 Do you want to blow up your fan base for cheap? It's very possible as long as you're willing to be a little unorthodox. And we're going to talk about how you can do that with ads today. And on top of that, we're going to talk about the simple thing that's making most of the music go viral today. We're also going to talk about some of the secret jobs of your favorite artists in this episode. Not only are we going to break down those topics, we're going to rapid fire through seven topics that artists need to know. Going forward, check it out here on yet another episode of no life is necessary. Let's get it. All right. So for this first topic, music executive Ray Daniels breaks down the new way to build your team. If you want to actually make more of your music, go viral for the low. Check this out. Every song is going viral. It's going viral because it's attached to a piece of content. If I was a label, I would hire a content house. I would try to make content every day, a reappropriating content that matches our songs, because you just never know. Like that Chris Brown Robo-Testing record that came out five years ago and went number one three, four years later. All right. So let's just stop right there, right? Content is the reason that most music goes viral. And I just want to say one thing, artists, right? Now, content does not mean the art does not matter. The music doesn't matter. We all know that the music does matter. Most of this is with the assumption that the music is good when we have to have these talks. The thing is, it's about finding the right song and then pairing the right song with the right piece of content. All right. So it might take five, 10, 20 pieces to find that right piece of content for that song. But yes, it will then take off and go viral when the right song is paired with the right piece of content. That's all this really means. Doesn't mean the music doesn't matter. I want to make sure the artists get that part. Yeah, no, he's saying the content is a conduit to bringing the music to new people. The content, a lot of times, is the visualization of the emotions or certain aspects of the song that the artist may be trying to get across, that they can't get across in their own content or maybe in a demographic where they can't create content for it. So, yeah, no, he makes sense to me, man. Like, and, you know, even to the point you made, like we all know content is a numbers game. If I can get 20 different content creators to make dope pieces of content in their own verticals to my music, you know, there's a good chance that one of these might take off. And the good thing about it is my song is right there with it. Exactly. It's all packaging, bro. Yeah. When you think about great content, paired with the right song, it's like going to a Jamaican restaurant and getting jerk chicken. That makes sense, right? Yeah. But if I was at McDonald's, I don't want no jerk chicken at McDonald's, right? The song might be the jerk chicken. The content might be McDonald's, right? I want some fries at McDonald's. You say that for the French fry song, right? You put the wrong thing at the wrong place. It's packaged and it's like, what's going on there? That's how I kind of think about pairing the content with the song, right? The right dish at the right restaurant at the right time. And then it's going to hit. Somebody said, I don't know. This feels kind of destructive to the art, tailoring your artist to fit the ideal needs of the Internet for virality. See, he didn't say none of that. They're making all that up, right? What he basically what he's saying is simple, right? We know that content makes this thing pop. He said hire a team, right? For the label, that's a whole another conversation, whether I think the labels will be responsible and why I think they wouldn't necessarily do it. Unless it's more of maybe a indie, I don't even know that. Maybe more of a management group. But like it's not destructive to the art because the art is already created. Exactly, right? Then the content team goes and figures out what to do with it. So don't get that twisted. I think a lot of times you all think it has to be you create music specifically for the content. It doesn't. Otherwise, we would have to say music videos are anti or indistractive destructive commercials or movie trailers or all these other things that need music to evoke the emotion. Exactly. It's just another way to express it. Stop what you're doing. We've got to interrupt you to let you know you can win twenty thousand dollars by submitting your music to two lost dot com slash collab for the crown. We're looking for the best songs and we're partner with two lost. So if you think you got some great music, if you think you got the goods, go to that site, two lost dot com slash collab for the crown. Check out the instructions for the contest. Win up to twenty thousand dollars and make sure you put in no label when you create your profile on two lost so you can make sure you get three months completely free. That's two lost dot com slash collab for the crown. And again, when you sign up, put in the code, no label, all one word and you will get three months completely free. Go in there, twenty thousand dollars because you know you got the good, she got the talent. You just got to make sure you submit peace. Now, with that being said, the next topic, a music legend broke down what artists must do if they want to create legendary music and legendary fan basis. Check out this clip that was posted on Curtis King's IG page. I came across it on his page. Shout out to him from Carlos Santana, one of my favorite artists of all time, by the way. If you don't give yourself chills, no one else is going to get them either. So you have to learn how to give yourself chills, you know, before you hit that note. And then other people are going to get chills because if you don't get them, why should anybody, you