Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to Bob Leftshut Podcast. My guest
Speaker 1: today is John Combe of Cornerstone and Fader. You have
Speaker 1: like a giant enterprise. How many different divisions do you have?
Speaker 2: It's first of all, nice to be here, Bob, Thank
Speaker 2: you so much for having me on. We actually run
Speaker 2: two separate companies, but they have very many tentacles, so
Speaker 2: I could take you through a little bit of what
Speaker 2: we do. Cornerstone is our agency and it's focused on
Speaker 2: helping brand build platforms, advertising strategy around music and culture,
Speaker 2: and we work in that business for Converse, Nike, Coca Cola,
Speaker 2: Major League Soccer, and our specialty is really and we're
Speaker 2: twenty eight years old. Our specialty is really helping brands
Speaker 2: understand how to connect to music and culture. And sometimes
Speaker 2: that's creating full service advertising creative. Sometimes that's purely music
Speaker 2: specific strategy. Sometimes that's experiential on how they interact with
Speaker 2: festivals and things of that nature. And then we have
Speaker 2: a media company called The Fader, and The Fader started
Speaker 2: twenty five years ago and it is a music platform.
Speaker 2: Started as a print magazine. We gave artists like Kanye
Speaker 2: and Cardi B and Kendrick Lamar and Drake and the Strokes,
Speaker 2: the White Stripes, some of their first covers, some of
Speaker 2: their first coverage in the press, and we really grew
Speaker 2: it into a full service media platform. We've got great
Speaker 2: social channels. We do a lot online. We have about
Speaker 2: three thousand pieces of unique video across all of our
Speaker 2: different video channels. We built a festival called Fader for
Speaker 2: it and then attached to that business. We've got a
Speaker 2: film and TV division called Fader Films, and we have
Speaker 2: a music division which is Fader Label. It's our management
Speaker 2: company and our publishing company. So it's a lot of entities,
Speaker 2: but they're all very tightly connected.
Speaker 1: Other than you, does anybody work for Cornerstone and also
Speaker 1: work for Fader or vice versa.
Speaker 2: Yes, there is some crossover. We've got an amazing team
Speaker 2: and there's a lot of synergies between the two. We
Speaker 2: absolutely want to keep the purity of editorials separate from
Speaker 2: what we do on the commercial side. But our incredible COO,
Speaker 2: Anthony Holland, touches every piece of that business and he
Speaker 2: is the guy that keeps all the trends running on time.
Speaker 2: You know. We have our back end services like accounting, legal,
Speaker 2: things of that nature. They work across all the entities.
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a lot of synergy by having so
Speaker 2: many businesses. Robert English, who's been with us for twenty
Speaker 2: five years, he's basically the de facto head of an
Speaker 2: R across the entire entire company. So when we're looking
Speaker 2: for music for a campaign, he is talking to all
Speaker 2: the agencies and the managers and the labels. He's doing
Speaker 2: the deals, and he'll do that for Fader, he'll do
Speaker 2: that for Cornerstone, he'll do that across everything. And then
Speaker 2: there's a music division which is headed up by a
Speaker 2: young guy named Carson Oberg, who does an incredible job.
Speaker 2: He oversees our management, he oversees the label team, he
Speaker 2: oversees our publishing, so he's pretty much isolated in that world,
Speaker 2: but he then gets to tap into some of those
Speaker 2: back end resources to help power what we do on
Speaker 2: the label side, so there is some crossover. It does
Speaker 2: work really well together. When we explain this to people,
Speaker 2: it's always overwhelming, and some people only know us by
Speaker 2: one small segment of the company, and then others have
Speaker 2: worked with us across the entire enterprise.
Speaker 1: Okay, how many full time employees now.
Speaker 2: We are currently at thirty five full time employees. It's
Speaker 2: the leanness we've been in a long time. At our peak,
Speaker 2: we were as many as one hundred and ten employees,
Speaker 2: and a lot of that scale is dictated sometimes by
Speaker 2: the number of brand clients we have or what we're
Speaker 2: doing on the media side. Clearly, you know, after Covid
Speaker 2: there were challenges with media and certain components of the business.
Speaker 2: So we made a decision to operate the company on
Speaker 2: a much leaner level, and it's worked out really well
Speaker 2: because it's given us a chance to focus on the
Speaker 2: revenue streams and the aspects of the business that are
Speaker 2: doing the best.
Speaker 1: Okay, and you oversee everything, is there? Anybody tell me?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So I oversee the entire company, and I think
Speaker 2: it's really important we start our conversation just to give
Speaker 2: you some background on my partner in our history. The
Speaker 2: companies were founded in partnership between myself and Rob Stone. Sadly,
Speaker 2: Rob passed away this summer. He not only has been
Speaker 2: an incredible partner for the last twenty eight years, Rob
Speaker 2: started the Cornerstone side of the business himself. The story
Speaker 2: is that Rob and I grew up together. We've been
Speaker 2: best friends since seventh grade. We discovered music together. Not
Speaker 2: only were we, you know, great friends growing up having
Speaker 2: so many amazing life experiences, our love and passion for
Speaker 2: music started when we were kids in junior high school
Speaker 2: all the way on up to high school. I remember
Speaker 2: discovering hip hop listening to run DMC with Rob Stone
Speaker 2: on cassette. I remember every big album that would come out.
Speaker 2: We would drive around in his car and listen to
Speaker 2: music and discovering not only hip hop, but you two
Speaker 2: so much music. And the bonds of our friendship led
Speaker 2: us to enter the music industry, and Rob and I
Speaker 2: started together at SBK. We worked under Daniel Glass. Rob
Speaker 2: was ahead of mixed show and dance promotion. His job
Speaker 2: was to really work with all the different DJs around
Speaker 2: the country. I was working in the field. I was working,
Speaker 2: you know, as a local promotion rep in the Northeast.
Speaker 2: I started in video promotion work my way into the field,
Speaker 2: and we worked together there and the seeds for our
Speaker 2: company were born out of all of those conversations, all
Speaker 2: of the time we spent loving music, and you know,
Speaker 2: we basically saw this rise as young people in the
Speaker 2: music industry and learned so much from so many people.
Speaker 2: I went and left SBKA, I went to Columbia Records.
Speaker 2: Rob left and he went to work for Clive Davis
Speaker 2: at Arista Records. And when our respective contracts were coming up,
Speaker 2: we started talking about the plans to start our own company.
Speaker 2: And Rob's deal expired first in nineteen ninety six, he
Speaker 2: stepped out and left Arista. At Arista, his claim to
Speaker 2: fame was he is the person who was big eas
Speaker 2: uguest confidant. He spent his time at Arista breaking notorious big.
Speaker 2: He traveled around the country with him, He got his
Speaker 2: music played on the radio. He was really the liaison
Speaker 2: between you know, bad Boy and Arista, and he really
Speaker 2: established himself, you know, in the world of hip hop
Speaker 2: through those times. I was working in alternative promotion for
Speaker 2: Columbia at the time. So Rob left first in ninety
Speaker 2: six when his contract expired, and the idea was we
Speaker 2: were going to start a music marketing company, and Cornerstone
Speaker 2: was initially a place for artists, managers and labels to
Speaker 2: hire us directly to help supplement what the labels weren't
Speaker 2: doing enough of for their artists. It was our ability
Speaker 2: to get records played on the radio, our ability to
Speaker 2: help build the right marketing plan, to build some resources
Speaker 2: to promote artists on college campuses, and we were wildly successful.
Speaker 2: So Rob started in ninety six. My contract expired a
Speaker 2: year later. Rob Rob started the company out of Loud Records.
Speaker 2: Steve Rifkin was a great mentor to Rob and to
Speaker 2: both of us. He gave Rob off of space and
Speaker 2: was a partner in the initial start of Cornerstone. And
Speaker 2: Rob was able to work with Steve and the power
Speaker 2: of Loud and all he was doing in the hip
Speaker 2: hop world to really cement Cornerstone's early success in the
Speaker 2: hip hop world. I left, I joined him and I
Speaker 2: started doing the alternative side of the business, and we
Speaker 2: were working for every major label. We were talking directly
Speaker 2: to so many artists. What was amazing about that time
Speaker 2: in Cornerstone was that a lot of artists they wanted
Speaker 2: to talk to somebody outside of the label system. They
Speaker 2: wanted to hear other people's opinions. So, you know, people
Speaker 2: like labeled like bad Boy would have us coming to
Speaker 2: the studio. We would go here Outcasts Records before even
Speaker 2: Arista had heard some of the music. You know, people
Speaker 2: like John Silva were asking us to come here Beck Music.
Speaker 2: We were working so closely with the labels and the
Speaker 2: artists that we were making an impact because we were
Speaker 2: helping use our knowledge of what we learned in the
Speaker 2: music industry to help them make better decisions and help
Speaker 2: use our relationships to break artists. Slowly we started making
Speaker 2: these tools, like we made a mixtape SERI like every
Speaker 2: month we put out a mixtape. Then eventually all of
Speaker 2: the access we had to music led to Fader. Fader
Speaker 2: was our way of documenting all of this access we
Speaker 2: had to music early and brands started getting their hands
Speaker 2: on all these materials. The head of Sprite was a
Speaker 2: guy named Darryl Cobb, and he called Rob and I
Speaker 2: up and said, Hey, I don't know who you guys are,
Speaker 2: but I've seen some of your materials and your work.
Speaker 2: We're trying to revolutionize Sprite and embrace the culture of
Speaker 2: hip hop to market Sprite, and we need someone to
Speaker 2: help guide us. Would you guys come down to Atlanta
Speaker 2: and sit with us and our agencies and our team
Speaker 2: to tell us a little bit more about music. I
Speaker 2: was reluctant. I was like, Ah, that's sellout shit, you know,
Speaker 2: like that is you know, like we're about the music.
Speaker 2: Rob was like, I think we should listen to this guy.
Speaker 2: He's really smart. He's really opened my mind. So Rob
Speaker 2: convinced both of us to go down there, and two
Speaker 2: things happen. Number One, we realized that these guys cared
Speaker 2: more about the music and the culture of the music
Speaker 2: than the labels at the time, and they had such
Speaker 2: enormous budgets compared to what we were working with within
Speaker 2: music that not only could we be more successful and
Speaker 2: make more money, they were willing to put more money
Speaker 2: into the marketing of all these artists. And that's when
Speaker 2: the light bulb for Rob and I went off and
Speaker 2: we realized, like, holy shit, we can have the best
Speaker 2: of both worlds. We can really consult some of the
Speaker 2: most powerful brands in the world in how they market themselves.
Speaker 2: And then we can take that money and that power
Speaker 2: and really strengthen our ties to the artists, to the managers,
Speaker 2: so we can do more for them, and we can
Speaker 2: enhance what artists can do outside of their normal record
Speaker 2: deals and put some more power on their hands. At
Speaker 2: the same time, we're building Fader as a way of
Speaker 2: documenting all of this access we have in culture. So
Speaker 2: number one, you know we wouldn't I wouldn't be here,
Speaker 2: My business wouldn't be here without the incredible legend of
Speaker 2: Rob Stone, and it's it's just sad to have this
Speaker 2: conversation without him. He Rob loved reading your work, Bob.
Speaker 2: We would often talk about various things that you write about.
Speaker 2: And I feel horrible that we're not doing this interview
Speaker 2: together because we had an incredible friendship that we've experienced
Speaker 2: so much, an incredible partnership with so much success, and
Speaker 2: the fact that you know, I'm talking about these things
Speaker 2: without him, it just still doesn't feel real to me.
Speaker 2: He was such a special person with such an incredible
Speaker 2: career and the impact he had on our company. What
Speaker 2: we've done together is something that it just it feels
Speaker 2: really surreal to be doing it without them. So that's
Speaker 2: the long Paull story of how we got to where
Speaker 2: we are with the business. But we are proudly record
Speaker 2: industry people. We are proudly born and raised in that system.
Speaker 2: And for all the flaws and things that we didn't
Speaker 2: love that led us to want to start our own business,
Speaker 2: there's so many things that we do love and it's
Speaker 2: still an incredible business and it's the reason we're successful
Speaker 2: coming up in that business. The things that we learned
Speaker 2: in our respective jobs gave us the platform to build
Speaker 2: what we have. And it's almost like we have operated
Speaker 2: someone under the radar. You know, we're still very close
Speaker 2: to so many people in that business, but we kind
Speaker 2: of live in a parallel universe, slightly under the radar.
Speaker 2: But music is still the thread, that's the DNA for
Speaker 2: every aspect of our business.
Speaker 1: Okay, just focusing on Rob for a minute. When did
Speaker 1: you find out he was ill?
Speaker 2: That he was ill in July of last summer, and
Speaker 2: he kept his diagnosis very private. When we were kids,
Speaker 2: Rob had cancer and was a survivor. He beat a
Speaker 2: very serious case of Hodgkins and was incredible throughout that
Speaker 2: journey when we were twenty and he's just he was
Speaker 2: just a warrior as a person. And he got diagnosed
Speaker 2: in July. He kept the diagnosis private, and I think
Speaker 2: that's why so many of our friends and so many
Speaker 2: in the industry were shocked. And he he just chose
Speaker 2: to put the focus on his recovery and his family.
Speaker 2: And you know, I was there along along with him
Speaker 2: for the whole ride, and he and he faced it
Speaker 2: and fought it bravely, and his hope was he was
Speaker 2: going to continue to improve and let more people in
Speaker 2: the circle. But unfortunately it just got out of control,
Speaker 2: and you know, he lost the battle.
Speaker 1: So who owns cornerstone in the theater today?
Speaker 2: Right now? I own corners thrown out right with Rob's estate,
Speaker 2: which will figure out the future of that.
Speaker 3: And that includes your saying, that includes everything. Yes, let's
Speaker 3: go back to the beginning. You guys are from where exactly?
Speaker 2: We're from Long Island. So Rob and I were both
Speaker 2: born in Brooklyn, and we grew up in Long Island,
Speaker 2: went to junior high school and high school together.
Speaker 1: And what did let's focus on you what did your
Speaker 1: parents do for a living.
Speaker 2: So my parents were in the retail business. Both of
Speaker 2: our parents were hard working, you know, entrepreneurs. My dad
Speaker 2: was in the leather goods business. He sold women's handbags
Speaker 2: and accessories. He still does it at eighty four years
Speaker 2: of age. And I worked in his business as a
Speaker 2: kid and he's still working hard. Rob's dad was in
Speaker 2: the trucking in warehouse business in Brooklyn, And we both
Speaker 2: came from real working class families, and I think our
Speaker 2: parents both instilled that work ethic and that hunger to
Speaker 2: run our own businesses, you know in both of us,
Speaker 2: and I think they both. They all had a real
Speaker 2: effect on how we built this company.
Speaker 1: And do you have siblings.
Speaker 2: I do. I have a brother who lives in la
Speaker 2: He runs a film and TV production company. He does
Speaker 2: some work for us. He shoots some of our TV
Speaker 2: commercials and content.
Speaker 1: He's just one brother, one brother. Yeah, Okay, So you
Speaker 1: graduate from high school, you end up going to Syracuse.
Speaker 1: Tell me about that choice.
Speaker 2: Syracuse was incredible. I went to Syracuse really not sure
Speaker 2: what I was going to study. I was in the
Speaker 2: new House program there. I was also a business major,
Speaker 2: but it was in new House, which is their communications school.
Speaker 2: I started to learn that there was really an industry
Speaker 2: behind music. I loved music. I'm a horrible guitar player,
Speaker 2: as I could see behind me, Bob I was in bands,
Speaker 2: but I knew I had no chance in hell of
Speaker 2: having any success as a musician. But what I realized
Speaker 2: through some great friends in college, is that there was
Speaker 2: a real industry behind the business. And I just loved
Speaker 2: researching and learning what I could about the business. And
Speaker 2: that school, as you probably know, had an unbelievable alumni
Speaker 2: that comes from our business. You know, there was so
Speaker 2: many generations. There was you know, the Rob Lights and
Speaker 2: Phil Q and John Syke's generation that all came out
Speaker 2: of Syracuse, and I always looked up to them and
Speaker 2: studied their stories. And then you know, I was there
Speaker 2: with an unbelievable cast of current players in the industry,
Speaker 2: whether it was Joel Klayman, who was the former GM
Speaker 2: of Columbia Records, or David Sadlow who runs Lama Vista
Speaker 2: and was at Aristo, or Jacquelin Saturn at virgin and
Speaker 2: Syracuse really gave me the platform to understand more about
Speaker 2: the music industry and and and a lot of different
Speaker 2: aspects of our business. And it's it's a really amazing
Speaker 2: school in the sense that they connect you to the
Speaker 2: people in the real world. You don't just learn and
Speaker 2: you know, take a bunch of things that anybody can
Speaker 2: learn from a book. They they've got this network where
Speaker 2: they really do a good job of connecting to people,
Speaker 2: to the to the outside world so they can learn
Speaker 2: first time.
