 So I'd say especially if you're an artist on the good music but not a lot of traction inside yet, just be ready for the fact that a lot of these meetings are just gonna be like, people are gonna rush you and you're gonna feel rushed. And there's some truth in that, right? Like you do wanna take advantage of that. Like if you're talking about like a really one, like life-changing type of viral moment, you got people who are throwing you way too much money. And sometimes it's good to just take it because it's not smart. They're not thinking like business-wise. They're thinking like competition-wise. So you need to take advantage of that. What's up, what's up, what's up? It's Brian Mann, Sean. And I'm Cory. We are back with another episode of No Labels Necessary Podcast. You can catch us every Tuesday, every Thursday on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, whatever you check your podcast out here at the intersection of currency and creative. We're figuring this thing out and we always are on the journey to find people who represent the No Labels concept. And we have one here with us today, Samson. Bro, you just fucking bodied that intro, holy. Oh, we're? Shit. Hey, appreciate that, man, but no. We got a really dope person here today. He is a label owner. A manager has worked with multiple different artists and just all around one of the coolest people in the industry. Y'all are gonna get a lot of gain from this interview with Sam. So first and foremost, Sam, appreciate having you on the pod. Yeah, man, you know, I hang out with y'all way too much anyway, especially him, so. Part two, you had this guy, Salty, the other day. I mean, technically it wasn't you, it was Tom, but that's the park situation, you know, I'm making it. Where did you go? No. You didn't go? It was in Monroe. All right. Y'all say that weird, but I'm not gonna let this get distracted. We're gonna hop right into it, man. Can you talk about the artist, I'm gonna call it your big three artist, right? The starter artist, now you're getting to a lot of different situations, becoming real industry and whatnot, but can you explain? Can you explain how you got into the game and the three main artists that you kind of, like they really kind of molded how you move in the industry. Yeah, so I started out just knowing I wanted to work in music, but I had no conception at all of how to do that. Like to the point that, you know, I was like on LinkedIn trying to like email people who worked at Warner, or even I was like trying to like send in applications off LinkedIn to like Warner Music Group and shit. Like I didn't realize that this is an industry that's its own ecosystem, that you can't just send an online resume. And it wasn't like, it wasn't that I wasn't working hard, it was just like the avenues that I had at the time to reach people. I got like one of those like, it was like a bullshit internship with some random dude who just like, I saw on LinkedIn that he worked at like a label. It was something like Def Jam or Rock Nation or something, but he just put it there. He didn't actually work at the label. He just like, it was a consultant, but he wasn't even really a consultant for the label. I think it was just one of those cap situations. And like, you know, even that situation, like where I put in like time and effort in this dude was just nuts, you know, was like something, you know, and then I finally got up here, got a unpaid internship at Patchwork Studios. So shout out to Oz, who is the studio manager there. Is he like really put me on and also like heavily influenced how I structure my business and how I run like from a management perspective and stuff. So, Ozman Bangura at Patchwork Studios was super, super, super influential. And I would say put me on whether anybody to like get started. And then right after that, I met you at, actually, yeah, I met you. I met you right after I met Jacory at Patchwork. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you came in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the one I wanted, because we had probably just met around that time. Yeah, it was when he was, I might have met you even maybe before y'all met. It's possible. Yeah, no, you definitely, I didn't met you definitely before I met you. Yeah, I didn't even know that. But yeah, I met you, I met Grant and Augusto and then we did Blue Summer. And then from doing Blue Summer, like I think we made a really good name for ourselves in the creative scene here in Atlanta. And like basically just got a good reputation for doing above and beyond for the artists and taking people really seriously, which is really influential to how I do the business too. It's like you got to take artists seriously. Like if you're sitting here and saying, oh, this kid is just a SoundCloud rapper. But you're not paying attention to like the lyrical cadences he's using or the type of perspective he's coming from and like the way that he's experimenting with sounds, then you're tripping, you know? And I think that that was one of the things that we really did was we really believed in the creative scene. Like we really believed in ourselves, we believed in the creative scene, we believed that we could be a vehicle to bring that creative scene to like a much wider audience. And that's how I met the first artist I started managing, Taj. And I met him because he performed, he was the, we would get so many DMs to the Blue Summer account. And we would get like a hundred DMs every show for people trying to like perform or whatever. And Taj was like the one that I was like, oh, this is hard. Like he sent Gunder. I was like, dude, this is fucking sick. Like, yeah, like come out. And then he pissed off the venue, but actually he pissed off Grant just throwing all the water bottles. It was like- I was at that show. That was his first show? Yeah, it was great, the fans loved it. Yo, I, because you weren't managing Taj at that time, right? That was like- But I fucked with him just from that performance. I was just like, yo, this dude is, I didn't really remember his name and all that stuff. But I was just like, that was the one person. I was like, yo, he was performing like, he was already that dude. Everybody was there for him. He's been that dude. That's why a big part of why he's so great. But yeah, and so I met Taj and then Taj just put on Instagram, like, yo, I need a manager. And I was just like, you know, like word, you know? Like, what's good? And then we just started working together and that's been like a really, really, really like rewarding and just insanely complex journey, you know, of like bringing him to where he's at and continuing to work and knowing that we're like, no, we're close to our goals. Like in some ways, we're very close to our goals. Like you all seen the video of shake bringing out Taj at Coachella? Yeah. Yeah. So we have these crazy moments that are awesome that are happening, but then we're also dealing with a lot of just real life shit and that can get in the way of things. And then also the fact that like, you know, we've been pushing so hard and we haven't been putting out like a whole lot of music. We've just been putting out extremely good music. And so it's kind of like, you know, we're trying to work on building out that audience, but that's, that's been awesome. So I started managing Taj and then I started managing six dogs in 2019. Like right after he left his deal with Interscope, I started managing him a couple months after that. And that was pretty crazy. Like essentially being a totally green manager, you know, just like believing like blue summer experience, just patchwork experience, just believing in myself and the people I was around, but just started working with Chase. Like, and once again, it was cause I took him so seriously, you know, cause I really, like he's genius. Like I knew that and I took him really, really, really seriously. And so I was really working on helping him build out his visions and like guide those visions in a way that was going to be like organized and maximize the impact of those things. And so that was cool. And that really resonated with him. And then I was at the time, I was editing like AMV edits for his songs, you know, but the crazy thing was I said I would do it, but I didn't know how to edit. And so I spent like 30 hours on like two of these like two minute edit clips, but they came out pretty crazy. And I learned like, that's how I like literally, that's how I learned how to use Premiere Pro for the most part. Like I knew how to do like really basic shit, but, and then, but then he just, I don't think he fucked with the, then when they came out either, like when, when I sent him to him, but he was just like, yo, this is so sick. You've worked so hard. You've been so much time like, and then I don't know, we just started getting closer. And then he, he hit me one day like, yo, can you help me get back into my YouTube channel? Cause I guess he'd like forgotten the password and it had been previously run by Interscope or something like that. Some like, some like that. Like it wasn't his like, I don't think he created the YouTube account. Probably not. Yeah. And so I was like, bet. And I sent him a proposal of like, yo, this is what I think I can do for you. You know what I mean? As if I'm like officially your manager. Cause we'd already been hanging out a lot and doing a lot of stuff for like a few months. And then he was like, yeah, for sure. And then he did one of the most amazing things. Cause he, I was put me on to get started. And then he put me on in a crazy way because he agreed, not even agreed. He just came out the gate and was like, cool. Like how much do you want as a manager? And I was like, well, because you already established and I don't know what like, I don't have that much experience. I feel like 10% is fair, you know? And then out the gate, he just started paying me 10% on what he was already making off of like his existing streaming. And that was such a crazy thing because that allowed me to go like that combined with getting a bunch of the $600 unemployment stuff from pandemic shit. And then also still working