know, it's important that a musician connects immediately with the heart, otherwise you lose them and then they go somewhere else. It's not volume, it's not loud or anything. It's more like the intensity of the intensity of your heart. Stop it right there. Your music should give you chills. Otherwise, how are you going to give somebody else chills? I love that he said that, right? And you need to be able to connect with it in that way. It's not that you can't manufacture some stuff, but by a rule, you want to be able to rock with your own stuff. And that's the exact same thing that I tell people about content. It's like the visuals should be able to connect with you in some way that then connects with other people. And I always speak on that gap. If your music doesn't give you enough chills, right, enough emotion where you can have a visual, like if you aren't inspired to create a visual from your own music, how could you expect anybody else to be inspired to connect with it and visually see anything themselves? Yeah, I get that. Because I've had artists say things like, oh, listen to my song. It'll make you cry. I'm like, I need proof. I need a video that looks like it might match well with it. I need proof that somebody cried to it. I want to see you cry to it. Honestly, you know what I'm saying? Shares and tears look sad. Something, you know, the only point of contention I will have with this is like at what point will we give grace and say like, like if I'm an artist, for example, in this scenario that made this really sad song, I might cry like the first time I listened to it. But like, am I supposed to cry every time I listen to it? No, no, I don't think it has to do that. But like, I think he's just saying it needs to come from someplace real, right? And then again, this is if you're trying to really connect with somebody. Now we're talking about longevity, not just the manufactured junk food music because we know that can go. Yeah, right. But if I'm going to connect with somebody for real and I'm going to be legendary to them and that's what something I think artists should get today. Right. We talk a lot about virally music that goes and marketing marketing yourself because we're just trying to help you get more attention and use music in the algorithms to get more attention. But the reality is you don't have to have a big fan base to be legendary. You could be legendary to one person. Yeah, we all follow YouTubers and content creators that we rock with them enough that if we saw them, we'll be like, yo, I can't believe I saw them and they'll be somebody who's way bigger. Where you're like, I whatever, right? So it's like, you could be legendary to one person and this is what it takes to be legendary to one person. So it's never about not doing the real music. Things that can be like connect with people and matter to people. Because if you do that again, you can become legendary. Overall, shoot, you can build a fan base that shoot is legendary and funds your career as well. Yeah, I was just having a conversation with somebody about that. I was like, the fan brain, if you're someone that connected with they see you no differently than how they see an artist that may be bigger than you. Right? Like if I love you and I love Drake, if I run into you, I'm going to probably react the same way I would react as if I ran to Drake because in my fan brain, I just know I love y'all. You know what I'm saying? Right, y'all are lucky to your point legendary. And I like that he talks about the intensity and everything. Building the emotion because that's one of those things that is hard to see unless you really keep up with an artist long term. And in a lot of times too, especially to your point with viral music, like if you don't go listen to that B-Sides, there are some artists that you may feel like are making microwavable music. But then you listen to an album or EP like, no, he actually talking about some shit. And you'll see people outside the fan base be like, I don't get it. You know what I'm saying? Like, how was this person that made this fucking dancey TikTok song? Got all these people going crazy in this life. Because he actually is talking about some shit. You just haven't made it past the initial entry point of like whatever the viral moment of our song was. Yeah, exactly. Let's see if he said a little bit more. No, he didn't. So the intensity of the hard thing, one last thing I want to say with that is it goes back to that conversation of simplicity versus complexity and I always harp on that point that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. You got the curve. It's simple because you didn't put no thought into it. It gets complex and you think you're being so artful and people don't get it, but then the people who make it most simple are the ones who are most sophisticated. If they get to the other side of that fence and take the complex and make it simple, when it's simple, when you take the complex and make it simple, it's intense. All right. But you know what you made me think about? What? I don't know. But it's just one song that hits me to this day. It's a Whitney Houston song. She's like, I can't think of the name on the song. But what she's like, um, it's 60, I went out and for y'all are really cheap. I don't know why, bro. I got to hear it. I can't remember the name of the song. But every time I hit that line, I'd be like, damn, bro. I feel like I just got caught up. Say the line again. It's 60, I went out and for y'all are really cheap. You know what I'm saying? Uh, it's not right, but it's okay. Every time I hear that song, I feel like I got caught up. And it's such a simple, simple line, bro. Like she's just saying, I looked at the receipt, you said 60. Y'all think it's one out. It's only a deal for two. Yeah. I'm saying no complex word play, no vivid imagery. I guess it's pretty vivid. It is, but that's the point. And that's