Episode 78: The Music Business Buddy Highlights of 2025

Year’s end is the perfect moment to trade myths for evidence. We brought together the most useful ideas from the season—data that flips audience assumptions, a calmer path to releasing music that actually moves your career, and a funding shift that weakens the old “advance or bust” story. Keith Jopling spotlights how streaming data exposes who really listens and why waiting until the songs and live set are undeniable saves you from burning momentum. We carry that thread into the studio with a reminder that great records are team sports—writing, performance, production, recording, mixing, and mastering each compounding the others.

We also tackle AI without the panic. Gary Charles warns how models can strip culture from local scenes, while Declan McGlynn lays out how contracts must separate recorded rights from AI training and voice models to protect future value. Anne‑Marie Gaillard reframes ethical AI as a creative co‑pilot that speeds iteration, and Dave Ronan shows how assistive mixing automates the grunt work while keeping taste human. On the other side of the ledger, Matt Jones makes the case for creators owning fan relationships and using blockchain as durable infrastructure, and Ryan Ouyang demonstrates chipped merch that proves fandom, unlocks access, and travels with the fan beyond any single platform.

Zooming out, Ralph W Peer maps how cross‑cultural collaboration—think amapiano grooves, Favela funk textures, hybrid pop—keeps music fresh as individual hits fade faster. Waylon Barnes gets practical about revenue: the money often arrives indirectly through syncs, brands, live, and merch, so attention is the spark and strategy is the engine. Tie it together with clean PR practices that spot bots, smart education and pitching, and rights literacy that licenses new formats before the law catches up.

If you’re planning 2026, use this episode as a checklist: finish better songs, build a fearless live show, protect your assets, embrace ethical tools, and design for superfans you can actually reach. If this helped, follow the show, share it with a creator who needs a nudge, and leave a quick review so more artists can find these ideas.

Chapters

• 0:15 Welcome And Year In Review Setup
• 2:08 Keith Jopling On Data, Audiences, And Funding
• 7:20 The Song Comes First: Team Sport Mixing
• 8:23 Spotting Hype And Bots In PR
• 10:59 AI, Culture, And Appropriation Risks
• 13:01 Session Craft And The Pro Tools Shift
• 14:47 Emerging Talent And Unchanged Essentials
• 16:45 Strategy Behind A TikTok-Born Hit
• 18:10 DIY Publishing And New Admin Options
• 19:01 Ethical AI As Creative Co‑Pilot
• 20:38 Contracts, AI Rights, And Voice Models
• 22:48 Assistive AI Mixing, Not Replacement
• 24:08 Fan Ownership, Blockchain, And Power Shift
• 27:33 Chipped Merch And Verified Fandom
• 31:57 Smart Pitching And The Value Of Education
• 34:19 Cross‑Cultural Collabs And Global Sounds
• 37:25 Shorter Hit Lifecycles And Longevity
• 38:01 Licensing Ahead Of Legislation
• 39:36 Attention, Indirect Income, And Strategy
• 42:01 Goals, Direction, And Supportive Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_15: 0:15

Welcome to you. You're listening to the music business of it with me, Jolly A Mons Podcasting out of Birmingham in England. I'm the author of the book, The Music Business for Music Creators, available in hardback, paperback, and ebook format. I'm a music creator as a writer-producer with a variety of credits. I'm a consultant, an artist, manager, and a senior lecturer in both music business and music creation. Wherever you are and whatever you do, consider yourself welcome to this podcast and to a part of the community. I'm here to try and educate and inspire music creators from all over the world in their quest to achieving their goals by gaining a greater understanding of the business of music. Okay, so it's time to say goodbye to 2025. And I thought what would be nice is to kind of look back over the year and play what I believe to be some of the most important clips of the year. So I've kind of gone through every single episode and looked at all of the things that people have said, and I've kind of picked out a few highlights of things that I hope and believe will be useful for you to listen to, either as a recap or maybe as an introduction point if you've not heard uh those particular clips before. Uh I think it's always a nice time of the year, right? To look back and just go, hey, what's happened this year? Let's have a look back and then let's have a look forward, right? I mean, because there are so many things that people have said this year that have really changed the way that I think about things. I've learned so much from talking to people on the podcast. In fact, no, listening to people, right, as they talk on the podcast. Um and just trying to give them questions that they might not get every time they're interviewed, right? So that we just look at things from different angles. So, with that in mind, I'm gonna play some clips, right? And just give you a little bit of context around each one from different episodes. Let's do it. Here we go. Okay, let's just rewind. Oh, Johnny Amos, just so cool. No, sorry, not that bit. Hang on. That's better. Okay. Okay, this is Keith Jopling, everybody. For anybody that doesn't know Keith, so he's the former head uh of Global Strategy at Spotify, one of the smartest minds in the UK music industry. Here he was talking about marketing data and how it forms approaches to understanding an artist's place in the market.

SPEAKER_14: 2:24

It's really funny because when streaming came along, they found that they got a lot of that wrong. They take an artist like Rag and Bone Man at Sony, and you know, you'd read his his his whole marketing profile that Sony had put together, thinking that his audience was kind of leaning under, you know, under 25 females. And actually, I think when they got the streaming data, they found uh okay, it's over 35 males.