Speaker 1: So how did you get connected such that you got
Speaker 1: the job at SBK.
Speaker 2: So I was lucky enough to meet Charles Koppleman. His
Speaker 2: daughter had attended Syracuse. She was a friend, and I
Speaker 2: was able to become one of their first campus reps
Speaker 2: up at Syracuse. So I was marketing all of their
Speaker 2: music in the Northeast.
Speaker 1: Just to be This was when SBK was all already
Speaker 1: a label.
Speaker 2: This is when SBK was a publishing company. And then
Speaker 2: it just got funding in this ridiculous, insane deal from
Speaker 2: EMI to start a label on the master side, and
Speaker 2: they had an unbelievab amount of funding. I went down
Speaker 2: met them in person. I think I was a junior.
Speaker 2: Really loved everybody I met there, and they gave me
Speaker 2: a chance to intern over the summer and then be
Speaker 2: a college rep on campus. And my job back then
Speaker 2: was to hang posters of our artists, take inventory or
Speaker 2: record stores, get artists played on the campus radio stations.
Speaker 2: And I would go anywhere from the Albany region up
Speaker 2: to Boston to cover stuff. And you know, SBK had
Speaker 2: a very unique deal. They had a deal with EMI
Speaker 2: that was based on gross revenue. So the idea was
Speaker 2: for them to have as much success as possible, but
Speaker 2: they didn't really have to worry about the bottom line.
Speaker 2: They just wanted to gross as much revenue, so we
Speaker 2: put out a lot of records. We were the home
Speaker 2: of a lot of the big one hit wonders. Back
Speaker 2: in those days, I worked on projects like Jesus Jones
Speaker 2: and Wilson Phillips, and then as I when I graduated,
Speaker 2: I went to work for them full time. The week
Speaker 2: after I graduated, we had put out Vanilla Ice. That
Speaker 2: summer arrested development. We had so many enormous artists, some
Speaker 2: of them that really stuck around for one or two singles.
Speaker 2: But it was an incredible time because they had this
Speaker 2: unique deal where they were all about really trying to
Speaker 2: rush and ramp up the success, and it was a
Speaker 2: fun time in the music industry to be a young person.
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to ask you. Know, at the beginning
Speaker 1: of SBK, Monty was a regional promotion man and he
Speaker 1: is arguably the most powerful and successful executive on the
Speaker 1: recorded side of music today. Did you work with Monty?
Speaker 2: I did?
Speaker 1: What did you see? I mean, I knew Monty. It's
Speaker 1: an amazing story. Did you see anything or were you surprised?
Speaker 1: Give me your take.
Speaker 2: Yes. First of all, I love Monty, so not only
Speaker 2: before Monty was thrown in the field he started. I
Speaker 2: believe he'll kill me if I got this wrong, but
Speaker 2: I think he was Neil Lasher's assistant. When I was
Speaker 2: an intern, I would help them out, and I believe
Speaker 2: Monty's first role there might have been helping Neil Lasher
Speaker 2: and then they quickly realized how smart he was and
Speaker 2: they sent him down to Atlanta. I knew Monty, and
Speaker 2: this sounds cliche. I knew he was going to be
Speaker 2: a huge success back then because he did two things.
Speaker 2: Number One, he outworked everyone, but he had this calm
Speaker 2: for a young person around him. But what I loved
Speaker 2: the most about Monty, and I subsequently got to know
Speaker 2: Avery really well to his brother, who he started Republic with.
Speaker 2: What I loved about Monty is he was an A
Speaker 2: and R guy. Even though they had him doing promotion,
Speaker 2: Monty was always looking for what was going to be
Speaker 2: next in music, and I really had this gut feeling
Speaker 2: he was going to be a superstar, and for me
Speaker 2: to have a front seat to watch him rise has
Speaker 2: been an honor. Both Rob and I were still are
Speaker 2: very close with Monty. I love him to death, and
Speaker 2: you know, he really had everything that you knew you
Speaker 2: needed to succeed in our business, and for a young
Speaker 2: person back then to really think beyond his role. You
Speaker 2: could tell he was going places. And I was lucky,
Speaker 2: like at the talent of the SPKA days, I got
Speaker 2: to see those two start Republic and they worked out
Speaker 2: of this I live in the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
Speaker 2: They started the label out of this really small, one
Speaker 2: bedroom apartment three blocks from where I am right now,
Speaker 2: and it was just so much fun to go over
Speaker 2: to see that these two guys quit in the middle
Speaker 2: of their height of their career. They could have made
Speaker 2: fortune continuing to work on the corporate record side, but
Speaker 2: they both had the balls to step out and start
Speaker 2: something entrepreneurial. And it was just so much fun when
Speaker 2: I would go knock the door of their apartment and
Speaker 2: I'd see boxes of CDEs and they'd be shipping stuff
Speaker 2: and they'd be running this business out of this really
Speaker 2: small apartment and it you know, they gave Rob and
Speaker 2: I a lot of confidence that, hey, you gotta be
Speaker 2: gutsy and step away from what's safe to really make
Speaker 2: an impact. So I have huge love and respect for Monty,
Speaker 2: and you know, beyond Monty that the one thing that
Speaker 2: Daniel doesn't get enough credit for is what a great
Speaker 2: teacher he was. I mean, we had so many incredible
Speaker 2: people that went on to big things in the music
Speaker 2: industry that came under his tutelage of Charles and Marty too,
Speaker 2: I mean they deserve tons of credit. I mean that
Speaker 2: Trio had so many amazing people who are running such
Speaker 2: big entities right now in our business that they deserve
Speaker 2: a lot of credit for what they really started.
Speaker 1: Okay, you started in video promotion. MTV was still very powerful.
Speaker 1: Tell us about that.
Speaker 2: So I was assisting Hillary shav at the time, who
Speaker 2: was our head of video promotion, and our job was
Speaker 2: to get our videos played on MTV. And and you know,
Speaker 2: you talk about this a lot, is you know what's
Speaker 2: missing in our industry today? There aren't big mass drivers.
Speaker 2: And back then, the reason why we broke so many
Speaker 2: superstars was you had big drivers, and none bigger of
Speaker 2: a driver was there than MTV. I mean the power
Speaker 2: that MTV had. When you got a video and what
Speaker 2: they call buzz bin back then, or a video into
Speaker 2: any form of rotation, you saw instant success, and not
Speaker 2: just a little success. You essentially knew you were going
Speaker 2: to break the artists. So our job was not only
Speaker 2: to submit our videos, but it was to figure to
Speaker 2: build relationships with that team at MTV and really figure
Speaker 2: out what what was an artist place and what was
Speaker 2: the best way to establish that artist. And we were
Speaker 2: very successful. I mean, labels, if you remember, spent so
Speaker 2: much money Bob on on making videos and the level
Speaker 2: of production, and MTV had such few slots. I mean,
Speaker 2: it was so hard to crack MTV. But if I
Speaker 2: think of the industry back then versus the industry today,
Speaker 2: MTV was a vehicle that just meant so much, and
Speaker 2: I sometimes think about imagine there was something like that
Speaker 2: equivalent to that where you had the Taylor Swifts and
Speaker 2: the major pop stars of today have access to that.
Speaker 2: I was thinking about that during the VMAs the other night,
Speaker 2: and the VMA has felt slightly more relevant this year
Speaker 2: than past. I mean, you probably have a better take
Speaker 2: on it than I do. But that was our role.
Speaker 2: Our role was not only to get our videos played,
Speaker 2: but to find the right way to get artists on
Speaker 2: one hundred and twenty minutes or then Unplugged came later,
Speaker 2: and then you had the VMAs were basically the equivalent,
Speaker 2: if not bigger than the Grammys back then, so it
Speaker 2: was a really good first experience for me to learn
Speaker 2: the ropes of breaking artists, how.
Speaker 1: Did you end up in the field and radio promotion.
Speaker 2: So the next step was they needed bodies and people
Speaker 2: to be out there, and I had built a really
Speaker 2: good relationship with Daniel and Ken Lane, who is our
Speaker 2: head of Top forty, and Neil l Asher, who I said
Speaker 2: earlier out of Rock, and they felt that was a
Speaker 2: good next step for me. I wanted to be more
Speaker 2: of an A and R person or a marketer. I
Speaker 2: didn't love the idea of promotion, but I knew it
Speaker 2: was an important part of the business, and I felt
Speaker 2: that it was a chance for me to work closely
Speaker 2: with artists. I really cherished that part of my job
Speaker 2: and working closely with artists. So they sent me to
Speaker 2: the field and I was responsible for getting our records
Speaker 2: played on stations like WBCN. And one of my claim
Speaker 2: to fames in my career is this young new British
Speaker 2: act was flying in to come to America for the
Speaker 2: first time and they sent me to the airport. I'm like,
Speaker 2: very new to the job. I'm literally on the job.
Speaker 2: A couple months, not even and I go to pick
Speaker 2: up this band called Blur, and I pile them with
Speaker 2: all their gear into my car and I drive them
Speaker 2: to WBCN and it's Damon and Graham and the whole
Speaker 2: band and their tour manager and we go. We do
Speaker 2: a great interview on WBCN. They do this great acoustic performance,
Speaker 2: and we're leaving WBCN and it's pouring rain now and
Speaker 2: I'm at a red light six weeks maybe into the job,
Speaker 2: and it's my first big thing that the label's having
Speaker 2: me to do. And Daniel nervous, He's like, how's it going?
Speaker 2: Is it going all right? Like this is really important?
Speaker 2: And I'm at a red light and a car skids
Speaker 2: from behind me, hits my car. We get into a
Speaker 2: total car wreck with Blur in the back and I
Speaker 2: look over. I'm like, holy shit, I hope these guys
Speaker 2: are okay, And thankfully they all start cracking up and
Speaker 2: laughing at the whole situation. We get out of the car,
Speaker 2: I get their gear, we go to their gear. Everything
Speaker 2: goes well, and luckily, the next day WBCN adds the
Speaker 2: first Blur record. But for a minute, my short lived
Speaker 2: career in the field could have ended very quickly, and
Speaker 2: I'm proud to say that I'm still you know, Dave,
Speaker 2: I consider Damon one of my best friends in the
Speaker 2: world to this day, and you know, from that minute
Speaker 2: it was it was an example that I made the
Speaker 2: right decision because it put me in the field and
Speaker 2: allowed me to get close to so many amazing artists
Speaker 2: and be part of so many moments. And I really
Speaker 2: learned a lot from from being out in the field
Speaker 2: and learning, you know, how to break artists. You know,
Speaker 2: I think the lost art is it's not just getting
Speaker 2: your records played on the radio. You're a part of
Speaker 2: what happens live. You're a part of, you know, having
Speaker 2: a relationship with the local press. Your job when you're
Speaker 2: in that job, and it's sad that this role doesn't
Speaker 2: really exist in today's record business. Your job is to
Speaker 2: connect that band, those artists to everything possible on a
Speaker 2: local level. And it's really changed a lot since then.
Speaker 2: I still think there is an importance to that mentality,
Speaker 2: but it's kind of gone from our business. Everything's so centralized.
Speaker 1: Okay, you bear no specific responsibility, but Blur was gigantic
Speaker 1: in the UK, blowing up the same time as Oasis.
Speaker 1: Oasis in America on Columbia was nowhere near as big
Speaker 1: as they were in the UK, but they did break.
Speaker 1: Blur essentially never broke in America. Ultimately, Gorillas did. What
Speaker 1: is your take why Blur didn't break in America?
Speaker 2: You know, I think it was a really exciting tie
Speaker 2: and that you know, I'm very passionate about the UK
Speaker 2: and British music and it's been a big part of
Speaker 2: my career. And I think the difference between the bands
Speaker 2: that have broken wide open and the bands that have it,
Speaker 2: or the reason why Blur did have success in their
Speaker 2: later years, they did sell out Medison Square Garden and
Speaker 2: the reason that Gorilla has succeeded is because the band
Speaker 2: that committed to touring and really doing laps around our
Speaker 2: country are the ones who succeeded. Radio had succeeded because
Speaker 2: they were a British band that really committed to doing
Speaker 2: laps around America. Oasis did a fair level, a fair
Speaker 2: amount of touring, you know, as chaotic as their world was,
Speaker 2: and I was at the first Oasis gig in New York.
Speaker 2: It was at Wetlands. I'll never forget it. I had
Speaker 2: an SBK act actually opening and I stayed and watched them.
Speaker 2: They put in the time and it's still the old
Speaker 2: school fundamentals that are important today. It's touring and lure.
Speaker 2: In those early years, they were frustrated with America. You know.
Speaker 2: It was I worked with Suede when I was a Columbia,
Speaker 2: another band that was so big. They could sell out
Speaker 2: the two or huge arenas all over Europe, but when
Speaker 2: it came to America, they could sell max Three four
Speaker 2: thousand tickets. And I think the reason why the those
Speaker 2: artists didn't break through in their early years, or the
Speaker 2: reason why Blur didn't break through at the level, was
Speaker 2: that touring commitment. They had success at home, and I
Speaker 2: think they put in a little more time now. Damon too,
Speaker 2: his credit started to fall in love with America. He
Speaker 2: started to realize, Wow, this is an incredible place. He
Speaker 2: took so much inspiration musically. He discovered hip hop himself,
Speaker 2: which inspired Gorillas, and then when it came to Gorillas,
Speaker 2: he really committed to putting in the time and touring
Speaker 2: Gorillas and doing press and really spending more time here.
Speaker 2: And I think that's a big part of the reason
Speaker 2: why Oasis broke Blur didn't. But Gorillas did, and I
Speaker 2: think that's a big reason what made those UK acts
Speaker 2: stick around here and those that haven't.
Speaker 1: Okay, how did you end up at Columbia and what
Speaker 1: was that experience like?
Speaker 2: So? I was brought to Columbia by a great friend
Speaker 2: named John who was formerly an Electra. He was the
Speaker 2: VP of artist development there and he was looking to
Speaker 2: change up the way they market alternative music. Donnie Ironer
Speaker 2: was the president. We had a great team there. I
Speaker 2: worked with some real characters, Jerry Blair, Charlie Walk. It
Speaker 2: was a lot of fun being there, and I worked
Speaker 2: with possibly the greatest artist I ever worked with in
Speaker 2: my career. And I was lucky enough to work at
Speaker 2: Columbia with Jeff Buckley. And Jeff Buckley is was so
Speaker 2: brilliant and so talented and and so troubled. I mean
Speaker 2: he was you know, when you met him, you knew
Speaker 2: he was. There was an inherent sadness or something that
Speaker 2: just was eating at him. And I think that's part
Speaker 2: of that was part of his success. But Columbia was
Speaker 2: was the major leagues. It was. It was a hard
Speaker 2: place to work. Donnie was brilliant, but relentless and really
Speaker 2: tough and He pushed us really hard. And you know,
Speaker 2: when you went to that lake and they're working major
Speaker 2: stars like Aerosmith and Springsteen and Mariah, there was no
Speaker 2: patience or tolerance for anything less than hitting a home
Speaker 2: run on everything he did. And it was hard, it
Speaker 2: was high pressure. But I got a lot out of
Speaker 2: being there. I learned a ton and the fact that
Speaker 2: I was able to work with Jeff Buckley changed my life.
Speaker 2: I mean, that is something that I don't I don't
Speaker 2: think enough artists study or know who he is. And
Speaker 2: I think the sad circumstance of his death and the
Speaker 2: shortness of his career, he just he isn't on a
Speaker 2: lot of people's radars. And I don't know what with
Speaker 2: your experience with Jeff Buckley, like we were able.
Speaker 1: I was a fan of the father the album Happy Said.