the intensity right there. The imagery that came from somewhere, it was, it could have been complex. You could have said all this different stuff, but you said one simple line that meet the world. My song that I hear about that is funny because it's always like some breakup type stuff. It's a cassette. Michelle got this song. Blame it on me. Say it's my fault. Say I'm a lie. I'm a cheat. Say whatever you want. As long as it's over. Damn. That's what I said when I first heard that, I said, oh, she doesn't care. You've been like, oh, you can talk all as crazy as you want. As long as we done. I was like, oh, yeah, she threw through. And that's all we're talking about. Well, we talk about simplicity. We're not talking about bad music, the stuff that y'all think we're talking about. No, that's the first part. Oh, I don't got nothing going on for myself. And I'm just throwing some simple. No, this is the other side where it's simple, but it means a lot. So intensity, intensity, intensity. That a lot of head. Sure, they will fuck me up so bad. Somebody said to me, I'm like, damn, all right. Can't do that with that. It's like, damn, I can't gas light no more. There's nothing left here. Tell me to talk my shit. I don't even do that no more. You know what I'm saying? With that being said, let's get to a cheap ad strategy to blow yourself up a little unorthodox. Most artists aren't rocking with it these days, but it still works. With Facebook and Instagram ads, and I'm talking five, ten thousand dollars a month on four countries. You can people don't realize how global the world's getting. People don't understand how inexpensive this is. Like I went to Hong Kong and by the third day, I'm like on a pedestal. America is still the number one brand in the world. America, correct. And so for you to just pick Indonesia and fuck with it, run ads on all your little videos, play that music down, bang them, bang them, bang them, and at London, it's noisy. That's what you see where I'm going. That's why I'm like, pick Portugal. Pick, I mean, you know, your foot and you know much Philippines ads are three cents like you'll get everybody and then all of a sudden here's how it works, right? You got a hat. All right. So let's just stop here before the clip's over. The one thing I want to say is this strategy absolutely works. Y'all shouldn't be afraid of foreign countries because as we had Adrian Malani on the podcast a couple of months ago and he talked about how many of the R&B artists, especially that is the strategy that all the labels use. They'll break artists over in those markets, get the algorithm going and then they'll break them in the U.S. For those of y'all who are concerned about breaking in the U.S. This is a typical route that many labels actually use are making that money, get some momentum, all that great stuff. All right. And on top of that, yeah, ads are still chief in those other places. They are still cheaper. It's not changed, man. They did. And it is interesting, right? Like this clip has to be from like five, six years ago. Yeah. He's talking to Nipsey, you know, and it's in this. So it's a minute ago. Yeah, a minute ago, right? So one is just interesting to see it like that strategy hasn't changed since then, which says a lot about. I think music culture, you know what I'm saying? Like it's a fun to see that like there were people like that telling this and everyone still wants to chase the U.S. Chase the UK, like he said, and they want to start there. And this is goes back and to artists hurting themselves with the initial dream that they have and only wanting to dream the way that they imagine. Yeah, you have to be willing, whether that's posting content or whether that's running ads and blowing up in a place you didn't know you were going to blow up first. You've got to be willing to go through some things and do things you don't want to to get the thing that you want at the end and blow up and be the star that you want to end, build a fan base. And the way this works is basically what he said. I was in Hong Kong, probably running ads three days. I started to blow up. Well, maybe you can't spend five to 10 K. But we have Asia. Melania was spending five hours a day for like three months and then added a campaign on top of that blew up in Southeast Asia. Russ, all right, was blowing up in Paris early on. And he wasn't using that as much. It was on the YouTube and the content was naturally being attracted there and he was going over overseas. I always tell people the very first time with the only time actually I met Russ. He wasn't a big artist or known yet. And he was I decided real short conversation. I wanted to do like a little interview with him because I had a little series or whatever going on. And he was like, oh, yeah, I'm about to go to Paris in like next week or something real soon. And I was like, dang, because at that time, you know, all the artists there, like nobody was like big in my mind. I was just like, yo, you're going to perform in Paris. You know, that just sounded crazy for just you like at a basically just imagine like being at a college show type of vibes. Like we're kind of fresh out of college. No college wasn't even done yet. So it was kind of like that time. It's like, dang, you're going to Paris. That sounded crazy and big to me going overseas. And that is very possible. Ryan Leslie, when I had the conversation with Ryan Leslie, his whole strategy, especially Europe in general. And I think especially Germany for a while. He was blowing up there, giving them more attention than other people were, right? Exporting the brand because he said other artists in America don't show the love to those countries. So they felt extra love from him and appreciated him even more because he was showing love that big artists wouldn't. Right? Yeah. Yeah. And it's a very real thing, man. I think one whenever I hear artists downplayed an international