SPEAKER_15: 2:49

Okay, I also asked Keith about the importance of new music, right? Because it's crucial, right, for the algorithmic flow of Spotify, amongst everything else. So um I asked him about the idea of you know new music and uh and and how he feels about it and uh what the standards are, and this is what he said.

SPEAKER_14: 3:05

I think there's more good music emerging now than there ever has been before, you know, of of an amazing quality in the production and in the songwriting.

SPEAKER_15: 3:15

I then asked him what tips he might have for artists that are just starting out right now and where to kind of pivot to. Here we go. Here's what he said.

SPEAKER_14: 3:23

I guess when you're when you're starting out, there's a couple of pointers. Um one's just a very practical thing about not going too soon. Um, and you know, there's been so much in recent years with the rise of TikTok and so on about you get that morality, or you drop something and it starts to hit apart, and before you know it, you're signed, or you're in a conversation about being signed. All of that is just is you're you're gonna you're on a hiding for nothing, really, unless you are exceptional. Really, it's the old-fashioned values. Take your time, practice your art, make sure you are working on the best songs, don't release um don't release anything that you really don't think is your best work. You can do that later, but you've got to get your best work out there. Uh and you've got to you've got to play live. You've got to just practice your art live because that is ultimately where you're gonna grow your real fan base.

SPEAKER_15: 4:27

Okay, here is a really interesting uh observation that Keith has made uh in the cultural differences of recorded music between the UK and the US. See what you make of this?

SPEAKER_14: 4:37

Uh and I one of the things that I've always been curious about, and this is another broad statement, but I'm convinced that this is true. And I'm I think Punk has got something to do with it as well in the UK. Okay, is that let's let's just be objective about whatever the music is, whatever genre it is, whatever style it is. My sense is that if you're gonna build as an artist in the US and make it there, you have to be technically better. You have to play better, perform better, sound better. I think in the UK we've always given artists a bit more leeway. You can be a little bit honky, you don't have to be perfect on that instrument that you play, you don't have to be super tight as a band, will forgive you that if you're creative and you're just doing something that's new or different or interesting.

SPEAKER_15: 5:33

Um I then asked him about um artist funding, right, and where that's headed and what kind of technological changes are upon us going forward, and he told me something extremely interesting.

SPEAKER_14: 5:42

Listen to this. One of the fundamental things that I can see around the corner is a shake up in funding. Okay. I mean, that agency I talked about that I worked at before Spotify was uh was partly financial services. And I said to those guys before I left, you're doing all this work in financial services. FinTech's gonna be huge. Just get into fintech now, you know. And I mean I mean, look at where fintech is and look at where it is in in the UK in particular. That you know, I think we're one of the one of the world leaders. So I think fintech is is on the way to solving artist funding. It's gonna be really interesting for the labels because it's one of the strongholds of a label is we can still we're still the guys you come to for money. Uh and most creators need money, right? They need that investment. So there are services emerging already. I mean, mentioning names, it's it's not really about names because it it could be the first generation doesn't work, but the next generation does. But I I kind of like what Beatbread's trying to do. Duetti there's been um has come onto the market recently. There's different takes on crowdfunding. When artists have a different route to funding, they're no longer held by the label to do the creative bit.

SPEAKER_15: 7:02

Okay, here's a little clip from an interview that I did with James Orwater, who is a uh an American uh Grammy Award winning mix engineer and a true gent. Lovely, lovely guy. Um, we were talking about the song, right? You can only work with what you've got, right? He was talking about the power of the song and importance of it. And he said something very interesting. Have a listen to this.

SPEAKER_10: 7:20

The song is is first and foremost what what is is the most uh the biggest part of any track, of course, right? I mean, it starts with the songwriting, and then after that, it's the performance and the production, then eventually the recording, then eventually the mix, and eventually the master. It's a team sport, though. So you don't want to you know check all those boxes and have an amazing song uh and then and then mix it internally and have it not reach its full potential, um, or have it mixed uh externally and and have it sound great, but then you know, skimp on the mastering process. I mean, I mean, it's a team sport. I mean, the better the song is, generally speaking, um, the better it's written, the easier it's going to be to perform, the easier it's it's gonna come across in the production stage, easier it is to record, easier it is to mix, etc. etc. So it's absolutely a team sport. And uh, you know, I'm sure it's not uh unique just to our our industry, but you know, that's that's a problem sometimes. People skimp on on certain aspects and and it doesn't allow something to reach its full potential.

SPEAKER_15: 8:16

Okay, this is a little clip from an interview that I did earlier on this year as well with Chris Sharp, uh, who's the head honcho at MusoSoup, right? For anybody that's not familiar with Muso Soup, um so they are kind of like a centralized platform for PR, for music PR. They've kind of changed the game in some ways in Music PR. Um, and uh and very often Chris is really, really there early on with discovering artists, um, and he kind of has made a reputation for himself through that, right? Uh, this is something that he said about grassroots artists, which I thought was really interesting.

