 What up? What up? I'm Brandman Sean and I'm Corey and we are back with another episode of No Labels, Necessary Podcast where you can catch us every Tuesday, every Thursday on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, wherever you stream your podcast, shopping up about music, money, the content creator, economy. This is for the people who think different. Now today we got a very special episode. We're going to talk about Beyoncé and how she messed up her brand. She made a huge brand faux pas and her own fans step back on it. Also, Russ, the artist Russ has actually broken down a major problem that many other artists are having in terms of their brand. He analyzed people's YouTube page, no, their Instagram page to explain how these artists are messing up in a game. So as you can see, this episode is going to be very heavy on the branding talk. Get ready. But before we get into that, this topic right here is blowing people's mind because the AI allowing people to make music sounding like whoever, whoever is blowing people's minds, but it's also scaring some folks as well. Let's have that quick talk. Jay Z's engineer breaks down why AI is going to take a terrible turn for artists and mess up a lot of people's careers. But first, let's start with this little clip right here. This is my voice without the Kendrick Lamar AI voice filter. And this is my voice with the Kendrick Lamar voice filter. Let it run, DC. Let it run. Wish I could go back to the beginning. Are they gonna go and fake a Kendrick? They could never capture all my essence. My justice simply haven't in case you let get the message. Let him pray now. That clip for those who just listened on the podcast was a guy who looks nothing like Kendrick Lamar. Chubby white guy with beard, glasses. Saying, hey, this is what my voice sounds like without the Kendrick Lamar filter. This is what it sounds like with the Kendrick Lamar filter. And young guru has broken down a lot of reasons why this is scary. The biggest thing skipping right to it is the fact that there is no copyright for voice today. Yeah. Right. So it's fun. It's all funny games until something takes a turn right now. Some people are being open that, oh, this is a AI sample. Is the AI flip or whatever a cover or whatever you want to call it. But what happens when you have a song that's blowing up and they really think it's an artist and it's not that artist? I don't know yet. Well, I guess because one is going to happen. Like we was just talking about that, right? Like it's going to happen at some point because the people who aren't really paying attention to add like that. It's going to hit that pocket. They're going to think it's real and we're going to have to deal with the ramifications of that. And I'm also just thinking about, you know, we were also talking about, I was saying, you know, conspiracy theory. Cory is like, okay, if they're trying to get us to accept AI and get us to be okay with it. They're doing a good job because they're leading with entertainment, right? That's what you always got to do. It's funny memes, funny memes, cool songs. Oh, listen to, listen to Uzi cover a future song. It's all like fun and entertaining stuff. But what about when the first malicious fan is like, oh, I'm going to put out, I don't know, Uzi dissing the president or some shit like that. You know what I'm saying? Because it's going to get there, bro. It's going to get there because like I said, somebody in the back end is going to accelerate it or a fan is going to do it. You know, we know, we know how fans can kind of go with this stuff. Well, I like that you said that because you said Uzi dissing the president. We're not even just talking about music, right? It could literally just be a clip and then you do a deep fake face on top of it. And then somebody is really saying and doing something that looks and feels to be them. Yeah. But I reeling it back and going back to music. Now we already had this. I feel like we had this conversation first, but now we've seen other people talk about it. Talk about it because we didn't get to drop that clip. But that's from that, that one episode. Yeah, that episode where the audio messed up. Well, it literally just was gone. But so if you are an artist and you create a reference track, right? Before we've always had artists in reference tracks. We all always had a songwriter send demos. Well, now that I can send a demo in your voice. Don't change the game. That's going to change the game. Well, that's a better selling point because I could make you like it more if I send you a demo in your voice, right? Yeah. But even greater, if I'm the artist on the other side at some point, I say, well, shit, I might not even need to rerecord this because they hit it in a way that's so perfect. And now being an artist looks like, oh, let me just get a bunch of, you know, songwriters, let them send in their references, producers, all that. And then all I do is approve. It's like signing off. Yep. This could be officially a Kanye West song because Kanye West, especially somebody like him, right? He already works with a bunch of people anyway. It's an orchestra of individuals. So there's a lot of people. As a matter of fact, some of these artists that we say need a ghostwriter at the beginning, they've accused a lot of women artists in the past about this type of thing. So you can literally build an artist. Yeah. Like we talk about social media being the error where, oh, there's just this personality. And then all of a sudden you get a song. I mean, give them a song because they're not popping. Music is going to be popping because they already got an audience. Well, what if I can truly build an artist? I can have Jacory just rap, write everything and then make it ice spice. Yeah. So the artist never has to do anything. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So I don't know, man. We're about to enter a really, I don't know. That's kind of adult error too, though. Delegating the creativity, you know, in a way that's kind of hard. I know it sucks from these anti-artists, but damn, that's kind of hard. That's how I'm saying it, bro. We was just saying that, man. Like I as a fan, I'm very excited to see where this goes. As a music industry professional, I'm just glad I'm not a songwriter or artist. You know what I'm saying? Thankfully, I'm on the other end of it. Well, we can look at it that way. But I don't know. I'd be empowered if I was a songwriter. Well, okay. Yeah, actually, right. Songwriter producer, yeah, 100% because like, yeah, I think that's what's going to change the most off of this, but the reference game or just like you said being able to amplify the selling point of the song just off of being able to input your personality and your little cadences and things like that. Oh, yes. That's going to be game changer for that end. I mean, but the regular artist that wants to, you know, put their voice out, I guess, but think about production deals again, which is in many ways is building an artist because it's developing, but it's expediting that. So now shoot, I got my producer and I'm a songwriter. I'm a songwriter. I'm I can write in different voices. You know what I'm saying? I was going to say, and that's what could be crazy, brother, building the artist thing could get really granular because sometimes like if you ever seen the artist, we're just like, maybe it's your voice, right? Like not saying it's bad or whatever, but for whatever reason, some artists have voices that people just take to a lot, a lot more of otherwise. So like now I can just go, I can, I can go find someone whose voice I like and like, yo, their voice is crazy, but they just suck at the cadence or they suck at, you know what I'm saying? Like staying on beat or something and then pair that with the ayasha from crazy breath. We're on the same page. I was about to say, as an example of this, do you remember when young GZ talked about Kanye taking his voice? Yeah, just a year. Yeah, like, because GZ has such a distinct and dope voice. That was an example of him using that, right? Just using GZ as ad libs because he has such a dope voice. So that's the exact same concept. I'm going to go find dope voices. There's no difference than me being a producer and I'm walking around and I hear some construction and I record it on my recorder and then I take it back to the studio and flip it. You