strategy, it always feels like you can you can see their xenophobia kind of shining through. You know what I'm saying? And he going there. I mean, you know, I've had some conversations. I'm like, I don't know, man, it's a little racist, bro. Like, you know, that you don't want to work yourself in XYZ places. And to the point you made earlier, right, where so many new artists and we've said this before, you guys play by rules that don't really make sense for you, right? Because the only ever conversation I've had where the international marketing thing didn't make sense was when, you know, the artist is really one to maximize like streaming royalty, right? It's like, you know, that's the real thing. There are certain countries that pay out more per stream, you know what I'm saying, than other places. So if you were playing the streaming game, then, you know, being sometimes intentional about being more intentional about certain places that's coming to play. Now, if you're playing the builder community and sales shit game, then people are people at that point. You know what I'm saying? Like the dollar, I don't care if it's a euro or peso or USD. As long as that shit hit the bank account, it's going to feel the same. You know what I'm saying? So I don't know. And just even before we move out this, I would encourage people listening to this, watching this to go check out this article that chart metric did called Trigger Cities like a couple of years ago. You remember that? Yep. Yeah. Really, really dope, you know what I'm saying? Take as the go along side, like, you know, what's been shown this video to kind of like put you in that space. But yeah, bro, like the international marketing strategy is one of the deep dark secrets of the music industry. Let me pop this motherfucker off in Mexico and make him look lit in the USA and, you know, most fans don't go research into what the numbers are coming from. So we know eventually people don't just believe like they popping in wherever they seem to be, you know, staking their home base up. That's it. That's it. It's like getting bot streams, except they're real people. Exactly. Like it's just good. Which is actually great. But even before we move out there, but that I will always make the argument with artists like really early in my career. Now I don't care, man. Y'all do what y'all want to do. But I'm like, bro, like why get bots when like Gary V said, but you can hit motherfuckers in Indonesia for like 0.001 cents. And I was like, yeah, it's not, you know, the streaming is going to pay well, but at least it's a real fucking person. You don't got to worry about Spotify taking it down. Exactly. Let's play the rest of what he said to her hack, hack attention, hack attention. Nobody owns Peru and now somebody will be like, well, Peru, but you don't realize like then like you go find some artists there and put them on here. Like there's so much of that. That's a 10 second in between. Like you're kind of like clicking everybody's stories and then you'll pop and then with you like you should be like, yeah, like, you know what's funny, you know what's funny, you should actually do exactly what the fuck you did when you were slinging your shit and be like, yo, swipe up. Listen, if you don't like it, fuck, that's it. You should fucking read. So I love the word that he said, you know, hack, hack, hack. And you mentioned that you can even bring an artist over in that country to be on your music, do a little remix. It's all these types of things because this is something that I've talked about with artists when breaking them in other spaces. You still have to do the things that it takes to break an artist. Even when you do it in other places, it's not just ads. Right now, once you start taking over of ads, then you have to still do the other things, which we can talk about in a whole another video, what that looks like or some other space. But like that is still a part of it. If you really, really want to start taking all ads can do wonders just alone, but you can really plant your seed in another marketplace and get money. And I know the struggle and the imagination sometimes it was limited where artists might say, but I can't get over there. That's too far. But again, I saw Russ do it as an early artist. We talk about what Adrian's doing right now. We talk about, like I said, Ryan Leslie, just the names I mentioned alone and they're not the only ones, right? Shout out to Quentin, bro. Quentin be going to... Oh yeah, everywhere. Quentin Moria, he'd be in East Europe countries that I've never even heard of performing and they love him over there and you will get paid for those performances, all right? So it's very possible. You kind of just have to remove that veil and that limitation in your mind, thinking that oh, it's going to be hard. If you want part of being an artist and especially indie, there's some rough and get or doing things you didn't necessarily plan for. But we're talking about people being real fans, pain. Come on, you can't hate on that. And even on the point to the getting over there, what I've seen with artists as they start to build international fan bases versus their domestic fan base, right? So I don't want to make it a USA thing because this applies to artists, no matter where they live, really, right? They all kind of experience the same thing. The people that are in your home city, state, country, sometimes it's hard for them to believe the character because they can see you in real life. Hard for me to believe that brand man Sean is Sean and I know I be seeing Sean Taylor at the gas station once a week picking up Skittles. But this person in Peru, this person in South Africa, this person in wherever, they don't have as much access to you to see you. So they're, you know, for lack of better word, more gullible to fall for like whatever the character images that you're trying to build, which is very