eating junk food at the gym. And I'm like, that's the gym I go to. I need to hit this dude up. I hit him up. He was already a fan. So, we just linked and started working. Right. So, there was two pranks that came before that, but neither of them were music related. I did one called awkwardly staring at strangers. Very awkward.
Sounds horrible.
It was the worst. But I'm like, bro, how do you do this? But he dropped it on his channel and he put my YouTube he put my music video at the end of it.
My music video skyrocketed and I'm like, "Oh, imagine if we can flip this into rap. Like this will be crazy." So, um, yeah, we did that two times and I just saw the growth when he posted my video at the end. So then we knew that like if we did a rap based one, it would go crazy. And so we held it. We held it until I went on tour and he was very anxious to put it out. I'm like, "Do not." Uh, we held it. Um, and actually a girl leaked it. One of the girls I wrapped to leaked it and it went viral on Facebook and the song wasn't out and I'm I'm cursing Facebook out. She doesn't have permission.
Get it out of here.
So, we knew that it was going to go viral. Um, so we dropped it the first day of my tour and so I posted it. And one other thing that happened was I realized that Facebook was promoting they just launched video. This is how old I am, right? They just launched video for the first time where you could upload video and they were prioritizing it. So he posted the YouTube link and I said, "Yo, tomorrow just upload the video. Don't upload the YouTube link, upload the video." Which was like very frowned upon cuz of course they make their money on YouTube.
Yeah. He was not about that.
Do that. And I'm like just do it, bro. And I did the same thing on mine. And so I posted it in the hotel room. I kid you not, this is my first show of the tour. I posted it in the hotel room. By the time I got to the venue, it had like 30,000 likes, 15-minute car ride. And I'm like, "Oh yeah, we're up over with." And so, yeah, posted in the hotel room, get to the venue, and I'm just at soundcheck like, you know, rapping and just watching these views roll in and knowing that like my life is about to change. And every single show that was at like 50 tickets, 250, 300 tickets, like in the matter of days, you know, and like from a money standpoint, it was like that song made $60,000 because people like that week because people were buying the single.
So it was iTunes days. So people are buying the single and not only that, they're buying all my other songs. So one thing that I always tell everybody is like, yo, like for a lot of people that was an intro to me, but I already had three albums out. I had already been touring for two, three years, four years. So your content is like Netflix where people want to binge watch it. So once that came out, I had three songs in the top 10 on iTunes for months and months after that. And then, you know, the pre-order for my album went out the next week. And then the album comes out and it sells mad copies. And so it was just like this crazy snowball effect of this one video that tied into everything. and we were ready to capitalize. That's why I told him, "Hold off until the song is mixed and mastered and on iTunes. Let's drop the music video and the prank the same day and link them both together." So, if you look, they're both at almost like the exact same play count. It's like 30 million views for this video, 30 million views for this video. And then the virality of like everybody else posting it, Lil Wayne and all these different people, World Star. So, yeah, it was a crazy thing, but we knew we knew that that was going to be the moment.
So, we did an episode recently kind of talking about like how to react to going viral and it and I feel like you were very strategic even back then, right? Um, about like, no, no, no, I need this that I know is going to work to be posted in conjunction with me starting to tour and then you already to your point like had the pre-order for the next thing ready. So, like when you're working with not only your own artistry, right, for yourself, but then also when you're managing, you know, you know, Michael Minnelli or whoever else you're working with, how do you recommend they maximize like viral moments? Because I know you said like your cousin or sister or whatever went viral and like, yeah, everyone can go viral, but if you do go viral, it is still like an opportunity, right? Like let's don't downplay the fact that like especially if you go viral for the right reason and like your song is in it and it's like a it's tied to your music like it can make a little bit of you know momentum spark right so how can people properly react to that cuz you know we had some ideas around it but I want to get your take too
Going viral or just reacting to viral?
I think if you go viral right because that's a you know how to go viral as a whole maybe we can dive into that too but yeah this is more like all right I posted this saying it's going crazy like what should I either have already had in place or what can I now scramble to do to
How do we avoid being one of those, you know viral g you know today gone tomorrow type people that we see all the time now?
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Yeah, it's the easiest and hardest thing to do as a creator is drop everything and do the same thing over and over again. It's not that complicated. If you if you go viral doing one thing, this is where everybody messes up. They go viral doing something and they're like, "Oh, I'm gonna throw all my other stuff at this. I'm gonna make something way better than this and people are going to love that." No, they're not. They're not going to love that. They're going to hate it. They're going to want you to do exactly what they saw you do the first time for 10 more times, 15 more times. In Michael Minnelli's case, 200 more times.
Yes. And that's a great segment. I I just got I'm very passionate about this cuz I just yelled at one of my homies who just had a viral moment the other day and I said, "Dude, don't do anything else. Just do this. Upload it now. Who cares?" Like, schedule it for 3 days from now. Upload it now. Make 10 more pieces of content exactly the same to the same thing and do it over and over again. And then the next song you release, it was a cover. The next thing you It better be a cover. He covered a Disney song. cover another Disney song and cover another Disney song and cover another Disney song and when you drop your original music, whatever content you you're gonna go try to shoot a big crazy music video. Don't make your original song have the same feel as your cover and roll it out just like you would roll out your cover in the same style format. Don't switch until everything literally falls off until the ride it till the wheels fall off.
And did he fight you? Did he fight you on it? We're we're probably six days removed and he hasn't done anything that I told him.
Oh no.
God damn it, bro.
Right now. I'm not gonna say your name, but I'm yelling at you. When you see this interview, I'm going to tag you in it.