Speaker 1: I mean, Tim Buckley started out on one of Frank
Speaker 1: Zappa's labels. He'd a lot of different things. But the
Speaker 1: fact that his son, who really didn't grow up with him,
Speaker 1: you know, I guess I'm not young enough to feel
Speaker 1: that he's forgotten, because it still comes up in conversation
Speaker 1: with people who were aware in that era. But staying
Speaker 1: with this how big a step was it emotionally and
Speaker 1: how difficult or easy was it to jump to go
Speaker 1: to work with Rob.
Speaker 2: It's surprisingly it was easy. A lot of people said
Speaker 2: that Rob and I were crazy. We were making really
Speaker 2: good livings. We were in our mid twenties, doing really well,
Speaker 2: on a really good path in the corporate music industry,
Speaker 2: and a lot of our mentors and people said, hey,
Speaker 2: you guys got to think through this, because you really
Speaker 2: are both on a great track. And Rob stepped out first,
Speaker 2: was doing well, not blowing it out to the point
Speaker 2: where I was going to make the same living joining
Speaker 2: him that I was at Columbia, and I had just
Speaker 2: had a kid, so I had it added responsibility and
Speaker 2: I had to make sure that I was making a move.
Speaker 2: But both of us had this mentality that if it
Speaker 2: didn't work out out, we were good at our jobs,
Speaker 2: we probably would be able to step back in and
Speaker 2: get a job in the corporate record industry again. And
Speaker 2: I also didn't, you know, love working for anyone. I mean,
Speaker 2: Donnie was a hard driving guy, Daniel was a hard
Speaker 2: driving guy, and I think they both taught me well,
Speaker 2: and I'm grateful for the time I had with them,
Speaker 2: But They both made me realize, like, wow, I want
Speaker 2: to be my own boss. I want to call the shots,
Speaker 2: and there are very few people on our industry that
Speaker 2: will put their money where their mouth is. And Rob
Speaker 2: and I both did that and we never looked back.
Speaker 2: We got lucky, but our mentality was if this fails,
Speaker 2: we are both good at what we do, we'll find
Speaker 2: our way back in. I was I think I was
Speaker 2: twenty six or twenty seven when Rob and I partnered up.
Speaker 2: He was twenty six when he broke out of Arista
Speaker 2: or twenty maybe we were twenty five and twenty six.
Speaker 2: I don't remember exactly, but somewhere in that range. So
Speaker 2: you know, I was lucky to start early in the
Speaker 2: record industry. I was eighteen or nineteen when I started,
Speaker 2: you know, doing all that college work, and I had
Speaker 2: spent a lot of time there, so I had some
Speaker 2: good relationships to build our business on. It wasn't like
Speaker 2: I was a year into a career. I was still young,
Speaker 2: but I had spent so much time that we had
Speaker 2: a good base to start the business.
Speaker 1: Okay, tell me about getting married and having a kid,
Speaker 1: because you have another person involved in your married who
Speaker 1: may or may not agree with your choices. Support you.
Speaker 1: This is a twenty four to seven business. You get
Speaker 1: a kid, you have to bring in the money. Tell
Speaker 1: me about all that.
Speaker 2: That was a lot of pressure. The amazing thing is
Speaker 2: I have an incredible wife, Aaron Cohen, and I met
Speaker 2: her at SBKA Records. She was Daniel Glasses as Distant
Speaker 2: and I met her when she first started there. I
Speaker 2: knew I was going to marry her. I just you know.
Speaker 2: We had this incredible friendship and relationship at work, and
Speaker 2: the best part of my job was I Hadtone at
Speaker 2: one end of the hall, my best friend in the world,
Speaker 2: and on the other end of the hall, I had
Speaker 2: the woman that I was going to marry, and it
Speaker 2: was a great time to have those two people there
Speaker 2: on a personal level. Coming up in this exciting time
Speaker 2: in the music industry was incredible. And I think one
Speaker 2: of the things that really helped me start my business
Speaker 2: and have the confidence is I had a wife who
Speaker 2: came from the business and had a really good understanding
Speaker 2: and she was very supportive. She was totally calm and
Speaker 2: chill about what I was doing. And I think the
Speaker 2: fact that she put in some time in our business
Speaker 2: gave her an understanding that this was going to be okay.
Speaker 2: And here we are twenty eight, twenty nine years into Cornerstone,
Speaker 2: let alone my career. She has this amazing patience and
Speaker 2: respect and love for what I do. You know, she
Speaker 2: she'll come on the road with me. You know, she'll
Speaker 2: come to festival. She's she's not deep in it. She
Speaker 2: she definitely only goes to what she likes. But she
Speaker 2: has this understanding and respect and that gave me the
Speaker 2: confidence that I can do it. But there was pressure.
Speaker 2: I mean when you have a newborn. I got married
Speaker 2: very young. I got married at twenty four years old,
Speaker 2: and you know it wasn't a new relationship. But having
Speaker 2: a new kid changes everything. And you know this, Bob,
Speaker 2: I mean, you our business. You're out late at night,
Speaker 2: and if you're if you're not out and you're not
Speaker 2: in the scene, you are out of mind. You are
Speaker 2: not in the mix. So the hardest part, and this
Speaker 2: is why I love my kids so much, is that
Speaker 2: I wasn't around as much as a young father. Because
Speaker 2: here I am in my early twenties. I had my
Speaker 2: son when I was like thirty, I think, or my
Speaker 2: late twenties, and I am on the road I'm not around.
Speaker 2: I have to go visit clients. I have to go
Speaker 2: visit you know, artists. I am traveling, you know, to festivals.
Speaker 2: And to my kid's credit, they I made up for
Speaker 2: it as they got older and they learned to appreciate
Speaker 2: what I did. And we're a very tight knit family.
Speaker 2: And they had a real patience for me, because you're
Speaker 2: trying to be a parent and do all the hard
Speaker 2: things of parenthood, but you're also trying to be committed
Speaker 2: to your business, and it's a very delicate balance, especially
Speaker 2: as a young parent. And hopefully, you know, it all
Speaker 2: worked out the way it should have, and they seem
Speaker 2: like great kids and they're happy, and they have such
Speaker 2: love for what I do. And my son actually works
Speaker 2: in the music industry. He works for an agency called
Speaker 2: well Or Media Agency where he does he helps run
Speaker 2: live nations, TikTok and does a lot of social media
Speaker 2: work within the business, so he has an appreciation for it.
Speaker 2: And my daughter works for the Infatuation, which is the
Speaker 2: food and restaurant, you know, content business, and you know
Speaker 2: they've done really well, but you know, it was a
Speaker 2: really big decision in terms of family and knowing that
Speaker 2: I wasn't going to be able to be around quite
Speaker 2: as much as your typical parent.
Speaker 1: Okay, what year do you go to work with Rob been?
Speaker 1: How old are you exactly?
Speaker 3: Then?
Speaker 2: I think, if I'm remembering it correct, Rob stepped out
Speaker 2: in June of ninety six. I resigned that September and
Speaker 2: told them, hey, guys, I'm not going to renew my deal,
Speaker 2: but I will stay here as long as you'd like.
Speaker 2: So I told whoever, Jim Burris, I think I'm what
Speaker 2: I told. And I three days later, I get a
Speaker 2: call on a Sunday, We're going to send all your
Speaker 2: stuff home. You don't need to come into work. And
Speaker 2: they basically paid me out of my deal and just
Speaker 2: you know, honored the deal and let me go. And
Speaker 2: then Rob and I joined forces sometime in early ninety seven.
Speaker 2: I believe I was twenty seven years old at the time.
Speaker 1: Okay, when you go to work with Rob, what is
Speaker 1: he doing? And what's the first thing you do?
Speaker 2: So Rob is already working a lot of hip hop records.
Speaker 2: He's getting hired directly by labels to help the marketing
Speaker 2: of hip hop records. I am starting a companion business
Speaker 2: in the alternative space. So my job is to get
Speaker 2: all the major labels, the independent labels, the managers to realize, hey,
Speaker 2: we are a resource to hire us one of the
Speaker 2: first records. I think I got it. I don't remember
Speaker 2: all the timelines on this stuff, so don't hold me
Speaker 2: to all the specifics. It's a little big, but like
Speaker 2: I remember Jeff quant It's calling me and saying, I
Speaker 2: have this new band, Limp Biscuit, I want you to
Speaker 2: hear it, and he played me Limp Biscuits, like, I
Speaker 2: want to hire you to help us break this band,
Speaker 2: Limp Biscuit. I remember Silva getting me involved in Beck Records.
Speaker 2: I remember, you know, a lot of label people like
Speaker 2: friends like Ross Apen hiring us for whatever Geffen was
Speaker 2: working at the time, even Columbia. I mean, you know,
Speaker 2: I ended up working for a lot of labels that
Speaker 2: I was with, and we had a lot of success.
Speaker 2: I mean they wanted to hear not just They didn't
Speaker 2: want just our relationships to help get people to support
Speaker 2: their music. They wanted our opinion. How should we roll
Speaker 2: this out? What do you think of this single? And
Speaker 2: so Rob was building the hip hop side, I'm building
Speaker 2: the alternative side. And then together we are brainstorming, Okay,
Speaker 2: what tools can we create? How do we build some
Speaker 2: new ways of marketing music. So we started the Cornerstone Mixtape.
Speaker 2: Then we started what was called the Cornerstone Player. These
Speaker 2: were compilations where obviously we live in a streaming world,
Speaker 2: they're kind of irrelevant, but there were compilations where we
Speaker 2: would get big name DJs to mix the best current music.
Speaker 2: So we would get a young Mark Ronson, for example,
Speaker 2: who we were friends with, who was a great, smart,
Speaker 2: young kid New York DJ, and we would get him
Speaker 2: to do a mix of whatever current songs. Or one
Speaker 2: time we did a jay Z mixtape with Mark Ronson,
Speaker 2: which I think you could find on eBay for like
Speaker 2: a thousand dollars, where we would have Ronson great this compilation.
Speaker 2: We'd get the rights from the labels to say, hey,
Speaker 2: we can do it. We eventually even started selling those
Speaker 2: opportunities for the labels to put music on these, and
Speaker 2: we would send that mixtape out to like five thousand
Speaker 2: people and every major DJ, hotel manager, restaurant gatekeeper that
Speaker 2: could break music. We would want them to have our
Speaker 2: mixtapes so they can hear what's next in music. On
Speaker 2: the Alternative mixtape. One of the first songs that we
Speaker 2: really broke that we were a big part of was
Speaker 2: Coldplay Yellow. You know, like where Kevin Weatherley or Mark
Speaker 2: Hamilton in Portland would hear some of the music on
Speaker 2: our different mixtapes as a way to turn them onto
Speaker 2: what was next, and then we would get a call
Speaker 2: and say, hey, tell me a little bit about this band,
Speaker 2: and if we were working the record, we would help.
Speaker 2: If not, we would connect them to the label so
Speaker 2: they can get more information about what was on those mixtapes.
Speaker 1: Okay, when you started, were you beating the bushes or
Speaker 1: was it very soon people were calling you? And how
Speaker 1: did you establish what the price was?
Speaker 2: So we were charging a flat fee per project. We
Speaker 2: set our pricing very expensive because our goal was we
Speaker 2: didn't want to be like some of the other promotion
Speaker 2: entities out there. We wanted to work for a handful
Speaker 2: of the best artists and labels like we wanted to.
Speaker 2: We said no to a lot of projects and we
Speaker 2: were beating the bush just to introduce what we were doing.
Speaker 2: But we had so many relationships and people we knew
Speaker 2: that that came kind of easy. And then then it
Speaker 2: was a lot of what's beautiful about our business. It
Speaker 2: just became very inbound. We didn't have to chase people,
Speaker 2: and Rob and I had the mentality that we wanted
Speaker 2: to be expensive, and we wanted to work just a
Speaker 2: handful of projects at a time, and we wanted to
Speaker 2: be involved for the long haul. We didn't want to
Speaker 2: keep plugging and playing like if someone committed to a project.
Speaker 2: If RCA wanted us to work this new bands, we
Speaker 2: wanted to know that we were going to be a
Speaker 2: part of what they were doing to break food Fighters
Speaker 2: for the long haul. So we would get hired by
Speaker 2: Dave Gottlieb, who was the marketing person at the time,
Speaker 2: and Ron Forr who was the promotion person at the time,
Speaker 2: and Silva who was managing at the time. We'd be
Speaker 2: working for all of those entities, and they'd be talking
Speaker 2: us to us directly because they would want to know
Speaker 2: the pulse of what we were getting back. And then
Speaker 2: our job was to fill in the blanks and help
Speaker 2: the label do all the things that they were already
Speaker 2: doing and anything that they weren't doing. So it was
Speaker 2: can you help us get on the radio? Who would MTV?
Speaker 2: Do you know? Can you help us with can you
Speaker 2: get in Lewis Largency here about this. Can you talk
Speaker 2: to this? You know, who do you have in the
Speaker 2: field that can talk to whatever retail they have managers
Speaker 2: with are their DJs that can support this? That That
Speaker 2: was the way. You know, That's something Daniel taught us
Speaker 2: really well, is that you know, artists broke from so
Speaker 2: many different directions. Even though I comment on having mass
Speaker 2: drivers in the industry, and this is still true today
Speaker 2: in today's business, is that artist development is the amalgamation.
Speaker 2: It's the total of a lot of little arts. And
Speaker 2: that's what I think Rob and I really excelled at
Speaker 2: is we built the system of smart young people that
Speaker 2: had their ear to the ground, that were plugged in
Speaker 2: and we knew Rob and I had the relationships on
Speaker 2: the math level. But then we had all these kids
Speaker 2: around the country, around the world for that matter, that
Speaker 2: knew who the cool kids were that could turn the
Speaker 2: right people onto music. And I think that's why we
Speaker 2: were successful in the early days of the promotion and
Speaker 2: marketing business.
Speaker 1: Okay, you said you were expensive, what was the price?
Speaker 1: And you talk about all these people in the field,
Speaker 1: were they on the payroll? And how many people were working.
Speaker 2: So at that time, maybe we had ten people in
Speaker 2: the company and I want to guess, and we had
Speaker 2: a mixture department, a bunch of guys that just called
Speaker 2: DJs all day long, and they would just ask DJs
Speaker 2: what they like, what they're listening to, Hey, could you
Speaker 2: listen to this? Could check this out? We had college reps.
Speaker 2: So once we started Fader, which was in nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 2: to distribute Fader, we couldn't get magazine distribution. We had
Speaker 2: no fucking clue what we were doing in the media business.
Speaker 2: So we built our own infrastructure and to market Fader.
Speaker 2: We built what we called the farm team, and these
Speaker 2: are college reps. In every campus. We would hire one
Speaker 2: or two kids at Columbus Ohio, a kid at NYU,
Speaker 2: a kid at Syracuse, a kid in Michigan, a kid
Speaker 2: in la and they would just give the Fader away
Speaker 2: for free. You know, if they could get us on
Speaker 2: a newstand, that would sell it great. But they're Our
Speaker 2: mission to them was, We're going to send you one
Speaker 2: hundred copies of Fader. Make sure one hundred of the
Speaker 2: coolest people in that city get a copy of it.
Speaker 2: And we started hiring those kids to do all the
Speaker 2: more marketing in the field. They would hang up posters,
Speaker 2: would they would give out twelve inches to local DJs.
Speaker 2: They would drive the right people to see the artists
Speaker 2: at early on, so they would know the local radio,
Speaker 2: the local press, the freelance writers. Eventually, over time we
Speaker 2: started moving into digital direction, so they would know all
Speaker 2: the people that were doing the right things online. Years later,
Speaker 2: but we basically were a full service artist development company,
Speaker 2: and we would charge anywhere from ten grand to twenty
Speaker 2: five thousand dollars a month, pending how many of those
Speaker 2: services you wanted and what kind of tools we were making,
Speaker 2: and it started becoming really successful. But the key transition
Speaker 2: is when the brand started calling us. Then that's when
Speaker 2: everything switched, because then we could be really selective and
Speaker 2: only pick the best of the best music and put
Speaker 2: our focus on working some of the brand projects.
Speaker 1: What came first, the brands are the Faeder.
