JESSE CANNON: Building a Music Career, Spotting Spotify Bots, Why Authenticity Wins

Speaker 1 (00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast, and now your host, Eyal Levi. Welcome to the URM podcast. Thank you so much for being here. It's crazy to think that we are now on our seventh year. Don't ask me how that all just flew by, but it did. Man, time moves fast and it's only because of you, the listeners, if you'd like us to stick around another seven years and there's a few simple things you can do that would really, really help us out, I would endlessly appreciate if you would, number one, share our episodes with your friends. Number two, post our episodes on your Facebook and Instagram and tag me at al Levi URM audio and at URM Academy and of course our guest. And number three, leave us reviews and five star reviews wherever you can. We especially love iTunes reviews. Once again, thank you for all the years and years of loyalty.

(01:01):

I just want you to know that we will never charge you for this podcast, and I will always work as hard as possible to improve the episodes in every single way. All we ask in return is a share a post and tag us. Oh, and one last thing. Do you have a question you would like me to answer on an episode? I don't mean for a guest. I mean for me, it can be about anything. Email it to [email protected]. That's EYAL at m dot A-C-D-E-M-Y. There's no.com on that. It's exactly the way I spelled it and use the subject line Answer me Eyal. Alright, let's get on with it. Hello everybody. Welcome to the Discord q and a with myself and my good friend Jesse Cannon. How are you doing, Jesse?

Speaker 2 (01:47):

Good, now that I'm talking to you. Good.

Speaker 1 (01:48):

Well good, I'm glad. I'm glad.

Speaker 2 (01:50):

Also was just doing a Twitter space, which is the most cursed way to do these things.

Speaker 1 (01:53):

I'm sorry, don't do a Twitter space.

Speaker 2 (01:55):

Yeah, well day jobs.

Speaker 1 (01:58):

Yeah, no, I don't actually.

Speaker 2 (02:01):

But technically this is yours.

Speaker 1 (02:04):

I guess you could call it a job. I think that we should talk about the kind of stuff that you wrote your book about, well one of your books about, and the stuff that will really help people get further in their careers, both on social media and in the studio or with their band. But real quick, Jesse, I'm just curious if I was to start a band back in the day, I had a very specific plan. Well, there was a very specific plan that I followed. I just researched what other bands that got signed to major labels did, and I just followed that exactly to a t. I found out disturbed handed out 250,000 CDs.

Speaker 2 (02:45):

Wow.

Speaker 1 (02:46):

Yeah, that they made. Exactly. It was definitely a Whoa. Wow.

Speaker 2 (02:51):

Did you have a signature sound for your band that everybody would think of?

Speaker 1 (02:54):

Not like that. Not one that everyone would hate us for, but I did what all those bands did and it worked, but the landscape is very, very different now. And so what I'm wondering is just right off the bat, if you're trying to get the attention of, I'm not asking whether or not it's a good idea to get the attention of the gatekeepers, but if you're trying to get the attention of the gatekeepers with your musical project, what do you think are some of the musts?

Speaker 2 (03:24):

So what you put out here is very important because most concussion I hear all the time is Metallica did this and I'm like, dude, you weren't born when Metallica got popular, I was barely born. Come on. Yes. So we talk about now, as I'm sure if you follow any entrepreneurial talking on the internet type of person, you hear about the attention economy more than you'd probably like to. With that, there is tricks that work on even the smarter people in this music business, which there are very few, which is that if you dominate attention, people eventually check you out. That's really not that hard to do, but people make a very big deal out of that. It's a technique I call consistent sustained promotion. And so with consistent sustained promotion, what you're basically doing is you're releasing a song every six to eight weeks. Then what you're doing in there as well as you're putting up either a lyric video or a visualizer and then you're putting up a music video, then perhaps you do an alternate version of that.

(04:19):

While you're also doing that, what we're trying to do is we're trying to make algorithmic and human attention span connections to you, which incidentally and very nicely coincidentally are pretty much the exact same thing. You research your community and you do other things with people within the community. So for example, even if it's playing shows, having somebody do a feature on a song, having a remix done of your song, you are trying to find people who you can connect with because on Spotify, the more you do those things and you tag primary artist with you, the more it recommends you to that artist, fans, algorithmic playlists, Spotify, radio, all sorts of things like that. Social media, that's how it learns, how to recommend you to other viewers and people end up hearing about you. So many people are an island and they're like, well, my favorite band never was doing this type of stuff.

(05:12):

Why would I do this? It's like, well dude, things changed and this is what you do. And they probably did kind of do these things touring with other bands. A lot of people weren't doing the last two years were a way to do these things. All those things, you start small, you start making connections, you keep rising up and up and when you're not an island, it creates a web of connections and that also coincidentally gets the attention of fans and gatekeepers. They see you're a part of a scene, they keep seeing your name and they eventually get curious to check you out.