important in early stages of branding. Exactly, a lot easier. And they go harder for you and try to sometimes even help you get the resources to come to them because to Gary V's point, they're so used to artists in these bigger countries, especially the U.S., not even paying attention to them. So if I'm a music fan in Peru and I'm fucking with this rapper from Atlanta and the rapper from Atlanta is like, man, I would love to come to Peru, but I don't know how I'm gonna get there. But you'd be surprised at the things that fans will start telling you and the information they'll start giving you and the resources they'll help you pull together in the name of just getting you out there, you know what I'm saying? Because they wanna see you and they feel like, they feel to a degree like, if I don't help this artist, especially at whatever stage you're at, I may never get to see them. And it's not like people like you are coming through here a lot anyway, versus like the U.S., we're bougie, bro. We get artists of all types and genres that come through all the time. So we don't give a fuck if you come here or not. You know what I'm saying? Like it's just like, there'll be 10 more U's in your demographic coming through. So it's just something to think about. For sure. I remember first artist I helped do that. He built the... Come to the U.S.? No, he would, no, go. Okay, okay. And he was, ends up crowd serving in Bangladesh at this huge event that he got brought out to. It was just amazing to see the real world translation of an international audience. But check this out. You guys, we're gonna talk about some of the secret jobs of your favorite artists. All right? We posted on our page, if y'all aren't following No Labels Necessary on Instagram, y'all make sure y'all do that. No labels necessary. That's it. No added stuff, no official. Just follow that. But the post was titled, Nine to Five Jobs Before They Were Famous. So just as a little inspiration, John Legend was a management consultant. Crazy, John Legend was getting a bad. He was getting a bad, so he took a risk for that artistic career, which just actually makes things make more sense when we think about some of the clients we have. We're like, man, he was an engineer, he was a lawyer, and he still wanted to do his music. J. Cole was an ad salesman. Probably the most surprising one on the list. We're not controlling, though there's Beyonce posts in there. They were, we're gonna leave that one out this combo. Tyler the Creator was a Starbucks barista. Makes sense, I can see that. I can definitely see that. Pharrell was a McDonald's crew member. I did not know he was at McDonald's. I can see that. I always forget about like young, slightly hood, Pharrell. You know, he's just so different now that I forget that, he had that phase in life. Oh man. That's because Richmond hood can look different from the rest of the world. Ooh, the screen. Yeah, like it might not translate sometimes until you, unless you really know it. It's like Nicki Minaj was a red lobster waitress. I can see that. That's crazy fitting. I can see that, yeah. That is crazy fitting. Wait, is that a real picture of her in the uniform? I was thinking about that. I'm like, that her face looks like current her, but the outfit looks like she really had a red lobster. So I don't know, did EJU Photoshop this or something? I don't know. I don't know. It's definitely fitting. It's definitely fitting. Then Kid Cudi was an American Apparel Associate. I could definitely see that. Yeah, I remember he used to talk about it a lot when he was coming up. I remember he used to talk about it a lot. Who else we got? Kanye was a gap sales assistant. He's already leveraged that narrative. Yep. Shout out to Spaceships. So again, if you want to see posts like that, follow No Labels Necessary y'all on Instagram. But hopefully it's a little bit of inspiration where you start is not where you have to finish. And in further news, Spotify and TikTok, they made a little feature advancement that can 10X the quality of TikTok for artists for sure. Spotify will now let you save songs from TikTok to your library directly. Just give me a little info. Spotify will let you save songs from TikTok to your library as in I'm scrolling TikTok right now. I see a song. I can save it in my library without leaving my TikTok experience. Everything's connected. That impact for people to be able to make impulse saves, that's basically what it is, right? Yep. Without having to go through all these barriers, go over to Spotify. When I say that's gonna be huge for artists, right? To begin to have that addition and is going to increase the impact of content especially. Right? Yeah. Whether you ask somebody directly, hey, if you like this song, go ahead and save it and you tie that type of narrative and you do a call to action within your content, that's gonna hit a lot harder, right? Whether you just do a song and it's popping and people are like, oh my gosh, is this out already? I would love if that save could be somewhere visually where people don't have to wonder is this song out already? Because that's always weird. Where it's like, why do people still do that so much? When it's like, oh, you gotta do, you can see the sound, you can click the sound and see that it's out. But this is going to be, like this is something that if you are not using TikTok now and inevitably we know it's gonna happen on Instagram, Instagram is already making these feature enhancements with Spotify, this is just more reason to create content, period. Yeah, and it's like, man, as a Spotify user, it's nice to finally be able to play the game that Apple music users have been playing for the last three, four years. So those of you with Apple probably don't care because y'all have been able to do this for a very long time. And yeah, to your point, man, like I said, speaking from and from the Spotify user side, there's