Speaker 2: The brand stuff came first before or maybe just as
Speaker 2: we're starting Fader. So companies started ninety six, you know,
Speaker 2: I would say the first brand stuff started coming in
Speaker 2: ninety eight, and then we started Fader in ninety nine,
Speaker 2: and Coca Cola was the first big breakthrough on the
Speaker 2: brand side. A few years later, we got to we
Speaker 2: signed these crazy NDAs from a company called Microsoft, and
Speaker 2: we were worried, like, these MDAs are crazy, what the
Speaker 2: hell is this? And they made us fly out to
Speaker 2: meet with them, and they told us about this secret
Speaker 2: note new video game system called Xbox they were launching,
Speaker 2: and they needed an agency to really help use music
Speaker 2: in college campuses to help establish it. They then came
Speaker 2: to our offices. They realized that our whole company was
Speaker 2: operating on Max, and they were appalled that we were
Speaker 2: willing to take on the business. And they said, hey,
Speaker 2: we're going to pay for this, but we need you
Speaker 2: all to switch to MAX. And Rob and I said,
Speaker 2: switched to switch to Windows. I'm sorry, switch switch to
Speaker 2: Windows computers. And Rob and I said that's a non starter. Me.
Speaker 2: Rob and Anthony, our CEO, said, hey, we want your business.
Speaker 2: We are so excited about this video game system. I
Speaker 2: don't even know if it was called Xbox, yet we
Speaker 2: want to be in business with you. We're not willing
Speaker 2: to change from you know, our MAX setup, which is
Speaker 2: so key and inherent's our business. So we said no,
Speaker 2: we call their bluff, and thankfully they still hired us
Speaker 2: and uh, but yeah. So that's how the brand stuff
Speaker 2: started evolving. And then you know, we were doing Nike work.
Speaker 2: Nike started discovering what we're.
Speaker 1: Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
Speaker 1: a little bit slower. The first is Sprite, which is
Speaker 1: a Coca Cola brand. You go for the meeting, go
Speaker 1: for the meeting in Atlanta. What is the ultimate agreement?
Speaker 1: Ultimate work?
Speaker 2: The ultimate work is that they were building some campaigns
Speaker 2: around right connected to hip hop. They had already done
Speaker 2: something with five call quests that they were on the
Speaker 2: right track, and they're like, we want to go bigger,
Speaker 2: So they hired us to build this campaign. It was
Speaker 2: called five Deadly Women, where they were using the culture
Speaker 2: of martial arts and hip hop and we help them decide, Okay,
Speaker 2: these are the radio stations and the media platforms where
Speaker 2: we think you should spend your money. These are the
Speaker 2: artists that you should lean towards. These are the different
Speaker 2: ways to market this. So they hired us to consult
Speaker 2: them and it was exploded. It was really successful. It
Speaker 2: led to us getting hired for this new energy drink
Speaker 2: they were launching. They eventually hired us to work on
Speaker 2: Coke Base brand, so it went from that one consulting
Speaker 2: project to really working across the portfolio. And here we
Speaker 2: are twenty eight years later, we're still work or twenty
Speaker 2: six years later. Since then we're working for coke stuff.
Speaker 1: Okay, so first come Coke. What is the next brand
Speaker 1: and how do they come to you when you come
Speaker 1: to them?
Speaker 2: I think the next brand was this internet startup called
Speaker 2: Boo dot Com. I don't know if you remember this.
Speaker 2: It was like the first big internet retailer that was
Speaker 2: a total bus but they spent like so many millions
Speaker 2: of dollars. They hired us to consult on that launch.
Speaker 2: From there, Nike hit us up. We started doing work.
Speaker 1: For Okay, you're sitting in the office, you get an
Speaker 1: email or a phone call. Hey, we're Nike, would like to.
Speaker 2: Meet We We had started Fader and we actually this
Speaker 2: was Rob the idea. It was brilliant. We had no
Speaker 2: advertisers in the first couple issues of Fader, and Rob's like,
Speaker 2: we've got to show that we have something going on.
Speaker 2: We can't just put this magazine out without anything. And
Speaker 2: we started cop photo copying and putting Nike ads in
Speaker 2: our magazine and Nike's agency winding case and he said, Hey,
Speaker 2: what the fuck, like, who told who said to run
Speaker 2: this ad? Where did this ad come from? And we
Speaker 2: kind of played dumb, and they knew that we were
Speaker 2: taking ads, and we did that because we wanted to
Speaker 2: show that Fader had some muscle and it was making
Speaker 2: an impact. And the Nike people actually called us and
Speaker 2: they reached out and we got a meeting with Nike
Speaker 2: because they thought that they liked what they saw on Fader.
Speaker 2: They thought it was a ball the interesting move that
Speaker 2: we wanted to do it, and that led to us
Speaker 2: having some early meetings and conversations with Nike and we
Speaker 2: started doing some work for Nike Basketball. It eventually led
Speaker 2: to us doing a campaign a few years later that
Speaker 2: celebrated the twenty fifth anniversary of Air Force one. Air
Speaker 2: Force one is Nike's iconic sneaker, and they put us
Speaker 2: in a pitch where it was Cornerstone and Fader. We
Speaker 2: consider ourselves one entity for that versus Widening, Kennedy and
Speaker 2: all these other big agencies. And they briefed us, they say,
Speaker 2: it's the twenty fifth anniversary of Air Force one. We
Speaker 2: want to make history. We want to do something non traditional.
Speaker 2: Here are the parameters here's the rough budget perimeters. And
Speaker 2: our idea was, don't do an advertising campaign, Let's make
Speaker 2: an original song. And we went to Rick Rubin. I
Speaker 2: called Rick, who we had covered in Fader, and luckily
Speaker 2: he was cool and always was a bit of a
Speaker 2: friend and listened to me. Rick Rick signed on to
Speaker 2: produce a Air Force one twenty fifth anniversary track. Kanye
Speaker 2: was the lead artist. We got Kanye on board, we
Speaker 2: got KRS one, we got rock Kim, and then we
Speaker 2: got Nas and we had the four of those artists
Speaker 2: on a Rick Rubin produced track. The budgets were enormous
Speaker 2: bomb I don't even remember the money. So we were
Speaker 2: able to entice all these legends because we had good money.
Speaker 2: They also had a lot of faith because they knew
Speaker 2: us from the hip hop space, they knew us from
Speaker 2: the years in the music industry. And Rick co wrote
Speaker 2: the song with Kanye. They produced an incredible track. I'll
Speaker 2: send you the link when we're done later so you
Speaker 2: can check it out. And we got DJ Premier from
Speaker 2: Gang Starter do a remix. And then we built a
Speaker 2: video and a whole platform around this campaign for Nike,
Speaker 2: and instead of it being a TV commercial to celebrate
Speaker 2: the twenty fifth anniversary of Air Force one. It was
Speaker 2: a song that had a whole marketing campaign around the sneaker.
Speaker 2: We did an event in New York City. Not only
Speaker 2: did all the artists come and perform, but Nike invited
Speaker 2: every one of their marquee athletes that we worked with
Speaker 2: them to produce. And the earned media and the viral
Speaker 2: nature of the song was so much more impactful than
Speaker 2: any paid media that they could buy, and it was
Speaker 2: an enormous success, and the pinnacle was we decided to
Speaker 2: work with them to submit the song to the Grammys
Speaker 2: and everyone's like, Ah, you're crazy, this will never do anything.
Speaker 2: And it was the first time a brand campaign ever
Speaker 2: got a Grammy nomination. And it didn't win, but it
Speaker 2: was nominated for Best Hip Hop Performance that year. I
Speaker 2: think it lost to another Kanye record, ironically, but it
Speaker 2: was an example of the type of evolution of our
Speaker 2: business and the way we could use our roots in
Speaker 2: music and our creativity to do things outside of music
Speaker 2: to help brand really make history. And from those moments,
Speaker 2: like those early moments, we were off to the races.
Speaker 2: The floodgates open. Then a lot of people started wanting
Speaker 2: to hear ideas and we started shedding the music work.
Speaker 2: We said, you know what, we don't need to be
Speaker 2: a hired hand for music. Let's focus solely on using
Speaker 2: our brand relationships and budgets and platform to do good
Speaker 2: for music, to do really good creative things with artists.
Speaker 2: And that's when the agency business really transformed to become
Speaker 2: more of a full service ad agency.
Speaker 1: Okay, what is the status of the agency today?
Speaker 2: Agency is still going strong. The agency business has changed
Speaker 2: quite a bit. Major League Soccer and one of our
Speaker 2: biggest clients, Coke, is still an enormous client. We help
Speaker 2: Coke with a lot of their music strategy. We help
Speaker 2: them negotiate their festival partnerships a bunch of years ago
Speaker 2: with Coachella and Lolla Clues and ACL and Live Nation AG.
Speaker 2: We help them with their talent selection and certain campaigns.
Speaker 2: You know, at Major League Soccer, we do all of
Speaker 2: their strategy in general advertising. So not only are we
Speaker 2: doing all the TV creative and the billboards and at
Speaker 2: a home you see, but like we help them with
Speaker 2: their All Star Game and their finals and not licensing
Speaker 2: music for their campaigns. The you know, we help work
Speaker 2: with Apple, who's their media partner. And building and developing
Speaker 2: and maintaining that relationship. But the agency business has changed
Speaker 2: a bit. Marketers are no longer anywhere near as brave
Speaker 2: as they were in the heyday of our company. You know,
Speaker 2: they are much more conservative and how they spend everything
Speaker 2: was so successful back in the day because brands operate
Speaker 2: good brands, not all brands. Brands operated on gut. Nike
Speaker 2: was a brave marketer. They didn't give a shit about
Speaker 2: what the metrics or the measurement or what the CPM
Speaker 2: value was. It was are we doing something that's going
Speaker 2: to change culture and lead culture. Now we live in
Speaker 2: a world where even Nike, the biggest brands in the world,
Speaker 2: are so measured and so conservative, and they're so you know,
Speaker 2: brands are so caught up in you know, are we
Speaker 2: getting maximum value? And I think it's hurting a lot
Speaker 2: of brands. I think, you know, the best most iconic
Speaker 2: brands in the world, the Apple, the Nikes, they always
Speaker 2: operated on gut. They were never guided on what the
Speaker 2: numbers said. And I think we live in such a
Speaker 2: measured world that, in my opinion, not just the agency business,
Speaker 2: the whole marketing business is really shattered and it's a
Speaker 2: reason you're seeing a lot of smaller, more niche brands
Speaker 2: rise because they're being a little braver and boulder, and
Speaker 2: a lot of young consumers don't lionize, you know, some
Speaker 2: of these big iconic brands the same way. The playing
Speaker 2: field is leveling, and it's because a lot of these brands,
Speaker 2: whether it's change in management or they're publicly traded companies
Speaker 2: with more pressure to maintain the stock price. I think
Speaker 2: they've lost their way, and I think I hope we're
Speaker 2: going to see a change for the better over the
Speaker 2: coming years where brands are going to get brave again,
Speaker 2: because right now, from my perspective, I believe the agency brand,
Speaker 2: you know side, it's just agencies can't do great work
Speaker 2: if they don't have the budgets and the support and
Speaker 2: the courage of brands. So I think that business has
Speaker 2: changed the lot.
Speaker 1: Okay, are you a full service agency? Most of this
Speaker 1: shit has moved online, but there's television, radio. If I
Speaker 1: go with you, you can service me across the board.
Speaker 2: We can in Major League Soccer, we play that role.
Speaker 2: Our wish is, you know, we want to we want
Speaker 2: to control as much as we can within reason. Our
Speaker 2: specialty is music, our specialty is creating non traditional platforms
Speaker 2: and ideas. But when it comes to a client that
Speaker 2: is really aligned with our thinking and they want the
Speaker 2: full service, like we have with Major League Soccer, we're
Speaker 2: all in and we've got a amazing pool of outside
Speaker 2: contributors that if a brand requires a specialty that we
Speaker 2: can find the resources. And we've got this amazing team
Speaker 2: of in house talent that knows how to keep building
Speaker 2: on what a brand needs. But I would say more
Speaker 2: often than not, our specialty is still going to be
Speaker 2: culture and music or so than being full service. Full
Speaker 2: service is a blessing and a curse. It can be
Speaker 2: very lucrative and very powerful, but it could also be
Speaker 2: so crippling because you have to hire so many people.
Speaker 2: You know, Like the biggest client we've ever had in
Speaker 2: the history of our company was Converse, which is the
Speaker 2: Nike owned sneaker brand, and at the peak of our
Speaker 2: Converse work, at one point we had fifty people working
Speaker 2: on the Converse business and we were doing incredible work.
Speaker 2: I mean work that I am so proud of, campaigns
Speaker 2: that are historical. But the problem is eventually there's a
Speaker 2: change in management and that goes away and then you
Speaker 2: have these amazing fifty people or you know, forty five
Speaker 2: people or whoever's working on the business, and you don't
Speaker 2: have the money to maintain the scale and the size
Speaker 2: of the staff. So you know, the blessing is you
Speaker 2: ramp up, you build this enormous business, the billing's great,
Speaker 2: the level works great, and then eventually it all ends.
Speaker 2: So being full service is pricky. I think at our
Speaker 2: core we want to stay rooted in music and culture.
Speaker 2: But when we can grow with the company like we
Speaker 2: did Converse or our Major League soccer, of course we're
Speaker 2: all in to do it.
Speaker 1: Okay, this is a business is consolidation. WPP owns a
Speaker 1: lot of iconic brands. There are other bigger companies. Has
Speaker 1: anyone approached you about buying the Cornerstone Agency and do
Speaker 1: you have a philosophy about that, like we're never going
Speaker 1: to sell out, or if the price is right or
Speaker 1: we need certain controls.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have been approached constantly over the years, and
Speaker 2: you know, we've rob and I were always fiercely independent.
Speaker 2: It's not that we wouldn't sell or take on an investor.
Speaker 2: We are just so proud of our independence. It's been
Speaker 2: a blessing and a curse. The blessing is it enabled
Speaker 2: us to stay true to the music and culture and
Speaker 2: what we love and what we do, and stay true
Speaker 2: to our staff. The curse is when you go through
Speaker 2: tough times like a COVID or or you want to
Speaker 2: invest and grow a business, it's inefficient to grow certain
Speaker 2: divisions of the company out of the profits of another
Speaker 2: division of the company. And when you hit a COVID
Speaker 2: and big, you know, complicated, you know, life changing moments
Speaker 2: and a business, you know, it's sometimes is really nice
Speaker 2: to have a deep pocketed parent company. So yes, to
Speaker 2: answer your question, We've been approached a lot by a
Speaker 2: lot of the major agency. We've been approached by a
Speaker 2: lot of the big media players, and have had amazing
Speaker 2: conversations with so many great people in the music industry.
Speaker 2: We've even talked to a lot of the majors about
Speaker 2: becoming a division of some of the majors because our
Speaker 2: services could really help exploit that. And it's not that
Speaker 2: I'm opposed to doing a deal at at some point,
Speaker 2: but I think we want to stay true through our
Speaker 2: mission and we're just somewhat selective. What I don't love
Speaker 2: about some of the advertising holding companies is the types
Speaker 2: of deals they do. You're essentially borrowing your own money.
Speaker 2: Some of these deals are earnouts, where essentially you're just
Speaker 2: getting multiple on your own success and in essence you're
Speaker 2: literally borrowing your future earnings to get a check up front.
Speaker 2: And I don't think that's the kind of deal that
Speaker 2: we would want to do. I think if we're ever
Speaker 2: going to do something, I would want to do it
Speaker 2: with a great music player. You know, music is in
Speaker 2: the DNA and it's the through line and the threat
Speaker 2: of every aspect of the company, and the best partners
Speaker 2: for us out there would be someone that is really
Speaker 2: true to building something great or has been building something
Speaker 2: great music And it's you know, when you work twenty
Speaker 2: eight years and now when I'm in this weird position
Speaker 2: that I'm in sole control of the company, these are
Speaker 2: really hard decisions to make. And you know, we came close.
Speaker 2: We came close to private equity, we came close to
Speaker 2: selling to some major music players, and ultimately we just
Speaker 2: never pulled the trigger. But at some point I think
Speaker 2: we would do something. It's just got to be the
Speaker 2: right people. I think people, not the deal or what's
Speaker 2: going to guide who we do something with. It's got
Speaker 2: to be people that really share our vision and believe
Speaker 2: in music and believe in artists and believe in what
Speaker 2: we do. And that's kind of what I'm looking for
Speaker 2: in a potential partner.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back to your earlier point about brands
Speaker 1: or gunshine. You mentioned that there's a change in regime.
Speaker 1: How much also is change in culture, cancelation culture, what's
Speaker 1: going on on x formally Twitter? How much has to
Speaker 1: do with the landscape as opposed to management.
