The New Music Business with Ari Herstand

This is a live episode, virtually, on Zoom, and we invited Ari's Take Academy students to be part of it. They were able to ask questions at the end of the episode. The episode is with Seth Kallen. He's an artist manager for JP Saxe, X Ambassadors, Jukebox The Ghost, and many others. He talks about how to get opening slots on tours and how he was relentless early on. We discussed creating during qu...

We are in very interesting times. Last week's episode was all about musicians for black lives and what this movement is all about and what we can do as allies. It has been a challenge for me personally to understand where I fit in with this movement. I've been using my platform to encourage other musicians and people with influence, namely white people, to stand up and support our black brothers a...

My thoughts on what this moment and movement surrounding Black Lives Matter, #DefundThePolice and the death of George Floyd requires of white people. Namely musicians. -- Quick links: 1:20 - About the Black Lives Matter movement and the system that has been setup to strongly favor white people 3:30 - Attending the Black Lives Matter protest in Hollywood, California and the work the black America n...

My guest today is singer-songwriter Kevin Garrett. He is an extremely talented R&B, Neo-soul, and soul songwriter. It was such a treat to speak with him. Famously, he's Grammy-nominated for writing Beyonce's track "Pray You Catch Me" from her 'Lemonade' album.  In this episode we discuss his music publishing deal with Roc Nation and his distribution strategies, his music creation process,...

Today's guest is my good friend, Andrew Leib. He's an artist manager at Red Light Management. He's worked on the teams of Robert Randolph and the Family Band, Counting Crows, Three Doors Down, Emily King, Lecrae, Luke James, Cory Henry, Victoria Canal, Nu Deco Ensemble. He's worked with a lot of artists.  Andrew and I get into his story and what he looks for in artists that he wants to work w...

Today's guest is with Madame Gandhi (birth name Kiran Gandhi). She's an incredibly inspiring person, an activist, and feminist. She started her career drumming for M.I.A., Thievery Corporation, and embarked on Oprah Winfrey's Vision 2020 tour before the COVID-19 pandemic. Gandhi is also a recording artist and speaker. She also holds an MBA from Harvard University. We talk about release strategy, h...

Today's guest is Dani Deahl. She's the music and technology writer for The Verge. In addition to being a journalist, she's a DJ and the Vice President of the Recording Academy, Chicago Division.  Dani and I dig into what it's like being a woman in a male-dominated industry. She also gives some tips on how to break in and become a professional DJ. We also discuss artificial intelligence (AI) i...

This episode is with superstar Grammy-winning producer and "Godfather of Trap," Zaytoven. He is one of the most influential producers in hip-hop right now. He's a Grammy winner and has worked with artists like Future, Rick Ross, 2 Chainz, Usher, T.I., Pusha T, and 21 Savage, to name a few. There are a lot of interviews with Zaytoven out there. He's an interesting guy with a cool workflow. I didn't...

Today's guest is Lucidious, a hip-hop artist originally from Virginia now living in Los Angeles. I’ve covered him in the book and on the website quite a bit. He has an interesting story from the business perspective. He has over 500,000 monthly listeners on Spotify without any official playlist inclusion, label, or manager. This translates to more than $20,000 per month from streaming revenue. I b...

Patreon co-founder and CEO, Pomplamoose and Scary Pockets co-founder, Jack Conte, believes in digital art. He believes in artists and he believes in fans to support artists. So much so that his company Patreon is setup to facilitate a symbiotic artist/fan relationship. He is the founding member of (and still active in) Scary Pockets, but doesn't tour with them and discusses how they're able to get...

Today's episode features Vo Williams, an incredibly successful hip-hop artist based in Los Angeles. Vo is originally from Sarasota, Florida and has been very successful in getting his music synced in film, commercials, TV shows, and video games. He has thousands of sync placements and makes a lot of money from them. We go in deep to discuss practical, tangible, actionable steps you can take to get...

You probably know Chris Douridas from Los Angeles' iconic, trend-setting radio station KCRW. He was the host of Morning Becomes Eclectic in the '90s. He has been at the station for about 30 years. Chris is someone who has hired most of the staff that we know at KCRW and is an extremely influential figure in the Los Angeles music scene. Chris also started the premiere music showcase, School Night....

This episode comes to you from Foundation Management's offices in Brooklyn, New York, which is Lauv's management company. I sat down with Emma MacDonald, Lauv's label manager. Lauv is an independent artist, and I profiled him the second edition of How to Make It in the New Music Business. He is one of those incredibly successful artists without a label. In fact, he was the most spun artist in 2019...

Welcome to episode number one of the New Music Business podcast! This interview with Andy Grammer was recorded live during my book signing event at Barnes & Noble at The Grove in Los Angeles on January 16th, 2020. I've conducted hundreds of interviews over the years. Most of them were private, one-on-one just for me to write about. This was by far one of my favorite interviews I've ever conduc...

Today's episode is with superstar music supervisor Jen Malone. She has placed music and worked on Euphoria, Atlanta, Creed 2, The Resident, Boomerang, Baskets, Shelter, Lady Dynamite, and Step Up. That's just scratching the surface. She has worked in sync licensing now for over a decade. She is so well established and so well respected. I was so happy to finally get to talk to her. We dug in deep...

Welcome to the New Music Business Podcast! This is my first podcast I've ever hosted and I'm excited that you've decided to join me here. I have conducted hundreds of interviews over the years writing for Ari's Take and other music publications, but most of the interviews weren't ever released publicly. I love interviewing people and some of these conversations are too valuable not to share in the...