definitely been times where I found songs on Spotify that I liked and I was like, man, do I really feel like swiping out the app right now? You know what I'm saying? Going to add this to my library, not really. Here's the way to think about it. Think about how many times you see songs that you like within some content that you like and you click like or you save the video so you can go back to it later. All right, fine, yeah, yeah, fine. Now all you gotta do is save it straight to Spotify. Which then lessens the barrier of, oh, I'm on Spotify now. Oh, dang, I gotta go back to TikTok to then figure out what those songs were. But those saves are gonna be mixed in with all my other random content saves, my cake recipe. All right, nah, now it's straight on Spotify so next time I'm on Spotify, I could just go look at my last saved TikToks. And you're like, where did I get this one from? Oh yeah, from that meme on TikTok I found this some shit. Exactly, smooth experience. I think that's gonna be beautiful for artists if we just think about less friction straight up. Now on the other end, if y'all didn't see this, Snoop Dogg announced he was giving up smoking. Crazy. And the world was in a frenzy. It was a whole finesse we're gonna talk about for the finesse, but the initial posts said after much consideration in conversation with my family, I've decided to give up smoke. Please respect my privacy at this time. Now, the please respect my privacy at this time was like- That's crazy. Stranger group dramatic. But then Snoop Dogg being as connected with smoking as he is like, all right, what's something going on? Cause why would Snoop Dogg stop posting, right? Obviously people congratulating him, et cetera, et cetera. But the whole thing ended up being a sham, just a finesse, so he could promote a smoker. Of course he went viral, I'ma play the clip and we're gonna talk about, there's a reason that we're talking about this. We're not, you know, getting any affiliate deals up off of this. Yeah, we should, yeah, not yet. I have an announcement. I'm giving up smoke. I know what you thinking. Snoop, smoke is kind of your whole thing, but I'm done with it. Done with the coffin and my clothes, smelling all sticky icky. I'm going smokeless. Solo stove fixed fire. They take out the smoke. Clever. And actually, is this a smoker, more of a fire pit type vibe? Yeah, it's like a fire pit. More of a fire pit type vibe. Cause I just caught it, while I caught it as you were reading it, I didn't want to spoil the surprise for people listening. But he didn't say in the post I was giving up smoking, he said I'm giving up smoke. You know what I'm saying? But you already know. I thought that was weird too, when I read it too, I was like, smoke. I was like, all right. But you already know what's gonna happen and the power of this, this goes to show the power of brand identity. So many people could have said that. And people will always feel a little way about the topic of smoking one way or another. That'll generate some type of conversation. But it being Snoop Dogg, and so attached to his brand, allowed him to be able to pull off this campaign in a way that nobody else could have. Yeah, bro, like you said, it's people congratulating him, you know what I'm saying? People would treat it like a real ordeal. When I first saw it, I thought something happened. I was like, why have so many people talking about Snoop like right now, you know? So yeah, to your point, there's a lot of artists who have found ways to incorporate weed and smoking into their brand. None, of course, to the degree at Snoop. Only other person that maybe could have pulled off is Wiz Cleaver, you know what I'm saying? That's the only other artist, I think, could have maybe had a similar effect on it, you know what I'm saying? But yeah, no, this whole thing was genius. I think a lot. Like, we can get that sponsorship, man. I tried out reviews on the pod, you know what I'm saying? But for sure. And this is the beauty of a strong brand identity and building up that reputation because for different artists, it can be something else. The idea is you now have an inside joke or an inside language and representation with your base. Yeah. Whatever that looks like. And it's important to kind of think about that as you begin to build and create that relationship with your audience. What does tie you all together? What might be a little bit more taboo that the rest of the world doesn't rock with that ties you all together? And then what are some of the more common universal things that tie you all together? Because then once you're aware of that, you can know where the nerves are. Yeah. And then you can touch those nerves, right? And just like a game of, what is it? Doctor or something? What's the thing? I'm just gonna say guess who? Crazy. The nose is gonna buzz. Yeah, I'm not just talking about the surgery game. Yeah, the surgery game, right? Just like that game, you know? All right, you touch your nerve, buzz off. And then now the world is talking about it with you doing little work. Because now everybody's like, oh, did you see this? It's like, don't even super care. But it's still like, oh, that's crazy. Like Snoop Dogg is quit smoking. Don't feel one way or another, but still just like a little bit of random, like water cooler talk. So that is something that, again, it should be a spot you should aspire to, all right? Create that relationship with your audience, whatever that thing will be for you or those things. Yeah, it makes me to think about when Lil Yachty gave up the red hair, like that was kind of like a big deal in his fan base, right? Cause he was using it to symbolize the growth from like child, you know what I'm saying? To adult and the new brand that came from it. So I was like, yeah, it don't even have to be something as big necessarily as like a smoking or a habit that you built up. I'm glad you did said that. Cause so