at a restaurant whilst getting that $600 because I have my hours reduced. So it's still qualified. Like that put me ahead and then I was able to quit my job. But mostly because Chase was like literally willing to just like put me on retainer basically on the belief that he had that I would be great. You know, and he would always tell me like, yo, like I feel like your, like your art is this management shit. Like you're so good at that. And so he was always such a huge champion for me. And that was like really important and super helpful. And then from there, you know, I guess I didn't realize the impact because I actually didn't know who Chase was like before. Like I maybe had heard some of his stuff on SoundCloud or something, but I hadn't like I really wasn't that hip. So when I first met him, I just, you know, I didn't know. So it took me a while to like really, I guess, realize how big of a deal it was that I was managing six dogs. Because it still just feels like, yo, it's just Chase. Like it still never has felt like anything else. Even after I kind of realized like how deep his fan base went and everything and how much like depth there was to what he built. But, you know, it was kind of just like, oh yeah, it's just Chase, you know. So it was interesting to see that like then me doing that, I think put my name on some people's radar and stuff. And then of course, Tom, who we'd been, who you'd brought out to our first, that you brought out to barely human or whatever, almost nearly. More human. More than human. Almost human. And then like two weeks later, he did Blue Summer with us. And so I've known Sean since we've both, we've known Sean since he had like 300 monthly listeners on Spotify and just had a little bit of traction on SoundCloud. And yeah, and then, you know, Sean kept working, getting his shit moving a little bit on social media and stuff and just getting pretty good YouTube views and things. And then some sort of dam broke. I think he hit Indify back when Indify was still primarily like sending out A&R sheets and stuff like that. If I think like, I never really understood all that as deeply because I'm not in the major label side. But, and then yeah, just like, he got hit up by a bunch of different labels and then that became that journey of like going and getting thrown into like the industry. Which was really, really, really beneficial. And I met a lot of really amazing people that I still, I'm just still growing in this place. It's so much fun being here in like the real industry. But I got thrown into it because then I'm meeting all these A&Rs and all these people that were reaching out about Sean. And then Tyler Henry, who runs a company called Sturdy, he literally put me, Chase, Sean and Taj up in his house in LA in the Hills for two weeks. And I mean, of course that was because like, you know, I was like, well, yeah, like if, if we're going out there, like the guys are coming. You know what I mean? And he was just like mad supportive of me and what I was doing as a manager at the time, he wasn't like necessarily trying to like sign Tom or anything like that. You know, so I owe him a lot for just being putting me out like that and putting all of us on like that. And then I just made sure to like really make friends with the people that were reaching out and not just like every, I mean, obviously people fall off your radar because you get so fucking busy. You can't be talking to all the people that you've like had a good connection with and shit, but like all the time, I try to tap in with people at least once every couple of months though. Like just real, but like- What's your system for that? I wouldn't say it's a system. It's just like, I think my system is that I, I fuck with people who I make friends with. And so like if, if I've gotten to the point that I want to hit you up because I think you're doing some dope shit, it's because I like I fuck with you on like a level. So usually it's not really, it's just like because that's the initial system of how like I basically dictate who I fuck with in the business side is like, do I like actually want to build creative stuff with you? And then do you like make me stoked to like talk to you and shit? And because of that, it's not really like I need a system after that. Cause I'll just remember and be like, oh fuck. Like, like, I haven't hit Jeremy. Or you'll see them do something and they're like- Oh shit, like bro, good shit. But like, yeah, it's all shit. I just haven't, I haven't talked to Jeremy for awhile. I forgot to hit Alex back about this Zoom call we were supposed to do or whatever, whatever. And then I'm like, oh shit, I'm gonna tell you because I want to talk to him. You know what I mean? And then it just so happens that because we're playing the same game, like we're playing the same sport basically and there's not that many people who are like really good at this sport. We're all like kind of almost like that there's like this group of us that are all the whole like industry as it is like the real at the top level industry. It's this big sport that we're all playing. And so you're always like super stoked to talk to someone else who's playing the same sport because I can't talk to most people about like, bro, did you see like thanks so much as marketing campaign and like did you see how they like did all these different like burner accounts and all posted this shit and built this crazy fucking narrative up about the release and got people thinking there was actually like these kids looting a mall with motorcycles is all part of this release and like do one of the most difficult things possible which is go from having a mega viral moment was spit in my face and then successfully having following that up with a second one like having a real it in moment, you know? Like but then do but doing the thing I mean I was able to do but doing that which is crazy. It's so difficult to catch two like certified hits like hits like really didn't say hit. You know, it's probably I would say even maybe maybe more bigger at this point in like Caroline, you know? As far as just like how much I hear it at parties and shit still. But anyway, point point aside, right? I love, I love, I love, I love a nice musical lot. But yeah, I don't know. I forgot what I was talking about. The system. No, he doesn't have a system. No system, no system. Well, I mean, let's get into this. So you came into the industry in many ways organically, right? But then I remember when, especially you mentioned when everybody was trying to like sign Tom, right? Meetings, meetings, meetings, meetings, meetings. Can you talk about what that experience is from a standpoint if I'm an artist cause there's so many people who get ripped with them up into that situation but they don't have a you yet, right? So how did you determine who we don't go with, who we do go with? And just what did you learn in general from that process? Yeah, so I would say the first thing is I was so excited and I was so happy to be there. And that's one of the, and like I said, I was really genuinely trying to make connections with people. And so if some, if an A&R reached out, like, I mean, like one of my best friends in the sort of music industry is a student named Pergo. And it's funny because we met over like a producer dispute. Like he managed a producer who had produced a song for Chase and there was back accounting that needed to be done and like, you know, we were just like, yeah, let's figure it out, whatever. But then our lawyers started kind of going out, especially like our lawyer at the time just kind of went a bit OD on it and sort of got it like hostile. So I'm like texting Pergo like, yo bro, like, it's not me, like we're just trying to get it done or whatever y'all want, we're totally cool. Because even Chase had been like, I had been like, yeah, like let's start here and then like they can negotiate up from there. But he was like, now let's just give him like a really fair amount, like out the gate, like I fuck with him, like it's cool, you know what I mean? So it was super easy. But then yeah, after that whole thing, we just like became homies. But I think like really genuinely being stoked to meet people is the first key. Like, so even, because you're not gonna sign it, obviously you're only, even if you do sign, you're only gonna sign with one person or one entity. So you're gonna meet 12. Make those other 11 meetings super valuable for your future. And like just, and let you have that experience and chill with those people. And the other thing is that most people unfortunately are not empowered to do signings. So most of the ANRs that reach out to you, especially from a major label system, are gonna be really genuine, really stoked, super excited about the project. But they're not super, they don't have the ability to say, okay, cool, we're gonna sign you. And we're gonna do it tomorrow. And this is the type of money. Because almost all the ANR, especially the ones that we're reaching out about time that I'm not friends with, I mean, they all like, they know what's up. Like they're very smart. They're very savvy with the industry. Like they're very, they know where the, how things are going. And so it's not necessarily them that's preventing us from doing a deal with them. It's the way the major labels are structured. So I'd say, especially if you're an artist on the good music, but not a lot of traction inside yet, more on that sort of side. I would say, just be ready for the fact that a lot of these meetings are just gonna be like, you're getting to know people and you're getting into that side of things. And then when there is a little bit more of a whirlwind, it's almost still the same. There's still gonna be a lot of people who really want, they really believe in your music, they really wanna help and they want you to be something they really were able to do at the label. But they're not all gonna be empowered to just act upon it. And then also people are gonna rush you and you're gonna feel rushed. And there's some truth in that, right? Like you do wanna take advantage of that. Like especially if you're in a real rush and you