know what I'm saying? You imagine that conversation. You're like, hold on real quick, bro. I like your voice. Can I get like a quick 30 seconds, man? It should kind of fall out. The gravel in the voice was perfect for this one song I got. Hey, I got real nice little rasp. You know, I'm saying that's you literally now can use the entire world as as I don't want to say the cameras, but just raw materials. All raw materials. I see this. I see this. I can mix and match every single thing when before you had to get the person to agree to it. You gotta give them an agreement and show up. So just imagine you seeing your voice on something. You're like, man, that's my voice. How do you even argue that sometimes? Because they might say I like your voice and then they just get catch that from this video. It's not even like they met you in person. So now you're like, well, I never met this person in person. How can I prove this is my voice? You're right. You're like, man, I think that's me. Yeah, you know, I feel like if it was me and just know taking to me personally, I feel like I would know. Of course you would know. How do you prove it's somebody else? Yeah, I mean, hopefully, hopefully, I'm gonna say hopefully my people would know me well enough to know, but that's not true, because I've been hearing some deep fake oozy songs. I've been all over them shit. It's like, damn, man, when was he put this out? Government wise, money wise, that's the part you're going to want. You're not going to care if I'm like, yeah, that's your corey voice. It don't matter if Sean agrees. You're gonna be mad at money not coming. That's what's the part. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what's so interesting about like all the verification, you know what I'm saying? Talk that's going on, you know, everybody's talking about verification to protect against like AI images. I'm like, I'm, I'm, I don't know, man. The images for me or whatever, but that's the voice thing that's fucking me up. It's like, man, you know, like that they've been I was I was just showing Sean before this episode like the progress of the AI right like last year when they dropped the juice world. Hey dad, the Lila to the shit that's been coming out in the last like couple of days, bro. That's that progress over a year span is like crazy. Yeah. I'm saying, yeah, from like robotic sounding to like, oh, damn moving on the fly hearing this really quickly. I couldn't tell even if I sat with it for a while. Some of them I still can't tell. So that's just what's interesting to me, man. It's like, I feel like the conversation around what are we going to do for this really got started with the initial young guru, I G clip, but it doesn't feel like it went far. You know, and I feel like we got at least another like four or five months of like jokes and games and how this is pretty funny. Look at kind of saying I spice and then some some shit gonna go down and we all gonna play. Oh, shit. You know what I'm saying? Oh, this is this is serious. We're going to see it now and it's going to be a fan. I'm telling you a fang for the game. Always. Yeah. It's going to be a new age fan. New age fans. Let's read Young Guru's post real quick. He said, I've been trying to tell everyone that this is where we are now with AI. For some reason, this one guy, everyone's attention and this post is not his original post that got taken down, but it's on the JZ remakes. That sounds a lot like JZ. So what so what do we do on one hand? I'm well aware that you can't stop technology. Once the genie is out of the box, you can't put it back in. On the other hand, we have to protect the rights of artists, not only artists, but everyone in society. People should not be able to take your name image and likeness without permission. You have to add the voice to this law. Again, that's not a thing right now. You cannot copyright your voice yet. We have to learn from past mistakes. You would be a fool to chase every person that is going to do this. We learned that lesson with Napster. The only way I see to deal with it is to change the law. There are so many different options. We could change the United States law tomorrow, but the internet is worldwide. What a time to live in. Oh, I didn't think about that. Yeah, because even changing in the U.S. doesn't mean you're changing it globally. So that's a whole another thing. And yes, to this point, you can't chase down all the individuals either. But we know technology moves so fast. What's the damage that's going to be done before the regulations of government catches up? That's always the game that's being played. It's going to be years. Years. At least three. We'll see. We'll see. And before we move on and get into the branding, branding talk, we got to talk about likeness and even how all this AI puts you in a position where you really need to make sure your brand is intact and you build something meaningful. But likeness. So him talking about likeness. Remember when we had our original conversation, I was talking about likeness being so important and how Michael Jordan was the only person in the NBA who owned his likeness like in the 90s. He didn't do whatever the deal was. Obviously he's Michael Jordan. He was on another level. So he had that type of leverage. Yeah. So that was why Michael Jordan wasn't in the other video games because NBA sells it off to NBA 2K, NBA Jam, all these different games. Michael Jordan was like, I'm cool on this one. I'm cool on this one. He had different reasons or nuances apparently on what he maybe he liked that he was represented. Maybe he wasn't realistic enough or I don't know what all the different reasons when he approved the game or not. But like having that type of leverage push you in a different position and likeness. That's the power of likeness. So for people to be able to take that away by using this AI like we think it's all funny games, but it's such a monetary opportunity to use likeness. It's something that is about to be played with heavily and we're not to watch because then that also alludes to Snoop Dogg. What do you just do with his likeness? He just gave his likeness to it was either NFT related or he just gave his likeness to something big, whatever, or maybe I wish I could remember what it was. No, it wasn't the wrestling. Let me we're just gonna have to bring up the Snoop Dogg thing later. But like the point is owning your likeness and how you monetize that likeness is extremely important, but without the laws of place and how do you really take advantage of it? You're only going to have the official corporations that always got to pay because they're easy to sue right in attack, but you'll have a lot of people on the Underworld world like just regular societal level always flipping people's likeness. Now you can't catch all of it, right? Because I might flip your likeness just enough of me to get to the next level and then all right cool. I'm legit now. Right? It's the same thing is like dealing drugs until you get legit. They're like, I'm gonna flip these likenesses and do all these other black hat things until I get to a certain level and now I'm in the game, right? So that's the world we're moving into for that being said. Quick second. Have you ever seen an artist catch some traction and then they start to move the numbers start to grow. They might even go viral, but then fast forward a year from now somehow their numbers haven't really grown that much. They drop back close to the same monthly listeners they had before the traction and viral moment. Well, that's because you have to know how to convert those moments into careers. And we've done this again and again with not only songs but artists. And so has J.R. McKee who's been a part of helping artists like Lil Dirk Rod Wave, Justin Scott and Money Long. And we just did a collab where J.R. McKee does a step-by-step breakdown of how he took money long from zero to millions of monthly listeners and winning a Grammy over Beyonce, Mary J. Blyes and Jasmine Sullivan. Check out this breakdown while we still have it up. You can check it out at www.brandmannetwork.com. Don't forget the www or it won't work. Again, that's www.brandmannetwork.com. Slash Grammy back to the video. AI is something that's going to be really important in terms of the ability for other people to cap off of an artist brand, but if your brand is not right in the first