TJ Chapman: Building your “Team”

Building your “Team”

As far as I can see, the power in the music industry shifted along with the advent of digital music and (digital) distribution became possible for everyone.

Great, right?

Absolutely. What it does mean is that it has created a generation of musos who are doing everything for themselves and are more skilled, knowledgable and educated on how to self-manage, distribute, book and hold the power and rights for their band, where traditionally a label and management have done everything for the band and kept them at arm’s length of the business side of the industry. There’s a good and bad point to the old arrangement. Good that the artists get time to be artists (i.e.creative) and bad, that they don’t see what’s going on and very quickly lose control and knowledge about what is going on in their own band (and often money that is rightfully theirs.) Remembering that knowledge is power, that’s a bad position for bands to be in.

Somewhere along the way, an imbalance happened and musicians became expected to do and know it all themselves ALL the time. It seems to me that there is a middle “working class” of bands, who lose out both ways. They are expected to create amazing music as well as do all of the management tasks, book the band’s tours, manage all the promotion and publicity, be the graphic designer, get the album/EP distributed, document all sales, co-ordinate studio time and much more.

Solution? Well, that’s where the music industry shift has been great too. As it turns out, the shift in power in the music industry has given rise to an entrepreneurial spirit and industry workers are now drilling down on specific elements in the music industry and working as consultants or contractors to combat the loss in numbers of 9-5 jobs in the music industry. This means that there are a lot of opportunities for bands to work on a non-exclusive, one-off/periodical basis with industry workers, with possibilities for creating long-lasting relationships.

It seems to me that the best way for an artist to multi-task, once they hit a certain level (most likely when the band has too much on their plate business-wise and hopefully enough money to pay) is to start building a team around them who can be delegated tasks. A trusted group of skilled individuals/businesses who can be called upon and hopefully paid when tasks need to be achieved. It’s exactly why non-exclusive, fee-for-service, no lock-in contract, artists/labels hold all the rights, it’s self-directed and you can claim all your payments all the time.

The band or the manager can now be the label, negotiating distribution deals, while hiring publicists and a plugger for radio, as well as working in conjunction with someone to gain sync opportunities.

The biggest question to ask is: What does the band need to do themselves and what can be delegated and paid for?

Who do you want on your team?