10. How to Be a Supportive Lovejoy Fan - an Interview with Music Industry Pro, Vinny Ribus

0:00 Hello and welcome back to the Lovejoy Nation Podcast. It is a busy time in Lovejoy Land and we are all grateful and blessed, as Dave would say. Absolutely. And what have you been up to since we last recorded Dave? Well, hello, what have I been up to? Nothing really. It's all, as we've sort of said previous back to school, back to work after the summer. The rains come in, the evenings are getting darker, but I am having a little midweek vacation, as you folks say. I've got one of them coming up out in the New Forest, so I'm looking forward to that. What else am I up to?

0:48 Wow. There is something like a gig in London, but I can't remember who that is. What about yourself? When you remember Liz now. I will OK. I'm back to the grind, back to school. That's what's mostly going on now. We have some fun things up ahead. Renfair and a record fair at the Brooklyn Flea Market coming up next weekend. It's about 40 different record stores are coming together and bringing their wares. Yeah, it's going to be fun. So hopefully the weather cooperates. Unlike you, we've had like no rain here. We've had a a drought, it's very dry and actually we all want the rain, which is kind of unusual, I know, but.

1:33 We've pretty much had nearly a fortnight of rain on and off now, in which, to be fair, the last time we had rain was when you were in England. So you had a dry patch too, but dry spell? Yeah, absolutely. So what's on the show tonight? Well, let's, oh, let's just first address that. You only hear 2 voices today because Angie is tied up with the being Mom taxi to Pebble today and couldn't make it. She couldn't join us. But she did join us for the interview that will come after we talk. So the yeah, we have some Lovejoy news to talk about since we last spoke.

2:16 There was a short. I think we both can agree that it was too short. Very yes. Far too short. Behind the scenes video that Lovejoy put out on Lovejoy etcetera. There spin off channel on YouTube for behind the scenes types of things. Yes they did it behind the scenes for the rob video and pay and display A2 Fer if you will. But yes too short. It was only 9 or so minutes, definitely 10 minutes. Just under 10 minutes. It was good. It's great. I like that sort of thing because I like to do stuff effectively behind the camera, behind the scenes. So that's my thing. Interesting to see the crew and the the other artists and and makeup and everything like that.

3:04 I really do like that sort of stuff. Did it's fun to see the the goofy funny thing? Yeah, absolutely. From the band. Yeah, the goofiness, the silliness. But yeah, it was it could have done with another at least 15 minutes. I always think that when they have, they must have so much footage from these things and concerts and festivals and such that they're just saving it for something else. So we just have to be patient. We'll see more down the road. Maybe. Yeah, never know. And then Noisiak posted. Was it a story or a post where they showed how they did the elevator? It was both actually.

3:45 Yeah how how they done the elevator. Been really enjoying noisy acts posts. That was neat to see. And I was thinking about it while now watching the video again, how it worked. You know that you you, you believe that it's a real elevator working, but in reality it's cleverly done to look like obviously a real elevator. And I was curious how they did the when the elevator like stops and they like sort of bounce, do they just all let's bounce at the same time or? Literally yes, it is a countdown 543. 21 That's cool. It's like I'm dating myself, but actually this is way older than me. The Music Man movie, when they're on the train, I've seen it on stage as well.

4:29 When they're on that in that train scene, they're all bouncing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you. Know they're all just bouncing, yeah, but it works. That's very effective. I love that. Yeah. So that was fun. And then? Yeah, it really was fun. I know the rest of the band didn't really have when I say much to do, obviously they had to film their footage of. The right. Music. It was good to see them hanging out in the back and. Being around for the the filming in general and I liked when Will came back over to them. They're like, oh, I'm in the band again and and just seeing him be silly and happy behind the scenes when these shoots, he's looking so scared or sad or upset. It is nice to see the levity when the camera was enough. Absolutely.

5:15 Yeah, we'll take as much as we can get a bit. Yeah, if I'm out and about and they're filming movies, TV programs, whatever, I really enjoy just watching the behind the scenes. It doesn't matter who's the actor is, I just really enjoy it. So yeah, that was good, just like we said numerous times, just far too short. Come on, love, Joy. Yes, you got a whole channel there. You can do more. Absolutely. You know, not like you have anything else going on. Yeah, and what else was released? There was something about a gig on the 24th of September. Is that the gig you were talking about earlier that you couldn't remember? Yeah, that's it.

5:58 It's 24th of September, Islington O2, Lovejoy dropping there album show what can I say? For the first and only time, I believe they're going to play the show debut album in its in its entirety in front of an audience. Yeah, which says to me that you're not going to get all the songs on tour. No, guessing not. Yeah, I guess that isn't a thing. I was mistaken when I thought like, maybe for the new album they'll do all the songs, but now they'll do a mix of old and new. Yeah, and I got tickets, so I'm going. How'd you manage that, Dave?

6:38 How'd you manage to get those tickets, the other high demand? What can I say? Gave Ash a ring. No I didn't. No I didn't. No I didn't. Obviously we've spoken about on previous pods and I missed out on a presale. I was out in the middle of nowhere, Signal wasn't great and I got online about, well, I got on at 10:00 but it just wasn't happening. Then I I had to drive a mile or so down the road and about 5 past 10 I come back on and they were gone. I'm not going to lie, absolutely gutted. So then a couple of days later I'd spoken to you guys and you both got up early to help me out. Sure did.