place, what are they going? Yeah, what are they going? Yeah, what are people even care about? So to Russ's point, artists, y'all need to get your IG pages together and what that looks like depends on who you are. I'm going to let Russ speak on it. Something every independent artist should know should be doing. Making sure that without trying too hard that you are making the brand called you. I've come across a lot of artists, a lot of up-and-coming artists who they might have cool music or potential, but you go to their page and it just looks like there's no branding, meaning like what are you about outside of the music? What are you about? Well, how do you approach your content? How do you approach your style of everything? Like what's the brand that gets people to buy into you as a person? Like I feel like for me, people have bought into the music, but people are still around now. I'm going, I'm going on seven years in this shit now. You know, I grew up in 2016. About to be 2023. And I think people are still here because yeah, the music, but also because they brought into me as a person and what I'm about and what I talk about. And I think that's really important. All right, cool. What do you talk about? Who are you as a person? I think a lot of these people when they hear branding, they always, always, always go to their aesthetic. And that was the thing that killed me when I first started working with artists. There's this thing in people's mind, maybe cause it's more creative in this space. They always think it's steady. It's like, oh man, what does my page look like? This is my brand. I'm using this color in this color. Brand is so much more than that. So if you look at Russ, his page isn't extremely like one vibe or another, but what do you say? People brought it to him as a person and what he talks about. All right. So what does Russ talk about? What do you think when you think Russ? Business, music, industry, advice, sprinkled of drama here and there. You know, you know, he's almost like, I don't know. I put him in the same bucket as like the, the Russell, you know what I'm saying? Like the artists who found a way to stay music industry adjacent when they're not making music. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a rap Gary Vee. Exactly. It's exactly what it's like. Actually a great description. Yeah. So when you think about that, though, again, that's something that people can connect with. People know that he's about independence or business and doing things a certain way and watch him do it. Yeah. Watch me do it in real time. I'm going to do the work. You know what I mean? I'm an entrepreneur. That's his mentality and people buy into that who don't necessarily like his music, right? And he have people who like his music who might not fully like connect with that message or care as much. But overall people understand that that's who he is beyond the music. Yeah. So who are you beyond the music? And then who are you within the music? And I think both of those are brands that people need to think about where I know a lot of artists don't want to show who they are beyond the music period, right? But what is your IG? What is your TikTok? What do they communicate? That's your food for thought, right? It doesn't have to be these high res videos because usually that's not going to be your brand unless you're like the weekend and you're doing, you know, these movie style videos, you know? But like, what do you, what do you talk about? What do you look like? What do you sound like? What do you hang around or who do you hang around? Like what's the environment you work within? Know where you're where, right? All those are different elements that create brand and brand impression. And you can lean into one heavier, right? Than others because there's people who are, I'm heavy in the fashion space and people think that first, right? Oftentimes the superstars have like multiple of those, but it's still done over time. You usually have to enter first with like one, maybe two real strong. Yeah, that you really lean into. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So I mean, I think the simplest way to explain, I've kind of found explain brand is what do you want people to think about when they hear your name or see you, right? Like, what do you want people to think about? What do you want people to think about you? Like whatever those things are that is your brand. So when I see, when they see me, I want people to think about fun and family and finance. My brand is fun family finance, right? So because I think, I don't know, I wish we could as a collective, like come together and change like branding to like personality building because that's basically what it is. Like branding is just building a personality, right? It's like you come in, the artist is kind of like a husk outside of whatever we're hearing in the music and branding is over time like building the personality of this person to the audience, right? So that's what I don't know. I feel like it could be, I wish it could be changed to something like that, but that's what that's how I'm kind of like just best explained to people. Like what do you want people to think about when they see you or hear your name or see your face? Like what do you want people to think about you when they see your name, hear your face or anything like that, right? Right. Now with that same thing in mind, a rich music executive broke down while so many artists are having struggles when it comes to figuring out what their brand is today versus the old days. Check this out right here. It takes more to make it today, but it's easier. It takes more thought, but it's easier. The old music business was like a supermarket. When you went to the supermarket, someone had to bring you in. That was a gatekeeper, a production company, a manager, someone who we trusted brought you in and then when you came in, they said, this is the aisle you belong in. Oh, Tamir, you're a soulful R&B singer. You belong here. Then we will put you there. And then the other gatekeepers will shine a light on you and people will discover you. That was the old way of the music business. The new music business is an open marketplace. So now everybody can walk in the supermarket, but now you got to decide where you belong on. I think a lot of the reason why people are frustrated because they're on the wrong aisle or they're not packaging themselves correctly. If you are peanut butter, let's find the aisle where the jelly lives. It takes more to make it today, but it's easier. It takes more thought, but it's easier. The old music business was like a supermarket. I see it right there. It's a bar. And this is why I always say people need to spend more time on the front end thinking. A lot of people hop straight into it and or they do stuff lazily. And I want to say lazily in terms of it didn't take you effort. I'm talking about lazily in terms of like the placement of where you belong, how you fit into things and how the overall creative is going to connect with people. And that's the thing that becomes an X factor. You can figure it out along the way. That's also great to avoid paralysis and analysis, but man, I think that is the struggle. Not just the saturation of the game, but now you have to be able to think about this where before someone was telling you where you go. There were these boxes and we're like, oh, no, I don't like the box that you can't put me in a box. But guess what? Boxes made it easy. The boxes made it easy. Boxes made it easy. And people are starting to see that. Artists are starting to see that because whether or not you like the box or not when it comes to generating a fan base and being able to monetize off of that, boxes still come into play. Yeah, bro, we as consumers love boxes. You know what I'm saying? I love a girl. Yeah, like we don't, but we do. Yeah, this is my R&B crowd. This is my underground rap crowd or whatever. And I mean too, like right at the annuals point, the boxes also just help you figure out like how to tell you the messaging, right? So everything you said earlier, your brand is how you speak, but what you talk about, who you hang around, what you wear, what you do, things like this. The boxes help you figure it out. Hey, I speak to the emo rap crowd. I know they like Doc Martens and they eat at Chipotle and they wear these obscure-ass underground brands. You