have people who are throwing like sort of, like if you're talking about like a really one, like life changing type of viral moment, you got people who are throwing you way too much money. And sometimes it's good to just take it because it's not smart. They're not thinking like business-wise. They're thinking like competition-wise. So you need to take advantage of that while there's all this hype. What do you mean competition-wise? Like, you know, Warner is gonna wanna get as much market share as possible compared to Sony. And every label, everyone who's on the business side for the most part, like of course they wanna be successful. And so it's really in the best interest of organizations with a lot of money that can take a lot of big risks to try to sign as much stuff as possible. And so that's where it becomes valuable because not only is there, because they're not necessarily putting a whole lot of risk on like losing a bunch of money if the song doesn't finish streaming well or the future stuff doesn't stream well because they're able to use that incidence to also play this sport that we're all playing. You know what I mean? If that makes sense. They're more invested in the loss that will come if they didn't make the artist, get the artist versus the loss that could come from just throwing them a bag. That's what that not really worth is what you're saying. Yeah, like there's a multitude of factors behind why like bidding wars happen and why they end up, how they end up. Because it's kind of, I mean, it's also kind of like the NBA draft, right? It's like statistically, I don't think, I think obviously the higher draft picks across the board are gonna be the more successful players. On an average bell curve, but you also don't see a whole lot of number one draft picks who are in the Michael Jordan conversation. You see high, I mean, obviously it's like, Kobe was 18, which is low, it's low for Kobe, but it's still high as fuck. Like that's a high pick, you know? And I think it's kind of the same thing where like, you know, every team, it doesn't necessarily matter. Like they need to also keep their fans happy and stuff. There's a lot of things, you know what I'm saying? There's a lot of concepts that go into why like the magic are tanking to get Markel Foltz a few years ago, right? And it's not just as simple as like one thing or another. Like it's not just, basically it's not just for the success of the team. There's other factors that go into it. Like on the, there's the winning record side of success, but then there's the fans being excited about the new side of things success. There's the showing the person who owns the team that you're doing stuff as a general manager. Like there's all these different factors. And then of course there's the fundamental desire to build a great team. But you know, like, I mean, like Greg Odin was, wasn't he number one? Yeah, he was. Yeah. And I mean, people shit on him. I think that's not fair. But I think he was someone who just isn't gonna be Kobe Bryant or Shaquille O'Neal. And he gets picked really high because of this hype thing. So it didn't necessarily make sense to pick Greg Odin number one overall. Like in retrospect, obviously not. But there was like a moment around why people felt they needed to get that pick. And that's kind of the equivalent of that viral moment, right? That was that hype because no other time, especially after that period, would Greg Odin be able to capture the same? Greg Odin going and playing in Spain for three years does not wind up with him number one overall, most likely. Exactly. I mean, unless, you know, like he goes and like, progresses the game. Yeah. But they have things they wouldn't have happened. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Let me take a quick second to tell you about Forever Fan because many of you know that my agency is responsible for helping multiple artists blow up tens of billions of views and billions of streams. But I want to specifically talk about a strategy that we've used to help artists get millions of streams on their very first song. And as a matter of fact, in the last 12 months, an artist got signed to a major label using this specific strategy and you'll never guess what it is. Pre-saves. Yeah, that's right. Pre-saves. They're extremely powerful when you do them correctly, but most people don't understand how to do it. See, the problem becomes we've been all this effort for this pre-save campaign and then the song finally comes out. And then what happens after that? Nothing. You're starting from ground zero again because you're not about to ask people to pre-save every single time you drop a song. So I'm here to put you on to our solution for that, which is Forever Fan, a platform that removes this massive pain for artists by making it so when a fan pre-saves one of your songs, they automatically pre-save every single song that you drop after that. So your work doesn't just create a one-time fan of a single song, it creates a forever fan. And you can take advantage of this same solution. Go to foreverfanmusic.com so that you can get more streams and a deeper relationship with your fans for the same amount of effort. Foreverfanmusic.com, check it out now. You know, one big thing, obviously, that managers are always weighing and even artists are always trying to weigh or get is money. How do you look at money like in terms of running the organization and also then building around the artist particularly, because those are two completely different things. And I think it didn't really click to me until we had clients that had really big artists, but they also had smaller artists. And then you have to really realize, it's like, yeah, I might be managing these two artists, but that's a different business. Like, I can't take that artist's money and put it in this artist's budget, you know what I mean? So how do you, again, just the business as a whole and then managing artists? Yeah, so I think, I mean, like money is obviously the most difficult thing in our society, right? Like in every single way. And the way I look at money from a fundamental standpoint is that it represents freedom. It represents agency. You know, if you have, it's the way our society operates, whether it's good or bad, but the more money you have, the more able you are to do things. And so it's really, really important to use money to build a future for what we're working on now. And so my priorities with business side, like try to work on the business, not in the business as much as possible. You know, is this the thing I go by, by the way? Side note. Sorry, it's in my head. But on the business side, like my primary goal isn't like, I'm not even gonna say what it isn't, but I'll say what it is. It's to be able to pay salaries to the people who work with me right now. To pay significant enough salaries that I can be competitive. And it's also, I mean, like there's a couple homies who if I got, you know, if we had the bread coming in to be able to pay people outside the core group and hire someone else, like I mean, I would offer them $100,000 tomorrow, 150, just because I know what they're capable of and like they work in, and I wanna outbid other organizations and music to be able to say, like build this over here, and but have the ability to really like make that happen. So first and foremost is having the team and just keeping the team so we can continue to build and continue to grow. And yeah, that's it. That's my main concern with the money on the business side is building a thing that's gonna be here in 10 years. And that not only is gonna be here in 10 years, but isn't gonna be me in a garage selling vinyls out the back. It's gonna be remiss, you know, like it's gonna be something really significant. And then on the artist side, it's the same philosophy. You know, I think what we're really looking at as being extremely important in the industry today is that artists are being able to build businesses, right? And we're here to help that and we're gonna make it fun and it's like it is supposed to be in the music industry. There's some glamour to that, but it's still a business and we're gonna help you build that. And so on any good business, you don't just throw money at shit that you don't need. You know what I'm saying? Like you don't necessarily, like if you're opening up, I always use a donut shop as a metaphor because it's very like, it's something you can make and sell. And people don't think of music in those terms enough. They think of it as very ambiguous and there's not a big connection to making music and getting money. So it seems to just sort of magically happen in some ways, you know? And so if you have, but if you have a donut, you give me $10 and I, you know, give you three donuts, then I just made $4 or whatever it is, right? Against the cost of the donuts. And so when I'm looking at artist expenditure, it's like, what can we do to keep costs down overall and get you making money as quickly as possible? So we're not saying, hey, look, we're gonna give you $100,000 cash advance to open your donut store, you know? Because that's not the most efficient thing. You know, the most efficient thing is to really focus on what do we need now? What can we do? What tools do we need on our side to help you execute creatively and for us to be able to do something on the paid side, on the marketing side, and on the event activation side and things like that. But what's the minimum amount we can do to achieve those goals so that instead of having to stand behind a $10,000 marketing budget before we start making money back, let's stand behind a $5,000 one before we start making money back. We can probably reasonably get similar good results. And then of course we have systems where based on our investor model and stuff, we're able to, we have access to pretty much like any amount of money for like within, you know, normal bounds, so long as it makes sense for the investor. So it's like, even if we do work with an artist on a very small budget, if that song goes stupid overnight and it's doing 200,000 streams a day, we can go get 200,000 streams a day worth of advance