Emily White

Emily White:              How are you doing today?

Lawrence Peryer:        I’m doing all right. I’m doing all right. Yeah. As I tell people I ride the rollercoaster like everybody else. So what’s happening up there?

EW:                             I mean a lot actually. I mean New York is fine. It’s sunny out which is nice. So yeah, that’s fine. But I feel busier than ever frankly, and I feel really in my groove, not that – it’s like there’s waves of sadness, right? Depending on what’s going on. But yeah, it’s like I’m really busy. So it is what it is.

LP:                              Yeah, it’s been a strange phenomenon to be so busy in the midst of all this and to have a lot of positive professional stuff going on when you know there’s lots of other people who are suffering and losing jobs. It’s very difficult to sort of be gracious and graceful with all that.

EW:                             Yeah, well it’s the opposite of being tone deaf, right? Whatever the word – there’s much better words but that’s how I say it because it’s just like—you know, it’s like I had a book come out March 5^th and there’s artists with albums out and there’s people that had films out the week of September 11^th and things like that.

It’s everybody’s individual choice. I have no idea what Lady Gaga was planning. I’m sure it was amazing and some sort of in-person parade or something. And she pushed her album and that’s fine. And then look what’s happening with Fiona Apple. You know?

                                    So from a privilege perspective, you know, artists and creators can be creating right now. I was talking to Jeff Levin. I assume you know Jeff. And he said thank goodness this didn’t happen for artists and everybody in the 80s. Right? Or anybody? Right?  No Netflix. I’m sure there could have been positive, creative things that would have come out of that but I thought that was a smart comment.

LP:                              Yeah, that’s funny that you say that. I had that conversation with somebody a couple weeks ago more on the social isolation tip. If this had happened – even 20 years ago it would have been a little different. There might have been more faxing. But 30 years ago, it would have been – I think it would have been a national nightmare. I don’t know how people would have done it. So, yeah, I think that in that regard, we are lucky that it’s this moment.

                                    Yeah, the Fiona Apple thing is fascinating. She’s kind of hitting this status now where she’s almost like – She’s like Sade (ph). Right? Like she can go away and just drop right back in where she left off and she has a really good gauge for when is her moment. It’s really fascinating.

EW:                             I don’t think she does have a gauge for that. I’m a huge fan. I think she is a pure artist and

                                    [Gap in audio until 0:06:53] … said to this non-music friend, I said, if it takes her 10 years to make an album that good, [00:07:03].

LP:                              I’m having a little bit of internet trouble here. Hold on one second.

EW:                             No problem. Same in New York actually.

LP:                              I’ve just had something happen that I’ve never experienced before.

EW:                             It’s on my end.

LP:                              No. I was using a hot spot instead of wi-fi and my phone crashed. Never had that happen before.

EW:                             Oh, crazy.

LP:                              Kind of exciting.

                                    [Gap in audio until 0:08:25]

EW:                             Yay! There you are.

LP:                              Sorry about that. Wow. OK. Hold on one sec, just logging back into my audio. After doing 20 some oddities, this is the most star-crossed technology morning I’ve had.

EW:                             Well maybe 100 years from now, during the next pandemic, those people will be like, “Remember – can you imagine this in 2020? Zoom would crash.”

LP:                              Ok, I think we’re stable now. Shall we talk about the book?

EW:                             Sure, thank you.

LP:                              Sure. So there’s a couple of things – you know what, if things get a little wonky, I might turn off video just to see about bandwidth so I disappear, I apologize in advance.

                                    In reading some of the marketing material about the book – before we talk about some of the content itself, a few things stuck out for me. One was that the book was born out of necessity. And I’d love to know whether that’s clever marketing copy or what’s the truth behind the copy?

EW:                             Yeah. I didn’t set out to be an author and this is my second book. My first book is called “Interning 101” and actually – probably a little more with “Interning 101” I felt an inherent need to get the information about there.

And that one really started as a handbook for our management company because they felt like I was explaining a lot of basics over and over and I just thought well if they have this handbook, maybe then we can work on higher level things.