people can realize how small it might be. Cause another example when we talk about hair was actually Justin Bieber, he was a child star. And he had that bowl cut or whatever that, you know, all the boys and his age bracket and demographic started to get, then when he cut his hair, he was a big deal with his fan base. Those small things, whatever they begin to know you for, whatever that thing is can then be used for another attention grabber or marketing deals, whatever. Yep, yep. And his last topic, Kirk Franklin is really a musical genius and he doesn't even sing. That is the title of his post. I'm gonna just play a little bit of this and then you got a question for y'all. It's a couple of clips. Kirk directing the choir, right? Them singing, we're not gonna even go through all of it cause it's all something similar. Actually. This particular combo is not one that I saw coming but it feels so right that it's happened right now. Kirk, I've been a man fan for so many years. He's an absolute, like, never imagined for everyone who's listening who knows Kirk. Kirk is like a gospel musician, like Titan. He's the guy. All right, that's the part that I think is important to play that people see him this way. And again, as the title says, he is a really a musical genius and he doesn't even sing. And the reason I think that's important is because one, we have a lot of producers that might follow us and they're trying to be acknowledged more as a producer versus a beat maker. I wanna orchestrate something. And even artists themselves, there's so many different ways to have musical talent, musical ear. Like I know when they talk about Michael Jackson versus Prince, they're like, Prince played 27 instruments. He's like, ah, but yeah, Michael Jackson, yes, he didn't play 27 instruments but you can't say he didn't have any musical talent. Like the way he would be beatboxing or be able to produce and create beats in his head and communicate, however, your talent comes into fruition. Like the way you interpret it, you can make it shake. All right, you can make an impact with it. And I think sometimes artists even get limited in the idea of what an artist is. And I hate that the most because it's just like, y'all of anybody. Supposed to get it. Yeah, are supposed to get it. Like you can't put the art in the box. And so you shouldn't be saying, this is real art or not real art. You really don't know cause you don't know where it came from, all right? But two, again, there's having a vision and pulling pieces together doesn't lessen your talent. If Jacory is the person who draws, all right? And Chirante is like doing the color and all that and blocks in the texture. But I was the one who came up with like what the silhouette was or I told y'all to like tweak, tweak, tweak here. And it's a part of maybe bringing my vision to life. The way like pop culture does and the unknowing fans will minimize things and say, oh, well, Sean, you didn't do anything, right? But the reality is sometimes you're an artist and your tool is the paintbrush. It is the beat pad. It is the pencil. But sometimes you're an artist and the people are the tools. I knew you'd like to say that. Of course, because it's the truth. Yeah, but it just sounds crazy. It sounds, I know for you, I know it sounds crazy to some people, right? But it's no different than Steve Jobs saying, I don't play an instrument, I play the orchestra. All right, I'm a conductor. Y'all are playing the cello. Like that guy at the front, which is what Kirk is, he's putting out emotions, inspiring, creating energy, doing other things that aren't art and producing in different ways. And I always encourage artists to bring all of that to the forefront because that's also what's gonna differentiate you versus just creating music or art in general, in the way that other people define art. Yeah, I don't think it's respected enough how much artistic, guiding, managing, and directing creative talent is, you know what I'm saying? Like that is an art form in itself. Like I know lots of people who could be in a room full of other talented people and not know what to do with them. I know talented people that don't know what to do until other people tell them how to use their talent. It's a lot of good spices in the cabinet. That don't mean you know how to cook with them. Yeah, but if you ain't nobody shaking them in the boat and you know, ginger's just ginger, bro. Like, you know what I'm saying? Exactly. One, I really have looked at like, Kirk Franklin is basically like the gospel Kanye, you know what I'm saying? Like in that sense, I think that's a fair comparison. Kanye is more the rap, Kirk, if we want to go that direction, you know what I'm saying? I got to respect the chronology. Who's in first? Kirk Franklin was in first? On Earth or in music? In music, bro, what you mean? I'm pretty sure Kirk was in first in both. Kirk was popping in the 90s, man. Oh yeah, you're right, man. All right, man, y'all can ignore that question. That's just all crazy, then, and I kind of think about it out loud. But I like to see the directors of talent get more love and music. And I like to see it be regarded as an artistic skill because I think that, you know, the creators, the artists that do, you know, to your point, something where the thing that produces directly tied to the art. Y'all love to get on y'all high horse and act like y'all are the only ones that matter, that just have an opinion, that we're the most integral part of the whole creation process. And, you know, stories like Kirk, stories like Kanye, stories like, you know, the Pharrell's and, you know, there's a lot of examples. A lot of them. You know what I'm saying? I talk about him, he was seen as more of a creative CEO of visionary and I always feel like artist, right? You should be a visionary at the highest scale. Every artist is a visionary. The skills are not the symbol of the greatest