SPEAKER_07: 8:48

The most buzzest thing for us is when you get an artist that comes on and they put the we we share in our little groups, you know, like we get an artist that comes on and like they got like 10 likes on 10 people following them on Facebook or Instagram, and they are unbelievable. You know, and just listen, all your hair's got up in your arm, and you go, oh my god, because you know we get these before all of the managers get them, we get them before all of the labels get them. You know, I mean that this is generally like the first stop before even all the blogs pick them up when we see the same as Smit, I'll probably get them straight for the door at the beginning like that. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_15: 9:19

I then asked Chris what tools he uses um to be able to kind of spot um, you know, kind of fake followers or playlists or curators that kind of have like a bort, botted kind of following and what he does to kind of stop that from happening on his platform. And uh he gave such an insightful answer. Check the names out that he mentions here now, because it's going to be so useful to so many people. Here we go.

SPEAKER_07: 9:44

So for Spotify, we use Spot and Track. Oh, good one. Yeah, that's that that costs like eight dollars a month. So, like if you're an artist, that's a no-brainer. There's another one called Artist Tools, I've never used that one, but I think it's similar. Um, Submit Hub, hats off to Jason again. He's made he's made the most amazing playlist bot checker. It's very, very accurate, and he's calling data and he's working with um a lot of distributors as well to feed in more data. So I hope I got that information right. But um, yeah, that I even though like you know they're just someone at a different platform, we're using that bot checker on a regular basis. Any artist can use that for free as long as they're logged in. So that's something really recommended.

SPEAKER_15: 10:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_07: 10:22

Um for influencers and stuff, we use a program called Hype Auditor, which can basically crawl back through the whole entire um history. In in I don't know how they do it, but but it basically will give us all graphs and we can sort of spot dodgy inflation of followers and mass followers and things getting cold. We can seal that. So we basically, whenever an influencer or a tick topper joins, we have to go through all the reports and make sure that they're uh they're on point. Um so it's easy to spot that kind of stuff. Okay. Watch you. There's another one called Social Blade. That's free for artists to use. Social Blade's good for influencers to check them out.

SPEAKER_15: 10:59

Okay, so it's kind of difficult to not talk about the elephant in the room, AI, right? So it's gonna be kind of mentioned a few times here. How can it not be, right? Um, this is an interview from earlier in the year with uh music producer Gary Charles, who pointed out something very interesting.

SPEAKER_03: 11:14

Big court cases between the major labels and um UDO and Suno, the the prominent AI generators at the moment. And so it can appear that that's kind of maybe going to be resolved. But when you think about, say, I'm a piano or com music, something that's very culturally embedded in a location um where in South Africa, if you're a young Tom or I'm a piano producer, you'll be uh creating tracks, usually, usually in your bedroom with with a cracked version of FL Studio or or um Ableton or whatever you whatever you can get your hands on. And that music is really even even in South Africa, a lot of the kind of genres of of music emerge from certain regions and they're very culturally embedded. What are we saying if we say, well, actually we've solved the the problem of AI and copyright because we've had the court cases, the major labels have have done a deal that they'll say is is protecting artists, um, and then we say, okay, that's solved. So now we can create a I'm a piano generator. Then you've got a the Silicon Valley monopolies and uh the music industry monopolies kind of colluding to essentially appropriate the entire cultural underpinning of a music that's very embedded in in communities or in in in locations.

SPEAKER_15: 12:54

Okay, here's a little clip from session musician Rich Watson talking about the craft and the importance of session playing. He's an outstanding guitar player and he has such an insightful way of looking at things. Um, I learned so much from talking to him about this. Here's a little clip.

SPEAKER_12: 13:11

And every like new generation of session musicians would, it seems, intently study the generation that came before them. So they would study, amalgamate, and advance, and then by the time you got to like the 80s, you had these guys that had this lineage of like almost like you know 20-30 years of this these incredible session musicians from generations before them. They would go and learn all of those records and then blend that with the kind of modern 80s rock stuff that was coming up within the original band scene at the time. So you had these guys that had the um the mental chops of a jazz musician, but the physical playing chops of like a high octane 80s rock player, you know?

SPEAKER_15: 13:53

Wow, which is that's a good combo.

SPEAKER_12: 13:55

Yeah, it's pretty cool, right? Which is why I think we we kind of hit like a little bit of like a peak of musicianship in terms of studio guitar players in like the 80s and 90s. It was that point, and then well, what happened? Well, obviously, when Pro Tools came in, suddenly we had an easier means, well not initially, I think everyone called it slow tools at first, didn't they? Uh uh an easier means of of editing audio, and as computing got better, that became more and more efficient. And of course, you reach a point where you don't necessarily need the best musician in the city. You know, you can get your mate to do it, and it doesn't matter if he does 60 takes from that, you can comp together a usable guitar part for your record, you know.

SPEAKER_15: 14:39

Okay, here is a little clip from Lawrence Hobbs, who is the CEO of Sappho Music Group uh in London. Lawrence is one of my kind of go-to specialists for anything to do with artist development and emerging artists. He's a master of it. Over the years, he's discovered so many artists and worked with them very, very early on in their career. He's brilliant at spotting talent, as well as being a uh, you know, an outstanding producer and songwriter. So here's a little something that he said about emerging talent.