                                    This one was a little different. I felt like I was explaining myself over and over and over, whether it was at conferences or – I’m originally from Wisconsin and I don’t have to post that I’m in Wisconsin. It could be Thanksgiving or whatever and local musicians reach out to me, what to pick my brain. And I just felt like you shouldn’t have to know me to have access to this information. So I wanted to make it available to everybody.

LP:                              And I think part of that ties into the next point which was you said that the industry was really set up to confuse artists. And I wonder if you could elaborate on that a little bit.

EW:                             Yeah, definitely. And I’m talking about the 1950s, I’m talking about the pre-digital era and just things – archaic formulas that – they’re not confusing to me now but they were confusing to me when I was studying it. Right? So, yeah, the pre-digital music industry was set up on the business end, particularly on the recording end, to confuse artists.

                                    So that was my other motivation in writing the book is I feel that all the information in the book, for the most part, is out there. I’ve just never seen it put in order from recording to release or creation to execution.

Instead, I speak at conferences where artists are spending a lot of money to be at South X Southwest in the audience and I see them taking notes and I see them literally grasping at nuggets of information like ok, this is what sound (ph) exchange is. Ok, this is when I need a publicist.

                                    And again, if this was an industry that was set up decades ago, in a manner that was confusing to artists, to me that would be like trying to teach a child multiplication and division before you teach them addition and subtraction. It would just be really difficult for the student and the educator. So, yeah, I put it together in a linear manner.

LP:                              And in a world where artists are theoretically surrounded by specialists, whether it’s a manager, an agent, attorney or what have you, why is it important that they, in particular, understand the things that you articulate?

EW:                             Well I think it’s for both. It’s definitely for artists and industry people. You know, one reason is – I mean it feels weird to even say this in this time, but I’ve said this to our artists before. What if I, as a manager, die. Right?

So there’s that extreme. But team members change all the time. People leave the industry for whatever reason and then with industry people, myself included, the reason I know how to do all this stuff is I’ve tried it all. So industry people have had to educate themselves on digital and the modern music industry so the book is certainly for both.

LP:                              And what’s the peril for an artist who says I create the art. I don’t want to know about all this stuff?

EW:                             Yeah. Well then, you’re probably missing out on money and I wrote – I mean that’s actually another reason why I wrote the book. I was sick of taking on national acts and finding money for them.

                                    And on one hand, that’s part of an artist/manager’s job. But if that’s happening to artists that people have heard of, what about everybody else? So this book I wrote in a manner where I don’t think I – I think I do define a mechanical royalty. I definitely don’t define the statutory rate.

I want artists to understand how – literally how to build a sustainable career which to me is very data-driven, email addresses and phone numbers. And then to collect on all of their revenue streams. I don’t want them overthinking royalty rates and things like that or certain vocabulary terms that confused me in college. It’s just like here’s how you build your career and here is how you get paid.

                                    And then if you want a deeper dive, read Passman’s (ph) book. I link to some other things. There are entire books on each chapter of my book, but I don’t feel that artists really need that. If they want to learn the history of copyright, please go do that. But I just think it’s too overwhelming otherwise.

LP:                              So it’s mainly the primer. It’s the roadmap of things you should have a working understanding enough of or the things you should be informed that exist so that you can ask questions and make sure somebody else is diving into the details of these things.

EW:                             Yeah, and that’s happening. I have an artist message me.  He was offered a publishing deal. It was a co-pub deal. I was a really low advance and again, I don’t work with this person. I’m friends with them. And like here’s my book. Read chapter five on publishing and he came back and quadrupled his advance because he then understood the difference between a co-publishing deal and an admin [unintelligible 00:15:00].

                                    So again, it lays out all this information. This is a pretty experienced artist, too, but he fell into the same insecurities which I told him which is, “Oh, I feel bad. I don’t know.” I’m like, “Don’t feel bad. That’s a 20-year term and you’re going to accept $2,000 for that?” He doesn’t need the money but – this was pre-pandemic but – go work at the coffee shop if you need $2,000 that badly.

And again, all he had to do was ask if they do admin deals where that would have been a more reasonable advance. Or if they only do co-pub deals, if the advance can be increased and that happened significantly for him.