to market that, you know what I mean? So there's not much of a limit on it. But yeah, in both cases, it's what can we do to keep the team together, to keep the business growing? You know, that's the main first and foremost concern. Yeah, so what does that process look like? Like you have the axe, right? And you know, to your point, there are so many different ways that artists can't make money or start to structure their business. So like what does the process look like in terms of figuring out like the first two, three steps for an artist you start working with? It looks at what their strengths are, you know? And I think it's always good to double down on strengths. And then it looks at like, what are ways that we can globalize and integrate this process within your world, you know? So basically like you're streaming your Instagram presence, your TikTok presence, your website, all those things should unify towards the goals that we have, whether it's like selling merch or releasing a project or whatever, you know? And that's difficult. Like it's difficult to do the sales and things side of things. And it's also difficult to grow that, you know? It's not like some magic silver bullet. Oh, you start doing merch, you'll make a lot of money. It's like, no, it'll be a lot of work and we might like make $400, you know? But it's all about the growth process. And so as, it's a blessing, but it's also very unstable. But right now streaming is like the main way that, you know, we hope to be able to make initial money, especially in the investment front-back. And that's scary because streaming is like, you're going through third parties, your fan bases are on third parties, you don't have controller access of those data points. You know, you're pretty much left out to drive. Anything should happen to one of those platforms. So that's why it's really important to us to find ways. And this is something that's still really journeying through and working on wrapping my bucket head around is how do we really build off-platform community where people are engaging with an artist's website and their Discord and we're spread out across so many things that first of all, we're spread out across third parties like Discord and Instagram and TikTok and Snapchat and Twitter and stuff so that when like Twitter goes belly up, you know, we're prepared to take that hit. But then, so it's diversification, but then there's really moving over to like the website and that's hard. It's hard to do that. And it's something we're still working on but I really think that if artists are gonna have true creative freedom and like we as a infrastructure that's not run by BlackRock investments and stuff like that, like this whole, this side of the industry basically, like if we're gonna succeed, we have to have truly independent ways of capitalizing on the IP that we own, right? If we're gonna say, hey, look, our side of the industry is gonna own these masters and this side of the thing, like the creatives are gonna own this stuff, then we have to use that. We can't just sit, sit. Because the reason why like Warner and shit is able to get away with having so much inefficiency with their booking and just like accounting and stuff and like there's all the, like there's just such a, like, you know, like people aren't getting paid on time. It's like super common, right? But it's because there's just so much money that it doesn't matter. So if you look at that model and you say, okay, cool. All we have to do is sort of like release music and be an artist and then streams will happen and we'll make money. Like that doesn't work on a small independent level and it doesn't even work as much on an independent, like, like an artist level, like not even independent from a label, but just like one individual artist. Like even like someone like Drake can probably always find ways to make his process better and still see a big return on that. But like Warner Music Group, and they make like $4 billion in profit a quarter or something. I mean, you know, they have no, so it's just taking that, looking at what their example is is not conducive, I think, to success as a particular artist or as a smaller team. Yeah, you mentioned the investors earlier. What did you learn when you went through that investment process? Because I know you've talked about how catalog is really huge these days, right? Like just as being a label, looking for investors for it, whether it's for an artist or your company, what do you feel like investors are, how are they analyzing things when they look at you? It's a process, right? Like first and foremost, the thing that I've learned the most is that you should never be reliant on getting an investor as step one of your business build because you might not get it. And also a lot of it's gonna come with stipulations that you're not gonna be cool with. And so that's something I learned last year, I really was trying to get distribution money to start the label. And I was trying to get some sort of, I mean, I wasn't asking for, this might sound crazy to some people, but you all know how the industry is. I wasn't asking for much. I was asking for $100,000 a year over three years, just super entirely marketing funds. And I even was asking for, you all can mutually approve anything over 5K. You know what I mean? Super low stakes stuff, right? I just wasn't able to get that. You know, and there was some learning, like one distributor had reached out and there are some really cool dudes over there, but like I was super hell bent on getting overhead. That's another thing. Overheads, most people aren't gonna go for that. To keep the team together, right? Yeah, but it's not realistic. So what I looked at, what I realized is that was such a blessing to go through that experience, spend a lot of time trying to really, I took like 16 meetings, you know, with different distributors, different labels, things like that. No one was really fucking with it. And so, well the problem was they were fucking with it. But then they were, I got so mad, bro. Every conversation, I actually did kind of, mildly get like visibly irritated to someone at one of these Zooms at this point, but like, you know, it's like every single conversation. Oh, you guys are developing artists? Amazing, we need that. That was needed more than ever in our industry. Like what do you need? Oh, the center, okay cool. Let me put you on with so and so. Boom, oh, what's your catalog stream? Oh, well we were management, so we don't like really own anything and then we don't do a shitload of streams every day. And we're only getting 15% of that. But we have this team that we've built, we have these things, we've done this, we've got this expertise and blah, blah, blah. Okay, cool, well, you know, hit us back when you're streaming. And then I'm like, what the fuck? By the time we're streaming, would I be hitting you back for money? We have enough money that you're gonna give me, like at this point. And so that was such a conversation. It was always this interest followed by disinterest. And once again, I think it goes back to like people who are lower on the totem pole and working up. Like those people are younger typically or they're fresher in the industry and they just understand. So they're like, yo, this is great. And then you get to the person at the top and they just aren't fucking with it, they don't care as much. That's exactly how I thought about that. Like the, even on the investment side, it's like A&Rs, right? And then you, and the people get it or a regular job, you talk to the recruiter. Oh my gosh, you're so amazing. Then they got to talk to the hiring manager and nothing happens, right? So it's a really common thing. There's been very, very few situations where it's been like the opposite. You get the person who is big money and they sign and close things. And they're like, oh, I love you. So then you can kind of try to supersede past that other person who doesn't love you or whatever, but they're lower on the totem pole. But it's, I think, but it's cool because at least you know that you need both of those tears, right? It's like the emotional connection essentially is usually that first line, the A&R type person, right? Because also you do want those people there who actually do care about you. Well, those are the most important people because I'm saying like they get severed. The connection gets severed between them and the upstairs people because most of the emotional, the people, not emotional, but the people who understand it, they don't even have a cloud enough to really convince someone to make sure they sign it. It's like, they have to rely on that person's decision. And so what happened is I learned that and the beauty of that lesson was it's kind of scary to think about, oh, shit, we've done all this stuff. We've learned all these things and now we have to also learn how to build a business that makes money. We, I was hoping to just sort of do the magical music thing and you go sign some artists and you get the distribution deal and then somehow you live in a house in the Pacific Palisades. But, no, that's not how it is. You gotta fucking get scary. You gotta go down and buckle down and face some fears and realize you're not gonna be making money for longer than you thought you weren't gonna be making money. And so, yeah. So really pursued that, built a really good distribution partnership with STEM which is awesome, non-exclusive. You know, we do everything on this basis where we have total freedom and total control which is really important. And then we have been working closely. We started out with 1960 Management. Did one record with them that went really well. It was awesome. Did Starkiller by Curtis Waters. And then we got a, we started working with Indify. And that's been really awesome. Jordan over there, I talk to like literally almost every day. And they've been so supportive and helpful and with them we've signed a couple people and then I've just been talking to someone else that I'm stoked to be working with. But I think what was key is like, we came correct. You know, like we really had these expectations of look, all