SPEAKER_16: 15:08

At the end of the day, there's so much exciting talent coming through. The youth coming through with their own spin on music, the way they're doing things, or what they talk about, that won't change. Whatever technology, whatever usage, AI, samplers, beats, whatever, and that excites me. When I see a 14, 15, 16-year-old come in here and you go, Wow, wow, listen to that beat, listen to that rap, listen to that voice, that is still there, and that's hasn't changed, that won't change. And actually, I suspect there's more people doing music than ever because of technology.

SPEAKER_15: 15:42

Speaking of technology, with all of the technological changes and platforms and all the different things that we hear about all the time, there's something to be said for having a bit of a strong philosophy from someone that's been there and seen it a million times before. This is what Lawrence said about his philosophy.

SPEAKER_16: 15:58

The essence of the music business, the essence of people coming through and creating livings and creating great songs will never change. I don't think it'll change because the youth is taking technology, using it, adapting it, and making some great music and great content. Um, and that's that's super exciting.

SPEAKER_15: 16:17

Okay, here's a little clip from an interview that I did with Lloyd Perrin, um, who came to the studio to talk to me about his platform serenada. But actually, whilst he was here, he also shared um some absolute drops of wisdom on a variety of other things, including this subject, which is where he created a big viral sensation on TikTok with a particular song. I asked him if it was kind of just, you know, uh, was it something that kind of just happened organically? Was it strategy? Uh, this is what he said. Was that organic or was it kind of strategised?

SPEAKER_04: 16:49

It was all strategy. Okay. Yeah. Um, at the time, you'd see there would have been a scrabble. All the major labels were running around trying to um buy the viral hits essentially. Yeah. TikTok had changed the game massively overnight. Someone who had never been heard of before would suddenly be hugely famous around the world. And so they would run in and want to get their market share. Then what they wanted to do was try and develop it at early stages when things were coming through, the data was showing that something, some sound was trending. Um, and so it was it was basically that the AR um had come up to me and said, Look, we can this is trending, obviously. We've gone and already paid for the replay to be done in London. Um, so they gave me basically a fresh and clear sample to use. So although it sounds like the original, it wasn't a sample again, it was another replay. Um, and I just got the Ono bit with the singing bit. Yeah. And then um I hooked up with um Love Sick, who are these writers, Scottish writers. Uh huh. And so I built the tune, sent it across to them, then they wrote the rest of it, sent it back, and then I sort of fiddled with it from there.

SPEAKER_15: 17:49

Oh right, okay. So they recorded their vocals, sent them to you, and then absolutely.

SPEAKER_04: 17:52

But it was the idea we take a trending sound that people are familiar with and then build it into an actual song so we can put it into the sort of a commercial mainstream sector.

SPEAKER_15: 18:00

All right, okay. I then asked him about um his song catalogue and you know what he does with that. Does he work with a music publisher like he always used to? Does he manage it himself? And uh this is what he said. Is is your publishing still with Notting Hill, or do you manage your own catalogue now?

SPEAKER_04: 18:14

No, no, um, so that I think I was that's probably about ten years ago. I had signed with them for a couple of years. It was a really nice um wonderful time being signed to them. They they got me lots of opportunities. Um, one of the things was the street dance movies. That was something that they yeah, that was a through Notting Hill, yeah. And you know, they're very active, especially at the time then, and there'd you know there'd be sessions every week put in, we'd be going all over the place, speaking to all sorts of people making all sorts of music. But um no, since since coming out of Notting Hill, um I've kind of just kept my publishing to me and sort of administered it myself as something I might think about in the future. There's lots of new options these days. You've got centric and all sorts of pieces where you can do your own publishing, but um it's not something I rush straight back into because I think it's it's important to get the right publisher.

SPEAKER_15: 18:59

Okay, back to AI. Okay, one of the many, many things I've learned about AI this year, everybody, is that a lot of it kind of gets grouped into one subject and just kind of thrown under the bus of that's AI. And actually, it's kind of not really the way I look at it anymore. Because, yes, we know some of the big tech firms are doing things in a very ugly fashion. But for every big tech company out there, there are a hundred very clean, ethical companies that are doing it the right way. And one of those companies is Darcy, DAACI. And I spoke to their head of partnerships, uh Anne-Marie Gaylard, and uh this is what she uh said that really kind of reassured me.

SPEAKER_11: 19:45

Done in the right way. I mean, these tools are so effective, productivity efficiency rises. Um, it's kind of just like having another colour in your paint box, you know, in your palette, uh uh, and maybe a new paintbrush um to work with. Um Are still in the driving site, you are it's still your creative ideas, as you said, Johnny. It's just helping you get there a little bit faster. Um and also, you know, sometimes I think as artists we can get stuck in creative rots or loops, you know. It happens to the best of us for whatever reason. And sometimes you just need a bit of inspiration. And I think these tools can kind of just help generate, get get get the brain going a bit and you know, generate some new ideas. Um certainly that's what we're doing with our tools at DASI. So um, and there are other tools out there that that are doing similar things. So I think, yeah, done in the right way, these are powerful tools that are there just to kind of co-pilot with us.