have a clear image of who you're talking to, right? And then sometimes what gets me about artists in the boxes is when they disagree with being in the box. It's like, hey, even the issues and things that you talk about, that you represent are the people more than likely in this box. Or they're in some box, you just haven't found the box yet, right? So like the boxes admit, I think artists see the boxes as almost being like disrespectful to the art. You're saying I sound like someone or move like someone artistically. And when someone puts you in the box, it's not necessarily what we're saying. We're just saying like, hey, you were talking to the same group of people that this person is talking to, right? You are trying to convert the same group of people that this person is. And these are all the things that he or she has done before you that has worked to attract this group of people. This group of people that for the most part all like some very similar things that we can tell you, hey, you wanna relate to the people in this crowd, go get you some Doc Martens. Next time you do an interview, wear Doc Martens, you know what I'm saying? And let them catch you at your next show with a T-shirt from this obscure underground brand and only people in that community know about, right? So if the box like helps point you in the right direction. Bro, and love it or hate it, that's how people think. Yeah. Like it sounds so trivial. Everybody loves this idea of not being superficial, bro. All y'all superficial. Everybody. All of us. You see, like you said, you see somebody wearing something that you recognize and now you feel like they know something that you know, right? And whatever made you be able to connect with that thing, you feel like they have similar values, right? So now you like them, you feel closer to them or it could be the opposite. Oh snap, this person's wearing that. And I hate that, right? It's like the perfect symbol of that over the last, what, four years was the MAGA hat, right? Yeah. Perfect. There was a very strong idea of what that stood for and people really loved it. People really hated it, but it meant something. Yeah. And we're doing that with everything. It's just not as strong. So we might not communicate it outwardly, but down to how you wear your hair, you know what I'm saying? Down to, you know, whether your clothes are tighter or a baggier or do you switch it up and all these different things, patterns, people pay attention to those. And even if you don't think you notice, there's like something in you, right? There's an instinct, that animal idea. Like that just judges, bro. We have to judge. People always try to get rid of this idea of judgment. Judgment is what allowed us to survive in the wild. Judgment is what's going to allow us to survive and navigate the wild of social media in today's society. It's just a different type of judgment. Some of it might be unfounded. We know, yes, but nobody's going to stop doing it because nobody has time to truly understand and figure shit out, right? Like for every single person, I can't get to know everybody to know them truly. Therefore, I'm going to have to have this shorthand way of saying, oh man, he wears that shirt. Okay, but, you know, he likes that artist. Okay, but, you know, that's my type of guy. Might be wrong, you know? Been wrong before, right? Oh, dang, man. Just threw out that word. I thought we were cool, buddy, but like, that's kind of the way to understand how much you need to do it as an artist. Like when you just extrapolate it into regular society and it's so obvious that way, it's like, it's no way I could be an artist and expect to like go around this system. Yeah, that's right. Like you expect people to just become morally pure when it comes to music? No, of course not. It doesn't make sense, man. Because nowhere else in my life should I have to do this, right? Or I do, I have to do it. So going back to the less, you know, philosophical aspect of it, but also just the idea of regular organization in general, right? My genres and vibes that I'm going for. So less about me judging who you are and whether I, for whether I like you or not, but also when do I want to experience you? What do you fit in my life? Where do you fit in my life? Is this for turn up time? All right, are you turn up Tommy? Or are we like on the romance vibes when you play your music? All right. Or are we in the family cookout when we play your music? All of those are different things, right? And people have people in their lives that they can take to these certain events and might not fit in another event, right? It's all the same. We're doing it all the time, man. You as an artist representing yet just another human to him at the end of the day still fall under these same type of restrictions. Yeah, that's true. Use them to your advantage though. Use them to your advantage. And that's part of what branding is. Manipulating those same foundations. Now, you got something else you're going to add on that one? Man, that was beautiful. Hey, well look, we're going to continue this branded conversation by skipping to the Beyonce side of things. Oh, okay. Should we play clip or let you talk about it? I feel like it's better that you just talk about it. Better than if I talk about it. You know, I mean, better you describe what happened versus just. No, oh wait, because I love to be honest. I think it's my Sierra thing. It's Beyonce and Sierra. And all right. I see what she doing, man. You're going to play dumb. Well, he want me to talk about it. No, man, because I know. I feel like I missed the Beyonce one. The other ones I know, but. All right, so let's do this. Oh, never mind. It's okay. Let's start with Sierra and then flip it into Beyonce and Chloe Bailey. There's a very, very strong movement that's been happening where people have been noticing some things. All right, and we're going to start with Sierra because there's an article. I could just read it straight up. It'll be easier to describe and it's not my own word. Listen, social media reacts to Sierra previewing girl power song for the girls that don't need no man. That's the quote, right? So before we get into fan reactions, let me just actually read these words. This is for the girls that get money. This is for the girls that don't need no man. This is for the girls in love with their self. This is for all the girls that done did it by themselves. This is for all the girls that are IND. I cannot do this on fuck. I hate that. This is for all the girls that are independent. I'm not about to say that because I'm fucking when I sing the way we saw. All right, so people are basically saying, yo, Sierra, you got Russell Wilson. Yeah. Like this doesn't make any sense. What are you talking about this independence? She's preaching independence and stay. Wait, no, not stay single. You can be independently married or independently single to what? See, I'm not. I'm not. We're going to, it's going to be a lot of editing around this cause this is confusing. We didn't get to do enough pre-production on this article. I didn't know it was going to be this bad. Okay. This is embarrassing to watch a married woman sing a song like this. You do not care about black. You do not care about the black woman in your community. You can easily make love songs since you are in love with your husband, but you are purposely choosing to make a living that will encourage the women in our community to stay single because you know that's what sells and makes money. Please make it make sense. Bring back, bring back love songs and stop trying to rob your community. Another fan said, okay, I love you CC, but you're married now. Let's change the narrative. We do need men and it's not always about money. You are a family woman sing about that encourage a generation of wives and mothers, but I guess I'll wait to hear the rest of the song. And then another fan said we need more songs promoting togetherness. Now, why is this so important? Why are we talking about this on the branding episode? Well, to touch on Beyonce slightly and it went viral on a freshen fit podcast clip that was like on Twitter. No, TikTok, I think it was, but apparently they were saying basically the same thing. They were saying what Beyonce makes all these independent women songs that she's telling you all these types of things. Yeah. If you look at her life, she was with