7:31 I think we all got online at 10:00, four AM your time and Angie's time. I got straight in, nothing, sold out, refresh, refresh, refresh, nothing. Nothing, nothing. And you got tickets in the bag. Isn't that crazy? All the way from New Jersey. I know all the this is what got me is the fact that you managed to get them in New Jersey magically. Yeah, I'm 70 miles down the road, 60 miles from Brighton and it's like couldn't get them. But anyway, yeah, I absolutely chuffed A bits and if I could I would have flown across and I'd be sat next to you now doing this because I would have flown across and given you a big hug. And as I said, I'd much rather be flying over there and lose my passport in the process, honestly. Yeah.

8:30 Yeah, I'll make the trip. Dave. You don't have to come all the way here. I don't mind going there. For the cake. I would love to. So I'm it's going to be a bit of a mad dash after work to get to London blah blah blah. But I think it's going to be worth it, I really do, to hear every single song from the album before it's released. Try to like absorb and like memorize every minute of it, right? Yeah, this is it. Don't know whether we're going to be allowed to film it. I really don't. I'm not expecting to. Screaming fans. It's going to be insane. I don't know whether there's going to be merch there.

9:11 I don't know what's going to be there so. Cool. And people were confused a little bit because there are two rooms at the venue. There's also another gig going on the same night, same time. Yes, and there's plenty of tickets left for them if you want to go and see them. That's funny. Is it an Australian band or something like that? I know they're another indie band, but they've got the main stage downstairs. That was the question people were asking. Is this the 800 person room or the 250 room? Yeah, I believe it's the 250 room, judging by how quick those tickets went. Yeah. I don't know how many tickets are sold, whether it's 200 and they've got 50 guests coming.

9:57 I really don't. But as far as we know, it's on the 250 room. It's going to be amazing and. I know that you'll be having some goodies in your pocket to possibly give out to those in the. Queue is correct. I will be having pocketfuls of Nuggets. I take as many as I can because I don't think I'm going to take a bag because of the, you know, you're not really allowed to take bags in. Right. You don't want to hold up security and all that. Absolutely. You need some Wilbur pants with lots of pockets. Yeah, that's exactly what I'm I'm going to be wearing. My, my I call them army trousers.

10:40 My cargo pants with all the pockets I'm going to need. My microphones. You never know, you have to bring a microphone well. This is it. I mean, I'm hoping to grab a chat with a few people out in the queue, so if you are about give me a shout, that's what I look like. If you want to be on the podcast, yeah. Absolutely. I'm not sure about after the gig because we might have to leg it to get a train. I'm sure it's going to be late. Are we going to have another band on before support group?

11:21 Are they just going to come in and maybe do a few songs and then right, This is it. We're now going into the album. You know who? Knows yeah maybe they're going to do a little chit chat beforehand I bet I hope people are quiet enough in the crowd to like just so you can hear it that's what makes me crazy sometimes when everybody's screaming while they're trying to talk so. Yeah, but I'm really looking forward to it. Oh my gosh, like I'd be pinching myself for you. As I said to you, I felt like I was handing over my newborn baby for adoption when I changed those tickets to you.

12:05 Yeah, I really don't know how grateful I was. And after I know I said to you, right, I got to get on because I was at work and I stopped. But I put the phone down, and that sigh of relief, the weight of the shoulders. The realization like this is really happening. This is really happening. And it was like, oh. No, I'm so happy for you. So it can't even be, can't even be mad. No, Everything I can possibly do and are allowed to do, I will send across pictures of March. Pictures of whatever. And your eyes and ears for the pod too, so that's valuable. Absolutely.

12:50 So it's not just us, Yeah. Absolutely, and I should be taking my daughter. We've got to wait for her to come home from school and then we're straight on, literally straight on a train to London, get across London. So cool. Grab some food from somewhere. Yeah, the best. Yeah, absolutely. Check back here on the next episode for for whatever we've got. But yeah, keep an eye on Lovejoy Nation over that evening because like I say, anything that I can get pictures to match wise photos, anything I should be sending them straight across and anything I send across should be able to go straight out. Very cool.

13:37 I'm looking forward to it. And it's what if we have 10 days away from as of today, right? That's right. Date of recording. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. All right. And then we got a surprise announcement this past Friday that I don't think anyone is expecting. Someone on Reddit was like, yeah. Absolutely. Wasn't that funny? One person predicted it. I predict we're going to get a new single tomorrow. This was on on a Thursday. Yeah. And it was like, yeah, OK, on my word. Then it happened, Yeah. So we're getting a a new single this Friday, September 19th, Common touch. And we heard a little snippet.