Speaker 1 (05:40):

Yeah, the constant never ending stream of attention, I mean just being top of mind, people did that to the best of their abilities in the old days too. I mean that is why bands would tour before they were signed for years straight, they were doing that was their best attempt at making that same idea happen. Given the limitations of that time period, it's the same thing. Alright, we have a question from Joe Scaletta. Hello, Joe.

Speaker 3 (06:10):

Jesse, I just want to say thank you for doing this. This is really exciting. My question kind of goes towards what you just said. So you mentioned that the constant stream of attention is important. Do you think you should just throw shit at the wall and see what sticks or should there be a strategy behind the constant content that you put out?

Speaker 2 (06:27):

I have pretty thorough strategies laid out on my YouTube channel. You have to be doing everything in a really high quality. You can't just throw out, see what sticks, because the other thing when we say throw out, see what sticks is we forget that in a post empire world is this thing Brett Ellas talks about, which is that social media brought down the thing where we worshiped facade and artists. This could be like I'm this, but they're really not that. You all can tell when somebody is being authentic and content is truly you that you believe in that you're like, oh, I would like to see this from a band. Oh, I think this is cool. That's all you can do because people can recognize when your heart's not in it when you're just bullshitting. It's the biggest myth in music that people aren't making that get popular of sub connection.

(07:16):

It's actually that you make resonant work by trying to make something that really resonates to you that you really would want to see in the world. So in addition to all this, yes, you have to be pursuing your emotions. That's part of the wild card of this is that some people's emotions not make music that people want to hear. If your emotions are like, wow, the most emotionally stirring song I could do is a Hoka ballad. I mean there's just not that much of a market for it, but you have to accept that because also all you can do, so throwing shit at the wall, it's ping time and particularly taking conscious time to brainstorm ideas that everyone involved is really passionate about.

Speaker 1 (07:54):

Yeah, the thing about authenticity is, the way I call it is music fans are like drug dogs when it comes to sniffing out authenticity. They can just tell. They can totally just tell, and especially those of us in here are into heavy music. So it is especially true in heavy music. I mean, just think about the things that artists have to lie about in heavy music. I played my own parts on the record. I mean even back in, we did it live. We did it live back in the seventies. Even lots of those huge bands that everyone loved with few exceptions, they weren't even the real bands you were hearing on record. People had to hide that shit from their audience in heavy music and still do because the audience can spot bullshit. And so when you are putting yourself out there on social, you're putting stuff out.

(08:55):

You need to be super, super careful and nothing works doing something that you are actually passionate about. The other thing about being super passionate about something and doing it at a high level is that that's keep you inspired to keep working. Not that, and I don't mean that to say that you should only wait for inspiration to work, but you need something to fuel you when things get hard or when it takes years longer than you think it's going to take. And if you're not doing something that you honestly believe in, you're going to get passed up by people who do give a shit and do have the drive because they're fueled by something in them that's real.

Speaker 2 (09:37):

It's a funny thing. I actually saw the evidence of this three hours ago. One friend, he's had a hard time getting his music to connect, but he just keeps making the music he wants to hear and he really, really believes in it. And now he's like 11 songs deep. He got added to three huge Spotify playlists in the last week after just he kept believing. He's like, no, I'm sticking with it. I'm sticking with it. I know I got to keep maintaining people's attention and honestly, most people I know who get as much rejection and opportunity as him give up because it's like it's too daunting. But you got to have that thing that he loves making the things he makes. So it's what kept him going and now he's reaping the rewards.

Speaker 1 (10:17):

It really, really makes a difference. What do you think are the metrics now that bans need to be looking at as opposed to vanity metrics? The reason I'm saying that is because I think that the goalposts keep moving as to what a vanity metric is versus what a legit metric is. There was a time period where the follower count on certain platforms mattered, but then eventually people started to realize you could buy those. And so that now is just the optics and the vanity metric. Let's define what a vanity metric is real quick. A vanity metric is a metric that makes you feel better, that doesn't actually matter.

Speaker 2 (10:57):

And here's the problem is we used to be able to say, oh, I have a hundred thousand friends on MySpace, or whatever it was. It's the craziest thing now is we have this uneven disparity. I actually consult for hundreds of artists and across all different genres, and it's the funniest thing is if you have 40,000 monthly listeners as an EMO or a metal band dog, you're killing the game. An EDM act, it's like, well, I guess you're starting something. It's literally the equivalent having 3000 in those genres. So it's hard to say, but vanity metrics, I mean I fucking hate looking at engagement. I hate there's just so much bullshit. But the other thing is then what I'm really relieved about is what's really changing is we actually are seeing at South by Southwest, the hottest topic was cutting down on bot farms, making streaming more authentic, which is very easy to do.

(11:52):

The companies just choose not to do it. It makes their numbers look good. Same reason why Twitter went bots run wild for so many years and then finally had to cut down after they were so responsible for election fuckery. Spotify is finally cutting down, but it's so easy to see and I'll tell you how you see when the fake things is. Usually it's like you go to the bottom of their profile, you double click, you see where their listeners from and they're an American group and all their listeners are from New Zealand, Denmark and Russia. You got a bot farm, Mexico City too. And while that can sometimes be authentic, if there's zero cities that are American there, you got a bot farm that really is usually like 99 times out of a hundred a thing. You can predict there are exceptions, of course. Indonesia. Yeah, Indonesia.