this with Jay-Z Jay-Z cheated and she's still with Jay-Z. All right. Now I think actual relationships are more complicated than that, but the general idea that we want to touch on is more so the messaging that sells and how people try to lean their brands into that, but when you start to get to a certain level and people really know your life, how hard that can be to just to just capitalize on a message and that works. So it's like is your brand congruent with who you really are because these people they know they do know it sells. Yeah. Yeah. They see the numbers. They talking to the the marketing managers and all that. You know, we all know. So how do you how do you move in a environment when you know your brand isn't the sexiest brand anymore? Even though you're on that level. Man, that's a that's a that's a great question. Sean, I think it's only really one or two things you can do. You either lean into it and your new brand becomes you know, you know, like I love the phase when all the artists are going through to watch me go through this new chapter in my life. You can always pull the new chapter in my life. You know what I'm saying? Especially if you've been around like long enough. So either you you ride the changes and you stand on that or you go into something else and you let knock you out. That's almost that's what happened to most artists. You know what I'm saying? Like like let's say for example, like think of all of the 2016 to 2018 like kind of like bubblegum trap artists that were really popular, right? And then what was it? Probably like 2020 ish is kind of like when the sound changed towards more like the rap of these stuff, right? You start getting like, you know, Meg and like the baby and all of them start popping more. So all the artists that were in that lane talking about things that appeal to that group of artists, they either switched up, right? Start talking about new things about what they were currently in life or they fell off with the musical trend. You know what I'm saying? And now they either do other things that make different music genres or their their fan bases aren't as lively as it once was. But that to me is really all of this. Like you either evolve and you take this new group of people with you or you go do something else. You know what I'm saying? Because very rarely does trying to go against that work out well. Like just we just see with the Sierra Club. Like I said, the audience, like they're too quick to call you out on it. You know, and it's like it's a special. Yeah, these are special. I was like, yo, we see all this stuff about you. This doesn't make sense for you to be at this point in your life unless you as an artist are willing to give us to consume more information, more context on why we should believe and support this and go along with this. But what you have presented to me is not clicking. And so I'm just going to go find something that does represent this thing better, right? Because I think that's where sometimes artists get confused. They think that we as consumers just want to see who can who can portray the lifestyle the best, right? Whatever that lifestyle is, whatever genre you in and lifestyle that sells, you know, genre just that, right? Yeah. When really it's about who makes us believe the lifestyle the most. Yeah, typically what is not about who portrays are the best. Who makes me believe it the most? In today's era, 100% people want to believe everything. Everything is more of a reality TV show or they're opting in and they want to feel that it's real where before you just want to hear a great voice sing a great song, right? That was what it was back in the day. You didn't necessarily have to believe that I don't know whoever was whatever they were singing, but in that same vein, there was some level of understanding when I know they understood it back there, but there was some level of still navigating the brain in that way to where you would still try to appear to be single, right? Or you would appear to be a ladies man and be with somebody for periods of time. Like all those PR moves and tricks basically played to this same thing, right? Well, I need to stay single that people don't need to see me with my girl all the time or see or people don't need to see me with my man all the time because my fans might not be able to believe me the fantasy of me that I'm selling and there's a difference between the brain that I'm selling and who I am as an individual. So when we switch from the rest clip of being able to get people to understand who you are as an artist and who you are as a person so they can love you more than the music itself. Well, you didn't have to be at a reconcile that with the other side. Well, what if who you are as a person? Fuck up people's perception of you as an artist. Yeah, it happens a lot. It happens a lot. Like sometimes you just, you just, I mean, I keep bringing the story up. But like I said, like the example when I saw the rapper I was hanging out with check his bank account brother that I will never let that go, bro. Let's just burn me to this day because it is my first time ever seeing that. You know what I'm saying? I was like, man, fiscally responsible. Yeah, actually, I didn't think about that. Maybe you probably wasn't fiscally responsible, but me back then. You just thought he didn't have enough money. Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm saying. That's how I took it. I was like, oh shit, man. Like he's unsure if he has enough money for this purchase he's about to make. And I just had never seen that at that point in my life. I've never seen like a rapper look concerned about the things in the checkout line. You know what I'm saying? So it threw me. Actually, it's all ignorant, bro. It is, bro. Like looking back on it, saying it out loud, it is stupid as fuck. But back then, bro, I just remember being just like shook like, damn, bro. He checking his bank of America out, bro. Like what you mean? I love it. I love it. But I will also give artists like Sierra and Beyonce to Ben and for the doubt because they are artists that grew up in the era that was perfectly fine with selling characters now transitioning into a generation that values authenticity, right? And so, like I said, to our point is like, hey, we know the value authenticity or they just want to be able to believe. We value the perception of authenticity. I think you are as real as you are letting me believe you are. You know what I'm saying? Exactly. And with what you've given me, that's all I can see. So I'm cool with that. That's really how we think. I'm like, you know, as consumers, we know that I only get so much information on the other side of the screen, you know what I'm saying? We know that every influencer artist's personality is basically their own media brand and media brands are only going to let out the information they want you to know now what sucks for artists and things that as you get bigger, you start to lose less control of your narrative because there are more people documenting you and paying attention to what you do, right? In the beginning, you could just lie. You could lie on every video that you put out and nobody would know the wiser. Once you get the audience, there's people picking things out. Man, you said in this one video that you grew up in South Side Chicago, but then in this other video, you were talking about visiting your uncle in Atlanta, like, you know what I'm saying? Like what's Atlanta, Chicago, a long way away from each other. Like what you talking about, right? People start paying attention to your story and the way you presented in these different spaces and things and piecing shit together. And then like you said, if it doesn't line up, then now we're turned off from you, right? If it's not lining up with what we think you're trying to sell to us, whatever that underlying messaging or perception or whatever it's meant to be, then it turns us off from the music, unless it's like funny or something. You know what I'm saying? It's like, or it's like, that's the joke is that you're meant to be a juxtaposition of kind of what's going on. So it's wild, man. It's wild. A really interesting example I kind of saw that recently is the, what's the dude's name? Like the white kid that everybody kind of hates right now, Mabu. You heard this rap name Mabu? Oh yeah. Did you see that video that he was going