We'll clip this and we'll all DM. You tell us who it is off camera. We'll DM it to him as well.
Damn it, man. Because it's this We've had it happen.
Yeah, 100%.
We went viral on TikTok for drafting rappers. Okay. We drafted our favorite Atlanta rappers first. We did the same thing. Drafted our favorite New York rappers, went millions of views. Drafted our favorite Chicago rappers, millions of views. Female rappers, old rappers, young rappers, short rappers, tall rappers, fat rappers, skinny rappers, whatever the version of it. We did it and it all worked. It literally all we could not miss, bro. And but I get it kind of from like the creative standpoint. Like it it feels not creative, but I almost think like get creative to figure out how you can like put a slight spin on this already proven to work thing, right? Cuz I mean
What you do, you make it its own thing.
Yes.
That's what we did with with Michael Minnelli, right? That's like it was he did a thing and then now it's a show. It's a series. So Michael Minnelli can be Michael Minnelli, but his series is Step to the Mic. So while he doesn't want that to be his whole brand identity as an artist, well now it's its own identity is the Step to the Mic show where that's the only thing the Step to the Mic show posts. And his Step to the Mic show has I want to say 800,000 followers on TikTok in less than 3 months.
Oh my god.
The fourth video got 30 million views.
Oh my god. So
Yeah,
It's like another thing too is people don't realize all these platforms incentivize new creators because they want to get them hooked. So if you have something that's gold and you start a new page, all that's going to happen is Tik Tok is going to boost it. So if you create this thing that worked for you and you don't want that to be your brand identity, then make it its own identity. Do it over and over again there. And if you want to collab post it with your page, you can. But realistically, it living on its own thing could crush. Or you flip it where like, yo, okay, we really wanted to do this podcast, but like yo, rap drafts is our thing. So the page that you got known for as rap drafts, just make that rap drafts and then switch the make a new page for
We did that.
We literally did that, dude. You're so I'm so glad we just got reassurance.
Yeah, that makes me feel way better.
And the other thing that we were thinking about Oh, that just connected with us on a deep level, you know?
Yeah, we're here. Well, we can just hint at it. We're launching a new series. It may or may not even be out actually by the time that this is dropping. If it is, go watch that. We're going to put in the description, but um but yeah, I mean, you know, we think it should also be kind of its own thing just because like it doesn't exactly,
You know, we don't want it to be the main thing on this, right? This is all about like how to kind of further your music careers and that's just like a little bit, you know, different, right? Um, but how hard was it
For not only maybe you, but also like even just using Michael as an example, I feel like a lot of artists are scared to have the new thing be the main thing.
Yeah. What if that gets bigger than me?
Exactly. And is that does it go back to just ego?
That's just your ego.
Yeah.
That's what I think too.
It's really It's really just your ego because if I think at the root of it, every artist has the same dream. I want to live off of my music. Period. At the root of it, that's every artist's dream. Sure, you you might want to win Grammys, you might want to do this, you might want to do that. I think at the root of it, the first thing that every artist wants to do is live off their dream. So, if this thing can get you there, it could either end up being the thing that stays with you forever, or it could be the thing that boosted you into that next season of life. And it's your job to either keep doing it or not. But it's it's an egodriven decision or it's a goal- driven decision, right? If if if you really don't want that. I was there the day. Talk about So Justina Valentine from Wild and Out, right?
Justina Valentine used to open up for me every tour I did. This is once again back 2012, 13, 14. Um, not to put her business out there, I think she actually bought on. She paid to be on the tours back then. Sure.
Um, some of them until
Statute of limitations at this point. I mean, you know, you can you can say it. It's been over over 10 years. So,
I remember having the conversation with her because one of our homies was on Wild and Out and invited us to go and she went and her whole thing was I don't want to be known as the Wild and Out girl. She almost did an audition and it's like, yo,
No matter what, you getting on TV is going to get more people to listen to your music than not.
You don't go and do Wild and Out, you're going to be in the same place, right? you go do Wild and Out, it can either be a season where you're on there and hopefully it brought people to your music or it could be forever, you know? And I think that even that like look at the people that do American Idol. They do American Idol and a lot of them come back and completely fall off, right? Others take it to the max. Her she's still on Wild and Out 12, 13 years later, longest female running castmate and her main identity is not being an artist, but her music does get more streams than it used to get. and she does make a lot more money now. So, it's just like when you could flip that switch and be like, "Okay, cool. I'm touring." You're doing all the same things you would have done just in a different light. And maybe that was God's plan for you the entire time.
You just had to get there.
I think one of your biggest strengths and something I wish more artists have is like you genuinely don't give a [expletive] what people think about you. And I think that is so power. I'm just like trying to think some of our like cool rapper friends.
Oh my god. So many come to mind.
Trying to pitch to them like go be like go pretend to be a nerd and rap in front of people and how immediately like shut down that would be like
I mean is that something you're born with? Like is it something people should try and get more out of their comfort zone? I really think comfort zones are hurting people out here. Or do they just need to be okay with? Cuz like one friend of ours in particular who I think you probably know who I'm thinking of.
Same one. Uh yeah, he he he's okay with he almost like accepts that like he knows if he posted more content and did certain things. He like knows he would be bigger andor knows that more people would listen to his music, which is obviously his goal. So it's like he knows that it would, but then he still doesn't. I don't really I just it doesn't make any sense to me to be honest.
It's a fear of failure and a fear of rejection and a fear of not looking cool. It's like, yo, I have a homie who's really, really cool. We play basketball together.
Got a cool homie.