SPEAKER_15: 20:33

Okay, okay. This is a little clip from staying on the AI thing, by the way. Sorry, um, is uh a little clip from Declan McGlynn from VoiceWap. So for anybody that's not familiar with VoiceWapper who didn't listen to this episode, um, VoiceWap are really um kind of starting to change the market on AI voice models, not just for music, by the way, but for adverts, audiobooks, all sorts of different things. Very, very pioneering company and a very fair company that remunerate absolutely everybody with pinpoint accuracy and fairness. So a really good standard setter um and uh and a kind of maverick company as well. I asked Declan about something that maybe artists, you know, maybe need to be aware of, which is when they sign their rights to recorded music to a record company, for instance, um do they need to be aware of the terms of how what then how their music is then used for training data, or i.e., to simplify it, should there be a separate set record deal for recorded music and a separate one for AI voice models, right? So this is a very interesting subject that came up in a conversation I had with a lawyer earlier on in the year as well. Declan had a great take on it. This is what he said.

SPEAKER_08: 21:42

Um, a lot of people can get swept away by the idea of being signed, and and that's still a very exciting and romantic concept being signed. Um, but you have to be very, very careful because your assets now can be used to build a model without your permission, they can compete with you. The whole point of this was to educate artists to say this threat is here, um, this could potentially happen. And one of the things about AI and the headlines, most of the headlines around AI are very apocalyptic, very humorous. Um, and again, some of that is valid. But what that means is that people just kind of panic and they don't think they're not thinking rationally about what's happening and while while they're over there panicking, the music industry is over here making deals and making decisions like they did in streaming. Um, so it's really important that I get on top of this stuff and are very, very, very conscious of um what they might be signing and what their assets are worth, when those assets can be used to train something that can create an endless amount of competing and derivative assets.

SPEAKER_15: 22:44

Okay, so then we then talked about the idea of kind of transferring a voice model into a different area, right? So in kind of instead of kind of taking the data of a human's voice, but we could take a musical interpretation of data when it comes to other aspects of music. And this is something that he said that made me kind of stop and think about the future of music. What do you think to this?

SPEAKER_08: 23:07

The concept that really took my imagination was if I was in the studio and and you know, I wasn't a great drummer, but I would just drum something out anyway, just like to the best of my ability. And then I had an AI model of you know John Bonham, and I took John Bonham, like kind of like a traditional preset, but like the next level of that, not just the sound of that drum kit, like the preset would offer, but the groove and the feel and the subtleties um of that plane style were modeled by um an AI model with the permission of his estate. Um, and I was thinking, God, then you could put it down to like you know, Prince's guitar style, or then you could even go to the next level of that and make it about mix engineering.

SPEAKER_15: 23:49

Talking of mix engineering, I then went on to talk to uh Dave Ronin, uh CEO of uh ROX Audio. Um now, what they've built is something very interesting, but could easily be misunderstood. What it actually is is AI-powered mixing. Now that term could actually grate on quite a lot of mix engineers if you just look at the headline. But actually, when you go a little deeper, you realise that actually all of the creative stuff in the mixing process is left to the humans to do. And all of the stuff that takes uh time and effort, um the kind of the kind of ugly stuff, if you like, uh, is done by AI. So it's not there to actually replace a human role, but more so to assist uh what a human can do. So this is Dave talking about that.

SPEAKER_06: 24:36

Yeah, so the the idea being that like we can give you back a mixed and master track back in minutes instead of days at very low costs, so we can mix up the 32 channels of audio and combine them, balance all the tracks out and kind of combined together to give you a really nice mix. And actually, the beauty of what we've uh we we we launched a uh kind of an extra feature there just after Christmas. Um, so not only can you just download it as a final WAV, MP3, or Flack, or whatever it is you want, you can actually download it as an Ableton Live project file. So what I mean by that is yeah, so you we'll what we'll have done is we'll take your unprocessed audio, put it into an Ableton Live project file, but we'll then configure Ableton as if it's been mixed, if you know what I mean. So essentially we've set the EQs, we've set the compressors, we've set all the volumes and faders. So then you're you can basically download it, open up your Ableton project file, and you have a mix there ready. So like you just basically need to tweak stuff if you want, or else you add your creative stuff on top. We've all we've done that now for Bitwig, Presonas Studio One, and Q Base as well. So and we're we're expanding it to as many dollars today as possible. And the beauty of that is like it's because it's fully then at that point, it's like you can just bounce it out if you're happy with it, or you can tweak it. So it's it's very assistive at that point, you know what I mean? It's getting you to the 90% points, and then you can do what you want on top of that, basically.

SPEAKER_15: 26:03

Okay, I've been lucky enough to talk to some top CEOs this year, everybody. And one of the most impressive uh was Matt Jones from Medallion. Uh, you may know Matt Jones from um some of his past uh successes, CrowdSurge, for example. Um, he really cares about um art um and the role that music plays in culture, and which is why he does what he does. It's what drives him to build things to help people that create art. Uh and this is something that he said on that subject.