we need is this amount of money for this single or for this EP and we can prove something. You know, and frankly, actually, the first person we signed this year was even before anyone had came through on the Indify side with an investment. I just came out of pocket because I found this song is Amina Sanad. She's super sick, like singer-songwriter that I really fucked with. We all like, she's super dope. But I found this song turned the record over on TikTok and I was like, yo, this is great. And so I reached out and like, I, you know, we weren't super, super locked in on having like a flow on the investment side yet. And so, yeah, I was like, yo, this is great. And like, but I made that move, you know. And so it's like that ability to be just building slowly is the biggest thing. So when you're looking for investment and stuff, I would say, don't worry about it. It's gonna be way longer and way harder to get. And then when you do get it, even so, it's never a bailout. Like it's never like, okay, cool, I have investors who fuck with me now. Therefore, you know, I'm making more money. I have enough money to pay the team. It's not like, now we have more work and it's great. But we have people to be accountable to. And yeah, but also it's like, because we have marketing funds and we have money for artists now, which is dope, but it doesn't really affect us. And then like, we're still in this place of like not getting a whole lot of streaming royalties coming through because of the recoupments on the investment. And just like the fact that we're starting and building artists from relatively smaller levels in a lot of cases, you know, which is super awesome and rewarding. But it's a process. So even just staying on the investment conversation and recoupment, like you gave me a really interesting piece of advice to other than that, I think would be good kind of iterated here, right? And you're talking to me about the, I'll let you word it better, but it was basically on the lines of like, you know, you don't need to shoot for the big bag, go for the smaller bag to prove to the investor that you're worth investing. You know what I'm talking about? You know what I'm talking about? Can you talk about that more and kind of break down your thinking, your thinking with that? Yeah, so just like with anything else, you know, you're looking long-term. You always have to be thinking about, what do I do to do a good job now that's gonna stack up? And if I do a good job on all these little things now, then in a year I'll be set up well. And so, you know, say for example, you have someone who's, let's just say like, I guess you're in my shoes, right? Which is a bit more rare. Like I know there's probably a lot more artists who watch this and it's not like a lot of aspiring, you know. You'll be surprised, man. Don't shit on our audience, man. I'm not shitting on your audience. You know y'all out there. I'm not shitting on your audience. I like artists, but I mean like, I have a very specific niche of existence. Like I'm like a struggling indie label owner. Like, it's like I'm from like a... Yeah, I feel like that. Like I'm a character in Scott Pilgrim. Like, but yeah, so it's basically, you want to work those relationships in a way that makes sense and then gives them the longest life because the real life things don't work out the first time for the most part or the second time or the third time even sometimes, especially not in the way that you really want them to. Like they might scrape by, but most of the time it's not like, oh, this is the first thing that we tried, it cool, our dreams came true, you know. And so when I'm looking at working with an investor, it's not like, oh shit, okay, we have this one chance to like blow this one artist out of the water and super impressed them because I know that's not super likely. So I'm like, what can we do to really show good faith and build a great relationship where they trust us and they trust what we're doing and we're able to show that we're making the money back. And it's like, yeah, dude, you know, you have to be ready for the fact that we might not recoup of the first couple things. So you don't, you want to never be in a position where you look stupid because you came in and they were like, hey, yeah, we can do $10,000 for this artist. And you're like, okay, sick, $10,000 for this artist. Like, awesome, let's put it all with this one person. And I know it doesn't make sense, you know, but let's say $10,000, let's say it's $20,000, right? $20,000, and you know for a fact this person needs like max of seven and a half or 10K, especially for the, what you're doing in that moment, right? You go and take that extra money and it flops, then you're in a position where you've demonstrated that you don't have a good handle of how much money you need to do this. You've demonstrated that you're not necessarily reliable in that regard, and you've also shown that you're like taking bigger risks than are necessary. But if you can come in there and say, look, you know, oh, here's 20K, cool, well, we really only need, in my opinion, like 6,500, but it's really good to know that if the artist comes back and they really want to have some more money for whatever reason, then we have the ability to make that call on whether or not to take this risk on this thing, you know, because the lifeblood of what we do is third-party investment. And so if we don't have that, then it's really difficult for us to make good avenues to signing artists, especially artists who already have some traction going. And so it's really, really, really important to always be doing a great job for the investor as well. But the thing is it all plays back into success because the artist doesn't lose out because, like I said, you went and thought, what's the minimum efficient way that we can maximize this stuff? Because then they're making money back faster, and you're making money back faster, and the investor's happy, and so then they want to put more money into the artist's next project. So it's all like an abundance mentality, and it all works. If you hold yourself accountable to the people who are doing right by you, then everything comes together and works out. You know what I mean? So yeah, it's super, super important to just be really cognizant of the fact that someone offering you X amount of dollars is not life-changing until it's life-changing money in your bank account. That's yours, you know? The beautiful thing about that is, I think when you say abundance mentality, a lot of times people just think big numbers, but really that's abundant. Really thinking about the long-term, and there's going to be more and more money that comes, that this money, all right? But most people just focus on what this money is and how big that number is, and it forces you to have a, this is gonna be it mentality, which warps how you think about it, when on a investor, and especially the more seasoned investors, like they have some very reasonable expectations. Like they don't think, a lot of times, the money's gonna come back just off of this song, within a month or something like that. But we're in this space that's unique because we have access to capital and in more abundance at smaller levels, like more micro loans, like it wouldn't have been easy to get a whole bunch of 5K, 10K type of investments back in like 2005 or something like that, right? It'll be more of that, oh yeah, I don't invest in anything less than 100K, 250K, so I think with now what we're encountering is this era where a lot of artists and their teams, they're being forced to have to learn this type of process because typically by the time you start getting to those other numbers, unless it's like a viral moment, you're a little bit more seasoned anyway and you're thinking about it more logically because even what you said, it reminded me of, shout out to Sir Love, it reminded me of two things, Sir Love was one of the first people who was like really music industry through and through in terms of how he thought and saw the business, he really knew it in and out from a technical standpoint and when he was building out campaigns for artists, he had this process where you were always like, we'll do a show at this cap and I think let's just pretend you're a venue owner and you own three different venues, I'm gonna go for your smaller venue and build your trust there, try to sell that out and then... That's a really good metaphor for it. Exactly, it's the same thing. So it's like, let's just get that we have trust because that's really what it comes down to. It's always better to sell out the 200 cap room than to have 400 people in the 1,000 cap room. Exactly, 100% but we're impatient ourselves. We all kind of want to even know where we're going. That's the thing too is like, I'm not removed from the giant hustle mentality of the creativity, that's one of the things I think people think that there's a sort of sometimes that seems like there's like these anards and stuff who are just sitting there and the artists are really struggling and creating this world and building up brick by brick and that's something that I'm really passionate about doing is just like working on this shit and making it great. And so that mentality of, I'm sorry, I actually lost my train of thought. I've been struggling to catch it for like six words. So I said mentality, I was like, I'm giving up the ghost. I guess I'll just add this then. What you did, went through last year, of course you not only learn, but it's great because of the way you move, you already built relationships and you have these initial investors that can keep up with you. And I think a lot of people don't realize that the first touch point, you're coming in to get money on their end, they're coming in to get to know you, right? And so a lot of times more often than not, you're not going to get that money, but over time, if you continue to prove out, they see you watch, they see you move, you continue to grow, eventually you'll be able to turn the faucet on this investor, this tech guy, basically when he took me through this process, he was like, yeah, man, when you