Will not play defense because he's so scared to get crossed. He's so scared for somebody to make a three in his face and look stupid. I'm like, we're going to look real stupid when we lose the game. Play defense, bro. Put your hand up. And And especially this younger generation, like my little brother, another basketball reference, I spotted him like eight or nine points in a game to 11. And then I played very very intensely. And he's like, "Man, I hate you. You're a tryh hard." And it's like, "Yeah, I'm going to try hard. I'm trying to beat you. There's there's something on the line here. I'm trying to get somewhere." So, at the end of the day, I'm a tryhard. However hard I got to try, whatever I got to do to get there that doesn't compromise my morals, I'm going to do it. I'm going to try it. And I'm going to try it for a long enough time to actually have a real case study of if it works or not. Your homie, tag him in this, too. Your homie is egotistical or insecure. One of the one of the two, dog. Like,
Which one do you think it is?
Scared little call. Little be scared to fail. You can't be You can't be scared to fail and you can't be scared to be judged. Another bro, people hated Jesus. People hate People say Eminem sucks.
Yeah.
No matter what you do, people are going to
What's that about? What is that about? What's up with all the Eminem hate, bro?
He's big and if you're if you're big, anyone that gets big enough is going to have people.
No matter how cool you are, people are going to hate you at a certain point. So why
People hate Gandhi? Like what the hell wrong with you?
So just just jump out, bro. Get out, like you said, get out your comfort zone. Try new things. Obviously, don't do things that don't align with who you are.
You have to do something new. If if it's the definition of insanity. If you want a different result and you keep doing the same thing, it's that's literally the definition of insanity, doing the same thing and expecting a different result. So, you have to go do something different.
Yeah. See, for me, it's always like people know that we're like the content guys. Like, we do think content is a very effective tool to get your music heard. Like, we do think that and to grow a fan base. So, you know, all cards on the table. We're those guys. We do think that. But like none of us have ever said like do something that like you don't support. But it's like I don't think you're trying hard enough. If there's there's no version of content that you think is cool,
There's nothing you want to share.
There's nothing that you like.
If you only like rapping, just rap.
Exactly.
In studio,
Just look cool and rap. Like that's still content. Like
Yeah.
I don't know, man. So literally look look cool and rap and do it very well. I had a combo on in my university the other day. Like one thing I do is I'll go through everybody's reels in their content and try to identify which one even if like all your reels have 200 views but this one has 500, right? Why does this one have 500 and all your other ones have 200? And weirdly the thing with him, he doesn't look cool when he moves too much. He's very good at standing still and rapping and like just having a face, right? But anytime he walks, it gets less views. Well, you look goofy walking. So just stand there and look cool and rap. More views every time. Every single time it did better. So like it could be something that's that small of a tweak is like, "Yo, your walk is a little a little peculiar, sir."
How did he how did he respond to that?
He was like, "Yo, no way, dog." He's like a very lyrical dude. And I'm like, I'm like, dog, I'm scrolling through your page. When you walk, I hate it, bro. When you stand here, when you stand here and it's framed up and it's just a slow zoom, like the friend is a great example, right? When the friend just stands there and it zooms in.
Cota might have a funny walk.
I was about to say, does Kota walk funny, bro? We'd still love to have you on.
The podcast. Big fan. He'll be sitting down.
"Yeah."
"Just don't move on the pod."
"It's all branding. That's your brand. You look cooler doing that than doing that."
Me, somebody who's animated or like my artist Pertinence when I was managing him.
"I love Pertinence, dude."
"I love Pery, bro."
"He's great."
"And and look how animated he is."
"Oh, he like skips and hops and [ __ ]"
[laughter]
"Right. It doesn't look as cool if he just stands there necessarily. Look better when he moves."
"Yeah. What is it? Cuz he's like so lanky or something. I don't know what it is."
"Just tall and lanky maybe. But"
"Animated. He's just animated."
"Yeah. So, so what's the name of the university by the way? I want to make sure we"
"India Amplify University."
"Okay. So, it's it's through India Amplify, right? Okay. So, Indie Amplify obviously is kind of the artist empowerment, education services, uh, you know, side of your your overarching business. Um, I also know that, you know, you kind of mentioned that you do a lot of music reviews, uh, via Nero. Uh, you know, we've also used Nero. Shout out to Eddie and and the, you know, I guess the Nero team."
"Shout out Nero, man."
"Yeah. You're one of the, you know, um, big early supporters. Are are you like officially involved with Nero or?"
"Okay, awesome. Cool. Yeah, love love the platform. So, um I think it would be beneficial to kind of walk through what are some of the most common points of feedback that you give during the music reviews cuz I think we've given a bunch of feedback on on music reviews, you know, using Nero as well and there were some like common themes to stuff that we talk about. Would love to know, you know, some of the most like recurring things that you might say."
"Everybody's mix is trash."
"That's our That's a top three. Top three for us as well."
"Goodness gracious. You know, I think that um I say it a lot. I'm like, 'Yo, Russ got everybody's head a little messed up.' Where or maybe the economy does, right, too, where you're like so many times I see people say, 'I produced it. I mixed it. I mastered it. I wrote it. I performed it. I sang on it. I wrapped on it.' It's like, 'Yeah, that sounds cool until I play it and it sounds terrible.'"
"No, you're you are Ben. like his favorite thing to say."
"He sounded so much cooler saying it than"
"Oh, yeah. Way cooler."
"I know."