Speaker 2: That affects everything. Sadly, of the riving force for us
Speaker 2: at a brand is always the CMO, the chief marketing officer,
Speaker 2: And I think that is just like you know, how
Speaker 2: the heads of labels eventually, you know, expire, and there's
Speaker 2: a change in management constantly in our in our side
Speaker 2: of the music industry, That's kind of how the marketing
Speaker 2: side works, except the timetables even shorter. You know, it's
Speaker 2: no different than an NFL football coach. There is just
Speaker 2: constant turnover. And usually when you get hired at these brands,
Speaker 2: your strength of the relationship and success is the partnership
Speaker 2: you have with the CMO and his or her team
Speaker 2: on down. And that's really you know, usually when we
Speaker 2: change clients, it's because of a change in management. And
Speaker 2: what happens is you get in a great groove with
Speaker 2: whoever you're working with, and then teams change and that
Speaker 2: person wants to build and bring in their own team.
Speaker 2: But to your point about you know, the Internet and culture,
Speaker 2: everything that's out there that affects all these brands, I think, yes,
Speaker 2: that has made certain brands more conservative. I think brands
Speaker 2: are definitely more calculated because of the messaging out there.
Speaker 2: I think brands are a lot more thoughtful because they
Speaker 2: want to manage public perception and they're really concerned. They're
Speaker 2: concerned that, hey, I'm building a ten million dollar campaign
Speaker 2: with an artist that God forbid this artist does something
Speaker 2: wrong or steps out of mound. We're liable, we have
Speaker 2: a lot at stake, And I think you're right. The
Speaker 2: Internet magnifies so many problems that I truly believe that
Speaker 2: you know, that is what contributes to some of these
Speaker 2: brands being gunshy.
Speaker 1: Okay, this may be below your pay grade, but in
Speaker 1: terms of corporations in sponsorship now it used to be
Speaker 1: for long to all, we'll get to get a sponsor.
Speaker 1: Then the sponsors felt that they weren't getting value for money.
Speaker 1: I hear you, what is this status of brands being
Speaker 1: involved with individual acts, with tours, with festivals or really
Speaker 1: do they want to play on a much grander level
Speaker 1: that is opposed to tying themselves to one of.
Speaker 2: Those great question. You know. The reason why we were
Speaker 2: successful with all of our cornerstone work and the reason
Speaker 2: why I think we're really important is when we do
Speaker 2: things with music, we don't want it to be transactional.
Speaker 2: And there's so many brands that have come out of
Speaker 2: the woodwork to spend money in music, whether it's sponsoring
Speaker 2: something or paying an artists, and it's when the partnership
Speaker 2: is truly about elevating the art or enhancing how that
Speaker 2: artist can make something for his or her fans. I
Speaker 2: think that's when the partnership succeeds. When the partnership is
Speaker 2: purely an exchange of money where you're paying a big
Speaker 2: name artist to endorse or support your product, it fails
Speaker 2: and it's just transactional and the artist is being pushed
Speaker 2: by the brand or the agency to check off all
Speaker 2: the contractual obligations, and the artists feel badgered by you know,
Speaker 2: having to shill or sell for for the brand they
Speaker 2: just took this enormous check from. And I think that's
Speaker 2: where a lot of these things fail. You Now, it's
Speaker 2: different in the festival, in the concert space because sometimes
Speaker 2: that's signage, or you're buying real estate, or you're buying
Speaker 2: you know, hospitality set up. But when it comes to
Speaker 2: an artist partnership, in my opinion, the most successful partnerships
Speaker 2: is when the decision makers, not just the agency, not
Speaker 2: just me and my team, but the actual CMO and
Speaker 2: the people at the brand get to sit with the
Speaker 2: artists and get to ask each other questions and look
Speaker 2: each other in the eye and say, hey, does this
Speaker 2: feel good to you? Is this a non starter for you?
Speaker 2: What's important to you? What's going to turn you off?
Speaker 2: That's when these partnerships succeed and they fail, and more
Speaker 2: so lately, they fail because it's just the monetary exchange.
Speaker 2: And I don't blame artists or management for taking the money,
Speaker 2: but I do blame brands for not doing their due
Speaker 2: diligence and really taking the time to speak and get
Speaker 2: to know the artists as they do this. And I
Speaker 2: think it's a very delicate dance between a successful partnership
Speaker 2: and just the paid transaction. And the good news is
Speaker 2: a lot of artists in our business have been able
Speaker 2: to succeed outside the economic downturn of aspects of the business.
Speaker 2: You know, there is non traditional money out there for
Speaker 2: certain acts. The bad news is it really only affects
Speaker 2: the upper middle to high tier of the industry. Developing
Speaker 2: artists just don't have as much opportunity on the brand side.
Speaker 2: There's just not as much out there because they just
Speaker 2: don't move the needle as much. So it's tricky.
Speaker 1: Can you give me a specific example of the relationship
Speaker 1: with a brand and a music tea, a band, or
Speaker 1: an individual act that is not transactional that you think works.
Speaker 2: You know, we created a series for Converse called Three Artists,
Speaker 2: One Song, and Converse was celebrating their one hundredth anniversary.
Speaker 2: They did some research. Jeff Kottrell, who's the CMO, brilliant guy,
Speaker 2: he was a gut guy. He was such a good
Speaker 2: mentor someone I learned so much from and really brilliant
Speaker 2: market probably one of the Hall of Fame cmos out there.
Speaker 2: And he said he did some research and he found
Speaker 2: that the one hundredth anniversary was spoke to old people.
Speaker 2: You know, it didn't speak to kids. Kids didn't give
Speaker 2: a shit. But they needed to do something to at
Speaker 2: least celebrate the moment. So they came up with a
Speaker 2: platform which connected music icons and influential icons that organically
Speaker 2: wore a Converse by their feet. You ever see paper dolls,
Speaker 2: how they're out and their connected paper dolls are connected
Speaker 2: by their hands. Well, they worked with anomally their creative interest.
Speaker 2: They created this platform to connect people by their feet.
Speaker 2: And our feeling was that's good. It's gonna be a
Speaker 2: striking visual. And if you think about Converse, the Ramones
Speaker 2: were Converse, Elvis wore Converse, Nwa were Converse. The Nirvana
Speaker 2: Kurt Cobain, you know, sadly died in Converse, and Converse
Speaker 2: has always been a music icon. And what we said
Speaker 2: to them is, guys, your DNA is music. If you
Speaker 2: think of Nike as the performance brand, your your your
Speaker 2: parent company. They own running and sports and golf and
Speaker 2: tennis blah blah blah. Converse owns music. You organically, the
Speaker 2: Strokes are wearing Converse in the height of their career,
Speaker 2: you're organically there. So they built this platform off of
Speaker 2: that insight to connect people as paper dolls from their feet,
Speaker 2: and we said, to celebrate this, we're going to build
Speaker 2: a platform, and to con versus credit, they gave us
Speaker 2: Sideenttle budgets. We're going to build a platform based on
Speaker 2: the diversity of how much music embraces your brand. And
Speaker 2: we create a platform called Three Artists, One Song, and
Speaker 2: the idea was to bring three disparate artists that would
Speaker 2: never work together. Whereas my ninety examples the kings of
Speaker 2: hip hop, this idea was, how do we bring three
Speaker 2: people that normally would never work together, where their labels
Speaker 2: would never have the budget to give them to do
Speaker 2: something like this, and we would envision giving them budget
Speaker 2: to make a music video that the industry couldn't afford
Speaker 2: to do anymore, and we would make a song collaboration
Speaker 2: with three disparate artists. The first one we did, we
Speaker 2: took Pharrell, We took Julian Casablancas from The Strokes at
Speaker 2: the height of the Strokes success, and we took Santy Gold,
Speaker 2: who was at the time a really buzzing, you know,
Speaker 2: great up and comer, and we had the three of them.
Speaker 2: We had this happened in my office. I had Julian
Speaker 2: and Farrell meet in my office for the first time.
Speaker 2: They had a lot of mutual respect for each other,
Speaker 2: didn't know that much about each other. And then subsequently
Speaker 2: Santy came and got to meet them as well, and
Speaker 2: they agreed. We paid them all for their participation, and
Speaker 2: they agreed to work on a collaboration and Forarrell and
Speaker 2: Santi and Julian wrote the lyrics and the track. Forrell
Speaker 2: produced the track. Julian played some instruments on the track,
Speaker 2: so out at Santy, and then we made We gave
Speaker 2: them an enormous budget. I think the budget was like
Speaker 2: half a million dollars for a music video, this beautifully animated,
Speaker 2: really cool music video. And instead of making a TV commercial,
Speaker 2: Converse would cut segments of the music video and they
Speaker 2: would run it during the VMA's. They would run it digitally.
Speaker 2: They would We made billboards of the three of them
Speaker 2: connected by their feet, and we put these iconic images
Speaker 2: of Farrell and I'll send you all the stuff so
Speaker 2: you can look at it after our call as well, Farrell,
Speaker 2: Julian and Santi. And it exploded because it blew people's mind.
Speaker 2: They're like number one. They're like, what the fuck are
Speaker 2: three of these artists coming together? How the hell did
Speaker 2: Converse pull this off? And to Converse's credit, it was
Speaker 2: so successful they went on their gut. They then funded
Speaker 2: us to do it for eight more years, and every
Speaker 2: single season when they had new product come out, we
Speaker 2: would do another three artist one song. We did one
Speaker 2: with Frank Ocean, which is one of the very few
Speaker 2: brand deals Frank's ever done, Dip Low and the two
Speaker 2: surviving members of The Clash, Paul simmon In and Mick Jones,
Speaker 2: and they all collaborated on a track which was incredible,
Speaker 2: and we made you know again the same image of
Speaker 2: all of those artists, and we put that on billboards
Speaker 2: in Hiccadilly Circus and on Sunset Boulevard and in Times Square.
Speaker 2: So we were moving the needle where we looked the
Speaker 2: artists in the face and said, hey, what would you
Speaker 2: want to do if you had almost endless budget and
Speaker 2: total creative control. And we did nine of them. We
Speaker 2: did Kid Cutty, Rostam from Vampire Weekend and Best Coast.
Speaker 2: We did we did so I'll send you the list
Speaker 2: of all of them. And we did Bernard Sumner from
Speaker 2: New Order and Hot Chip did one, and then we
Speaker 2: started doing them with regional appeal. We did an early
Speaker 2: version of a K pop one, you know, for just
Speaker 2: the Korean market. So that's an example of when you
Speaker 2: get people aligned creatively of what it could succeed. I'm
Speaker 2: trying to think of a failure example, but I don't
Speaker 2: have one on the spot for you, But there are
Speaker 2: a lot of those.
Speaker 1: These are creatively tens. Do these brands then say, you
Speaker 1: know something like Coke, it's a giant company and these
Speaker 1: are image campaigns. Do these companies want to see a
Speaker 1: direct impact on sales?
Speaker 2: They do, they don't. They have a patience. This is
Speaker 2: not driven solely about hey, we run the spot, are
Speaker 2: we seeing product? They want to see a rye in
Speaker 2: their brand heat, they want to see that they're being
Speaker 2: organically spoken about in social media, They're being organically spoken
Speaker 2: about in a lot of different you know press, lifestyle press,
Speaker 2: and ultimately they do want to see a correlation to sales.
Speaker 2: But I think what these campaigns do first and foremost
Speaker 2: is they start getting their younger consumer excited and talking
Speaker 2: about the brand, and then the hope is eventually it
Speaker 2: makes a sales connection. A lot of our stuff always
Speaker 2: has a retail call to action. So if we were
Speaker 2: doing these three artists one song collaborations, you would go
Speaker 2: into a Journey's store in the mall, or you would
Speaker 2: go into foot locker and then you would see that
Speaker 2: display and you'd see a connection through the campaign in there.
Speaker 2: But the best marketers are again, they're not making the
Speaker 2: future success of these campaigns solely based on a scent
Speaker 2: rise in sales. When they do that, they don't allow
Speaker 2: it the time to flourish. A lot of these campaigns
Speaker 2: succeed because we repeated them. We did it consistently for five, six, seven, eight,
Speaker 2: nine years, and a lot of brands right now will
Speaker 2: do these campaigns as a one off, but they don't
Speaker 2: build any momentum. And if you don't build any momentum,
Speaker 2: you're really not going to see the sales reaction. So yes,
Speaker 2: there is a form of measurement eventually that's needed, but
Speaker 2: it's not as black and white as hey, we need
Speaker 2: to see a ten percent rise in sales or we're
Speaker 2: not doing this again.
Speaker 1: Okay, when you deal with acts, Eil Young famously wrote
Speaker 1: a song and won't take any money from people. He
Speaker 1: still means something in today's marketplace. You can go back
Speaker 1: and look at people who took the money. They don't
Speaker 1: mean as much. The issue of credibility now in the business,
Speaker 1: and a lot of these people are percent people say, oh,
Speaker 1: the customer doesn't care. You know, you can sell out,
Speaker 1: it's no big deal. What is the status of the
Speaker 1: impact on one of these clients, And would you say
Speaker 1: every client there's a musician, there's a way to do
Speaker 1: a brand deal. Or should certain acts still not do
Speaker 1: brand deals?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great question. I don't think it's a blanket,
Speaker 2: black and white answer. I don't think the consumer cares
Speaker 2: anywhere near as much as they used to, you know,
Speaker 2: like back in the day, if Nirvana did a brand
Speaker 2: deal in the height of their success, I think it
Speaker 2: would have been a complete failure and gone against everything
Speaker 2: they stand for. There are certain acts that I think
Speaker 2: have to tread slowly and take their time, But the
Speaker 2: consumer is a lot more accepting, even embracing. I mean,
Speaker 2: we live in a social world where, especially in hip
Speaker 2: hop and certain genres, you know, the right brand association
Speaker 2: really elevates an artist's status, you know, and it shows
Speaker 2: that you know, whether it's high fashion that embraces a
Speaker 2: lot of music, you know, or the right car brand.
Speaker 2: There are situations where brands can elevate the consumer perception.
Speaker 2: I do think consumers are much more forgiving and accepting.
Speaker 2: They're not as critical as maybe they were back in
Speaker 2: the day. But there are certain artists that have to
Speaker 2: have a high filter. You can't just take every check.
Speaker 2: You know, I have approached I'm not going to name names,
Speaker 2: but I've talked to I've spoken with, you know, and
Speaker 2: talked to some of the biggest superstars in the business
Speaker 2: on behalf of some of the biggest brands in the world,
Speaker 2: and they have cited certain corporate policies and issues for
Speaker 2: the reason that they're not going to work there. So
Speaker 2: brands do artists have a very high filter. They have
Speaker 2: a lot of social conscience. They're not just out for
Speaker 2: the biggest check. And I think the best artists will
Speaker 2: always evaluate brand partnerships based on not just the finances,
Speaker 2: but what is the best for them, their fans, and
Speaker 2: how it's going to be perceived.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's switch gears. Tell me about starting the Fader.
Speaker 2: So Fader started in the summer of nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 2: and it was a guy named Lee Harrison, who was
Speaker 2: heading up a lot of marketing for Rob and I brilliant,
Speaker 2: smart guy. I worked with him at Columbia. He was
Speaker 2: the guy that came up with so many really great
Speaker 2: ideas for us, and he was the young guy on
Speaker 2: our team that just always had his foot on the
Speaker 2: pulse of every great new artist, what was going on culturally.
Speaker 2: And the idea was we were going to start Fader,
Speaker 2: and a fader is the mixer. It's it's the way
Speaker 2: that DJ blends records. So it's the way a DJ
Speaker 2: is going from one record to another record and on
Speaker 2: the mixing console of his DJ gear. And the idea
Speaker 2: was to start a small, you know, publication focus on
Speaker 2: what's next in music, to turn the same people who
Speaker 2: were giving those mixtapes to that I was describing, to
Speaker 2: turn those people onto what's next in music, to document
Speaker 2: the access we had to hearing all this early music
Speaker 2: and using some really great photography, writing some great stories
Speaker 2: to turn DJ's influencers just people that could help break artists.
Speaker 2: And the first issue. Rob was the one who pushed us.
Speaker 2: He's like, I'm so fucking sick of hearing of this
Speaker 2: idea we're getting in a room right now, and we're
Speaker 2: making this thing. And it was a team of like
Speaker 2: six or seven of us. Our CEO, Anthony Holland, was
Speaker 2: one of those one of those guys who just get
Speaker 2: you come up with an idea, he figures out how
Speaker 2: to do it. And Rob was the muscle and the
Speaker 2: energy to get us to all to stay in the
Speaker 2: office for a week straight and just figure it out.