(12:32):

Well, it's funny, Indonesia, apparently the bot farms got shut down there. Oh, okay, cool. So yeah, I mean this is a thing I have to keep up on all the time. And so an interesting thing is that when I'm looking at artists that I'm judging if they actually are having authentic enthusiasm, yes, I'm going to look at those countries, but I'm also going to look at how many tracks they put out in the last six months that are consistently hitting about the same number. Now, yes, you all can have that song. I actually have a Spotify page open right now and it's like one song is 51,000,001 song is a million and it's like, well that song's a week old. You've got to give markers there, but you just don't want to see absolutely insane disparities in your numbers. If that song with only a million was nine months old and the other one was two months old, you'd be like, well, there's a problem here chief.

Speaker 1 (13:21):

Yep, totally. Next up is Jay Ruti.

Speaker 4 (13:25):

Alright, thanks for being here, Jesse. We really appreciate it. My question comes more from the producer's side of this. Obviously it does us a big favor whenever our artists get heard by as many people, it gets our name out as well, but a lot of bands don't really want to put in the work to do anything. What advice would you have from us to give the artists a push in the right direction or explain why this is beneficial?

Speaker 2 (13:52):

This is a tough one because you can't put a work ethic into a bed. And you also, the big problem is that you all are familiar with Parkinson's law's. The idea that you can only do so many things a day that are not familiar to you without it being absolutely exhausting. I experienced this myself and I'm a work 16 hours a day type of person, but if I do something that I'm like, oh fuck, I got no idea what I'm doing, it's going to wear me out way faster than when I'm doing a lot of things that are familiar. So the problem is a lot of artists look at Mole Hills and Sea Mountains when it comes to promotion, and the easiest way for me to say this is I have playlists on my YouTube channel that explain exactly what's to do. It's not that much work, but like yes, in some genres, unfortunately, unlike let's say SoundCloud rap where you can put up a video filmed on your iPhone, put a cool filter on it and cut it up for three hours and it can get 3 million plays, some genres need really high quality, good looking stuff, so you got a level with them that part of this is my mentor, Alan Douches always would say, we'd hand somebody a master, you go.

(14:58):

Now the hard part begins, and there's truth to that, but the real thing is, is people have to accept, they put a lot of bands put effort into shit that totally doesn't matter. Rehearsing for the show where 20 people are going to show up or 60 hours, that's great if you're writing songs there too. But if it's just to rehearse for the 20 person show, taking some of those 60 hours and shipping 10 hours off to figure out how you can make the best video possible, maybe taking five of those hours off and each of you go into your job and putting those five hours you worked at the job or did something into making that music video can be way more effective. Most bands don't analyze how effective their time is spent. That's even just the first thing. Honestly, what I do a lot when I do consults with artists is we actually break down what the priorities of their time should be and how much time. Oftentimes they're already devoting a lot of time, but they're just using it really, really fucking poorly and not doing the things that actually matter. And I do think every genre has cheat codes. I talk about those a lot and there's different things that you've got to do that are effective versus just this total bullshit time spent some time. I was just talking with Aris and they were telling me that they do nine hours of Twitch streams to 60 people every week. And I'm like, well, in that nine hours,

Speaker 1 (16:18):

That's a long time.

Speaker 2 (16:19):

You got to analyze your time and do it effectively. And I think so much of the time people overestimate how much time it's going to take. They build it up and you got to analyze it and look at that in the eye. Unfortunately, that takes a lot of looking and it takes some education too, which you have to spend time doing.

Speaker 1 (16:37):

Awesome. Well thank you Jay. Alright, next question is from Stefan.

Speaker 5 (16:45):

Do you have any tips for bands or producers trying to make it into bigger markets like say a European band trying to make it into the states?

Speaker 2 (16:55):

It's all really the same. I mean what's interesting is like yes, language barriers could be like American audiences, obviously second you're speaking another language. Americans are dumb as shit, they're not having it. But once we're past that, I think the most underestimated thing of when you're a artist who exists in another region that where they want to break into is that call this community work. And what I mean by I have this series on how you find community on my YouTube channel and what it is is you find the message boards and the online communities, the Discords, the Facebook groups, the subreddits, et cetera that are really discussing what you do and making a presence, making connections with people and doing those things, finding people to tie each other together. And the other really valuable thing you have when you're from another region is when you like a smaller group, let's call it not a national touring group yet, and you're like, yo, I love your stuff. If you ever come to, let's call it Belarus, even though no one wants to tour the earthquake right now, you should hit me up and I'll get you a show. That's a good way to get heard and then also have it that when you come to town you get to do it. There's been many, many huge bands for on just reaching out across the pond.