"Yeah. That all you're telling me is that"
"You prioritized me listening to your music more than you prioritized going and getting a decent mix because you paid $50 to super skip and you could have gave that to an engineer to make your song actually sound good. And now that I'm telling you that, you come back next week with another song that sounds the same. It's like your priorities, you know? So, I've seen that a lot. I've seen that a lot where it's like the mixes aren't good. Um, weirdly, I've seen that people's, and this is maybe nitpicky, people's syllable counts be weird, people will drag words to try to make them fit"
"in like a phrase where they don't fit. And I don't know why, but that that one to me every time I'm like, there's one quality of somebody who I could tell that is amateur and it's the dragging of the words to fit the syllable count, if that makes sense."
"Or squeezing an extra one in."
"Or squeezing an extra one in. It's one or the other."
"And then um"
"Just authenticity, just like people not having a story in their music and not being authentic to them because I think that, you know, in a world where there is 200,000 songs uploaded every single day, there's when people ask me what I'm looking for. I'm like, I'm looking for something unique. I just listened to 500 songs this month. So, you have to have a unique story. You have to have a unique sound. You have to have unique production. You have to have a unique voice. You have to have a unique flow. One of those things if not all five to really stand out. If you're not just like overly just amazing, right? Like uh like somebody who has an amazing voice. It's like it don't matter what they do and their voice is is crazy, right? You have to be unique and you have to be authentic to yourself. And so so many people feel like carbon copies of other people. And it's like the Ray Charles movie. It's like, yo, Ray, you could sound like anybody in the world, but what does Ray sound like? you know, you can imitate all these other artists, but like what's what does Ray Charles sound like? So, what do you sound like as an artist? What's your identifying quality? And then the last thing I'll say is I usually dive into like when I hear somebody that's really good and I go to their Spotify and they have 12 monthly listeners."
"I'm like, what are you doing? They're just not marketing themselves. They're not making content. They're not doing any of the things that it takes. And the music at this point is 10% of your success. 10 10%."
"Wow."
"I would I would Okay, let me not be dramatic."
"No, I mean if that's what you I don't I just want to make"
"20%."
"Because at the end of the day, just another hoop analogy, you could be the best basketball player in the world, but if you only go to the park and shoot around, that's not going to get you nowhere."
"So recording music ain't going to get you nowhere until you market it."
"Yeah. Damn."
"I want to add to that, too. Like my biggest probably feedback when we do the reviews is just believability. Like someone might even have a cool story and a cool beat and a cool all that and I'm but like the tone it's the tone of the boy. I do not believe that you mean what you're saying and that kills me. It could be a great song otherwise but if I'm just not if I can't buy into it it's a confidence thing I think for sure."
"The confidence in the delivery a lot of people lack that. A lot of people haven't found their voice yet which it takes time. So you know some people are submitting and it's like their fifth song. And then the believability and like I think believability and authenticity like yo I don't want to hear about your Rolex. I don't want to hear about like"
"Even if I believe you know"
"Yeah."
[clears throat]
"Because if if Yeah. You might not be submitting to my stream if you really have all these things that you're talking about."
[laughter]
"Like there probably you should be at a nice dinner right now."
"Yeah. But but so you know kind of piggybacking off of the uh the story narrative authenticity side of things, right? Um, you know having that be unique. Is it possible to have a unique and compelling story no matter who you are? Or do you think that some people just have like naturally more interesting storylines about them, right? Because I feel like that's like a huge thing that we agree is important, but I I think it's it's missing from so many artists, you know, brands. And I'm scratching my head as to why, right? And I think their reasoning is that like, well, it's just like I don't know what's interesting about myself. So like is it that it's just like natural for some and not for others or like how do you feel about that?"
"No, I think it's it's once again like even that could be an insecurity, right? Where it's like you've had a you know you've had a maybe you've had a privileged life, you haven't really gone through much, right? Well, there's still billion millions of people that have gone through that same life as you. What you have some sort of tension in your life somehow, right? some way or and it doesn't have to be around tension. It could be about how blessed you are. It could be whatever the case may be. Like you have a story. You you're the only one with your story like your exact story, but it relates with millions no matter what it is. So yeah, everybody has a story to tell no matter what."
"So if so, you just got to figure out a way to tell it."
"Yeah. And and if so, if I'm an artist and I I don't feel like I'm doing a great job at conveying my story, is there some like exercise I could be doing or you know what I like just how it it feels so theoretical of like well figure out your story but it's like"
"What what are some examples or like things I can do to hone in on it and like make sure it is compelling."
"I'll say maybe it's the type of music that you're making that doesn't relate with your story, right?"
"Okay. Like like yeah matching it up like making it make sense. There's comedy rappers like I was I was talking with um Anderson Burroughs. Anderson Burroughs. Anthony Bur. He's a battle rapper. Okay."
"Right. Super. He kind of looks like you to be honest. Uh"
"An amazingly good-looking white gentleman."
"No,"
"Precisely. And and he goes into these battles and he's just overly white."
[laughter]
"Okay. He goes into these rap battles against the hood dudes and he's just overly white and like he'll compliment them. He'll wear a Chick-fil-A outfit, [clears throat] whatever. If he tried to go into this and had a whole bunch of gun bar schemes and everything else that everybody else does, it wouldn't work, right? He don't have a story other than like he is a basic white guy. So, he plays up his"
"Basic white guyess in his rap battles and he's huge. Yes."
"So, like at the end of the day, it might not be that you're that you're not telling your story. It's maybe you shouldn't be telling that story over a trap beat,"
"You know? Like maybe you shouldn't be telling that story with this style of content. Maybe you should be in a Chick-fil-A outfit, bro, cuz that's where you work and"
[laughter]
"That's your"
"My pleasure. My pleasure."
"You know, like maybe your hit single should be called My Pleasure. Yeah. I should be over"
"Damn, [clears throat] it's a good idea."