Speaker 2: And Rob and I wrote a lot of the early
Speaker 2: pieces to get We hired some freelancers, We had some friends.
Speaker 2: We had this incredible guy named Jonathan Manyon who was
Speaker 2: an up and coming respected hip hop photographer, and he
Speaker 2: came in and got the first few covers for us,
Speaker 2: and Anthony hired some young designers that did the layout.
Speaker 2: In designing, eventually we met a young guy named Jeff
Speaker 2: Staple who has a very successful clothing company, big designer
Speaker 2: and in the clothing space and super successful entrepreneur. Jeff
Speaker 2: Staple came in and became our first real designer to
Speaker 2: help lay out the designs of all the early issues
Speaker 2: of Fader, and we just scrapped together the ability to
Speaker 2: make this magazine. The first one had funk Master Flex,
Speaker 2: a big New York DJ from Hot ninety seven on
Speaker 2: the cover and it was almost like a pamphlet. And
Speaker 2: then the second one thanks to a great young girl
Speaker 2: who worked for us for years, Sarah Nwkirk. She most
Speaker 2: recently she manages Raging against the Machine now to this day.
Speaker 2: But Sarah was able to get us Zach Dala Roche
Speaker 2: from Rage, Rob was able to get Run from Run
Speaker 2: DMC and Premiere from Gangstar and we put the three
Speaker 2: of them on the cover of Fader. Again, here we
Speaker 2: are Bob men, melting genres, bringing really disparate genres together,
Speaker 2: and we get the three of them to be on
Speaker 2: the cover of Fader. And it was the caption the
Speaker 2: title on the cover was three Kings and people's heads
Speaker 2: exploded when we put the three of them on the cover.
Speaker 2: People started noticing, holy shit, what the hell is Fader?
Speaker 2: Who's behind this? And how did they get those three
Speaker 2: artists together on the cover. And from there it exploded
Speaker 2: because every young photographer saw that we were making Fader
Speaker 2: on this really heavy paper stock. We were breaking all
Speaker 2: the rules. We were allowing young photographers, not the legends
Speaker 2: have their first shot to shoot covers. We were giving
Speaker 2: shots to artists that were really young in the evolution
Speaker 2: in their career, and we went from that Three King's
Speaker 2: cover to getting Beck and D'Angelo together on a cover,
Speaker 2: and then we had the idea that we were never
Speaker 2: going to sell the ad space on the back cover,
Speaker 2: but we were always going to do two covers. So
Speaker 2: the idea was, how do we take all of our
Speaker 2: history and the alternative rock space, the dance electronics space,
Speaker 2: and our history in the hip hop space and have
Speaker 2: a truly diverse magazine that represented everything in culture. And
Speaker 2: it was modeled after the Face like. We saw that
Speaker 2: the UK was doing things in magazines and media so
Speaker 2: much better than the US. Spin and Rolling Stone at
Speaker 2: the time had gotten stale. They were moving in a
Speaker 2: much more pop direction. And our whole mandate was, let's
Speaker 2: break the rules, Let's start putting relatively unknown artists on
Speaker 2: these covers. Let's do two covers of every issue. And
Speaker 2: it really exploded, and we went from selling the ads
Speaker 2: ourselves and writing stuff to building a team and bringing
Speaker 2: in some expertise, and with every every issue it got
Speaker 2: bigger and bigger. The bet d'andelo issue led to us
Speaker 2: having outcasts on the cover. Outcast led to us having
Speaker 2: thanks to the help of Paul Rosenberg, a young eminem
Speaker 2: who was just starting out and putting EM and M
Speaker 2: on the cover. And then then the world started just
Speaker 2: noticing what we're doing, and everything was inbound. Everybody was
Speaker 2: pitching us their ideas and stories. I think fader Though,
Speaker 2: really came to life when we started doing events, and
Speaker 2: when we started celebrating every issue with an issue release party.
Speaker 2: It really started to all the right people, whether we
Speaker 2: were in New York or la or London, all the
Speaker 2: right people would come out and come to our parties
Speaker 2: and our performances. We did an event in New York
Speaker 2: in the Round. We got Red Striped the beer company
Speaker 2: to give us some money and we had this virtually
Speaker 2: unknown artist named Mia play in the Round in New
Speaker 2: York City and it was her first New York City
Speaker 2: performance ever think and it was like moments like that
Speaker 2: where everyone knew that we were playing a big role
Speaker 2: in introducing new things in culture. We eventually would go
Speaker 2: on to start fader Ford. Fader Fort was our festival
Speaker 2: property that was almost like counter programming to different things
Speaker 2: that would happen in a city. We did it in
Speaker 2: New York City during CMJ or the VMAs. We did
Speaker 2: it in Austin during south By Southwest, and it was
Speaker 2: our way of bringing the editorial of Fader to life
Speaker 2: in a physical sense. Fader Ford in Austin. It's one
Speaker 2: of the first shows Amy Winehouse did down there. You know,
Speaker 2: she did like a handful of shows. You know, she
Speaker 2: chose to play our events as a young artist. Fader
Speaker 2: Fort was the place where so many established and young
Speaker 2: acts would come and perform, and they'd use Fader as
Speaker 2: a platform. We did events with. You know, Travis Scott
Speaker 2: played fader Ford at a at a very early stage
Speaker 2: of his career, both in New York and in Austin.
Speaker 2: Eventually Kanye would headline Fader for It, Drake would headline
Speaker 2: Fader for It. Bony Ver, a young nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 2: open Fader for It when they were just starting out.
Speaker 2: So we built this editorial platform that was focused on
Speaker 2: telling the stories of who was next in music. And
Speaker 2: we're so proud of the artists that we were part of.
Speaker 2: Pharrell and Chad Hugo when they were the Neptunes were
Speaker 2: on the cover the White Stripes. But then we brought
Speaker 2: it to life in a physical sense for creating our
Speaker 2: own festival property, and it really exploded because we were
Speaker 2: doing things differently.
Speaker 1: Okay, when you started the Fader, what were the goals?
Speaker 1: Was there an economic goal, like this is a business?
Speaker 1: Was it just spreading the word? What was the goal
Speaker 1: at the advent?
Speaker 2: The advent and the goal was to turn more people
Speaker 2: onto new music. We felt there was a hole in
Speaker 2: the media space in the US that nobody was talking
Speaker 2: about what's next in music anymore, you know, like I said,
Speaker 2: spinning Rolling Stone, we're covering whatever. Mainstream pop stars they
Speaker 2: were trying to become bigger, broader, and only the UK
Speaker 2: publications were really digging in on new stuff. So the
Speaker 2: goal was to create a vehicle, a tool to turn
Speaker 2: people onto new music and culture, and that would help us.
Speaker 2: It would help, you know, really just build a better
Speaker 2: network of relationships that could help all the other aspects
Speaker 2: of the business. Eventually, Yes, we hoped to turn it
Speaker 2: into a profitable business, but the Fader in its early
Speaker 2: years it lost money. I mean, we were lucky that
Speaker 2: we had an agency and other businesses that we could
Speaker 2: pour that money into funding the start of Fader. We
Speaker 2: always wanted to keep a clear separation of church and
Speaker 2: state between the agency and Fader, but they did help
Speaker 2: each other out. Fader opened up a lot of doors
Speaker 2: for us to get a lot of meetings on the
Speaker 2: agency side, and then Cornerstone got us the brand relationships
Speaker 2: where we could go to these brands and said, hey,
Speaker 2: help us meet your advertising people. We need your help
Speaker 2: to support this great new media property we're starting. So
Speaker 2: both businesses did help each other out, and then probably
Speaker 2: a couple of years in, we started becoming profitable and
Speaker 2: it became a great standalone business.
Speaker 1: You know, we had so many magazines of going on
Speaker 1: a business or stopped in print. What was the history
Speaker 1: of Fader as the Internet came along? Uh?
Speaker 2: It was the Internet was exciting our editorial team, you know,
Speaker 2: really was discovering what was then known as blogging and
Speaker 2: that world. And we hired this great young guy, Nick
Speaker 2: Cash Dubbs, who is a Trax partner right now on
Speaker 2: more on the record side, but he was our initial
Speaker 2: Fader dot com editor. We brought him on board. He
Speaker 2: was running his own blog, and he and our editorial
Speaker 2: team really built the first version of Fader dot com
Speaker 2: and it was really successful. You know, we started with
Speaker 2: writing our stories online. We never wanted to stop printing
Speaker 2: the magazine and the Internet really was a great evolution
Speaker 2: of Fader. It opened us up to so many worlds.
Speaker 2: Eventually we started spending more and more money on video
Speaker 2: and short form documentaries. We you know, really we're telling
Speaker 2: great stories both in a video sense. That would lead
Speaker 2: to us starting some podcasts, you know. A couple of
Speaker 2: years ago, during COVID, we started a partnership with Mark
Speaker 2: Ronson and we started a podcast with Mark we call
Speaker 2: a Fader Uncovered, so in between him producing whatever massive album,
Speaker 2: he would interview the who's who of icons and music.
Speaker 2: So we started using the podcasting platform. We still do
Speaker 2: a lot of social video obviously now everything is on
Speaker 2: Instagram and TikTok. Unfortunately, we haven't printed the magazine since
Speaker 2: COVID because it just doesn't make financial success, you know sense.
Speaker 2: But we're we're really trying to reactivate print. I do
Speaker 2: want to bring it back and maybe do two issues
Speaker 2: a year. But the media business is true, and you know,
Speaker 2: you and I were talking about this in in London
Speaker 2: a few months ago. The media business is so challenging.
Speaker 2: Dollars have moved away from media, dollars are from from brands,
Speaker 2: are being spent again on social media and measured platforms.
Speaker 2: And it's been a really really challenging period for Fader
Speaker 2: and any media business. You know, it's it's as a business,
Speaker 2: it's become really really hard to figure out what is
Speaker 2: the path forward of media. And I think, you know,
Speaker 2: we're not alone. A lot of media properties are in
Speaker 2: this business. It's it's the film and TV world going
Speaker 2: through it, it's the it's the content business is going
Speaker 2: through it. Every business in media is really in a struggle. Luckily,
Speaker 2: we we really doubled down on Fader label and building
Speaker 2: a whole music division, and that through through the success
Speaker 2: of streaming, has been an enormously profitable business and been
Speaker 2: a really strong component. But the media business is something
Speaker 2: that we're challenged with to figure out what is the
Speaker 2: way forward. And we're experimenting with a lot of new
Speaker 2: things on a lot of new approaches, but it is
Speaker 2: not easy.
Speaker 1: So tell me about the elements of the music division.
Speaker 2: So music division started in the early two thousands because
Speaker 2: a lot of artists that we met through Fader, New
Speaker 2: Rob and I came from the music industry. They knew
Speaker 2: we had a lot of expertise and they would ask
Speaker 2: for our help and we didn't want to charge them.
Speaker 2: We didn't want to open up a music marketing division again.
Speaker 2: So we said, you know what, we want to help
Speaker 2: you guys. Let's become partners. We'll put up the money,
Speaker 2: we'll do the work in the marketing, you'll be the artist,
Speaker 2: and we'll create what is now a pretty modern deal
Speaker 2: structure that the whole industry is embrace. I'm not saying
Speaker 2: we started it, but we wanted to be early to
Speaker 2: create a true fifty to fifty partnership with artists. So
Speaker 2: we met tons of artists through Fader. They would always
Speaker 2: be in our office, they always play us Munick. Some
Speaker 2: were on majors, some were disenchanted with that system. They
Speaker 2: wanted options and help with their career. And it started
Speaker 2: with this brilliant artist who we still work with to
Speaker 2: this day named Saul Williams, whose first record was produced
Speaker 2: by Rick Rubmin. Came out on Columbia on Rick Rubin's label,
Speaker 2: and then we eventually signed him over to management and
Speaker 2: signed him to Fader label. We then got Trent Reznor
Speaker 2: to work with him on the second record. Saul was
Speaker 2: on tour with Trent and they made the album together
Speaker 2: and Saul's what really got us started, and from Saul,
Speaker 2: we then signed this amazing duo named Matt and Kim.
Speaker 2: They had an offer from Warners and Colombia, all the majors.
Speaker 2: They just were an indie band all the way, and
Speaker 2: we just fell in love with each other. They were
Speaker 2: this brilliant duo who toured relentlessly and they had excellent music.
Speaker 2: They had played me Daylight, which would become their career
Speaker 2: head and they were managed by Kevin Patrick, who to
Speaker 2: this day is a great friend who is an A
Speaker 2: and R guy at Columbia who I worked with, and
Speaker 2: just a really smart, brilliant guy. And he always knew
Speaker 2: that the major label system were going to eat them up,
Speaker 2: and we partnered on that and our label just really
Speaker 2: started that way. It started organically was profitable, but as
Speaker 2: we entered the twenty ten to twenty fifteen era, it
Speaker 2: was a tough time to make money in the music business,
Speaker 2: so we were very conservative about how we signed acts
Speaker 2: and what we went after. And all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: we started looking at our catalog circa twenty sixteen seventeen,
Speaker 2: and the revenue that we saw coming in from streaming
Speaker 2: was enormous. It started to really make sense. We had
Speaker 2: built this great catalog, and all of a sudden, the
Speaker 2: third small component of our business was becoming one of
Speaker 2: the most profitable and most efficient by virtue of the
Speaker 2: success of streaming. And it was at that point that
Speaker 2: we said we got to double down on this business
Speaker 2: and reinvest in it. And I met Carson Oberg who
Speaker 2: was a young manager who's managing a few artists, and
Speaker 2: we brought him in to head up the label. He
Speaker 2: was in his early twenties and really really smart beyond
Speaker 2: his years and or in his mid twenties, and he, uh,
Speaker 2: he really transformed the label. We we then I met Claro.
Speaker 2: We signed Claro, who you know, is an absolutely brilliant artist.
Speaker 2: We then parlayed the success of Claro and and and
Speaker 2: grew the label roster from what was about six artists
Speaker 2: to about thirty five artists right now. We built a
Speaker 2: publishing entity that goes through Cobalt. The label is solely
Speaker 2: owned by us, but it's distributed by Virgin And then
Speaker 2: we have a management company that Carson heads up. And
Speaker 2: we worked with this, you know, brilliant roster of artists.
Speaker 2: Dell water Gap is our biggest success on that side.
Speaker 2: He is an incredible artists, the hardest working artist I've
Speaker 2: ever seen in my thirty seven years of music. He
Speaker 2: is so committed to what he is. He is everything
Speaker 2: that an artist needs to do in today's climate. But
Speaker 2: it's a challenging business for independent labels and it's a
Speaker 2: challenging business for young artists. We're doing really well with everything,
Speaker 2: but as you and I have talked about in the past,
Speaker 2: is it is so hard to break through in today's business.
Speaker 2: The opportunity is there for so many. The problem is
Speaker 2: to have real success and to make a living and
Speaker 2: sustain for independent artists and independent labels, it's really challenging.
Speaker 2: And you know, by having a catalog, we're able to
Speaker 2: continue to invest in new artists and that's our mission.
Speaker 2: Our mandate with Fader Label is to sign career artists,
Speaker 2: whether it's to management or label, and really put in
Speaker 2: the time to have a five to ten year plan
Speaker 2: or horizon. You know, I remember you and I talking
Speaker 2: about it. It's so many artists don't make it because
Speaker 2: they don't have the perseverance they they they just they
Speaker 2: can't either survive financially, which is difficult, or they just
Speaker 2: can't take the years of lack of progress. And it's
Speaker 2: the name of the game for independent artists right now.
Speaker 2: It's it's you've got to be a great songwriter, you
Speaker 2: got to tour like crazy, but most importantly, you've got
Speaker 2: to have perseverance and time in the game. It's all
Speaker 2: about how much time you know you're willing to put
Speaker 2: to gradually establish your career. Now, yeah, some people do
Speaker 2: get lucky, they have a TikTok hit, they have some moment,
Speaker 2: but at the end of the day, it takes artists
Speaker 2: a long time to establish themselves. And that's that's our
Speaker 2: mentality of fat or Label is that we want to
Speaker 2: really partner with artists that want to stay in the
Speaker 2: game and our career artists. We're not looking to sign
Speaker 2: quick hitting songs. You know, obviously if they come along,
Speaker 2: it's nice because it will fund the next wave of signings.