Speaker 5 (18:14):

Alright man, thanks.

Speaker 1 (18:15):

I'll just say, think about how you discover music. That's the thing that I always like to remind people is the way that you discover music has a lot to do with how other people discover it too. And usually it's not through some crazy magical tactic or anything like that. It's usually because someone recommended it to you and you ignored them and then you heard about it on social media somewhere and you ignored it again and then it got recommended to you on YouTube and you were watching something and then it just started Autoplaying Next and oh, this is kind of cool. And then you turn it off and then somebody else says it again. And then maybe a year later after you've heard about it 15 different times, you're like, fuck it, I'm going to check it out. Oh, this is cool. And then you don't think about it again for six months and then it comes up again and then you listen to it a little more and you're like, oh wow, this is cool.

(19:14):

And then suddenly you go down the rabbit hole. That's kind of how it works for a lot of people. Why what Jesse said originally about the repeated exposure is really, really, really important. So assume that most people discover music the way you do and this doesn't matter where you are in the world. Just to emphasize what Jesse said, people are people and they take in music the way that they take in music. You just need to find ways to be in front of them, but no matter where they are. And the cool thing is that if your music's actually good, they'll spread it for you eventually.

Speaker 2 (19:49):

The thing I think that'll be relevant for this audience that I tell this story a good amount is from the nineties I worked at this club in New York that was like the big punk rock club medal and stuff like that, and we were only a 200 seat venue in our biggest room and we had a smaller half size of that upstairs. The funny thing is Ger Skateland people I grew up with and I've known worked with over the years, they had heard of this band but sugar and they begged my boss to have them play a show, even though he's like, no one's served this band. And the show barely sold out Dillinger Escape Plan with Shuga, but the buzz after those shows as they went from town to town, this is when the Internet's barely alive. Every message board was lighting up with how insane Shuga was and the shows were tiny.

(20:32):

But to piggyback with AI saying is so many people forget that you have to do that thing and people focus on that one artist who comes to town for the first time. It's 5,000 seat venues, but there's all these things. I think I worked with this band basement who's on Atlantic Records now, and I did their first record and I remember when they came to New York the first time, they played to 40 people in the worst venue I've ever seen a show in Brooklyn in my entire life. And the next time they actually broke up after their record found so many people and so many people talked about them for years after they made some initial contacts and Buzz the next time they played, they were headlined to 2,600 people. When you're going across the sea, I should say basement's from England and they came over here.

(21:14):

So much of this is that point of contact and that you do initial work and that you do some of that eating shit. But if you do the eating shit in the ways where you're connecting with all the right people and know your community and say that band's going to be big in a few years, that band's going to be big and I authentically like them. I believe in them. That's the type of stuff that does it. You have to just start planning route and then wait for it to pay off for a while by doing a lot of work. Yep.

Speaker 1 (21:38):

Hey everybody, if you're enjoying this podcast and you should know that it's brought to you by URM Academy, URM Academy's mission is to create the next generation of audio professionals by giving them the inspiration and information to hone their craft and build a career doing what they love. You've probably heard me talk about Nail the Mix before, and if you're a member, you already know how amazing it is. The beginning of the month, nail the mix members, get the raw multi-tracks to a new song by artists like Lama, God Angels and Airwaves. Knock loose OPEC Shuga, bring me the Horizon Gaira asking Alexandria Machine Head and Papa Roach among many, many others over 60 at this point. Then at the end of the month, the producer who mixed it comes on and does a live streaming walkthrough of exactly how they mix the song on the album and takes your questions live on air.

(22:30):

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Speaker 6 (23:51):

So my question for Jesse is I started working with a band a few days ago and the previous producer just told them to waste all their money on bots and everything just to promote their band. Oh man. Yeah. Yes. So now everything they try to do, it keeps feeding to those bots. So they heard me like, dude, don't pay bots, but everything they do, it keeps feeding the bots. It won't feed real people. So what should I do in this case? Should they just start from scratch? I dunno what to do. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (24:19):

So this is a really interesting what I've actually been writing a video on, but when I write my YouTube videos, for those who aren't familiar, I'll write for months, I'll just keep opening the document and doing it and doing research as I get new thoughts. But this one's coming soon and I'll explain. So the problem with the bot is for every play you, you then have to dig yourself out with authentic listeners to undo all the damage. What most people don't understand the damage is the bots. Then make your fans also like your Spotify radio, all those things, all the other people who bought bots. So let's say you're a death metal band and the other person who bought it is a mariachi band. Well guess what? You're fucked. And you're not making any of those algorithmic connections. And when you go to get considered for playlists and things like that, people are like, nah, I'm good.