"Super smart cooking. Yeah,"
"I think it's that I think it's sometimes if your story isn't resonating, then change the format in which you're telling your story."
"Yeah. I mean, that's actually something we've talked about a lot, too. You know, it's like someone will have a look that looks all like kind of like folksy, but they'll be [ __ ] rapping like lyrical miracle. And it's like, why do you look like that? Like,"
[laughter]
"Bro, you're confused."
"Yeah. Oh my god. That's interesting. So, do you see yourself more like as a CEO right now or more of an artist at this point?"
"I'm a retired rapper for sure."
[laughter]
"Okay."
"That still releases rap music and punk pop punk music as well."
"Yeah. Yeah. I would argue that my pop punk music is is it's one of my favorite albums. My pop punk album is one of my favorite albums for sure. Top three. Um, yeah, I'm a basketball guy, so I'm going hit you with one more basketball analog."
"Hey, I'm here for the hoops analogies, bro. You know,"
"I might look like a basic white guy, but I'll I'll definitely see you on the court, bro. Let's go."
"Corner jump shot."
"That's all it is. Literally, I post up in the corner, bro."
[laughter]
"Yeah. Perfect form."
"I'm dialed in. Perfect form. Don't play with me."
"Yeah. Um, I see why rappers have publicly retired. No rapper that's publicly retired is actually retired, right? Jay-Z is not actually retired. Logic sure as hell is not actually retired. But you lose this competitive drive [clears throat] to want to be the biggest artist in the world or want to be like whatever. You don't want to be that no more. You're not trying to win the championship. You're not trying to whatever. I'm like a retired hooper where a retired hooper is going to go to LA Fitness [music] and still be the best player there, right? They're still going to go crazy. They're still going to put 50 on your head. They're just not balling in the league no more. [music] So for me, it feels like that where it's like I'm always going to make music to the day I die. But like that competitive edge to try to get to a new place with my music is not what fills my cup. It's not what makes me wake up every day excited. Where back in the day it's like I'm going to write a verse today that's getting somebody out of here. Where now it's like, yo, I'm going to wake up today and [music] like I'm going to drop gyms on this podcast is going to change somebody's life. I'm going to get on this music review and convert somebody. Like I'm going to teach I'm going to Michael Minnelli. Like I'm waiting for the next brand deal for him. like I'm going to go get that brand deal. I'm going to go get the best artist to go on Step to the Mic. Like I'm going to make plays for everybody around me and cultivate something that's going to be the next wave and that's what gets me excited. Not making a song in 10 minutes."
"Did that soft retirement like just alleviate a bunch of pressure too? Do you just feel like freer you think?"
"Yeah, for sure. I think everyone like feels like they have to be a Taylor Swift Kendrick Lamar level artist when like you can you definitely don't have to be that big to like make a living and maybe in some ways these insanely lofty goals like sure like you know if that's what you want shoot for the moon but like more people can I think be more realistic with themselves and maybe be happier and achieve their goals quicker if we level set a little bit."
"For sure. And I think you have to like [music] you have to really think about yourself. I was having a conversation with somebody at a retreat the other day and he was like, 'Yo,' he was telling me how much anxiety he had. He was telling me how he's literally bedridden sometimes. He can't get out of bed cuz he's so [music] anxious for 2 weeks at a time. He can't leave the crib. And then he's telling me he wants to be the biggest artist in the world. And I'm like, 'No, you freaking don't, bro.'"
[laughter]
"You don't want to be the biggest artist in the world."
"Imagine, imagine having that anxiety walking out of your house and getting Justin Bieber with seven camera people at your doorstep or you're trying to close your garage and you have your Kanye moment. Bro, you're going to have a nervous breakdown."
"You don't want to be that artist. So, stop tricking yourself and giving yourself more anxiety thinking you want to be that artist because you don't."
"You want to make money off your music and you want to stay in your crib. So, do that. Stay in your crib. Stop trying to scale to these crazy places and and get these interviews and do this and do that. Bro, you don't even like leaving your house. So, just make great content in your house. Make it have a message. Talk about your anxiety and the music. Film things that feel moody in your crib and relate with people through that story and don't try to if you end up getting all these views and all this stuff, which he is doing. He has over a million monthly listeners already, so he's doing well. I'm like, you're already there. You already achieved it, bro. just keep doing what you're doing and start loving yourself and loving your life instead of thinking that you want something that you don't actually want because when you get there, you're going to be miserable."
"So, I think a lot of artists need to think of like what do you actually want? What what makes you the happiest and pursue that instead,"
"Bro? Self-awareness is like it makes its way into so many episodes, but I I love it cuz I just think it's so important, man. People really got to deep dive into the soul"
"And the goals. I mean, yeah. Which goes hand in hand with goals. Yeah. It's like, well, what is your actual goal? And then does it actually fit with who you are, right? Because I mean, to your point,"
"Soul goals."
"Soul goals."
"Soul goals."
"Did we just come up with that? Is that Yeah, I said we, but"
"I'm going to sit by my man's right there. We going to do soul goals starting starting next week. Y'all heard it. It's in the description."
"Let's go. Link to soul goals down below."
[laughter]
"That's great."
"So, you know, I know through Andy Amplify, obviously, there's a ton of resources, right? Um, and so one thing I want to get your, I guess, take on, um, the latest thing is that like the waterfall approach doesn't work, right? to release strategies and there's all these things about like popularity scores from Spotify and so on and so forth. I've seen multiple videos about that. So, if that's true or not, no idea. I just will have to assume it is. But, what's your guidance to indie artists as far as like release strategies, right? like you know everything from like consistency to everything from like how many pieces of content should we post, how long should we be posting about a song, right?"