viral for like a month and a half ago? Yeah, I knew with him before that and then I saw that. And yeah, we want to explain what that video was. Yeah, man. So essentially like Mabu is like this 16 year old rapper that like popped on TikTok. Maybe a year or two years ago at this point. And he's in the trap rap world, right? So going back, that's the new trap rap world. That suggests there's some skinny rich white kid hanging up with these hood niggas from wherever, whatever. And he dropped this video. I'm thinking, I can't think of a name. It sounds like go, go to the hood. I want to go to the hood or something like that where he's playing the character of a suburban kid who wants to go visit the hood, you know what I'm saying? And then it plays along with the lines of the song. He said, I took a trip to the hood so I can make it out. And I was like, man, this is like, this is extreme character selling, you know what I'm saying? It makes me think six, nine of those artists who sometimes wouldn't like go to that extreme to like sell the character because if nothing about him makes me believe it. You know what I'm saying? Other than the fact that he has money. I personally believe. I mean, that is believable. No, I mean, the wanting to go. That concept, go to the hood so I can make it out a suburban kid and I'm just playing around. No one's believing that either actually hood, right? Or, you know, came up by that environment. Yeah. To me, it's not the character. If anything, if he's selling a character, the problem is it is believable that he's this person that little brother, like let's just get to it. We know our people. We know how people are mad at this, right? Like is, you know, whether we want to say appropriation, whether we want to say just not having an understanding of what you're dealing with and how like real, what you're talking about is all of his trash. Yeah, he's 16, but there's enough people around him and there was enough black people in that video where I wouldn't look. I don't know how much money he paid them black dudes to be in that video. But again, if they, if they are taking money from him, they're in the same position as 69, right? The gang that was around 69. Because 69 was obviously violating, like real gang behavior. He was not, he didn't go by the code. He wasn't like officially one of them, right? Any of those things. So then when shit went left, then wait, what's going on? Like how could he beat do this? Well, you let him in. You already knew he really wasn't cut from the same cloth. It's the same thing. Yeah, y'all taking this money or y'all like trying to use this kid for some clout or whatever. But the reality is, like, it is what it is. Yeah. Like this is not, y'all aren't cut from that same cloth. And if he go left and decide to do like an Adam 22, then y'all gonna feel crazy, right? Which he probably will at some point, man. They all do. But I was thinking about it because I was thinking like, man, who was the last like artist like this that really took off? And then first I was like, oh, it was a kid Leroy. When the kid Leroy first came out, remember, he was hanging out. You remember a kid Leroy coming up, bro? He was hanging out with Dirk. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But he, I don't know, I don't know how to explain it. It was like different. Like he was different because he didn't, he didn't try to make himself seem someone he wasn't. Yeah. Well. No, yeah, I can't say. Yeah, I'm gonna say. But it wasn't as extreme. He wasn't trying to make us believe that he lived the same life. Right. He didn't try to make himself believe he lived a certain lifestyle. He might have changed his outlook to maybe identify a little bit more with a certain audience. But you know, at the end of the day, that's also just tattoos, right? Like, so who to say, right? But like, like, so tattoos don't necessarily make you hood or anything, but he hung around a certain type of people. But those were, didn't they find him? Yeah, they did. So like, these are the people who signed me. Like, so what can I do about that? Right. And this is how they said they wanted to make me up as an artist. And I think that's a part of it too. Right. So you have Derek and someone who already has a name and then, you know, they're kind of building the artists or introducing them to a world and there's some decisions that get made that probably are decisions that are seen from the way they view the world. But yeah, killer Roy didn't like ever hourly that I'm aware of like, you know, so they keep that right there. He didn't ever hourly that I'm aware of, try to put himself out in a way that made him seem like he's this guy, which, which reminds me real quick. Got to mention another example of the Beyonce Sierra thing and selling something that you aren't necessarily as well is the Ja Rule situation, right? OG one. OG. Over this time. Right. Well, if it's as true as 50 Cent makes it seem, right? Ja Rule was this good, good dude from a good background. But then he put on this hood persona and hung more around that crowd because that was what he was attracted to it. And then he made all these great songs for women. But then he also he could have just continued to be big there, but then he played himself by leaning so hard into the murder and get in that whole vibe. Right. But we know what was also selling heavily at hip hop at the time because you got to throw in that. I mean, we are talking about Lil Mabu and we mentioned 6ix9ine and all that as well. Just want to make sure is you just balance. We're not just saying because it was one of the hood misrepresenting their brains. It's across all sides. It's been happening for a long time. But you think about like Tupac. Tupac is a great example of it, right? Beautiful example actually. Why one of the best historical examples, you know what I'm saying? Not at all what he appeared to be. So that's why, you know, I don't know. But I think that's an important thing for us to think about when it just called Tupac 6ix9ine. The OG 6ix9ine. I think I did. I didn't mean to, but I think I did. It was true, but I remember watching this like old interview with somebody. I can't remember who it was. I was talking about like how like just lost he got in the character from Juice, you know what I'm saying? And how much of an impact they had on everything, bruh. And it's like, it's wild to think about, bruh. And you think of it then fast forward like years later and you think about the dude, I can't think his name, but the dude that played the Joker in the Dark Knight movie. Heath Ledger. Heath Ledger, bruh. And you start to think about what somebody's actor would be going through, living a character. And then you pull yourself out of movies and think about music. It's not so hard to think about artists going through the same thing, right? I build this character. I started, I have to be this character 85 to 95% of my time and I started to believe I really am this character. You know, that shit happens a lot. Oh, that makes it harder. Yeah. Like I think artists have it harder when they take it to that extent. I think it's more of a norm for actors to go really deep into a character, but if a musician ever goes as deep as an actor might, let's just say in real deal method acting, the musician 100% has it worse because there's a start and end date to that movie, right? And then there's an expectation on the consumer in that you are acting and playing a character. But as an artist, the consumers, they expect that to actually be who you are. So now you have the world around you validating because you're playing this out in the real world. You're bringing this person into a real world. So if let's just pretend like I'm the Joker, right? It's one thing I do this in a movie, but if I do some Joker shit to you in real life, I'm going to get repercussions, right? You know what I'm saying? So the musicians are doing it in the world, not the simulation of a movie. So I think that leads to a lot of the mental health things that we see, which we're going to get into when we talk to Sam next episode. I mean, it's a weird space. I don't want to go too deep there because I know we're going to talk about it. I don't want to stay on the branding aspect of things and that little Marvel situation. I think I just put that in the back of my head. I was thinking about it because the clip hit my time and I was like, man, I hate that stuff. Yeah, I was like, man, it's interesting. I think because like we're so used to seeing like people come up like that who try to get us to believe that they are a part of their lifestyle. But he's the first person I've seen that building the character like, no, I don't live it. I'm just rich enough to be able to observe it. You know what I'm saying? And get access to observe it when I want to. I was just like, man, I think that's almost more violated. Yeah, it is not. I agree. I think so. Yeah, because it's like, it's like I see you as a cage. Yeah, I'm gonna come play in. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And I think, of course, that's where the obvious offense is. But the thing is, is it always going to work because the people who don't understand are going to only be more on his side. Like the upward of polarization is just going to make people love him more. Like, oh, y'all don't get it. Y'all don't get him. This isn't even that serious. And he's not racist or that. That's just going to make them love him more. Yeah, it's going to be 6-9 all over again. It's going to be 6-9 all over again, except for racial, which 6-9 wasn't a racial thing. It was more gang and just like other students. And you have the kid shield. Right. And you got the kid shield. All the gang, the gang that they, you know, the gangs that get played. You know, I now know I was immature. Like all those type of things. But like, and I think that's where the calculator risk is. There's a lot of people who get credit for being like marketing geniuses, who I'll call them, who may be more courageous than genius because there are certain moves that just work and they're simple moves, but they're hard to do. If you aren't willing to take the force that it comes with. Got to be willing. That's all it is. It's not a genius move. It's just a move that most people are scared to do. Yeah. Or you have to be ignorant enough to do it, which is a lot of times why you see younger kids do it because they don't quite, they truly don't quite understand. All right. Everything that they're doing at the moment. But, but yeah, I think that his situation is going to be interesting to see how that develops. But yeah, you it's at this space where again, we're only going to have people get deeper on his side and where they see anything like that. It's always going to create intention in general just because of how it's done. And then on the other side, I don't think he'll ever have too much damage because it's not pop in the lens and it's in a world today where everything is so segmented. You're not going to get enough of black people to even be aware for it to even matter. Yeah. You know what I mean? And, you know, you can enter any community, right? But like, you're just not going to have enough people aware of some of these types of things are doing these type of moves. They the risk is pretty low unless you go again to the pop level. You're trying to run from president or something one day. Or to your point, it somehow crosses over to the other side. Somehow across. Yeah. And they learn like, oh, shit, this is what? Yeah. Bug is going on. Right. Right. Yeah. That is that. Now, last thing on branding that we got to talk about and that is, I don't know. Artists, you can play yourself with your brand. You can lean into some of these things just like what we just talked about. Right? Characters. Is there a moment that you can lean into a character? You can lean into an image and it bites you in the back as an artist. A perfect example based on what your courier has told me is Chloe Bailey. Can you walk through? Bro, you are funny, bro. You are hilarious. Well, but what's the name of that movie she was just in? The one that, you know, everybody was walking out about the scene for it. I can't think of the name of the movie, but she's in a new movie with, what's his name? Dampson Idris. Okay. And look it up. They have a sex scene in the movie and there's an interview clip of her talking about how uncomfortable she was doing the sex scene and how he did a good job making her feel comfortable. The big point of that interview that I took away was there was a point when she says like, yeah, they were like, you were uncomfortable like really? And she's like, yeah, you know, everybody assumes because, you know, I kind of make like sexual music and I do sexual things. Like I'm a super sexual person, but I'm not, you know, like I'm actually very conservative and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, this is interesting. It's interesting. Like she is, if what she's saying is true, which I believe her, I believe Chloe, because I just kind of get that vibe from her based on other artists who do sexuality in a way where I believe them. You know what I'm saying? It's probably the best way to look at it. But it's, I'm like, man, she is essentially create this character that she doesn't seem to mine. You know what I'm saying? But she is stuck in it. But she doesn't seem to mind it. You know, at least I will. She's not, she hasn't said anything. So speak more on the character that she created. The like super hyper sexual character. I mean, if you've been following like them, like, I remember the day, I think I'll tell you this over, but I remember the day when she saw that being a bad bitch was gonna open so many doors. I saw it. I saw the Instagram post that popped it all off. And I saw the moves that her team made after the Instagram post where I could tell that they realized what was going on. And so they took her brand from being, you know, that was really like family friendly, super clean, strad of Disney type shit before. And then she just 180 asks everywhere. You know what I'm saying? Just hard left run. You know what I'm saying? And like I said, but I saw the social media posts where I think the whole team realized this, this was the way to go. Or they will always like how to actually, this is conspiracy. Many things that they were always ready for. They were just waiting for her to do something that they could do to push it along. You know, there's a couple of things to that. So we know there's a move, right? When I talk about moves that aren't genius. This is just a playbook and you either do it or not. We know that the, hey, I have a squeaky clean image and then let me over sexualize myself. That's a move, right? Miley Cyrus did it. Because you know, you never did it. Rihanna did it in her own way. Like you can go down the list, right? Now the thing is with her is finding that transition. And like based on what I'm hearing, like you are, you saw that this is working for you. All right. You see this is working. I'm leaving on social media. And then I was watching grown-ish with my girl and I saw her like changing on that show too. It was interesting how this is happening in real life and on the show and they allowed that to reflect on both right and played into it. But she was literally doing that on the show. So if you don't know what grown-ish is, it's like a show where all these kids are in college, right? And so her character in college started to be more sexualized and started to like be more experimental. And you can literally see this entire evolution that you pretty much have seen if you've been to high school to college, right? And as that happens over the years and the problem then becomes when you don't have that same way of moving in real life and people don't understand that it's an image. Yeah. Right? Yeah. But again, it's one thing to do it in grown-ish. The TV show is another thing to do it on social media because people don't add it up the same. So it's like being that artist versus being the, well, no, being the musician artist versus being an actor. All right. Yeah. So I'm doing it on social media. So people, oh, what you mean that you were uncomfortable or are you now? So some people probably feel like offensive like, all right, like, come on, Shawty. Like, you already know what it is. There's those people. Then you got some people who their fantasy will be broken because they thought you were this person, right? Now it's like, oh, so she's not really about that life. And you got some people think, oh, well, you just trying to play, like, was it like play innocent? The ones that attack you, like, you're going to have all these basically bad interpretations. No matter what, it's like an L