(25:04):

Thank you. I'll see you later. You don't get any of the algorithmic things. And so in all honesty, here's the problem, but you have to do what you are judging whether you have to start over all again, which you can pull the songs down and do a new name and all that stuff and then get a nice reset and post those songs again. But what you have to then decide what you want to do with that is can I dig myself out authentically? I've had some clients who only got three 4,000 plays who had a good news song and then had gotten signed to a label. I'm like, don't worry, you're going to get out of this and they're out of it in a day or two from when their song comes out. But there's other people who I know who have a hundred thousand of these bot plays and they're getting recommended some pop singer in Poland. They're never getting out of it unless they get a real stroke of luck. So you have to judge how deep the hole did they dig themselves and also I highly suggest a Super Soaker filled with piss for that producer.

Speaker 1 (25:59):

So what I wonder is, does this person just not understand or is he an asshole?

Speaker 2 (26:04):

He might've gotten Grif in too. There's some way YouTube channel, these YouTube channel guys just bullshit and say things all day. They take business practices they've seen in other businesses. They're like Alcon musicians, they're fucking morons. And if they don't know shit about the music business, they don't get the implications of what they're saying.

Speaker 1 (26:21):

Yeah, that man, that bothers me a lot. It bothers me a lot because they're making money off of people's dreams and they're not helping them at all. They're actually hurting them. They're taking tactics from online marketers from 2015 and trying to apply them to bands. It's just dirty, dirty shit. So this is from Julianne Hendrickson, he says, I'm wondering what advice you might have for a solo death metal style project considering there isn't much for a solo death metal live show. I've watched your YouTube videos religiously and appreciate your content very much.

Speaker 2 (26:57):

We talk a lot about the sheet codes. I think one of the most interesting thing in metal marketing is that there's two things that work really, really well, which is forums like the QRM Academy forum, which I would say even if I wasn't dear friends with Al, where Buzz starts you all discussing who's doing six shit is where some buzz could start. It's not where it's going to start and be your break, but it will be a place you can do it and being in other forms and things like that participate. But the second biggest thing that I think is the most interesting cheat coated metal because Al and I were just making fun of, oh, you took that from Metallica. I think the oldest rule in metal that stayed forever is that war or people have a story that they think is really, really interesting about a group.

(27:42):

The group obviously has to be able to back up. War is still the greatest thing because I'm going to make fun of all y'all with a lot of love because I'm one of you. Is that what do all of us fucking nerds do all day? We discussed the people we're doing fiction like whether it was when ghosts first came out onto Eskimo call, you see something that has a story behind it, you discuss it, people get curious and do it. I periphery an amazing example, Misha's story with the band. All the interactions of people coming and going, all that stuff is lore that keeps people going. In fact, our dear friend Pin McKenty actually has a great video on lore with this. You are a solo person. We're discounting live lore and spreading yourself through message boards is probably the two biggest things you have. The other thing that can pour a little bit of gasoline on the fire obviously is really sick content. Whether that's playthroughs to a really great music video, those are really the three weapons you have on your body that probably can kill the giant that you need to slay. Awesome.

Speaker 1 (28:46):

Another question from someone whose microphone situation is just less than ideal man, I can't even pronounce your last name, mark Van, sorry. How would you deal with this kind of stuff where you have an off the wall aesthetic and vibe as a band where you do stuff which is not particularly easy listening or just make it messed up on purpose to convey some sort of form of emotion, angst, depression or whatever. It's hard to promote, for instance, a 22 minute piece on a two minute attention span platform. Would you for instance go for small snippets? Thanks.

Speaker 2 (29:23):

Yes, I do think you need both things, but here's the other thing is it's always fine. I talk about this a lot with musicians will be like, it's so hard. We're unique. I'm like, no, being unique is the best thing you can be. Actually the problem is when you're generic as shit, when you sound like bad blink 22, that's the hardest thing to promote the fucking world. What you need to do is you need to figure out how you describe and build that lore that we were just talking about, about why it's important. A good example I think of all the time is actually what people do to show how special this thing is, is they make what I call, I have this video called the Splash versus the Trickle. The trickle is what most people do. They're just putting out things that are good, great, but not that eventful.

(30:08):

You'll talk about. Then all of a sudden, here's a good example. Turnstile puts out that four song video that they recently did that was just an incredible piece of directing that was made everybody go, wow, most bands that make hardcore this dumb are not this creative. Like, wow, what a different band. There's this girl shy girl who's getting very big in the hyper pop scene and no one was putting out four song things. She drops that you need to. I should also say then there's Drain Gang and the white boy rap thing who just put out an eight minute song on their record that dropped Thursday night and he always like an even funny thing, they did this really smart thing, they dropped it Wednesday into Thursday at night so it wouldn't get lost at all. The rush and everybody's like, oh my god, these guys who've been making under two minute songs just did this eight minute journey. You got to find how you make that palatable. A lot of people do it in movements, things like that, but then make it part of it but then also draw attention to it. There's this book Guide to Board Society. The spectacle really explains how you discuss things that should be seen as a spectacle and like wow, they're doing this bigger thing. I highly recommend looking at that and then figuring out how you describe that to people that this is a spectacle they should look at.

Speaker 1 (31:23):

So actually almost reverse engineering how this shit's done.