"Doing singles right now in early"
"Singles out like just kind of your general philosophy for maybe yourself but also even the artists you work with, right? Like how should we be releasing music moving into 2026 right now?"
"Depends definitely depends on the level that you're at, but we'll just like start at the floor, right? Like if you have any sort of following, I would just say go off the metric that your song only stays on release radar for 3 weeks,"
"Which tells me that Spotify expects you to release a new song every 3 weeks, right? So every 3 weeks should be the metric, which means if you're posting five times a week, that means that song should have at least 15 pieces of content, right? Five times a week. 15 pieces of content for a song. Uh post all of them organically, drop that song. If one of those pieces does well, that should become an ad, right? That way, as you move on to the next song, that ad is still cooking for the last song and bringing people in, and that song continues to be the biggest song. If nothing hits for the next song, don't run an ad on it. Means it didn't work, right? 15 pieces of content, none of them hit. Cool. Maybe you can come back and post them later. If they work, then then run the ad. Then then the last piece of your formula should be automations. Anybody that's coming to your page that comments on something should get an automation. they should get a DM as soon as they comment. Whether it be comment this word and get that or just a regularly triggered automation where whatever they comment, they get something. You can do that through minihat or you could do it through us which will be coming probably not when this drops but in a little bit. Just join the university or follow your boy. Um, but yeah, so it's it's organic content releasing every 3 weeks. Um, obviously having the organic and real authentic story and then as you grow, I think the formula has never really changed if if I'm being real, right? Like the formula has never changed for sustainably having all the pieces to your puzzle, right? First, make sure you're registered everywhere so you're collecting everywhere. And then as far as what you should be doing, you should be dropping merch probably quarterly um or around your big project. and that's where you're going to make your money back on the ads is when you can sell a product with it after you do those types of things. Um, and if you can tour, you should tour, you should open for artists until you have a big enough fan base to headline. So, if it's opening and then headlining. So, that's like that formula has never changed. Like merch drop every year, album every year, singles every 3 weeks, tour if you're if you're big enough to tour."
"So, still an album. So, still an album. still an album because it's going to be your biggest revenue gainer, right? Like if you can sell a vinyl and you can sell a hundred vinyls at $50, you know what I'm saying? If you can and it's the connectivity, it's it's the it's still your story. So people, I think, still do crave an album eventually, right? Like Connor Price just dropped an album. He's the single king, right? But he dropped an album and he was so excited to drop it because he knows it further tells his story. So when you get to that point, sure. But yes, singles every three weeks. Um, and run it that way."
"Damn, I like it."
"Yeah, good. I still love"
"Who was it? Z from Audio Mac. I think about like no one should try and like stifle your creativity and your like desire to drop an album, but it's just like being okay with until you reach a Connor Price's level, like it might not be as efficient"
"As, you know, as effective too, right? It's like it might not work. Like the songs at the very end of the album are likely going to have [ __ ] streams. You know what I mean? It's just kind of is what it is."
"Depends on how diehard your fan base is, right? Like Lar Russell, you just had him on. This dude has dropped 50 albums dang near in the last however many years. But he's he's dropping them on on Even Biz and he's making mad bread. He's doing a show in his backyard and making 200K in a week."
"That was nuts, by the way. We didn't even talk about"
"We haven't even talked about that. That was wild. But like if you have a diehard fan base of even a hundred people, that album could still make you more money than all your streams put together if all hundred people buy it via Even Biz or via hard copy or via a piece of merch with a QR code or or whatever, right? And then another thing too is people that have an overflow of music are also now starting memberships. So, like there's no there's no real like this is for sure what you should do because I think everybody's trying to do everything and that's why everybody's burning out. You have to figure out the things that you artistically are drawn to and that you feel like you would love to do and then add those into your revenue stream, right? Like not everybody can do music reviews as an artist. Some people can. Not everybody can have a membership because they don't create enough to have extra content. But if you do, you can have a membership. So I think it's like the streaming thing to me where that used to be like the most important thing. I think if we're talking about living off your music, it's all the things that tell your story around that. And then you just hope that you strike gold with the streaming. So hopefully you have this passive revenue coming eventually."
"Yeah. What the last thing I'll say is"
"Spotify has an algorithm and that's where people are getting the game twisted a little bit. Um, somebody like me, I've seen it, right? For me, collaborating with so many people as music is not my main focus, it's really crippled my release radar compared to what it used to do because people aren't listening to my songs as much. If I'm a primary artist and I get on a song with somebody who's not that great, right? Um, so what I've seen from artists like Pertinence and some other artists that don't even really have social media, Pertinence has a social media following, but there's artists that don't have social media followings that are crushing on Spotify."
"Yeah."
"And it's because Spotify has an algorithm. They make the same type of song. They collab with other artists that share that algorithm. And when that song gets played, it starts to crush on radio. Starts to crush on Spotify radio and all these algorithmic Spotify playlists. So keep in mind that the music you make and the niche that you have and the way that you drop that music is still going into an algorithm just like your Instagram and your Tik Tok. And if you mess your algorithm up, it's going to be hard to recover. So make sure that you're making music that aligns with the previous music that you made because if you catch a a good wind on Spotify radio, which I've seen happen, you could be making so much money and not even have a social media following."
"Yeah. No, I do think people they sleep on the idea of a Spotify algorithm. You know what I mean?"
"And positioning yourself and your music correctly is kind of an afterthought sometimes."
"And then also something you like touched on that I think is super important is a lot of artists maybe are a little too focused on the like traditional artist model which again is like streams. Streams turns into album sales. Album sales mean you go on tour. Touring means you sell merch. And that's like just the kind of standard way to do it. But like doing music reviews or building other communities or doing content series like Step to the Mic. I mean these are all viable business like models and like different levers you can pull to make money to then fund"
"The music."