try to get money, it should be easy. That was a crazy party, like through my mind off, because I was pretty early twenties at the time. He was just like, yeah, it should be easy because you should be building these relationships beforehand. You never want to build the relationships when you need the money and the business is going to go down or all of a sudden just something major is going to happen. You should already have the relationships. And he took me through a really technical process where you're reach out to people and kind of let them know you're interested, not at what you're trying to raise, but you'll send like weekly updates. But this is only like a regular business. Well, that's something that I think is cool to talk about too is like, you know, how do you reach out to people in music if you're trying to get into it? And the answer is you always, you should bother them because I had, dude, I have like literally 467 unread text messages, notification on my phone right now. And I'm not in like group chats that I don't answer. I'm only in two. So it's like, it's like at least 200 people. I just haven't fucking replied to, you know? And it's like, it's just because, it's not because I'm ignoring anybody. It's just because like I get so busy in those days I might get, I might talk to them. So you're saying bother them like, make sure they're aware or like really bother them. Well, I brought text me every three days, you know what I'm saying? Because otherwise I'm not going to see it. And the first four times I'm not going to care. And it's like, the best way to do that is to just show progress. Like don't just be like, hey, what's up? Would love to still get on this call. Instead of that, say, hey, what's up? I just did this photo shoot with my friend who's an artist. Check it out. Hey, what's up? I just, you know, my artist friend just released this so I put together a show for him, whatever. And then by the second or third one, oh, shit, this person gives a fuck. Cool. And my thing is I think anyone for the most part can learn to do anything as long as they want to. And like, there's nothing that I do that I don't think someone couldn't be become capable of doing in the high level that we need in like six months. And so, dude, I would like, it doesn't matter about experience or whatever, it's just like, do you give a fuck and are you doing things on your own that are showing that you're in that same hustle mentality? I mean, like, dude, like Cam and Agusta, like Agusto is, like, Don't Be Greedy is managing FEMS tour in, for Avril Lavigne, opening for Avril Lavigne right now in Europe, like 30 dates. And- Can't be Greedy is your company, just a reminder. Yes, Don't Be Greedy is the company. Yeah, I got that shit yatted. But yeah, we're doing that. And dude, Agusto managed his first tour, like, I think last year, he managed Tom's tour, right? And that was because I just said, yo, you know, I need like tour manager. And like, obviously, I met Ruffin, we did Blue Summer together. And he was just like on some Batman shit, like I knew this day would come. But I was like, yo, yeah, like, let's do it. And so then it's like, cool, like you're gonna manage Tom's tour. And like, I just threw him into that. I mean, like within like the month or something, he's like, he's advancing the entire tour. And it's like, the very first thing is, okay, cool. Yo, our agent at Arrival Jeremy, yo, this is Agusto, like talk to him about a lot of this stuff, keep him in the loop. And it's like, but you put people in that. And I know, like, I believe in him. I know he's smart enough to do that. I know he's got the background. I know he gives a fuck. Then he does it. Or like Cam, who runs our marketing. Like, he just always wanted to be involved because he's like, been trying to work in music for a while. And obviously he's Cam's, he's Taj's best friend. And so, yeah, that's how like, yeah. Cam and Taj went to it. I wonder how you camera out another. Yeah. They play basketball together. Yeah. You got to get hip to the lore. He explains. You got to get hip to the lore, man. You got to understand what's going on. You know that, bro. You got to. I know I met Cam in person like one time. He's six, seven. But, yeah, I mean, he just wanted to be involved. And then it was like, cool, we need someone to do marketing. It's like, yo, Cam, do you think you can do this? And like, you know, ground zero. Another scratch got in there and y'all helped. Obviously, Jacory, you went through and like showed him like the ropes and stuff. But like, and now we're running campaigns. I mean, we've run consultation campaign for Suki Waterhouse. We were doing one with rebounder right now. We're doing like marketing consultation campaigns. And we're running all the Tom stuff, the Taj stuff, the Chase stuff and all the record stuff as well. And it's going really well. And it's like, he didn't have experience in that. You know, it's just like, yo, all right, cool. You've got like, bro, the first campaign he did, we spent $14,000. It was on fuck with me too. And that song now it does about 10 to 12 across the apple and everything probably does about 14,000 streams a day. You know, and I attribute most of that to that campaign we did. And it's like, that was Cam's first experience. Like, hey, like, essentially, you know, obviously I was like heavily involved. And I did a lot of the outreach and things like that, but it was pretty much like what I told him was basically, yo, here's $15,000 figure out how to spend it. And of course, like, you know, there's like a middle ground. He didn't just like Superman up and just do it perfectly out the gate. But like I said, I did do a lot of it, but it was still like just cool. You did that now. You're officially more experienced than like most marketing. So that's been huge. And so I started to say like, it's really important to, and like the way I met Nick, who runs our A&R and the same thing with him. He was just like, yo, I want to be an A&R. It's like, cool, okay. On CC is the head of A&R, don't be greedy. You know, and Nick spent almost two years now, I think. But he wrote, Nick hit me like four or five times in the DM and then I gave him my number. And then he texted me like four or five times. And then literally the time that I hit him back, I was like, fuck, I feel bad that I haven't hit this dude back. He keeps hitting me up. But he hit me up in the right way. He'd always be like, yo, I'm doing this photo shoot or yo, check this shit out or whatever constantly. It's just like, yo, or even if it's just like, yo, I saw Thomas in another show, even if it's like double texting from the last show, still like, oh, I saw Thomas as the other thing coming up. Can I shoot this one? You know what I mean? It's just like being super on it. And I was like in line at Publix, like getting a sub. And I was like, fuck, and then I like called him. I was like, yo, you're on. And I called him, but, and yeah, no, we've been working together for the two years. But that was so sick. And like, that's what I would say. It's like, be like Nick, be like Nick. You gotta be in this industry, I think, which is weird because people, it's so unorganized, it's chaotic. And as somebody who initially started like not being in music at all and then transitioning and just seeing like how different professional worlds exist. And so you would try to organize as much as possible, but it's just the nature of being in a creative industry. Yeah. And it's also like, there's only so much you can organize without fucking exploding. Like my brain, in some cases, I do operate much more abstractly and it's just kind of a struggle to take things out of my mind and put them on paper. But I do also like the security that comes with that. So that's why we have a big emphasis on systems at the company. But it's so difficult. It's so difficult because you can't organize everything because we're in such a fluid industry. So you can't say, oh, two p.m. to four p.m. I work on this because every day this is different. You know what I mean? You can't say, oh, you know, cool, I'll send my emails today and then it'll be done. Like I'll have these 10 emails. Cause every time you send an email, it creates this like fractal of possibilities that you then have to deal with. So you have responses and possibilities. Yeah. I almost don't even want to send it. Yeah. And that's every single email. Every single call, every single interaction. And they all take some part of your energy throughout the day, especially if you're stoked about stuff a lot, which like I usually get pretty stoked when I take calls and meetings. So I'm usually just stoked to talk to whoever it is. And so that'll like drain my ability to do other work because I've just spent like, especially if like back to backs, it'll be like three hours of just like being stoked. And then I'm like, fuck, I need to like go outside and like eat something or smoke a blunt or whatever. But yeah. So organization is super important but super difficult to nail down, I would say. No, we touched on touring a little bit, but like getting deeper into it. So, you know, budgets are a real thing. Setting up your first tour in general is just the logistics. It's a new process. How'd y'all go about setting up the first tour and you know, what are some of the ways you got around things in a way that'll help artists who are trying to learn that? I was really, really, really lucky because one of my good friends is a dude named Jake Short. And he is the tour manager for Snot. And I think Eame tripling now and like their whole camp is just crushing it. But he's super experienced and I just reached out to him for like a couple of times, like just breakdowns like, yo, what the fuck do I do here? And just had him walk me through it. And then Jake took more time too because when the first thing I said when I said to Goosey, you want to be tour manager or whatever, I was like, okay, cool, talk to Jake. And like, he like just got literally Jake just like put him on game for an hour as well. And so having a Jake in your life is super helpful. Those who do not have a Jake or a Jake. I have like seven