artists that we acknowledge. Skills are their skills. There's something you learn, you train and you gain, but the vision in which you apply those skills is what makes you an artist. It's your point of view. There's a lot of people who can like draw and they can look at something directly. I can look at your face and I can draw your face and look and make it super, super accurate, right? And I might not be able to do that myself, but the way I see something and innovate and put things together can be way, way more creative. Right? And I think a lot of times we think the technical parts in executing music or art is what makes an artist. That is not true. But I use that example as well as of Kanye. I was talking less about the music. Actually, when I said with the art and drawing and painting, a lot of it, I was thinking about Kanye too, because when it comes to fashion, he can't do a lot of the things in terms of a technical aspect, but he knows how to direct people, bring the Virgil's around, right? I came in thinking about, I was trying to think of the other buddy's theory guy, like bringing all these people around, producing his team on Donda and getting in a room, having that think tank and coming out with something great and being the visionary that creates the guardrails of what the outcome is. And that's just fine. Some of y'all have these creative aspirations and you feel like, oh, I don't have the time or I can't be as good as that. I remember when Kanye went to Timberland and it was like, I can't do drums. I need these drums fixed. And he went to, I think, Ferrell and all these folks because he was competing with Tim and he didn't want to have to go to Tim. He was like, dang, I went through all these people and it wasn't right. And I gotta go back? I went to Tim and Tim immediately knew how to fix it. I forgot what song that was. And that the song became the song. I think it was Gold Digger, actually. But the point is, again, that's him knowing the tools and knowing that there's an outcome of this song and even trying to go away from the tool, trying to do a little song different, right? It was like, all right, well, let me use Timberland's skill set. And Timberland's musically is an artist himself. However, in collaboration, you can use other artists' skills. That's how you build the best shit, bro, but... Yeah, 100%. But like, this is a, first of all, I think this is an amazing flip of the Kirk Franklin topic. Like, I just want to acknowledge that. I hope y'all... Who would've thought, man? Who would've thought? I hope y'all appreciate that. Like, can we acknowledge the title real quick, bro? Because I thought Kirk Franklin was considered a singer to some degree this whole time. Yeah, let's end with that. Yeah, let's end with that, please. Do y'all consider Kirk Franklin to be a singer? Because I... Beats me, are you with me? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. See, you're singing it more than Kirk sings it. No, bro, he's... Kirk says it. GP, are you with me? Oh, yeah. That's a melody to it, bro. It's chanting, yeah. Of course, there's a little melody so to speak, a call and response. First of all, I super appreciate Kirk for that. Like, a normalizing that in the 90s. It makes it so easy to learn songs and participate. Oh, my gosh, man. You can enjoy everything. And I feel like he was singing on that song with Lil Baby. I don't even remember that song, to be real. But Kirk wanted to be a rapper first, by the way. Makes sense. And that was why he was able to innovate in the gospel space, because he took that inspiration from that space and brought that energy to gospel when people actually fought against that, you know? That's like, oh, that's that secular music, bro. You talking about bringing the Funkadelics to gospel? If y'all don't really understand and know the Funkadelics, bringing them into gospel, that's a whole another conversation. Y'all research the Funkadelics. It's a lot, they were wilder, always groups like them, and even the princes and a lot of these people early on. Like, these people are way wilder than we think we're wild now. They can get away with shit, bro. And they can get away with shit, bro. And plus, I want to, at least my talks before this. But I feel like the originals, a lot of times when I see stuff today, it feels like in the beginning of this spectrum, we go 50s to 80s, they were establishing and building, all right? They were creating, and a lot of people today are just cosplaying. Okay, that's a spicy take, man. They're artists who were inspired by these artists and now they're trying to represent indeed those artists. Bring some type of energy from it, go back. Yeah, you're right, man, because it's interesting how popular nostalgia is. It is, exactly. And I'm not coaching them yet. That's what we're doing from a marketing standpoint. It's funny, because Gary Vee will be talking about that all the time, from a like, I'ma bring an avocado, me and Fitch Back, or Banana Republic, these brands that still have value, and people are doing that artistically as well, which kind of speaks to some of the pain in terms of the missing nature of like, the missing originality. And we're seeing it in movies, we're actually, nostalgic, like you said, it's all back. Everything, bro. We gotta stop it, we gotta stop it, because artists aren't supposed to be cosplaying, not developed artists. It took all the good ideas, man. Like they had, they just... They had a blank slate. Exactly, bro. I was just about to say a blank slate, blessing of being born first, you know what I'm saying? Like 30, 40, 50 year ahead start. It took all the good melodies, all the good words, you know what I'm saying? All the good phrases, like what else can we do? That's a fact, that's a fact. It is what it is. And that's it for this episode of No Labels Necessary. Hope y'all enjoy that episode. I'm Brandon Shawn. And I'm Cory. And we out. Peace.