"There's so many ways to get you know so many ways. Yeah."
"Yeah. I mean, we were going to make something I think right about like you know creative ways to monetize your music or something right and it's like"
"That aren't streams."
"Yeah. That aren't streams. We all seen what Spotify pays. We've all seen the royalty checks for $1.17. Like,"
"It can make it work, but there's a million other ways. It might not be your main thing."
"No facts. And all these artists that are doing everything by themselves, it's like, why aren't if you're doing it for you and making zero dollars off doing it for you? Why don't you do it for all of your artist homies that don't know how to do it and make some money doing it?"
"You know, so that's that's kind of like for me. I mean, that's that's all management is, right? It's like, yo, I don't really want to tour anymore. I don't really want to do this, but I know how to do all this, so let me help y'all do it so y'all can go do it. You know, it's just like, how can you use your skill set that you've built so you could be an artist, but your artistry isn't paying you, so how can you give that to the world and monetize it?"
"So, do you think that um your ability to manage is cuz I don't know. I'm always kind of weary of like artists managing other artists or artists signing to other artists labels. Do you think it's working because you're not as focused on your own music because like you know you're self, you know, alleged retired or whatever, right? Like is that why you think it's working or can it just work in general? Even if you were super focused on your own music, could it still work?"
"It can and it can't, right? like um I think it just depends on the person, but I think where most people they sign to another artist and like unless you really know me, you don't necessarily know that I managed Mike. Most people didn't know that I managed Pertinence. Most people Tony 22 or Buffalo Farm or Chris Calico or whatever the case may be cuz I wasn't implementing myself into like publicly implementing myself into their stuff. where most artists they try to sign an artist and then use their influence to blow that artist up and you're basically libl broing them at that point where they're always kind of under you until they're not right and that's what most artists don't like. So if you are going to take on that role you're taking on a behind-the-scenes role. A label and a manager is a behind-the-scenes role. It's not a public role, you know. So take that role behind the scenes, you know. I'll talk about it in a podcast, but you're not going to see me diddy and dancing in in the videos necessarily, you know? So, so it's just like I think that's one thing. Um, and then I think it's just a time frame where like if you're an artist, do you have the time to do that? And so for me, because my artistry is secondary, if Mike called me right now, I'd bang it on y'all. You know, if he was like, you know, if he's like, 'Yo, I I need you right now. This is D. Can you handle this?' I gotta hang up and go do that. you know, so"
"Don't call right now. Mike, he's in the middle of the One More Time podcast."
"We're almost done, Mike. So, it's just a priority thing. And I think that that's the tough part. So, when I was taking my artistry a little bit more seriously, when I started, man, cuz I've been managing artists for five or six years now."
"Um, I had a partner. So, I knew that I needed a partner then where if I was out doing my stuff, he could he was like dayto-day and I was business management. I was closing deals. I was given big picture ideas and and resources and he was day-to-day management where they knew call call him. But now it's just like this is my main priority. So music is secondary."
"Damn. Well, Futuristic, we've entered a final segment of the podcast, my friend."
"Oh [ __ ] Oh [ __ ] Oh [ __ ] Oh [ __ ] Oh [ __ ] Like, comment, and subscribe if you're finding value out of this episode. We forgot to say it during the episode."
"I know. It's like we got to do that better, bro. Like, comment, subscribe because we forgot to say it way earlier in the episode and you feel bad for us and we brought you some value and Futuristic brought you some value. Anyway, this is the final section. This is the rapid fire rampage with Futuristic. It's going to be three sections. I'll explain them as we go. We're just going to start with some short answer questions. [screaming]"
"Let's get into it. When are we getting the Future and Futuristic collab?"
"February 15th."
"Oh man, I thought that would be pretty cool to see like I agree. Throw that out there. That response doesn't sound like it's pretty cool."
[laughter]
"I don't know."
"Your little cousin, by the way, I've been using like little cousin in these questions a lot. I don't know. It might be a recurring. Anyway, your little cousin just started his music career. What are the first three pieces of advice that you give him?"
"Be yourself. Make sure you're happy in real life, not just on the internet."
"And be and be relentless in your pursuit at this or it's not going to work."
"I love those, man. Those are great."
"That's just life and anything you want to do."
"Really is. What is a recent bar? Maybe anything you wrote in the last year that you're proud of or maybe even a Michael bar or an artist another artist like what's a bar from your camp that you're like that was a bar."
"What What do I say? Uh I'd have to listen to it. Basically it's it's a bar. It's all my music is Christian now. I've been growing in my faith a ton. Um, and the bar is basically like you think different when you realize that the beginning is at the end. You know, when you start to realize that there's there's more to life than than what we're doing right now. And you start to realize like you're a vessel and the beginning your life starts at the end of it, right? Um, it's a it's a bar about that, but there's been a lot of a lot of faith bars in all my music that my album finally found and and all them things."
"I like it. I like that one. What is the last work call that you made and what was it about?"
"Last work call that I made? Well, I had a consulting call right before this and then 15 minutes between Sunreal called me um and was asking me about music reviews and Beat Star purchases and do those work."
"Sunreal uh music reviews coming soon. Maybe"
"Sunre music reviews coming soon. You heard it here."
"Big fan of Sunre. I love the new uh I love the new song him and Nick D just dropped. Really, really good. Yeah. Beautiful. Yeah. You've just been appointed supreme leader of the music industry. With the power to do absolutely anything, what is the first move that you make?"