LP:                              Yeah. If it’s not too much of a trade secret, where would be the places you most commonly find money? When you walk into a new situation with an artist, a working/touring artist, you walk in day one. You kind of do your review of the business. What were the obvious areas?

EW:                             That’s a great question. Usually catalog. There’s usually royalties missing. And I also created a Google spreadsheet in the book that’s a revenue stream chart so I did that for artists and I basically lovingly yell at artists in the book. I’m like if there are blank cells in this spreadsheet, you are missing money.

                                    But yeah, definitely catalog. Also reviving that catalog, doing a pre-order for vinyl if vinyl didn’t exist for your previous releases. And then I was a tour manager a long time ago so not only reducing expenses on tour, but also generating more revenue. So something you’ve been doing for a long time – things like VIP upsells we’re actually evolving that into webcasts now. Right?

                                    We manage an artist names Julia Nunes. She had a canceled May tour. She’s planning a big blow out webcast w here she’s going to make a pretty big announcement at that as well. I could go on and on about her and most of it is very her driven. She is doing everything right.

                                    But I also said to her, “You know, you could still do a VIP upsell for webcasts and do a private performance for five fans, 20 fans, whatever that number is. Take requests. Do Q&As. So yeah, I kind of forgot the question.

                                    Oh, yeah, where we find money. Catalog stuff and then also creating new revenue streams in case any of them are missing.

LP:                              Yeah, I think on that front, something that was interesting to me, very early actually, just reading the initial introduce, the interview with Zoe Keating, something that was interesting to me I hadn’t thought of in the past was I’m very used to an artist – you know, an individual artist sort of has either an idea or some self-knowledge or a brand ideal of the things that they would do or not do.

                                    In the old days maybe, it was sponsorship or today it might be platinum tickets, whatever is right for an artist’s ethos. I had never seen that an artist say that they didn’t really participate in merch. Now her reasoning made great sense. Environmental reasons, sort of I have no criticism for anything obviously in her choice. But I’d never seen that particular use case before of an artist actually foregoing what would be for an artist at her level, probably a pretty good revenue stream.

EW:                             Same. And again, that’s someone I’ve known for 15 years. Her little sister is my best friend. And I also didn’t know she’d never made a music video and she land syncs (ph) like crazy. And I’m not saying don’t make music videos or don’t make merch. Zoe is an example of an artist that is true to herself and it’s all about being pure to the art.

By the way, I thought of a really important revenue stream that I think artists sometimes overlook because artists and industry people are so scared of publishing and all publishing is is collecting on and exploiting in the legal sense of the term your songwriting. The exact same thing that a label does for your master recording.

                                    But a lot of times artists sign up for ASCAP, BMI, SESAC. You know, sign up for their PRO and they think they’re done as far as publishing election goes. That can be particular confusing not to get too into the weeds because the PROs encourage you to create a publishing designee and then your individual songwriting name so you’re like, “Oh, well I’m already collecting on my publishing” and I have nothing to gain by saying this but I really love song trusts because anyone can sign up for song trust. It’s basically an admin deal that you can also get out of.

So if you are landing syncs, if your songs are getting covered and you are just signed up for your PRO, you also need to make sure your publishing is being collected on. Like I said, I’ve taken on national acts and they didn’t have their publishing collected on. It’s crazy.

LP:                              That’s amazing. That’s really amazing. So they go through, they sign up and they say, “I’m done” and they sort of wait for the checks to arrive.

EW:                             Yeah, exactly.

LP:                              Yeah. In the course of putting the book together, were there any ah-hah moments for you? Were you thing that you thought you knew or some conventional wisdom that you have been living by that surprised you? Did you come away from this learning?

EW:                             That’s a great question. I’d probably have to think about it more. I think I mostly learned from the Zoe sections because everything else – the Zoe interview – because everything else was very much my life experience.

LP:                              Yeah. I mean that was a powerful way to start the book. To have an artist’s voice and to have an artist who, to your earlier comment, has sort of a truth that they’re working from or has a point of view, sort of knows the boundaries, that those are the things that she wants to care about, to think about. There’s a confidence there that I think people don’t really understand that a lot of times the artists don’t bet on themselves.

EW:                             Right.