SPEAKER_05: 26:34

How important they are to culture, how important they are to these massive platforms, you know, how how influential they are on everything we do all day, every day. And I think that that's basically been my mission. It's like how do I take that 10% to 90, 100%? Like, why can't it be that? And why can't why can't, you know, Substack has done this for publishers, like for journalists, they have figured it out. Like, that's why I wrote that article. Like, you launch a subscription on Substack, they take 10%, the journalist takes 90%. You look at the amount of journalists that are coming out of the major publications, that's why. And I think why can't the same be true for music? Um, so yeah, that's really what I get excited about.

SPEAKER_15: 27:17

Now I know that Matt is extremely well versed in the subject of uh crypto and NFTs and blockchain and all that kind of stuff. Um for those of you that read my book, you know it's a subject that I talk about because I feel like it was perhaps a little bit of a wasted opportunity uh in the earlier part of this decade. And I don't think it's gonna go away. I think it's gonna come back in a different form. But I won't bore you with my predictions, that's in a whole other episode in the past. But um, here is Matt talking about it.

SPEAKER_05: 27:47

I will say this on kind of music X, you know, crypto, if you will. I think this idea of blockchain and applying it in a world where like artists do own fan relationships, and you can put some kind of immutability on that. E.g., like it's great that we share data with artists, that's very important. But at the end of the day, what are they gonna do with a lot of this data, right? Like, sure, they there's a lot of feeling of like safety when that happens, but with the blockchain, what you can do is is you can actually put a lot of this stuff on chain so it lives forever. Like this idea of like fan profiles living on chain, so they're associated with certain artists. So I actually think that the blockchain technology is like infrastructure for this idea of like creating permanent records that are owned by the people that should own them makes a lot of sense. Yeah, and I think that that will ultimately come back because I think it's a no-brainer.

SPEAKER_15: 28:51

Okay, so a few days after I spoke to Matt, I then went on to have a conversation uh with Ryan Oyang, uh, who is the CEO of IYK. So they're experts in chipping, right? Um, he has some fascinating insights on what could be ahead of us in music based upon what he's already achieved uh in other things like fashion. Uh so let's hear something that he said.

SPEAKER_01: 29:13

You know, back when, you know, NFTs and Web3, you know, people were in sort of full discussion about um what that could mean for commerce and you know, ownership. And we actually uh set out to combine sort of this idea of an NFT with like ownership in the physical world. And so the really cool thing about sort of that digital record of ownership is that you know, any application can read it, uh, it's public, you can show it off, and we really wanted to bring that so all the all those characteristics of that digital asset to physical ownership. And so the platform, you know, back then and even today is really about how can we represent ownership of your physical items in a digital way. So actually, the shirt I'm wearing right now um has an NFC chip in it. Now, I don't know if there's a video here, but for audio only listeners, there's actually an orange tag on my t-shirt that you can scan with any modern smartphone. And by scanning the chip, you can open up an experience that's non-shareable, fully gated to the chip, that allows you to claim ownership of that specific product.

SPEAKER_15: 30:32

Okay, let's go a little deeper into those products because sometimes it can be difficult to actually relate this to music. So let's just go outside of music and then back into music with this that Ryan said.

SPEAKER_01: 30:43

Over time, though, yeah, we've done toys, collectibles, we've worked with a few book publishers at this point. Uh, some people have, you know, been chipping instruments, and so it's really been a wide variety of stuff. Um, and obviously, more recently, uh, you know, uh per the title of this podcast, I've been doing a lot more in the on the music side of things as well.

SPEAKER_15: 31:04

Okay, let's hone in on the live side of music and what merch looks like from there and also what experiential stuff looks like. Uh, because Ryan has some fascinating insights on this subject and where it might go moving forward. Here's what he had to say on that subject.

SPEAKER_01: 31:20

Music specifically, I think, happens so much in like that live environment, right? Like, I think if you look at me when I'm supporting the artist that I love the most, right? Uh, John Mayer, for example, is like one of my all-time favorite artists. Like, there's so much evidence that I am a fan that's represented in sort of the items that I own, right? Like, I own a John Mayer t-shirt, I own John Mayer's signature guitar, I have like two of his watch collaborations with G Shock and Casio, right? And so there's all this evidence, right, that I am a fan of that artist because they've, you know, put their name on and you know created these things for me as a fan to buy. I think uh that's a lot of where our work manifests, where if I'm a merch owner, if I have all of these things, if I've demonstrated myself to be a fan in these ways, I want that to be represented digitally so that you know I might be, you know, the first one to get tickets or you know, get a chance for a seat upgrade at a show, or you know, like a way to represent my fandom digitally means that that's actually a direct path for the artist to recognize me for my support of them over the years. And so that's really sort of the the place where we live, which is um, how could we take, you know, your existing population of you know fans and really recognize them for their support in a way that they haven't felt in the past.

SPEAKER_15: 32:52

Okay, let's move away from technology temporarily. Um, as I play you a clip uh from an interview that I did with Kristen Hurst, um who is an emerging music publisher, uh, very early on in her career, and somebody that I think will do big things ahead. She's already doing great things. Um, she's a lovely lady and she's got some great insights, uh, a very, very useful person for songwriters. Here's what she had to say.