Speaker 2 (31:28):

Yeah, I mean I think the one thing we have to always remember what good marketing actually is, is creating what you want to hear musically and what you believe in to make the strongest motion and then after it's done figuring out what you can do around that to then market it. Second is the correct order of things and not vice versa because vice versa makes stuff that is not as emotional. But I tell people all the time, it's like, so you have a 22 minute song, make four movements. People do it all the time and then it's like the reckoning part one, I saw my mom naked, the reckoning part two, I saw my dad naked even worse. Whatever you have to do, I don't want to write about that bad. Sounds horrible.

Speaker 1 (32:14):

So alright Scott, you are invited back to the stage. I hope your mic works this time.

Speaker 7 (32:19):

Thanks for having me. Question for Jesse at the summit. Your 0.8 was doing what you said you do keeps clients and you sort of recommended two books. You said organized mind and this is your brain on music and I think just that kind of peas in on consistency I guess is kind of a broad question, but what do you think are the elements of a consistent person? If someone's struggling with consistency, how do you think they can improve on that? Do you think it's sort of a binary, you naturally are more inclined to just be a consistent person or not? Or do you think it's kind of a gray area and what are some things that people could do to do what they say they're going to do to keep their clients, I guess is all encompassing?

Speaker 2 (32:53):

Here's a really good example. I was not a consistent person and truth be told, it is a miracle. I'm as effective as I am. I wake up after eight, 10 hours of sleep all the time at different hours and then get my stuff done. But I've learned systems that work for me. All of this is muscles that you build up over time in standards you make for yourself. Over time, everyone who knew me before I was 19 cannot believe the human I am because there's signs I can become this, but it was pretty unlikely. Let's just say that there is an app that I believe is the most game-changing app in the entire world and I know when somebody says that it's usually some dumb word, old bullshit or something like that. It's called do DUE. I think somebody told me it's like 4 99, but what does that's different than all other to do and reminder reps is you type in what you're going to do.

(33:47):

So here's some of my ones. For example, the best time for me to post on TikTok is two 30. So every day at two 30 it reminds me of I'm going to put up a TikTok do that. I am getting a tattoo this week and I want to look at the design one more time. So I knew I wouldn't have much time to do that. I produce podcasts, they go up at midnight. I have to check and make sure they actually went up because the software we use sometimes messes up. So at 12:10 AM since all podcasts go up at midnight at my company, I have a reminder to check every night that the podcast actually went up. What's cool about this app is not that just it reminds you and you can tell it to consistently remind you to do things is you can also tell it to how often it annoy you when you haven't done it and then it keeps annoying you until you say, yes, I've done it. That helps me be consistent and it helps me do what I said I would do. My other really big trick is I use the star system in my email box, emails in the inbox come in and those are things I haven't dealt with yet, but if it's something that the person that said, Hey, I'd like you to do this. Let's say it's mix changes or master changes, I start it and then when it's time to do things like that, I look through that list and I make sure I then do it.

Speaker 1 (34:55):

So that's different than just having notifications that hit you every single fucking day.

Speaker 2 (35:01):

What's different about do is you don't clear it until it's done and it annoys the living shit out of you at an interval. You choose and it can repeat. What's good about it is is it's annoying and I never thought I'd pay something to annoy me, but I'm about a year into this app. The first two months I'm like, this is good for things. Remember to take out the garbage every Thursday night. Now I'm like, now I put most of my to-do list to it and I just find a time that I'm supposed to do this and I do it and when I can't do it, then I tell it, Hey, I could actually probably do this at six 30. Annoy me then.

Speaker 1 (35:34):

Got it. Ben, you've always got some system for this shit.

Speaker 2 (35:37):

It

Speaker 1 (35:38):

Is definitely one of my biggest interests. It's impressive. Well, thank you Scott.

Speaker 7 (35:42):

Yeah, thank you. That was really insightful. I appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (35:44):

Up next we have a question from Mr. Joe Scta. So Joe, you have been invited to Z Stage. How are you doing?

Speaker 3 (35:53):

I'm good. This is kind of probably a question that a lot of people have When you're first starting a band, what should come first? Putting out the page and inviting people to your pages or having music created and then you release your page after you have the content.

Speaker 2 (36:09):

No, get your friends who care about you, people who care about you enough previous work to get there two weeks before, build up some numbers, build up some reach so that that way if somebody hears about you, you're not starting from zero. There's also things that shadow banning is largely bullshitted. Unless you're going on and talking about QAN all day.

Speaker 1 (36:29):

Damn, damn. So I'm going to get shadow banned.

Speaker 2 (36:31):

Yeah, I mean I will tell you as the person who produces the largest podcast covering Q anon, I didn't want to believe it, but sadly that is true. The shadow banning is real for the crazies. Barring that, the one thing that social media does do a lot is that when you have zero followers and zero things, they're often not going to spread your content as much. Whereas if you even have 40 followers and on Twitter, a good example B, and let's say five of them hit heart, they're going to show that to some of their friends that looks like organic activity. Whereas zero followers will be like our singles out now and then people start following you and chew people like it. It's just not seen as the same organic wing. They want to see some organic activity of people who've existed in the world interacting with your account.