people named Jake in my phone. It's by far the most common name in my phone. What did Jake tell you though? Yeah, so I think a lot of it could be summarized and don't panic, you know what I mean? Just stay organized. Just be on top of every correspondence, you know? And there's a lot of intangibles that you just can't like tell somebody because I was pretty like, I would trust you Corey with it too for example or you because we've run events. And that's very similar. Running an event is very similar to running a tour. And so I didn't really go from scratch nothing because it's like, it's not just that I started out on the merch table or I started out doing day-to-day tour stuff. It's like, I was like on top of an entire tour initially. And then we, yeah, even like when we had, we opened for Jack or we co, well, no, yeah, we opened. We opened for Jack K's, it was awesome. And like I put that together too. So it's like at the time I was also acting the part of the agent, you know what I mean? So it was like a lot, but I can't, I don't know if there's anything very particular that I could say that, because there's so many small things. There's so many things. I guess the biggest thing I would say is make sure you book everything ahead of time and over communicate. Like if you need information from somebody before something else can happen, hit them every single fucking day until you get it. You know what I mean? I also realized that like festivals and stuff won't start advancing until a month out and most venues won't tell you they won't start advancing until a month out explicitly, but they really don't respond to you until it's like pretty close to it. So there's only so much you can do. So I'd maybe say make sure you have your hotels and everything organized and then do advancing. What's advancing? Just like getting all the information over to the venue and like figuring out, okay, cool, where's the load in? Where does the merch table go? Do you have our sound plot, like our stage plot rather? Do you have all these elements that they need to have ahead of time? And then also it's sort of like advancing the whole tour, like getting Airbnbs organized, getting the rental car organized, figuring out who's getting paid what, figuring out like what the gas cost is gonna be routing. Like usually if your agent will route it for you, if you don't have an agent, it's like, cool, what's the best, like how can we travel? Because we had our first tour, we had to drive from fucking Chicago to San Francisco. We had two days to do that. It was 19 hours the first day and 17 hours the second day of driving. Obviously not repeating that, right? So yeah, but basically too much to, a lot of it just comes from you just gotta do it and just be, oh, you know what? Okay, here's a piece of advice that this is what I did now to think about it. Every single, I made it a habit with touring specifically with our first tour. Every single time anyone said anything in an email that I didn't understand, even if it was like an oblique reference to something, I would say, oh, yo, really quick, what does that mean? I had no, it can take a little bit of courage, I think, to do that because, you know, you wanna feel like you have your shit going on, so people take you seriously, so you want them to perceive that, I guess, like socially, at least I do. And so, having the, just being made, like literally making myself, oh cool, I don't know what she's referring to or whatever here. Hey, by the way, what does this mean? I'm not gonna try to infer it based on context cause I'm gonna ask you specifically, I did that so much in the beginning and that helped out immensely because it's really easy to sort of, I don't know, I don't wanna ask anyone about them and then you were on two different pages over time on shit, so that was the big one. Even if it's like an email and you're like, yo, I have six questions, like, I don't know what this is, I don't know what that is, I don't know what this is, I don't know how to do this and I didn't even know we had to do that. Ask them all, you know what I'm saying? Like, get information, that's the big takeaway. How did y'all choose the cities? That was our agent, I mean, like it's, there's A markets, B markets and C markets. A markets is like Los Angeles, New York City, I think a B market is probably like- An Augusta. No, that'd be like a C market, yeah. A B market might be like Orlando, I think. I'm not sure, I don't, there's not like a, I'm not an agent, so I don't know exactly, but for like an example, like Tampa, Florida versus like New York City, like they're not the same type of market, right? And so you start out in the A markets, which basically it goes by like a combination of overall population size is by far the biggest factor and then secondarily I would say it's kind of like culture, you know, like cultural relevancy and things like that. And then you like hit those ones first because you have the most chances of people being there to fuck with you. So in most people in the US, like most of their fans are usually gonna be in LA County, you know, or New York City or something like that when they start getting some traction, like, if you're in a certain space, I guess, but you know what I'm saying? Like you have a higher chance of selling 200 tickets in a place with like 20 million people as opposed to a place with like 100,000 people type thing. So you start with A markets and then you do A and mostly A markets with some B markets peppered in there. And then when you really get to the point you're doing 30 or 40 city tours, you might be doing some stuff like, I don't even know if there's C markets. I might have made that up, but I think there is. It's the primary, secondary, tertiary markets. Yeah, okay. Yeah. So I don't know what a C market to me would look like, like no offense, but like, you know, like a mobile, you know, I don't know if I really want to, I don't know, I hate to mobile though, bro. I have a funny story about mobile, but I won't say it because I'll piss off all the mobile people in the audience on the Alabama. Appreciate that. Mobile's too close to that. All right, you look, you manage like different levels of artists. Jacory was talking about that earlier and before the pot, you know, Taj is in a different place, different type of creative approach. You talked about very few songs over a long period of time. Tom's at a different place. All right, Chase was at a very different place. Like what is it like when you managing that? Like, can you kind of even use the details of this artist moves this way that causes me to have to do that. And this artist, I can't build you that same system. So it causes me to have to do that. Like what does that look like? I think they're, it's all pretty similar. You know, I mean, that was one thing I do remember like early on, like when I first started working with him, Chase was like, you know, just keep in mind, like I'm gonna, he said it pretty explicitly. Like just keep in mind, like I'm at a different level, you know, than Taj is, or when, you know, Sean, when we first started working together, like he was at a much different level than Sean was, you know what I mean? So it's like, he wasn't saying it in like a, you know, hot shit way, but he was just saying like, just remember, like you can't like treat everything the same for me as it is with them. Because I had, and that was something he would like, was really just sort of gently getting into my head. It's like, yo, like, you know, I was signed to Benny Blanco. Like I've been around like real shit, you know, like really high level shit at a time when I still hadn't, you know? So that was like really good advice that I've always kept in mind. But at the same time, I think the most tangible way to say it is the way it operates is pretty egalitarian. So it's like, this has always been my policy because I've started out managing a few people. And so it's like, if we get an opportunity because of Taj, or we get an opportunity because of Tom, right? The first thing that happens is that opportunity with Tom gets completely handled for Tom, right? It's like, okay, cool, like this brand reached out or this Spotify reached out or I got this new connection. I think a more, a more consistent realistic example is like, I get a new connection at a DSP, right? Something like that. They're interested, they're excited about Tom, right? As it so often is the way that people come in the door and it's like, cool, here's all Tom's stuff. Let's work together, here's what we're doing. Let's get the meeting set up with you guys, all this stuff. Let's get that handled, it's done. There's no possible way to fuck that up. And then it's like, cool, hey, by the way, this is my other artist, Taj Keaton. This is what he's got going on, you know what I mean? Similarly, like, we got a euphoria placement a couple of years ago for Taj and was able to make friends with a Jen Maloney who's a really dope music supervisor. She's like, apparently the goat now. She's doing so much fucking crazy shit. So I'm just even stoked that we got to work with her for a little bit. But, you know, and so, you know, got that contact and was able to send her music and stuff. And so it's like, cool, this is because of Taj. So, yo, here's all the Taj stuff. Here's all this stuff, here's what's going on. Okay, cool, blah, blah, we're doing it. Like, that's accepted, that's done. It's in her mind and a place of importance and priority and it's there. And then a week later, it's like, oh, and also, here's some of the other artists I'm working with. Here's some of the songs. You know what I mean? Here's Tom's stuff. But in that way, I think it's fair because that's the way that I'm able to build like the all ships rise type of thing without ever leveraging someone's stuff in a way that like would get into the territory of potentially benefiting me more overall than them. You know what I mean? So that's what I would say very specifically is when you're working with artists, just for me, it's work first, like just go based off of who the reach out is from. You know what I'm saying? Like, just really go and make