LP:                              You used the word confidence before. I’ve always thought of it as I guess, a mixture of confidence and just this idea that artists never know if there’s going to be another kick at the can. You know? And I think that’s led to a lot of – and I don’t know if that’s whispered in their ear to like take all the money off the table every time now, and then it’s only artists with a real sort of confident streak – like a Radiohead or whomever who can say we don’t need it all sometime. And by leaving some for next time, the audience is hungry, the audience is eager to come back.

                                    I think that’s a really interesting dynamic like this maximizing the revenue today versus having a career and I don’t know if that can necessarily be codified into a book except to maybe talk about case studies and individual artists and the choices they’ve made, and then trying to apply that to whatever your own ethos is. I wonder how you think about that for the spectrum of artists.

EW:                             Yeah, definitely. The whole point of the book is to build a long-term career. I really mean it with the word sustainability and that fear and insecurity is definitely there. It still exists amongst young people.

I taught management at the Clive program at NYU in the fall and that’s in Tisch. It’s just these phenomenally talented sometimes musical theater actors. It was like that. A lot of them didn’t know you could record and distribute music without getting signed. And I was just like what have we been doing for the past 10 years at conferences and things like that.

                                    So I basically taught the course based on the book because so many were artists that wanted to learn how to self-manage and I’m like, “Look, you need to do everything in this book if you want to get signed.” I’m on panels of major label people all the time and they nod their heads yes. Like build a career, build fans, create great art.

                                    If you don’t care about getting signed, obviously you need to listen to this book and if you do get signed, it’s even more important that you listen to this book so you are capturing all the data in case that label falls apart, if they drop you, if you’re A&R person moves on.

                                    So the whole point of the book is like here’s everything you need to know to build your career brick by brick and know who your fans are.

LP:                              If you had to give an artist the Cliff notes version of the book, what would be the two or three things, you’d say focus on this or if you don’t focus on these things, it’s at your own peril?

EW:                             Collecting email addresses from your fans. Collecting phone numbers and knowing where your fans are. I think the next time I present on this book or teach a class on it, I’m just going to open by saying why are tech companies the most valuable companies in the world? Because they have our data.

                                    And in music, as artists and industry people, we just give that data to the streaming platforms. We have no idea who the fans are. So really I [unintelligible 00:24:05] it’s probably not super-sexy but artists need to think of themselves as a tech company. You need to know who those fans are. You need to be able to communicate with them directly and you need to use it to strategize your touring. Or we talk a little bit about this or not, like what we’re doing at I Voted.

                                    It’s like in the normal touring world, I see this all the time. This is not a dis on agents but I see agents just book the same 10 or 15 clubs for a national tour. Instead, look at your social media metrics, look at your website metrics. I’ve done this many times with artists all over the world. Find out where the fans are and go there instead of booking a show in Cleveland and hoping that people show up.

LP:                              Yeah. Yeah, I think that that’s sort of a fascinating ah-hah realization which is if you build that – what you’re really talking about is build the mechanism to speak directly to your fans and that’s portable.

It doesn’t matter then who you’re assigned to or your t-shirt company is or anything else. You can tell your fans where you are, where you’re going, understand where they are. You do not let somebody else intermediate that relationship.

EW:                             Yeah, and again, [unintelligible 00:25:13] is a perfect example of this. She’s been doing it for a long time before we started working with her, but she has been releasing a song on the first of every month since January, along with a YouTube video, along with a merch item that’s often an inside joke about a lyric or something.

                                    And so, when the pandemic hit, yes, we did have to cancel a May tour but to her it was just like ok, that’s that but is it the first yet? You know what I mean? She’s continuing her output and then like I said will do a big blowout webcast show, will have an exclusive merch item that you can only get at that show and then she’ll be making an announcement about kind of what these tracks are leading to – her idea.

                                    So yeah, if you’re privileged enough as a creator, now is the time to create and keep going if you can. Nothing has stopped her career. If anything, she continues to evolve.

LP:                              If this book were coming out nine months from now or if you were still working on it, how do you think the pandemic situation would inform the content, if at all? Is there anything you’d be telling people to do differently?