Speaker 1 (37:21):

Makes sense. Well thank you Joe. All right, next question we've got here. So DC Eaton says, similar to Scott's question, how do we deal with confidence? I'm always finding myself second guessing everything I do, even when things come out sounded great, or how I heard it in my mind, I still find myself telling myself I'm doing it all wrong.

Speaker 2 (37:44):

Yeah, I mean, I think I've said before, so I'm 23 years full-time making records and year nine was the first one I made a record. When I listen to it now, I'm like, good work. You've got to killed this record. Problem is confidence is earned. But here's the other thing is oftentimes this is the shitty struggle of an artist is second guessing and learning to make it healthy is what makes you good and what drives you to be better. I mean the biggest, truthfully, the other side of the coin is the worst. I get so many people, these fucking morons, particularly on my TikTok, who are I should shit sounds just as good as Taylor Swift. She pays people off and it's like,

Speaker 1 (38:30):

I've seen people like that.

Speaker 2 (38:32):

Yeah, your shit sounds like you broke the focus, the right scarlet with a fucking screwdriver before you recorded and it's shorting out on your vocal, whatever you say dog. And the biggest thing is this, and there's this famous I glass quote on it from American Life. Greatest gift you could have as a creator is seeing things and seeing what's wrong with them and how they can be better. It's also a fucking curse. I hate having to watch documentaries and be like, and they really should have told that story a little bit different. I like listening to music where I don't sit there the whole time going, oh, this master's so bad. I want to just listen to stuff that feels good to me and feels nice that I'm like, yo, I'm vibing. This is good. The greatest gift you have second guessing yourself, hearing what's wrong and hearing what could be improved. Fortunately, it's what drives you to get better, unfortunately. Well, welcome to the tortured life of us creators who can actually have discretion in life. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (39:27):

I agree. Imposter syndrome goes with confidence. The reason I'm saying that is because just about everyone I know above the age of 30 who has some sort of a successful music career, basically has some sort of imposter syndrome. And it tends to be that the better they are, the more they have it. And a lot of it comes from second guessing everything they do, kind of like the person was just asking. I kind of think it goes together and the thing that I have always done, got it. Just like anyone else, it's just ignore it. Just tell yourself to shut the fuck up. If there's a deadline, just hand the shit in and move on with your fucking life. If you have to send something to somebody, bounce that shit and send it. You're never going to be happy. So the thing is, if you listen to people who we've had on the podcast who are mixing the biggest records in the genre or whatever, multi-platinum rich dudes who really won, they fucking won at this.

(40:41):

They also feel this way. They have days where they hear their own mix and they want to drink themselves under the table at best. At worst, they want to throw themselves off a bridge. Those feelings don't change regardless of what's going on in the outside world. Your internal world is still there. You are taking your head with you anywhere you go, your head's going with you. So you just kind of have to learn to manage that. Maybe it gets a little better once you have some proof in life that you don't totally suck. Whatever causes that, it's very, it's almost impossible to rewire. But what you can do is you can learn to manage it and one of the best ways to manage it is to just tell yourself to shut the fuck up and get on with things and let the outside world decide if you're actually good or not because you don't have a good perspective on things. I cannot tell you how many people I know who think they did something shitty where everybody else thinks it's great. And the inverse where people think they did something great and everybody else thinks it's shitty, your own view on yourself is one of the most inaccurate things you can possibly have. And so just fucking keep going and keep progressing and the world will tell you, if people are paying you for your work and they're booking your time and you're moving along, then who cares what you're saying to yourself in your head? You're wrong. Obviously,

Speaker 2 (42:08):

Piggyback on imposter syndrome, the best way to incur imposter syndrome out in the world, be around other people, see that everyone else who's killing it is probably just as unqualified as you. Just as much second guessing and particularly people don't, we haven't introduced this part. I work in politics for my day job ever since the pandemic started. I was really intimidated. I would make the joke, I was on the phone with the White House two days ago. They told me something really crazy and somebody's like, is that a secret? I'm like, I don't think they'd be telling secrets to a guy who was producing metal and punk records. Two years ago. I had major imposter syndrome about I'm on the phone with the fucking White House all the time, and the thing I came to realize is no one's checking credentials. We'll let other people open the doors for them.

(42:50):

And a good example is I can remember a lot in my early career, people would be so pissed I would get this record to do and they'd be like, I could do so much better. It's like, well, you didn't The bad chose me for a reason and we made what we made. We made decisions in a room is not a meritocracy in this world. People don't get what they deserve. You get what your work does and the opportunities you make, but the world does not work on a meritocracy and a point score system. It's messy. And most people found some way to get to the top or had some luck along the way or

Speaker 1 (43:19):

Both. I remember Sky magazine on Delta back in the day,

Speaker 2 (43:25):

This is the least shocking Al Levi reference for anyone who knows him Well

Speaker 1 (43:30):

Before the screens, before you had screens and all that and there were magazines. I would be so bored out of my fucking mind and I would just read everything. I'd read all the ads in them and everything. I remember this one that was in it every time and it was this weird looking dude in a suit and the line was, you don't get what you deserve. You get when you negotiate. And he was like some lawyer, but I was like, yeah, he's right.