SPEAKER_09: 33:17

I would say as a songwriter, the biggest thing you can do for yourself when you're writing and when you're pitching is to know who you're pitching to and to also have some sort of a passion towards these genres. I think that's really, really important, and also that also can help you have a lot of success if you know the market you're writing for.

SPEAKER_15: 33:37

Okay, cool little tip there. Um, I then asked Kristen about the importance of a music education course, right? Because, you know, there's a lot of different options out there these days, but of course, degrees are expensive, aren't they? So, you know, is it worth it sometimes to spend all of that money uh, you know, to create a network and you know how you then use that network going forward? How important was it for her? This is something that I asked, and this is something that she said.

SPEAKER_09: 34:02

I think it's the reason I'm here now. I think I think it was the biggest deciding factor of what I'm doing now.

SPEAKER_15: 34:11

Okay, staying on the music publishing subject, um, here is a clip um from my recent interview with Ralph W. Peer from Peer Music, where we talked about the importance of cross-cultural collaboration.

SPEAKER_13: 34:25

There's a proven track record that cross-cultural collaboration leads to uh fantastic music and fantastic output. I mean, starting back in roots music in the United States, you know, that's that's African rhythms with Scottish traditional folk music mashed together, and that's kind of where you get what we would now sort of call country. And of course, blues, jazz, etc., modern pop music, it just all leads from there. But in more modern times, I mean you can think of like um Despacito, right? Justin Bieber with reggaeton. Um, another good example is the the AMA piano, the log drum sound that then became that's so that's from South Africa, but then it became um like Nigerian producers started using it a lot and became kind of like the signature sound of the of Afro. Um, so yeah, I mean for me personally, my my AR guys are probably sick of me talking about this, but I think I'm I'm there's a couple countries that I really kind of follow to see what's going on. Um, one of those is South Africa, another one is Brazil. Um there's a a genre of music that's been in Brazil for gosh, probably over 20 years, Favela Funk. Um, that's now metamorphosized, so to speak. So you have Funk here in the UK is a massive genre, and then you also have a subgenre. Well, there's a couple subgenres of that. One of them is baile and brujera. Um, I personally think like one of the next big global hits will have those influences in it. Um, I remember like the weekend when he did his last album in February this year, I think is when it came out. Um, there was a there was a Favela funk track on there, and I was like, yes, this is this is the start.

SPEAKER_15: 36:07

Wow.

SPEAKER_13: 36:08

So yeah, I'm a I'm a huge believer in cross-cultural, cross-geographical, whatever you want to call it, um, collaboration.

SPEAKER_15: 36:15

Ralph and I also talked about the subject of the lifespan of a song, which is something which has kind of altered in recent years. Um, this is what he said on that subject.

SPEAKER_13: 36:25

They they seem to have a much shorter lifespan. You know, I there were a lot of articles going around um a couple months ago about how there wasn't really a 2025 summer hit. Like, what's the song of the summer of 2025? It's an interesting question. Um, I mean, I would argue like the Charlie XXX Bratt uh album, that was a fantastic marketing campaign. Amazing. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Just hit every nail on the head. Well, well, well done. Um, yeah, credit where credit's due for that one. Yeah. But it's it wasn't, you know, the song of the summer, so to speak.

SPEAKER_15: 37:04

We then started to look ahead and uh and start to think about the shape of the landscape of music publishing, but also recorded music. And he had some very interesting insights to share.

SPEAKER_13: 37:15

My question is, is there an ex Rolling Stones?

SPEAKER_02: 37:18

Right?

SPEAKER_13: 37:18

Is there going to be another act or band that is so seminal to become part of the fabric of so many people's lives? And I think it's I think it's an interesting question. I'm not saying that it can't happen, please don't get me wrong.

SPEAKER_15: 37:33

No, no.

SPEAKER_13: 37:34

I'm sure Taylor Swift is a is a very good example.

SPEAKER_02: 37:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_13: 37:38

Um, but it's kind of like instead of, how can I put it, you know, is the quilt getting bigger?

SPEAKER_02: 37:44

Right?

SPEAKER_13: 37:45

So that more people can can can wrap themselves in it, so to speak. Um, or uh is it dilution?

SPEAKER_15: 37:53

Okay, so Ralph is not only um, you know, a heralded music publisher, but he's also got a background in intellectual property law. So um I wanted to talk to him about the role of what the big tech companies, the small tech companies, the AI, create tech startups, what we need to do in order to link that with legislation and the music industry.

SPEAKER_13: 38:14

Generally speaking, with technology and intellectual property, it's always going to be a case of intellectual property playing catch-up to technology. And that's just by virtue of the fact that intellectual property is based in legislation and it takes a while for legislation to catch up with the times. It's just there's an inherent delay. So whenever a new uh technology comes around, we as an industry have to find a way to in a lot of cases it's putting square pegs into round holes. So I remember during COVID, you know, we were all talking about NFTs. Yes. And it's a fascinating um academic question, excuse me, um, of you know, was it a mechanical, was it a synchronization, what rights exactly were getting exploited here? Um, but at the end of the day, a lot of it comes down to look, this technology is here, we need to figure out a way to license it. And as far as what I would like to see the industry do, we need to license. And we need to be seen as um getting ahead of the legislation, so to speak, so that when legislation does eventually come around, we have a model that works and that you know that can that can go into law.