EW:                             Not really. Because I wrote it with artists in mind who are unable to tour at any time be it due to disability or Zoe Keating. So sad at losing her husband to cancer and now she’s a single parent or caring for an aging parent. There’s countless artists that can’t tour even in non-pandemic times, so I wrote it with those artists in mind so everything in it can be done at home.

                                    I’m sure I would have made some references or certain nuances and I still – I don’t think in the book – because I hesitated in writing this book for a long time because the information can get outdated. So I just said, “Ok, here’s a link. When I find new things that I like that I think can support artists, I’m going to post it at this link.” And I’m sure we will be updating that as far as webcast information goes.

                                    I mean we have webcast stuff in there but obviously there’s investment going into it and things are being really beefed up.

LP:                              Yeah, that area – it’s funny, I was speaking with someone else about this. That model or that media channel has existed now for over 20 years but it’s finally having its moment. It’s finally getting mainstream.

                                    And it’s fascinating to me that it started off as something that was basically a promotional tool. But really it was always many to many. It was never really outside of individual cases, I’m sure. But it was always let’s take a big event and make it bigger. Let’s take a big event and bring it to people around the world. And to see it adapted now it’s truly like individual broadcasters. And with a little bit of hindsight, it seems like yeah, that would have been the use case. Right? People want the intimacy. It’s fun to watch the multi-camera shot from a big festival or a big event but that’s novelty. That’s not really a new content type.

EW:                             Right.

LP:                              It’s just television somewhere else.

EW:                             And you and I love production as much as anyone else and the live show experience. We’re not saying it’s replacing that but there are some special moments happening.

                                    I also work in sports and you’ve been interviewing some of my clients. My dad runs a swim team in Milwaukee. We are booking Olympians to do zooms with his team left and right. I mean those are experiences that those kids would never have. Not never, but maybe once a year. Once every few years. And it’s the same with music. Right. It’s like you can – with Julia when we did the VIP upsell again, make requests, ask questions. I mean she’s very engaging on social media.

                                    But I mean I love Noel Gallagher. I’m sure Noel would never do something like that but if he did, I would be so into it.

LP:                              You’d be first in line?

EW:                             I mean – don’t even get me started on Noel stories.

LP:                              To put you on the spot a little bit, is there anything you’ve seen from your artists or another artist in particular over the last six or eight weeks where you say, “Oh wow, that’s a really of the moment thing” or a really great use case to turn what’s going on right now into a really different artist fan experience?

EW:                             I think I already said it. I mean the stuff Julia is doing, definitely pay attention to her. And again, I think a lot of the direct to fan connections have just been amplified.

                                    We manage an artist names Torres (ph) who was on tour in Europe when – I don’t like saying his name – but the President did the travel ban from Europe. So my business partner was up all night – and that was like a break even tour. You know, her album just came out. So my business partner was up all night trying to re-route her through London, get the band home and everything.

                                    I don’t have the numbers but I know that fans just gave her thousands of dollars. I don’t think she asked for it. But yeah, they’ve just been reaching out to support her like crazy. And that’s an artist who’s on merge (ph). You know what I mean?

                                    So I do think the direct to fan connections have really been amplified not just for the artists who know how to do it but for everyone.

LP:                              Yeah, that part is super interesting how it is sort of necessity being the mother of invention. Also, pushing artists to a certain extent – I don’t want to say out of their comfort zone – but I think there’s a lot of artists that in the past never would have just spontaneously live-streamed or done an Instagram live because they think about production or presentation.

                                    I think it’s going to be very interesting now that they’ve had some experience with this and the sky didn’t fall and they didn’t get criticized for not having their hair perfect. Like the authenticity that this has forced to be brought to the table, it’s going to be really interesting over the next three to five years to see what survives and what comes forward.

                                    Because I do think some of these are new – they’re new media types that didn’t exist before. Just because the tools were there, they weren’t being used to create new content types.

EW:                             That’s exactly right and for better or for worse, the music industry has always been at the head of innovation. And so, to me that’s what I see here. I mean you know more than anyone, I’ve just been physically heartsick over what’s happening in the concert industry.