"The power to do absolutely anything in the music industry. I would change I would change all the algorithms back to chronological."
"Ooh."
"Or find a way to like implement the chronological system more because I feel like it's very unfair for people to build fan bases for only 2% of their audience to see the content that they make."
"M."
"So, make it more follower based and chronological."
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
"What do you think about uh the Gary Vee? Like he he wants to do a platform where you can only post like is it once a day or just once a week? You only get one post. You know what I mean? So, it's very like you got to be conscious kind of about it. And"
"I think that's kind of an interesting idea. If it works in that format where it's chronological and it's follower based, I think it could actually be really cool and and almost function as like a membership where it's like, yo, like this is the thing."
"This is my post weekly."
"Yeah."
"What's what's his post going to be this week? Look forward to it."
"Yeah. It's almost like a TV episode or something. Yeah."
"It could work."
"Yeah. I do hate the like I hate when I see a post that's like 3 weeks old and it's just mixed in to just"
"You know I check the date on it and it's like from September and I'm like late"
[laughter]
"Or I'm like yeah I just thought that this just happened and like it's someone's birthday or something. It's literally 3 weeks old."
"Love it."
"Fact."
"Uh what is one non-m music skill that every artist should learn? I think like you said like self-awareness and work ethic and scheduling like mentality honestly like just focused focusing on on your mentality and building your mentality. I don't know if that's a it is a skill actually."
"It's definitely a skill. Yeah. Because everything else will crumble at some point if you don't have your your morals and your mentality down."
"Last one of the short answer. You have just lost your entire fan base and social media accounts and have to start completely over from square one. And let's assume that you're still artist first in this scenario."
"Yeah."
"What does your first 24 hours of rebuilding look like?"
"Identifying my niche, probably doing a cover of some sort, a remix of some sort. Um, probably batch filming. Like if I still had all my like if I have all my music."
"We'll say you have music."
"Boom. Yeah. I'm I'm I'm just making a ton of content, starting a new page on every platform, making sure the back end of everything is set up, and then I'm just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, rolling out like the best type of content over and over again. And but I I'd probably start with like remixes. I would just body the most current songs, but niche them out. Like if if Kendrick Lamar was Christian, if Taylor Swift was Christian, if whatever, you know, if Jelly Roll's new single went Christian rap, like that would be all of my things I would do right away. That's fire. Love that."
"Bro, not enough people do that whole like remix and cover thing, man."
"It's a way to"
"It's a very like people have mixed reviews on it, man."
"Because people are scared of something brand new, but you also need to give them some of you. So, it's the perfect split of like, you know, you know, Taylor Swift, you like Taylor Swift, but it's my twist on it so they feel comfortable enough to wa start watching it and then they get the you infused."
"Anything that people like, you just have to figure out a way to put your spin on it. Right before we got on this call, actually, I watched a piece of content where a dude was taking like viral interviews, like cringe-worthy stuff people said. Like somebody was like, 'Don't job your love. Love your job. Don't love your job. Job your love.' Or something. And he had that and then he took the comments, let the com turned the comments into lyrics and played heavy metal guitar over it. And that's his thing. And"
"It's crushing. Like everything has a million likes. So you just have to take what's working in the world and figure out a way to remix it one way or the other."
"Wow. All right. Part two is the this or that. I'm going to give you two choices. You just GOT TO PICK ONE."
"Y'ALL GOING TO get me in trouble with this one."
"Hooks or verses?"
"Hooks."
"Singles or projects?"
"These are tough. Singles."
"TikTok viral or Spotify editorial playlist?"
"TikTok viral."
"Ice bath or sauna?"
"Sauna. Every day I'm in there."
"Early music access or exclusive merch drop?"
"I'm going to go with merch."
"Unwavering consistency or elite quality?"
"Consistency."
"Crocs or slides?"
"Slides."
"Global superstar or Forbes level CEO?"
"Forbes level CEO."
"And finally, become a full-time folk singer or leave the music industry forever."
"Me personally,"
"Christian folk."
"Uh, full-time folk singer or leave the music industry forever?"
"Nothing in the related to music ever again. There it is."
"I get a banjo right now."
"It doesn't surprise me, honestly."
"I know. I was thinking maybe do it maybe or no drop. Never mind. Anyway, going on to the"
"Description chat ladies."
[laughter]
"My new folk album is out there."
"Christian folk albumated by Futuristic ando."
"Yeah."
"Yeah. There you go. There it is. Uh last section is the word association. I'm going to say one word and you just got to give me the first word off the top of your head. There are no correct answers. You're only judged on speed. [screaming]"
"Starting with music"
"Review."
"Viral"
"Sensation"
"Breakfast"
"Lunch"
"Autotune"
"Brand deal"
"Vinyl"
"Collection"
"Money"
"Power"
"Live stream"
"Review"
"AI"
"Alan Iverson"
"I see what you did there skirted that one real quick"
"God"
"Is everything"
"Podcast"
"I'm on it"
"DIY"
"Yourself"
"Roach"
"Roach Roach"
"Infestation"
"Arizona"
"The greatest"
"Bitcoin"
"Sold"
"Haircut"
"Taper"
"Nerd"
"Raps and"
"Confus appreciate you coming on the podcast man"
"Thank you man"
"As always please like comment and subscribe if you [ __ ] with this interview we are here"
"Damn near every week"
"We're getting back up there to week"
"Yeah we're up there"
"But not putting the pressure on ourselves at the same time so"
"Thank you man appreciate you coming So many people right now."
[laughter]
"I know. Everyone's dead."
"Until next time, what are we doing? Getting out of here. Get out of here. Peace, y'all."