Speaker 2 (43:54):

It's so douchey, but it's so true.

Speaker 1 (43:56):

I know. You should have seen his hair. Here is a question from Stefan. Thank

Speaker 5 (44:03):

You. Would you ever use boosted posts on social media and is there a proper time to actually use those things?

Speaker 2 (44:09):

Here's a funny thing about me. I am the guy on YouTube who tells you that everybody who is selling Facebook ads as a solution and boosted posts are wrong. 99.9% of them know they're full of shit. There's some people who are true believers, but I think most of those true believers are people who see the smallest of small gains and know they don't scale. So they sell it and they believe it. But in all honesty, no. I'm the guy who literally tells you, do not pay a dollar for advertising. Now here's an interesting twist to this. The one thing you could spend your money on that is kind of advertising that I've worked a few campaigns on that I've seen literally one of the biggest indie labels in the world told me the campaign we did had the greatest ROI of a thousand dollars they've ever spent is TikTok, influencer marketing.

(45:02):

I know we all come from the more metal world of this stuff, but metal exists there. There's going to be a point where that opens up to being like Go away and keeping your eye on that. It is a thousand percent true that every genre, actually, it's even funny that band knocked loose. They had a huge TikTok trend for a while that was really, I remember looking on sharp metric. It was really helping their numbers. It's coming this way. It's mostly in a lot of other genres, but you want to talk about a way to spend money on promotion? Oh my god, numbers we've never seen before of anything. It's just fucking nuts.

Speaker 1 (45:38):

Well, let me just say it's different if you've got a business selling products. A

Speaker 2 (45:42):

Hundred percent. The other thing too is a familiar product. Iron Maiden can kill on Facebook ads and get great ROI an unknown artist Kent and truffle mayonnaise can kill.

Speaker 1 (45:52):

Yep, exactly. If you're a producer or an artist that's building Uhuh,

Speaker 2 (45:58):

Burn the money and keep a homeless person warm for the night instead. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:03):

Last question, this is from BC Levenger Mike wasn't working. What are your thoughts on bands changing up their style and formula for the music they write? Do you feel more often that the amount of new fans that the new style pulls outweighs the amount of original fans they lost?

Speaker 2 (46:20):

Okay, so I wrote a book called Processing Creativity that I will plug here. It's a book on how you make music people like. The thing I observed in my bajillion years doing this is that the only option is to write the music you want to hear. There is no other option. And every time a musician doesn't do that, I know you think Taylor Swift or Doja Cat is in the studio making inauthentic shit, you are wrong. They're making what they want to hear. Dr. Lukes and Max Martins, when they sit down with these artists, I've been here ask them, what's going on in your life? What's the kernel of truth is the term they use. They find that Katie Perry is breaking up with Russell Brand, so they write some dumb ass fucking song about it. A choose the track that is going to go along with their life and what they're feeling at the time because they know that the artist has to align to make a powerful emotion that goes along with it.

(47:13):

So the same reason why when Blink one A two that's making records about dog farts in their fucking mid forties, we were all like, yo, this is not hitting the same dogs. You have to make what you want to hear. It is the only choice when you don't make what you want to hear. People are like, eh, this is mids. It's not very good. The pursuit is making the most of powerful emotion you can make. I've been in the room with tons of bands that no one wants to hear and tons of the biggest bands in the world. The difference between the two of them always that the bands that are huge are making what they want to hear and they have high standards for what a powerful emotion is and usually unique standards for what that emotion sounds like and how you get to it. And that's why people are interested in them. And it's the only choice you can make in music. And if you want to read 250 pages on that, it's available at fine bookstore.

Speaker 1 (48:04):

You should. Alright, everybody. Jesse, thank you so much for your time. Anytime. Anytime. Thanks everyone for hanging out. It's been a pleasure as always. And I'm sure I'll be texting you at 2:00 AM

Speaker 2 (48:14):

Yes. Yes. I can't wait to discuss more.

Speaker 1 (48:17):

Alright then another URM podcast episode in the bag. Please remember to share our episodes with your friends as well as post them to your Facebook and Instagram or any social media you use. Please tag me at al Levi URM audio at URM Academy and of course tag our guest as well. I mean, they really do appreciate it. In addition, do you have any questions for me about anything? Email them to [email protected]. That's EYAL at M dot aca DMY. And use the subject line answer me Al. Alright then. Till next time, happy mixing.

Speaker 2 (48:56):

You've been listening to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. To ask us questions, make suggestions and interact, visit URM Academy and press the podcast link today.