                                    But at the same time, as an overall industry and from my perspective where [unintelligible 00:31:42] and artists, we just have to continue to innovate, iterate, pivot and evolve and not just using those buzz words, actually do it. You’re on the board of I Voted. As you know, we activate the news to let fans in on election night who show a selfie from outside of their polling place. Well now, we’re offering artists the option of webcasts and fans can access the stream by RSVP’ing with a selfie from home with mail-in ballot or if in person voting happens, doing it the normal way.

                                    To me that’s a very natural evolution because, to your point, artists are webcasting anyway. And I’m the first to not just assume an artist is going to do something. Like I’m constantly telling people when they’re like, “Hey can’t they just make” – pre-pandemic – “Can’t they just make a video?”

                                    Well it’s harder than you think. So I’m sensitive to being like just do webcasts. They’re doing it anyway. They have their own set-ups and so that’s a very seamless evolution.

                                    And so, whether it’s management or activism or the industry at large. I mean you tell me if this is a totally crazy idea but I’m thinking about the news. You know, I live in Willingsburg (ph). I’ve got a million venues around. But I think about the knitting factory down the street and that’s just an empty space right now with an otherwise excellent staff and I’m just sitting here like well, ok, the staff needs revenue, the state needs revenue, the country needs revenue.

We don’t have legalized marijuana in New York. Can we turn venues into legal marijuana dispensaries? I know that’s a mess of laws.

                                    And then in the states where it is legal, we’re going to need testing and so can we turn venues into testing centers? Again, I just think we need to listen to public health experts and the credible news as difficult as that is. I was just talking to a billboard writer who was like, “Well if shows don’t happen this fall …” I’m like statistically, they’re not. You know?

                                    So that’s why we have to plan and innovate and try to generate revenue to take care of people so we can get through this.

LP:                              Yeah, a couple of other quick questions. I see we’re pretty much at the end of our time for now. You mentioned earlier that the book dropped – was it March 5^th?

EW:                             Yeah.

LP:                              What if anything had to change in your own roll-out?

EW:                             Yeah, again just the opposite of being tone deaf. So, not being like it’s me. Let’s all talk about me. I’ll tell you another time a story about my attorney was managing an artist who did have an album come out on September 11^th and wanted to put out a press release.

                                    Again, you want to be the opposite of tone deaf. So one of the first pieces of content that popped up with my book was I taped a podcast with Ariel Hyatt a while ago. And so, yeah, that was like the second week of March or something so I posted it and said, “Hey want to pretend it’s a few months ago? Listen to this conversation between Ariel and myself.” You know?

                                    So you just want to be sensitive to the situation but also keep moving forward because people – not to put my book in this category – but people want Fiona Apple albums to listen to. They want things to read. They want things to do so you just have to be mindful about how you communicate that, I think.

LP:                              Yeah. How much of the book was self-referential in terms of you used elements from the book in your own marketing roll-out?

EW:                             Oh, yeah, completely. Yeah, I’m completely taking my own advice in so many ways. I had frustrations with my publisher. I’m completely on my own. You know? And at the same time, when we do artists and voices every month – I should have this page number memorized – but the revenue stream checklist, I just go through it to make sure that we’re not missing any revenue for our artists every month and our encourage our team to do the same.

LP:                              So it’s an operating manual for your business?

EW:                             It is. It’s really handy.

LP:                              That’s great. That’s great. Well, I would definitely like to have you come back later in the spring or early summer to talk about I Voted in more depth.

EW:                             Thank you.

LP:                              Once that landscape is a little more solid, I think we can do a deeper diver into some of the issues we’re going to see in maybe like June or July through the home stretch. Yeah, I think there’s a lot to unpack there.

EW:                             Yeah, because you’re getting the data geek. I mean geek is not the right word.  The data-driven strategy that we’re doing. And I am high on life cranking on that. And I will say – and you probably experienced this too – it’s so fun, as far as artist discovery. I’m getting to listen to all these artists that we’re finding that’s like the number three top Spotify streamed artists in Milwaukee but is so new his Pollstar data is two headlining shows or 283 tickets. I never would have found him if I was just looking at touring data and I’m enjoying his music.

LP:                              Wow, that’s actually really fascinating. We’ll unpack that as well. Well thank you.