sure that gets handled first. You know, and it could be like, there's times when it's like, okay, cool, like this person reached out for something from Tom and I know Taj would just be a great fit or vice versa. So I reached out for something about Taj and I know Tom be a great fit. But it's like, that doesn't matter. You know what I'm saying? Because they reached out to Taj. They reached out to Tom. So that's who's getting handled with the whole thing. You know what I mean? And if it like fizzles out because, you know, maybe it isn't a good fit and one of them doesn't want to do it, but the other one would have, it's still like, I'll let it fizzle. You know what I'm saying? Because it's not about like, oh, but we got Tom or we got Taj. You know what I mean? It's like just letting them live their own lives in those spaces, it's really important. Because it is like, it's separate. They're separate people with separate brands and separate businesses and we have separate relationships and all this stuff. And it's like, there is a collective mentality around don't be greedy for sure. You know? And like, you know, Shawn and Taj like work together all the time on shit. And they're definitely respect the fuck out of each other's art, but it's not like odd future. You know what I mean? And so it's like, you know, I spent a lot of my day doing Taj stuff and a lot of my day doing Tom stuff. And that's also part of the reason why don't be greedy records exist in the first place is because I wanted to create a vehicle to sort of help unify the team that we had on the management side, to help unify what we're doing culturally, you know, and provide a bedrock for that beyond just, you know, these three guys. You know what I mean? And so, and the other thing is that gives me like the better that the label does and the more we're able to impact culture and make a big difference for creatives and do awesome shit that we're stoked about, then I'm more empowered to create opportunities, whether it's salaries for like the people that I want to keep working with or if it's upgraded connections as the artists that I'm working with like Taj and Tom are growing, I'm more empowered to help Taj meet his moment when he does have something go viral and then all these connections we've been building come out the fold. Like I'll be much more able to do that in a much more effective and meet the moment type of way. If I'm already Sam who owns Don't Be Greedy who everyone knows about because I'm doing great shit in the industry and so then really big pieces of the puzzle are only a phone call away, you know? So it's like, it's basically almost like, I would think of it almost as it's like, I don't know how to phrase it, but it's just what I do to be able to continue to do what I do. Like even the artists that we're signing on the record side are also fucking sick and it's just amazing to me that we're even getting time of day from these people let alone they want to work with us, you know? And that wouldn't be there if we hadn't consistently just demonstrated like all this dope shit we're doing. So yeah, it's like you got to just build something that's going to support everything else I guess, but then there's a difference as to like the management is different from the label, you know? And so the type of stuff that I do for Taj and Tom individually is different than the type of stuff that I personally will do for some of the, like for the record side, right? Because there's like, you know, like this really, really deep relationship that we've built over like years and years and years of working together so closely. Yeah. And so in order to be able to still work with and support amazing creatives and like be able to be part of this world that I love so much, you know, I can't go and manage like three other people or anyone because I'm not gonna be the same manager as good as that manager personally because what you're seeing with Taj is like, or with Tom, it's like, bro, it's like so much blood, sweat and tears. You know what I mean? That's like real like 3 a.m. phone call. It's a lot of shit. And I just like, that's what makes it work so well. I think makes me such a great manager, but like you can't replicate that with a whole bunch of people. So it's like, how do we create something where I can truly do a great job with everybody that we want to work with, you know? And then it's like, that's where the record side come in because then it's like, well, now I really have a team supporting me with these records things, especially because, you know, most people like Nick's goal is not to just work for someone's manager, like a manager who has some clotted artists down the line, like, you know, if everyone blows up, it's not his goal, you know? I'm sure. And so it's like, what can I do to create an ecosystem that someone like Nick or like Cam or Augusto or Courtney or whomever is gonna be empowered to grow within what I'm working on, you know? And so that gives a way for like, these are people that I think can really carry forward my vision in a really effective way. And of course I'm like, me, I'm so, I'm still incredibly involved with everything, but it's like, this way I have this way to know, like, I'm not gonna let anyone down that we're working with, you know, this great team, you know? Yeah, and you said something interesting, right? You talk about wearing the two hats, the label owner hat and then the manager hat. Like, how do you see the difference in those roles? Cause I think a lot of artists, at least once I talk to them, they tend to get the lines blurred right between like what managers do and what labels do. It sounds like you've kind of drawn like a pretty clear line for that. So like, what is the, like, one, like, how do you view those roles, like, and the differences in terms of like what you have to do? And then I guess follow up question would be, like, what is the difference between a manager and a really involved label head? Like, well, how do you view that difference? Yeah, so I would say that like, you know, I don't think there's as clear of a line as I meant it to come off as. It's like, there is like a difference, right? There's a difference. And the fact is I don't think it's very possible as an individual to be a really good manager in the way that I'm a really good manager for a whole lot of people, you know? Sometimes you just need just. It's a personal relationship. Like I said, you were friends with Tom and Todd before. Yeah, it's a different, it's been a different type of scenario for me. And so I think that basically I love management. Like I love doing that stuff. I love being that involved. And so like the goal for what Don't Be Greedy as a label does, I like the term label almost like aesthetically, like it sounds cool to me to say I run a label, but I think more succinctly, it's a creative services company, you know? And I think that what we've kind of done is realized like, hey, as management, we really, I released Ronald pretty much me and Julia Maltz and Foundation distributor, but we pretty much released Ronald. Like it was mostly me, you know, operating as Don't Be Greedy. And like Courtney and Nick helped out quite a bit, but most of the heavy lifting and everything was me. And so I was like, shit, like, and then, you know, the deals we do with Tom, they're all distribution deals. And the distributors are dope. We like working with them, but like we do most of the work by design, you know? And we did, everyone's scared with Taj. And I was just realizing like, yo, this management stuff is basically we're acting as a label. And so to me, what we do on the record side is we try to, we have the same approach as management. Like, you know, it might not be as deeply like personal with every single artist that we're signing for me as it would be with like Taj, which is just because he's, you know, or Sean or whomever, like, that's someone I've known for four years. But what it is, shit, what the fuck was I saying? It's like, we still want to really be there for people and really be part of their journey and really be part of their process and have fun and like be friends with them and have like a sort of family mentality around what don't be greedy is. And so I want to be able to give that to people that work with us and feel like when they work with us, it's like, we really want to be like homies. Like we want people to be able to have frank discussions and have conversations about things that aren't just music and really be friends with people and stuff like that. And I think it's like, you know, yeah, just creating that world. And I think part of it too that's important to me is like the label moniker gives artists a sense of flexibility, right? Because you could, if it doesn't work out, don't be greedy. Like you can just go to your next song or your next album with somebody else. And that's totally fine, you know? But I think with management, it's a little bit more like, you're really committing on a personal level to somebody. And so that can be a little bit overwhelming for an artist to make a decision on. It's like, oh, you know, do I want to like commit to you as a manager? And then this kind of gives people a way to build that relationship because ultimately I think there is gonna be such a blurred line between management and label. You know, I mean, it already is. Like the way we work with the artists that we work with now on label side, I mean, dude, we do so much cool shit with them. And most of it stuff like a label traditionally wouldn't be doing necessarily, right? It's just about having fun and like building a community. I think it's important. So, well, hey man, Sam, appreciate you stopping by man. It's always dope to talk to you. And hopefully I feel like people should have a really holistic view of what that journey looks like for a manager to go from ground up. But also on the other side, like what it looks like to work with a good manager, right? Some of the thoughts and how they're thinking about things as well. So once again, everybody, y'all know what it is. This is no labels necessary. I'm Brandon Shaw and I'm Corey and we out. Peace.