Speaker 2: But our our rosters what we see as a bunch
Speaker 2: of career artists.
Speaker 1: Okay, how many of your artists are both on the
Speaker 1: label and also managed.
Speaker 2: There are four artists on the management roster, three of
Speaker 2: them we work with on the label side, Dell Water
Speaker 2: Gap as signed to Mom and Pop. We don't force
Speaker 2: that issue at all. We use our label as an
Speaker 2: option and our publishing entity as an option if a
Speaker 2: managed artist likes the control and wants it as a solution.
Speaker 2: We never commission the master side if we're managing them,
Speaker 2: so we keep that revenue stream separate. And we also
Speaker 2: can control the type of deal structures. So as an
Speaker 2: artist get bigger, if we build them on the label,
Speaker 2: we then have the option to go sign to a
Speaker 2: bigger label, another indie major if it's moreranted. So it
Speaker 2: gives us a lot of flexibility and I think where
Speaker 2: that used to be taboo in the business, I think
Speaker 2: you're seeing more and more or that artists and managers
Speaker 2: like the control. Doing everything under one roof enables you
Speaker 2: to call all the shots and makes the make the decisions.
Speaker 2: That's not taking anything away from you know. Partnering with
Speaker 2: another good label like Mom and Pop on the Dell
Speaker 2: water Gap side have been incredible partners. Love working with them.
Speaker 2: They're smart, they they spend money the right way and
Speaker 2: we'll invest heavily in our project and they work really hard.
Speaker 2: So that's an example of where it works. Sometimes you
Speaker 2: go to a major it doesn't always work, or another
Speaker 2: label it doesn't work, So we like the flex to
Speaker 2: have the ability to do both.
Speaker 1: Okay, is Fader label a farm team for the majors
Speaker 1: or is it a competitor to the majors.
Speaker 2: I like to say it's a competitor. I do not
Speaker 2: want to do their bidding and their dirty work. And
Speaker 2: you know, sometimes it fucking sucks being in our position, Bob,
Speaker 2: I don't have their budget. Claro is a great example.
Speaker 2: I don't you know. I don't have the ability to
Speaker 2: sign mega deals to keep some of these artists. And
Speaker 2: we give these artists such fair deal structures where the
Speaker 2: reason we beat a lot of majors to sign them
Speaker 2: is because our deal structure is very competitive. Unfortunately, that
Speaker 2: eventually puts you in a vulnerable position. And you know,
Speaker 2: when your deal structure is so artist friendly, you run
Speaker 2: the risk of someone coming along with a bigger check
Speaker 2: and a bigger opportunity. So we do see ourselves as
Speaker 2: competitors to the majors. Clearly, I don't have the catalog,
Speaker 2: or the budgets or the muscle that they have, but
Speaker 2: I do have an incredible young team who really live it,
Speaker 2: and they are so all of them are so good
Speaker 2: at their jobs, and they have such passion for what
Speaker 2: they do, and our artists work so closely with them,
Speaker 2: and we have a label head who's a manager first,
Speaker 2: and when artists come to Fader label, even if we
Speaker 2: don't manage them, we act as a second management team.
Speaker 2: We are there to supplement and help the existing management
Speaker 2: team on any aspect of the project. So, yes, we
Speaker 2: compete with the majors. And it's a really stricky business
Speaker 2: for us because a lot of times, after we do
Speaker 2: a couple albums we get an artist to the next level,
Speaker 2: we often do lose them because there's a big advance
Speaker 2: or something waiting. Occasionally they come back to us. We
Speaker 2: lost Matt and Kim to Harvest and Capital for an
Speaker 2: album and luckily, you know, after that didn't you know,
Speaker 2: hit the expectations they want. They came back. So occasionally
Speaker 2: that happens, and you know, we don't get bitter when
Speaker 2: we when we lose an artist or an artist moves on.
Speaker 2: We actually set up our deals knowing that that inevitably
Speaker 2: can is going to happen to us. The hope is
Speaker 2: if we do our job really well, everybody wins they
Speaker 2: want to continue with us.
Speaker 1: Let's say I make a deal with you, you're going
Speaker 1: to give me fifty percent of the net? Am I
Speaker 1: going to own the album?
Speaker 2: We do license deals, so yes, eventually, when I am
Speaker 2: long gone, you are going to own your masters again.
Speaker 2: And we try to do long term license deals, but
Speaker 2: not they're not like ridiculous when it's not like the
Speaker 2: artist is going to get it back when they're you know,
Speaker 2: seventy years old. They're they're very fair license deals, and
Speaker 2: you know, we need to give ourselves enough runway to
Speaker 2: recoup and get ourselves in a position to make the
Speaker 2: money we invest. But the artists will own their masters
Speaker 2: with fate or label. We don't do perpetuity deals.
Speaker 1: Okay. We have a couple of examples Matt and Kim
Speaker 1: Claro who are on majors and came back. Yep. I
Speaker 1: don't want to focus on those specifically. I want to
Speaker 1: ask the question, if somebody comes to you and you
Speaker 1: are not the only option, they are talking to other people,
Speaker 1: what is the pitch for the Feeder label? Why should
Speaker 1: they sign with you?
Speaker 2: They should sign with us because we have all of
Speaker 2: the infrastructure of a big label, Because we run a
Speaker 2: very vast corporation. We understand the brand partnership. We have
Speaker 2: a lot of creative resources across the entire company that
Speaker 2: we can tap, and we have a small, nimble team
Speaker 2: that is going to pay a lot more attention to
Speaker 2: that particular artist for release because we're only putting out
Speaker 2: a handful of records a year. I mean, we are
Speaker 2: not you know, we're not in a system that you're
Speaker 2: competing with you know, ten other priorities at any given time.
Speaker 2: We try to slot every one of our releases, so
Speaker 2: that is getting the sole attention of our label. So
Speaker 2: really good, strong, diverse infrastructure, excellent relationships where we can
Speaker 2: parlay all the relationships across the history of this company
Speaker 2: to talk to agents and festivals and all the key
Speaker 2: partners and music and the driving force is this amazing
Speaker 2: young team we have. You know, I you know what
Speaker 2: I learned really on in my career, it's that that
Speaker 2: young generation that drive our business. It's kind it's kind
Speaker 2: of what's broken in our business if you think about it.
Speaker 2: And I'm putting all the power of Fader label into
Speaker 2: sal our. A and R guy who is a former
Speaker 2: Fader writer who we made an A and R guy
Speaker 2: Carson who's a young manager who's now running a label
Speaker 2: as well, Sophia who heads up marketing, Rita who's our
Speaker 2: head of digital and project management. These are young people,
Speaker 2: all thirty or younger, that live, eat, and breathe the
Speaker 2: culture of what we're building around our roster, and I
Speaker 2: think there's something to be said about that energy and
Speaker 2: that hunger and that work ethic because they're peers of
Speaker 2: these artists and they're going to kill for them, and
Speaker 2: they are just as much as we're trying to establish
Speaker 2: the artist's career, I'm trying to establish their careers. I'm
Speaker 2: trying to teach them and mentor them the same way
Speaker 2: that I was mentored. And the idea is, you know,
Speaker 2: how we can make them really excel at their jobs
Speaker 2: and successful just as much as their artists, because if
Speaker 2: they become more powerful and more skilled and build better relationships,
Speaker 2: that's going to rub off on the success of our artists.
Speaker 2: So I think that's why people should should consider us
Speaker 2: as an option. It's we're a very different company than
Speaker 2: what's out there, even even the other indies we're competing with.
Speaker 2: We're just we come from a different mentality.
Speaker 1: You were saying that it's broken with young employees. What
Speaker 1: were you referencing.
Speaker 2: I, you know, our industry is a little broken. I
Speaker 2: think there's you know, this was This is an industry
Speaker 2: that I think the youth has to be empowered. You're
Speaker 2: starting to see that transition. We'll see how it works.
Speaker 2: And I'm not saying that older execus negatives should be out,
Speaker 2: but I think the older generation like myself and older
Speaker 2: executives have to do a better job of teaching and
Speaker 2: mentoring young talent, and then the industry has to start
Speaker 2: to empower the younger generation to take over. I think,
Speaker 2: you know, it's not just about the next TikTok. It's
Speaker 2: about people that are willing to go out and get
Speaker 2: their hands dirty and do the work. You know. I
Speaker 2: was with you, Bob in London and we were at
Speaker 2: Nile Horn, and the one thing that really blew me
Speaker 2: away is I love seeing you at two o'clock in
Speaker 2: the morning. We are there at Niles after party. It's
Speaker 2: the last show the tour, and you're still there and
Speaker 2: you're talking to people and you're engaging, and that to
Speaker 2: me is still in It may sound flippant, flippant or stupid,
Speaker 2: that is inherently what is most important in our business.
Speaker 2: It's being out and listening and seeing music and talking
Speaker 2: to people and engaging with people. And we need a
Speaker 2: general that isn't tired and is still willing to do that,
Speaker 2: because that's where the fundamental is. This business doesn't change.
Speaker 2: And we live in a world where everyone's on their
Speaker 2: phones and they're so quick to think that they can
Speaker 2: stay plugged in because they're watching TikTok and social media.
Speaker 2: And you know, I watched you in that room. You
Speaker 2: and I were two of the older dudes there. We
Speaker 2: were the last men standing. And I think that is
Speaker 2: a lost art in our business. People have gotten tired
Speaker 2: or they've gotten complacent with how digital things have become.
Speaker 2: And to me, in the music industry is all about
Speaker 2: being present and being out there and being immersed in
Speaker 2: the culture. And that's what I pride myself on doing
Speaker 2: and leading by example. That's what I'm trying to push
Speaker 2: our staff to do. And it's hard. It's harder. Even
Speaker 2: young people are a little tired of doing it. But
Speaker 2: I think that's what makes the big successes separate of
Speaker 2: those people that are having moderate success and they're in
Speaker 2: the scene, they're willing to to stay out there and
Speaker 2: they're curious and they're asking the questions and meeting people
Speaker 2: and watching with their own eyes, not on their on
Speaker 2: their cell phones.
Speaker 1: Okay, you say that the Fader label has a relationship
Speaker 1: with Virgin, What does that look like and does Virgin
Speaker 1: have the right to sort of pick up on artists
Speaker 1: you have success with or is it straight distribution or
Speaker 1: are they providing any other services.
Speaker 2: They are a straight distributor, so we fund everything ourselves,
Speaker 2: We own everything out right. They take a percentage of
Speaker 2: our gross revenue. They help us with DSPs and placement
Speaker 2: of the songs. They will help us sometimes will upstream
Speaker 2: certain marketing services. We don't upstream records to them, but
Speaker 2: we will, you know, use some of their services if
Speaker 2: we need some help either globally in other areas. And
Speaker 2: it's hard, I mean, Virgin is part of a major
Speaker 2: label system and they've just merged the company with three
Speaker 2: other companies. And my fear with all of the indie distributors,
Speaker 2: not just Virgin, is that they're so consolidated and we're
Speaker 2: competing with so many other releases, and we're competing for attention,
Speaker 2: and there is not a true indie focused system out
Speaker 2: there right now, and it's really it's concerning for me.
Speaker 2: I mean, Virgin has been a great partner, They've done
Speaker 2: great work. I think as they complete the merger of
Speaker 2: these other companies that they merge with, they're going to
Speaker 2: get stronger and better. But my concern is that there
Speaker 2: are not a true indie distribution resource. It is a
Speaker 2: conglomerate of a lot of different companies that are all
Speaker 2: merged into one, and all of a sudden, we find
Speaker 2: ourselves competing with tons of releases for attention. And I
Speaker 2: think our philosophy is we got to try to become
Speaker 2: as self sufficient as we can and take what's best
Speaker 2: out of that system and really rely on ourselves for
Speaker 2: everything else. But because the major label system is it's
Speaker 2: at a real cross at least when it comes to indies.
Speaker 2: They're all these labels are in more of the artist's business.
Speaker 2: They are doing as many direct deals with the artists themselves.
Speaker 2: They're giving artists bigger percentages of their revenue, They're fronting
Speaker 2: them cash. THEA walls of the world are doing a
Speaker 2: great job of it. Virgins starting to do more of this,
Speaker 2: and my fear is they want to be as direct,
Speaker 2: thus becoming competitors to our model, and it's a concern
Speaker 2: to us. And you know, I believe that there's a
Speaker 2: role for us within these systems. But I'm trying to
Speaker 2: figure out what is that way forward.
Speaker 1: Okay, traditional labels, the three majors in their different divisions,
Speaker 1: they are really at this laid date heavily focused on radio. Radio.
Speaker 1: Terrestrial radio has a smaller share of mind share than
Speaker 1: ever before. It's kind of like people advertising on network television. Yes,
Speaker 1: fewer viewers, but it's got more mass than others. You
Speaker 1: own a label, ay, what is your view on radio?
Speaker 1: What is your view on where the majors are putting
Speaker 1: the reference and where you're putting your reference.
Speaker 2: You know, I used to work radio. I still listen
Speaker 2: and get turned on to a lot of music via radio.
Speaker 2: I love listening to six Music. I love listening to
Speaker 2: Zane Lowe's show on Apple Music. I love Sirius XMU
Speaker 2: on Sirius. I mean radio for me, if you find
Speaker 2: the right sources have always been really useful in a
Speaker 2: great way to keep me in the no. But radio
Speaker 2: is completely irrelevant to a young generation right now, and
Speaker 2: it's radio's own fault. Radio didn't evolve. Radio basically latched
Speaker 2: onto this older demographic and played the ratings game when
Speaker 2: they could have really rebuilt and rebranded themselves. And now
Speaker 2: you're faced with a generation that just doesn't care. They
Speaker 2: are not listening to radio at all. They're listening to
Speaker 2: Spotify or Apple Music, or they're finding music on TikTok,
Speaker 2: they're finding music on reels, YouTube, YouTube shorts, and I
Speaker 2: think radio is really only capturing a much older audience.
Speaker 2: Pop radio maybe has more impact than some of the
Speaker 2: other formats. Maybe specialty shows and mix shows make some impact,
Speaker 2: but I don't think radio as a driver for commerce
Speaker 2: to develop new artists has anywhere the same impact. I
Speaker 2: do think there are offshoots of radio that can can
Speaker 2: be helpful and useful, but I think the major labels
Speaker 2: play that game. We don't invest in it. You know,
Speaker 2: we invested in it with Claro back in the day.
Speaker 2: Occasionally we'll take a shot. We don't really see en
Speaker 2: up tick in our streams that's commensurate to the amount
Speaker 2: of money you just spent. It will help touring, it
Speaker 2: will help awareness. I just don't think radio isn't a
Speaker 2: good place right now. And I think they they could
Speaker 2: have reinvented themselves in so many ways, and you know
Speaker 2: I didn't. I don't root for radio's failure. I'd love
Speaker 2: to see radio turning around. But radio's gotta just get innovatives,
Speaker 2: and right now there's no innovation with the way they're
Speaker 2: they're going about their business.
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's say I sign to you, what are
Speaker 1: you gonna do for me?
Speaker 2: We are going to build a strategy that includes the
Speaker 2: follow up number number one, We're gonna get the music right.
Speaker 2: First thing we're gonna do is hear what your vision
Speaker 2: is for your music. You know, what do you like,
Speaker 2: who do you respect, what kind of music you want
Speaker 2: to make. Let's find the right sessions and get you
Speaker 2: in the studio to get you some experience. Let's get
Speaker 2: you know, Bob a session with so and so and
Speaker 2: see how it goes, See what you can learn from
Speaker 2: that session, and let's start to make some early music.
Speaker 2: Would probably start by putting out a handful of singles
Speaker 2: or mapping out a few EP projects before we speed
Speaker 2: for racing to build an album. And then the most
Speaker 2: important thing is as we're doing that and we're developing
Speaker 2: your craft and your writing, we are working on making
Speaker 2: sure you can perform live the biggest lost art in music,
Speaker 2: and the one constant that hasn't changed in all the
Speaker 2: years I've been doing this is you have to be
Speaker 2: a great songwriter and you really have to play live
Speaker 2: and be willing to do the work to tour. And
Speaker 2: I don't care if we start you playing to fifty
Speaker 2: people all night. We've got to start to establish you
Speaker 2: as a live act. As that's happening, We're then working
Speaker 2: on the imagery's let's hear your creative vision. What's your
Speaker 2: look and feel? How do we want to style you?