every single, every single direction, which is interesting. All right. And I think that's a especially unique space for women when it comes to, like, that topic, like this, the sexuality and where they want to get too deep into it. But it's like, I'm projecting this image. But then I'm not like this in real life, but then people question, like, well, why are you question projecting that image? All right. Especially for people who think it's a negative image and you have talent to do it without. All right. That creates that catch on you too. I don't know if there's a winning way out of that. I don't know if there's a winning way out of that argument or whatever. Other than just saying, this is what I want to do. I do what I want or something like that. And I guess let the chips fall where they may because people still going to feel however they feel. I mean, every time I see it, man, like every time I see a new like woman already started getting bad bitch, I'm like, oh, man, they've been doing the, what's her name, bro? BK the ruler, bro. They've been doing the BK the ruler. It's been it's interesting watching. I don't even know BK the ruler. Yeah, man. Looking to her pre like a year ago and then as like the last year, huge difference, bro. Huge difference in how they're branding her and putting her out. And like I saw what I did with like Tierra Whack. Like I seen the Chloe one live. I seen a couple of hours like go through the bad bitchification, you know what I'm saying? Do you think that women have to do that? I don't think they have to do it. I look at it like this with women artists. It's like, I think talent can get you very far. Talent plus ass is going to take you to the moon. You know what I'm saying? Like if we've been honest, you know what I'm saying? Like there's always been a degree of sexualization in the top 10. You know what I'm saying? Women artists. Well, I already at least last like 20, 30 years. You know what I'm saying? So I think it's one of those things. Taylor Swift have some sexualization going on. She did like a little bit, especially in this new like project, you know, she's trying to be like the whole bad girl thing. She got like a little like, you know, okay, she wearing some red lipstick might be a little top. You know, I guess that's just so far from my type. I wouldn't know. Well, that's what you would do, but she was going for it. But I mean, but even in general, man, I think just like sexual adding sex into a brand. Men or women is I think a very slippery slope. There's an actor. I can't think of his name, but his old, old dude actor that was going viral over the last couple of days because he was saying that he's tired like his fans like sexualizing him. And I've heard that from like different acts before. I've heard that from music artists. I've heard that from actors. I've seen it in person. Like I've seen an artist, a male artist dealing with his female fans and they trying to hit and he just over it. Like I seen it in his eyes, but he's like, you know what? That's fair. And I think because there's other, I mean, the dynamics are different and you don't see males lean into that as heavily because also, well, no, as often because also there's like a downside from a male perspective. Right? Like I don't typically see women. Talk down on women for being not overly sexualized overly sexualized is one thing, right? Where you like, of course, there'll be someone who have some kind of pushback or there's morally or just whatever, but like for being sexualized, typically they like sex, they promote it. They maybe appreciated. Maybe even Myra kind of gives them some ideas of how they want to present themselves or whatever or just respected. And then men obviously are like mouth thought wide open. Oh, man, I love it. I love it. I love it. You know, like being thirsty about it when a man does that though, women will uphold that man. And oh, he's sexy. But dudes, there might be a pushback like I can't follow no dude like this. I just do posting these pictures. I can't follow no man who always got his shirt off, right? You know, it's so women get gains on both sides. Men could cut off their entire like half of their audience. Yeah, I see. Yeah, I even think about that in that same way. So I think that's probably part of why they don't leave into it as as heavily or as often within a case like the Angelo. He was a perfect case. All right. He had the untitled track classic amazing black excellence yet at the same time when he did that woman like groveled over him ridiculously and he literally couldn't take it and left the industry because you pay attention to the Angelo. He's an artist artist like artists artists artists artists like when it comes to interpretation, the care for the music, how he handles himself. And I don't know if you ever heard this, but like he wasn't that dude growing up like apparently he was like overweight. It wasn't Mr. Bitch like nah, not even close to it like a like maybe like a gamer like that was before gamers was coolest gamers are today. You know what I mean? I see that's a whole side argument, but a lot of this stuff that people like to lean in today. They don't even count no more because it's cool. Like all this alt stuff is like but the alt is cool. So it's not really off. Yeah, it's cool to be different. It ain't different to be different. Exactly. I don't mean it would be different for real, but I don't get social gain from it. But but yeah, like he would really wasn't that. So he was like taking a back. It was just too much at once. And then like women wouldn't respect the music, but it was like take your shirt off. Take your shirt off at a concert and he up here trying to like, you know what I mean? Play these riffs and get one off. And it really did like get to him. It was a big thing because now he had this entire image that overtook who he wanted to present himself as and who he really identified himself as. So, you know, it can go both ways for sure. Yeah, we've seen it with like the Kevin Gates getting assaulted at his show, right? Like I have an artist homie who at one of his festival performances is one of the fans that I reached over the fence and like kissed him and he was like, he was mad about it exactly, but he was kissing a random festival stranger bro. But he was mad. He was he was salty about that shit bro. Like he was he was mad about shit the whole day like my face will feel burning man. I would not. Yeah, so it's like you see the negatives of both side which you know to take it back to the branding point is something that ours have to kind of think about, right? Because I would tell our I've had ours asked me before yo should I make my brand be built around who I am as a person, a real person or do I build my brand around a character and what I want people to think of me and the answer to that question is neither are really right or wrong. But you have to be aware of the possible consequences that come with whatever direction you choose to go. So there are real elements about your life that could bring a particular result to you. If you were to publicize it or go that way. Are you cool with the consequences and then same with the character if I make this character and this character is this type of person that these types of things am I cool with what the possible end result might be and what I might have to uphold to my audience for the rest of my career. You know, those are those are things that you have to think about when you're thinking about what direction do you want to build your brand in? And some of it is hard, right? It's hard to know that if I follow the brand path of being the cool vegan guy for the next four years, I don't know where that's going to end up or what my audience is going to think of me and what I can't change about myself five, six, seven years from them because that shit is so deep in their psyche. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, but it's the hard questions you got to think about. You know what I'm saying? Hard question. Like, no, like, like I say, like, what do you want people to think about when they see you hear your name, see your face? Like, that's essentially what you're building. Real or fake. Real or fake, right? That's up to you. That's up to you. Now, with that being said, this is yet another episode of No Labels, necessary podcast. I'm Brandon. Sean. I'm Ron Kowry. We out. Peace.