SPEAKER_15: 39:31

Okay, here's a clip from my recent interview with Whalen Barnes, CEO of C2 Management. Um, Whalen is an expert in marketing, amongst many other things. Um, and he gave me an answer which I was really inspired by and really intrigued by. Um, so I asked him at this point, um, surely if someone is to work with you as an artist or as a label or as a manager, um, they would need to know their marketplace before they come to you to do the marketing. And he said this.

SPEAKER_00: 39:59

I don't think it's Particularly important. I think uh it's helpful 100%, but uh really that's what we're for. So, you know, I've worked with countless artists that uh think they know who their niche is and uh who their main audience is, and and come to find out they they really couldn't have been more wrong, right? So, yes, 100% is it fantastic that you that you think you know it or that you have no clue, whatever it may be, uh that's what we're for. We utilize a lot of proprietary data and and social listening tools to really identify who your main audience is, right? So, not particularly important when you come to us. That's what we're for. We're your trusted advisors, and you know, we're gonna give you the the short of the skinny.

SPEAKER_15: 40:46

Now we shouldn't confuse that subject with artist direction. It doesn't mean that we can just make whatever music we want and then we go, right, let's pay people to go and find the audience. Maybe that happens some places, perhaps sometimes it does. But generally speaking, in my experience and in my observations of others and in talking with others, it doesn't generally work that way. So there's an important point here about knowing a little bit, right, about that audience, which is then kind of reactively fed through the artist direction. You know, what does the artist do? What do they represent? What's their values? What's their message? This is what Wayland said on that subject.

SPEAKER_00: 41:23

Yeah, you know, I think um it's super important for artists to know the direction they're going into. So if you know exactly who your audience is, you're not gonna frivolously spend in the wrong direction.

SPEAKER_15: 41:38

Okay, so then in comes the subject of attention, gaining attention, but in the right way with the right tactics, the right approach, and the right methods. Uh, this is then something that Whalen said on that subject.

SPEAKER_00: 41:51

Contrary to popular belief, music doesn't make that much money anymore. Uh, most of the money is going to come from indirect income. So that's sync deals, brand deals, merch, performances, appearance fees. Those are the things that that artists need to have a blueprint to attract, right? And so attention is what attracts them. So for literally anything of value, attention's the biggest commodity. So one of the tools is their music, right? Of course, they make good music. Maybe it goes viral, maybe it has a moment. Awesome. You have some attention, right? Tool number two is marketing it, right? So if you use marketing properly, you're gonna add fuel to the fire. So that's gonna help it grow outside its grow outside of its organic bubble. Um, those indirect income streams are gonna be a lot easier to attain. And so, yes, I think it is the most important strategy for artists to create strategies outside of their music because that's simply how they're they're gonna get paid, right?

SPEAKER_15: 42:55

I wanted to just close with that there, because the idea of getting paid, it's an interesting subject in music, isn't it? I mean, it's really important, but also not very important. By that, what I mean is um I don't think it's the reason why a lot of people get into music, you know. Oh, I'm gonna do this to make money. I don't often hear people saying that, um, or uh at least not finding success if they say that. Um, but it is important to make a living, isn't it? Because otherwise, if you don't, uh then you have to do something else to make a living, and then the music might suffer, right? That might be temporarily, but you know, nevertheless, you know, time spent on music creates better music, hasn't it, right? Now, it's not all about making music. We know that, right? There's also legacy involved, right? It's important, therefore, to try and get the balance right, isn't it? Between what do I want here? What do I want to do? And it's a great time of the year to be asking that, right? As we look back over a year and we look ahead to the next year, we go, right, what do I want? You know, because if if it's I just want to live as a musician, I'd be as bold as to say that's not enough. You need to be a little bit more narrow than that. I want to be here, I want to be there, I want my music to do this, therefore I'm gonna have to release this map of singles this year to get that kind of number. Or, you know, I want to be able to get on these festivals right. What do I need to do to be able to do that right? I want to widen my team, I want to get a manager right. What would I say to a manager? All these things, these are all the steps towards that wider goal, aren't they? I do hope with all my heart, everybody, that this podcast serves you well in that quest to try and make that happen. Because sooner or later these steps they do move you forward, right? And then the things start to become plausible and without you even really noticing, you've then entered the music industry, and then you need to know what to say when you get there, right? So I'm here for you, everybody. I have been all year and I will be all the next year too, um, and a year after that. Please know that you can reach out to me anytime you like. You know, if you want to send in questions and you want me to answer it privately to you, and you don't want me to set your question on here, that's fine as well. My my goal is to be here, to be resourceful, to be supportive. I know what it's like to not have that much of a support around you. I remember what that was like many moons ago when I was much younger, and it's tough, right? And it's it can be isolating and it can be lonely. But my point is it shouldn't have to be. I'm here for you, everybody. I'm in your corner anytime you like. Okay, I wish you well, everybody. Happy New Year to one and all, and may the force be with you.

SPEAKER_02: 45:23

The music, business party. The music, business party.