Speaker 2: What do you want the photos to look. How do
Speaker 2: we help rebuild and work with you on your social channels?
Speaker 2: What message can we convey about you and who you are,
Speaker 2: where you come from? What inspire you on your social channels?
Speaker 2: How are we using TikTok verse Instagram? How are we
Speaker 2: you know, bang the right content and shooting the right
Speaker 2: content within a reasonable budget. So over the course of
Speaker 2: these next six months to a year, we're parceling out
Speaker 2: content at a regular cadence. It's probably too soon for
Speaker 2: a new artist to have brand partnerships, but I want
Speaker 2: to get an idea of what a what are your brands?
Speaker 2: What do you like what do you what do you
Speaker 2: like fashion wise? What sneakers do you wear? What do
Speaker 2: you drink? Where are you from? How do we tell
Speaker 2: a story about where you're from and the influence of
Speaker 2: that market that's around you? And then who are the
Speaker 2: artists that are in your periphery. The best way to
Speaker 2: break a young artist right now is collaboration or getting
Speaker 2: the uplift from another artist. If I think back to Clara,
Speaker 2: you know, she was incredible because she she had such
Speaker 2: good taste, She had such an amazing frame of reference
Speaker 2: for a young kid. You know, she was a music historian,
Speaker 2: and artists started seeking her out. They would find her online,
Speaker 2: they would see what she was listening to or posting
Speaker 2: or playing, and she would get you call dms from
Speaker 2: incredible artists because they liked her taste, they liked the
Speaker 2: way she established herself. And as I got to know her,
Speaker 2: I was like, Wow, the DNA of her is not
Speaker 2: only what a great songwriter she is, or what a
Speaker 2: great performer she is, or the fact that she wanted
Speaker 2: to learn and play as many instruments as herself, but
Speaker 2: it was her frame of history. She knew so much
Speaker 2: about music. Does not get enough credit for what a
Speaker 2: great music mind she has, and what a student she
Speaker 2: is of music. She names her dog Joni, after Joni Mitchell.
Speaker 2: And if I'm pointing to the things that make her successful,
Speaker 2: it's all of those combined. She was a student of
Speaker 2: music and really knew her history, and really pushed herself
Speaker 2: to listen to a lot of things. And I'm not
Speaker 2: just talking current peers, but really did the work. Was
Speaker 2: always writing songs, always doing sessions, and then to her credit,
Speaker 2: pushed herself so hard on the road to the point
Speaker 2: that she really exhausted herself. If I think of Dell
Speaker 2: wa and why, ten years into our career, he is
Speaker 2: so successful in doing what he's doing, He's like the
Speaker 2: next one. He is so on the verge, Bob of
Speaker 2: being our industry's next big artist. It's because he bled
Speaker 2: and did the hard work for ten years. This kid
Speaker 2: has toured, relentlessly, paid money out of his own success,
Speaker 2: like the money that he should be living off, to
Speaker 2: downsize his lifestyle, to reinvest in touring, to write, to
Speaker 2: do sessions. So if to answer your question about what
Speaker 2: I'm going to do for you, it's can I instill
Speaker 2: that work ethic in you? Can I inspire you and
Speaker 2: help give you the tools to be a good writer.
Speaker 2: But more importantly, can we establish that live act and
Speaker 2: can we give you a little bit of that experience
Speaker 2: and frame of reference so you really have the basis
Speaker 2: to build, you know, the career that you want, and
Speaker 2: it just takes time. Then from there, it's lots of
Speaker 2: little steps. It's you know, I have so many artists
Speaker 2: that the p and ls don't look great, that the
Speaker 2: growth is slow, but lots of little things add up
Speaker 2: and then you know, you know, then you then you
Speaker 2: break through to a Clara, then you start seeing the
Speaker 2: success of Adull Water Gap. It happens, but it's time
Speaker 2: in the game. It's like I said earlier, you gotta
Speaker 2: you gotta keep in the game. And over time, if
Speaker 2: you're just making that little progress, you're going to start
Speaker 2: to break through.
Speaker 1: Okay, the majors are focused on pop and hip hop.
Speaker 1: What is the status of rock and what is the
Speaker 1: status of other genres?
Speaker 2: You know, I think rock music is way healthier than
Speaker 2: anyone gives it credit. You know, I mean I love
Speaker 2: reading all your stuff. You're you're really I love your
Speaker 2: take on on this how it comes up every few years.
Speaker 2: But if you look at careers right now, there are
Speaker 2: so many careers in rock music. Maybe if you're going
Speaker 2: to measure the success relative to Chapel Rowan or Taylor Swift,
Speaker 2: it doesn't look the same. But if you look at
Speaker 2: Fontane's DC, Bob right now signed to Excel Records, Irish
Speaker 2: band like they are, They're a rock band that is
Speaker 2: really succeeding. It's not about radio. It's about the fact
Speaker 2: that they toured like crazy. They've got lots of press
Speaker 2: love for whatever that means. I'm not quite sure how
Speaker 2: much it moves the needle. You know, we've talked about that,
Speaker 2: you've written about that. They've done all the little things,
Speaker 2: but most importantly, they've built a direct pipeline to fans
Speaker 2: through touring. And Fontane's DC is a rock band that
Speaker 2: is really succeeding and breaking through in a big way.
Speaker 2: And I think I think rock music. You know, you
Speaker 2: look at Noah Com, you look at Zach Bryan, country rock,
Speaker 2: whatever you want to call them, Like, there are plenty
Speaker 2: of artists. You look at McGee right now. I don't
Speaker 2: know if you know this kid McGee. You know he's
Speaker 2: playing New York tonight, But like he comes from Dejon's camp,
Speaker 2: great guitar player, like very modest streaming numbers, but he's
Speaker 2: he's selling out Terminal five tonight. He sold out the
Speaker 2: Brooklyn Paramount on Sunday. These are rock based artists that
Speaker 2: are so under the industry's radar, and we all talk
Speaker 2: about the death of rock. Rock is dead, and these
Speaker 2: are young kids coming to see them. They're selling tickets,
Speaker 2: they're streaming, they have buzz and they have These aren't
Speaker 2: just moments, these are gonna be careers. And I really
Speaker 2: think rock is in the best place it's been in
Speaker 2: a long time. I think that pop music has become
Speaker 2: an amalgamation of lots of genres. You know, noa con
Speaker 2: of pop artists. But he's really a folky rock artist
Speaker 2: at heart. And I think even Taylor Swift, as pop
Speaker 2: as she is, she's a songwriter, singer songwriter. At the
Speaker 2: core of what she does is pop, folk leaning country music.
Speaker 2: And I think rock is in a strong place. I
Speaker 2: think hip hop's in a more of a transitionary place.
Speaker 2: I think hip hop is it's it's the passing of
Speaker 2: a torch to a new generation. And it's the question
Speaker 2: with hip hop is who are going to be the
Speaker 2: new stars. You know, Kendrick's clearly the leader right now,
Speaker 2: and he's an icon, and he's amazing, and he's doing
Speaker 2: good things and he's saying good things, and I love
Speaker 2: that he's doing the super Bowl. But the question in
Speaker 2: hip hop is, Okay, who's the next you know, who
Speaker 2: are the next leaders? You know, there are plenty of
Speaker 2: really good young hip hop acts, but are they going
Speaker 2: to be the heir to the Drake Kendrick throne. You know,
Speaker 2: Playboy Cardi doing really well, but he's he going to
Speaker 2: be that that major hip hop icon. I think music's
Speaker 2: in a good place, though, The question becomes, you know,
Speaker 2: does rock music continue this run? Because I think rock
Speaker 2: music is really in a better place than it's been
Speaker 2: in years.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about music in general. In the sixties,
Speaker 1: FM and before that, AM where everything you want to
Speaker 1: know what was going on in the world. He turned
Speaker 1: on the radio. That grew into the seventies and the eighties.
Speaker 1: We had MTV. We have the explosion of television with
Speaker 1: the Sopranos in nineteen ninety nine, so we have this
Speaker 1: burgeoning streaming television, We have social media, and we have music.
Speaker 1: Where does music fit into the cultural world. Let me
Speaker 1: set it up. A lot of people in this business
Speaker 1: will say, same as it ever was, you know, the
Speaker 1: young people feel the same way, it's as good as
Speaker 1: it ever was. I believe that's patently untrue. Listen, I
Speaker 1: lived through the Beatles. Whatever Taylor Swift is and it's big,
Speaker 1: it's not the Beatles. Okay, So we're is music today
Speaker 1: and what might music change to further its place in
Speaker 1: the firmament.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm more aligned with your thinking. We don't have
Speaker 2: the Beatles. We don't have Heyday peak Michael Jackson. We
Speaker 2: don't have Heyday peak Springsteen. You know, like I think
Speaker 2: we have stars they're doing well. We have kids that
Speaker 2: are growing up with passion for music. The problem with
Speaker 2: the media landscape when it relates to the establishing music,
Speaker 2: it is so quick and disposable. We live in a
Speaker 2: forty second clip world or a fifteen second clip world.
Speaker 2: Like kids are so passionate about a song, but then
Speaker 2: it goes away. I mean, you know, like there are
Speaker 2: so many big moments. The question is are they going
Speaker 2: to be lasting moments? You know, Like I think you know,
Speaker 2: the question is the medium that's delivering a lot of
Speaker 2: these kids, the exposure to this music. It's it's not
Speaker 2: set up to resonate from a career standpoint. Even the festivals,
Speaker 2: which you know they're in a transitionary period, are being
Speaker 2: programmed more with that mentality. The festival lineups are being
Speaker 2: built around more of a TikTok mentality, and you have
Speaker 2: kids winding up for one artist for one moment in
Speaker 2: one song, and then that song comes and then they're
Speaker 2: moving to the next one. You know, Chapaaran's kind of
Speaker 2: transcended all that. She's proven like, maybe I can be
Speaker 2: an artist that broke that moment, but I got the
Speaker 2: kids paying attention to everything I'm doing. But I think
Speaker 2: we're in a very precarious position to establish the next
Speaker 2: Beatles or the next wave of superstars, because right now
Speaker 2: media is in this mentality. However, you know, you did
Speaker 2: your whole round about super fans and super fandom and
Speaker 2: how that insight was gotten wrong by Universal. I do
Speaker 2: think that there is a hunger from the music consumer
Speaker 2: to be a super fan. That is there. Maybe on
Speaker 2: a business level, a lot of the major players are
Speaker 2: getting that wrong, and I do agree with your take
Speaker 2: on that, But I do think and I see it
Speaker 2: Man del Water Gap. I see it from working with
Speaker 2: Clara all these past years, and I went to her
Speaker 2: show the other night, which was absolutely fucking incredible. There
Speaker 2: is a passion that artists have for the artists they love,
Speaker 2: and a willingness to go so much deeper into into
Speaker 2: that artist. And that's something that I think today's media
Speaker 2: landscape is helping. And if we can make fans want
Speaker 2: to go deeper and learn more about those artists and
Speaker 2: buy more merchant and buy vinyl and buy tickets, I
Speaker 2: do think we're going to head to a place where
Speaker 2: we may never have a Beatles again, but we're going
Speaker 2: to have career artists. You know. Noah CON's got that,
Speaker 2: Charlie FCX, at least in the major cities. I don't
Speaker 2: know if it's working in the Midwest, but I know
Speaker 2: like in New York she played MSG this week and
Speaker 2: it was one of the hottest tickets of the year
Speaker 2: in New York City, Like, you could not get a ticket,
Speaker 2: you know, even even industry people struggle to get, you know,
Speaker 2: tickets that so, you know, and that's a ten year
Speaker 2: plus career of the making. Maybe I think she started
Speaker 2: in twenty twelve, So I do think that media has
Speaker 2: made it a lot harder, and kids attention span is
Speaker 2: a little more disposable and they're not going as deep.
Speaker 2: But the few people that latch onto an act and
Speaker 2: fall in love with that favorite act are going deeper.
Speaker 2: The problem is how big can can those acts become?
Speaker 2: You know, Taylor Swift an anomaly. You know you're not
Speaker 2: gonna have many of those. I find it pretty mind
Speaker 2: blowing that the buzziest tour of twenty twenty four the
Speaker 2: Oasis reading. I mean, the the mania for that. And
Speaker 2: it's not just old britpop fans like me or British people.
Speaker 2: I mean, there are so many kids asking me for
Speaker 2: tickets or are curious. And you know that's the Internet
Speaker 2: driving that, that's TikTok driving that. That is there is
Speaker 2: a curiosity. The problem is it moves so fast. And
Speaker 2: what's beautiful all about the Beatle and a lot of
Speaker 2: stuff that you and I grew up listening to and
Speaker 2: how we discovered music. We had to work for it,
Speaker 2: and you had to take your time, and you had
Speaker 2: to put a piece of vinyl on the turntable or
Speaker 2: go to the record store buy it, or you had
Speaker 2: to line up for a ticket. I'm not saying we
Speaker 2: should go backwards to that, but when you had to
Speaker 2: put in that kind of commitment and you've got to
Speaker 2: slow the process down, it made that connection to that
Speaker 2: music so much deeper. There's got to be a version
Speaker 2: of that connection that comes from all of the new
Speaker 2: media evolution. It's just a question of will it be
Speaker 2: lasting or is it gonna even get quicker, or is
Speaker 2: AI going to even fuck it up more? Or our
Speaker 2: algorithm is gonna take us so much further that that's
Speaker 2: still I'm sorry to not have a conclusive answer.
Speaker 1: No, No, that that's a good answer, better answer than most.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this, is there a number where
Speaker 1: you'd sell move on, sit on the each or are
Speaker 1: you going to be eighty five years old? So, man,
Speaker 1: I just heard a great record. You know, let's get
Speaker 1: the team together.
Speaker 2: I want to do it till I'm I'm eighty five
Speaker 2: years old, but I got to be I have to
Speaker 2: be realistic. I'm in a business that they don't want
Speaker 2: to hear from me at my age anymore. I need
Speaker 2: to be the strategist and the advisor, and I need
Speaker 2: to have the ego, the humility and not have the
Speaker 2: ego to put the business in the young people's hands.
Speaker 2: That that's the downfall of so many in our business.
Speaker 2: You know, I think I want to stay involved forever.
Speaker 2: I'm not tired. I love what I do. I love
Speaker 2: the music. My favorite thing is being with our artists,
Speaker 2: you know. I love, you know, being on the road
Speaker 2: with Dell water Gap this past year, touring with him
Speaker 2: and watching his evolution is one of the most enjoyable
Speaker 2: things I get to do in my job and my career.
Speaker 2: I love when Damon Albarne calls me up and asks
Speaker 2: me to come here what he's working on for Gorillas.
Speaker 2: I love going to say I declare even though we
Speaker 2: don't work together on this new current project. Going backstage
Speaker 2: and seeing her face after she just played ten sold
Speaker 2: out residency dates in New York and LA and seeing
Speaker 2: how happy she is with the react That means the
Speaker 2: world to me. The stuff that drives me nuts. The
Speaker 2: reason I have all this gray hair is the business
Speaker 2: is hard. It's challenging as fuck. And the agency business,
Speaker 2: the media business. I want to see them thrive, and
Speaker 2: it's it's been relentlessly hard to keep them even going
Speaker 2: at the levels that we are. So I have to
Speaker 2: be realistic about where all these businesses are going and
Speaker 2: what to do. But I want to keep doing it forever.
Speaker 2: I don't want to bail, but at some point I
Speaker 2: want to make sure I empower the youth of our
Speaker 2: company and the future is set up because it's a
Speaker 2: young people's business, and I think the best people in
Speaker 2: our business really empower that next generation and support them,
Speaker 2: and that's what I need to do.
Speaker 1: John, this has been wonderful. Thanks so much for spending
Speaker 1: this time with my audience, with the history and the insight.
Speaker 1: I certainly really appreciate it. I'm sure the listeners will too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bob, thanks for having me. It was great to
Speaker 2: spend a couple hours with you, and congrats on all
Speaker 2: you do. Keep it going. I want you doing it
Speaker 2: to your one hundred too. I want to keep reading
Speaker 2: what you're doing.
Speaker 1: Oh, believe me, I'm going to do it till I die.
Speaker 2: All right, I'll see you. I'll see you in London
Speaker 2: against you.
Speaker 1: Right till next time. This is Bob left six