14:18 I think we have 28 seconds of of the song. Sounds really good. Yeah. Having said that pane display, we were all like Oh my God, wow and. Then. It started off totally different how we were expecting. So the 28 second snippet, love it sounds really really good. We've just got to wait for the rest. Yeah, I'm curious for what little, as Angie always said, and I guess always say crumbs, what crumbs will we get this week leading up to Friday? What from little Tik toks or videos or things? I can't believe it's so soon after the last one. I honestly was expecting it to perhaps drop after the album, but I guess I guess how they want to play it. Another music video along with, presumably. Yeah.

15:12 Well, didn't noise noisy act say that there would be a third one? Didn't? They give me a trilogy. Yeah, Trilogy. Yeah. So do we think that it'll become it'll be another prequel prequel to Pain display or post ROB? I think it'll be post because it does come along further on the album track. I see, that's good detective work, the. Next song after pain display I believe is White Shark Cafe then Common Touch so surely it's got to be post.

15:52 OK, that's exciting too. Not just the song, but music video to go with it. Yeah, I find it strange how we've we've sat here and we've we're like love Rob. Yeah. Great tune. Oh my God. Pay and display. Love it. Yeah. And is this one going to be the same and? Then like how many do we not know a thing about yet because we know foxholes? Well, yes, yeah, we do know foxholes, don't we? So we got what, 7? Was it 11 on the album? I've avoided hearing perfect blue so I don't know anything about it.

16:33 Oh yeah, so six I've saw I I watched Angie's footage once for Perfect Blue, maybe twice. It's really hard at times to get that feeling. Right. From. A cell phone video from. Exactly. Yeah. But yeah, so I guess we've sort of heard half the album, we've got half the. Album isn't that crazy? Isn't that crazy? That's crazy. We have 6 songs at least, right? Or let me think, we haven't heard it all and foxholes might change, you know, things might change from studio version to what was we we heard the concert, but for the most part, apparently.

17:13 Foxholes did chat a little bit in the last concert. Yeah. So, and This is why they've taken off wasted summer because they want to clearly do it better. But yeah, when when you ask that question, we we've heard six songs. Is it 6? So we've got Rob. Paint, display, Foxholes, common touch. Perfect blue. Perfect blue. So we've heard five. And there's 12 or. 1111 yeah. So we've heard just under half the album. That's amazing. Like I can't, it's like so exciting for. It's so exciting for them.

17:55 And you could tell they love these songs. You know, I was afraid at first that they'd be nervous about presenting the these things because there's so much weight behind them. But it's clear that they're so confident and proud and happy about them that that kind of floats away. And the response has been so amazing so. Yes, but just blow me away. How many we've actually heard now? And how many are still left? That I think that's the most exciting part. Well, then, let's get on with the show. Angie and I recorded an interview with a really amazing, brilliant man named Vinny Rebus the other night, and I hope you enjoy listening as much as we enjoyed recording it. He's a music industry professional. We grilled him with all kinds of questions regarding the music industry and ways that fans can help support an indie artist that's sort of on their way up and producing new music and releasing songs and how we can really do the most we can for them other than just streaming.

19:02 So take a listen to that. Let us know what you think and also check out his website, Cartney CARTN e.com. It's a really robust website of online music industry lessons from I think it's at 100 professionals and really fascinating. Even if you're not in the industry, you'll find it very interesting if you have an interest in music and supporting bands that you love and definitely it's worth checking out. So we'll put the link in the description. Today we're joined by Vinny Reba, an artist manager, artist consultant, music industry consultant, founder and CEO of Indy Connect, and a plethora of other things.

19:53 Is there anything you'd like to add or tell us about yourself? Basically, I also own cartney.com, which is a e-learning platform for the music industry, and I've just gotten into documentary filming. Oh wow. Amazing. That's like my favorite genre of of things to watch when I'm home with free time. Excellent, very cool. Thank you for joining us. We found you on LinkedIn for I found you with your article Because I'm, I run a fan account. I'm always looking for ways to encourage fans to support Lovejoy and do everything we can for them that they've had EPS and single, but they've not had a debut full length album, but they have one coming out October 3rd.

20:40 And so there's so much writing on the as you well, well know. And so I found your article, 30 ways to help support your favorite indie artist. And I was like, Oh my God, Angie, you got to see this, Dave. What a goldmine. Oh my goodness, I was so excited. Wonderful. It's it's interesting how much fans don't actually realize what artists have to go through and so they don't really know how to support them. That's so true because I often see, you know, we're pushing like, let's get it to 1,000,000 streams, you know, and they're like, I just want to listen how I want to listen. It's not our job to worry about that. It's like, it's not your job, but do you love this band? Do you want them to be able to stick around and tour and be here for a long?

21:23 Term. It benefits the band and it benefits us. If you want the band to stick around, you've got to help them out a little bit. Yeah. And it doesn't take much, you know, especially when you have that many fans. But it does take, you know, a little bit of effort, a little bit of conscious effort. Yeah, I think just to raise the awareness, especially the audience is on the younger side, most of which probably under 18 Even so. And we all grew up with CDs and tapes and and radio being the big things. But now it's a different world. And I was actually interested on your take since I know you, I saw that you were on the other side of the curtain at one point being a full time entertainer and then booking agent.

22:03 So you've been on, you know, the whole spectrum. Old, I mean, when you are you're old, you get to do a lot of stuff. It's we welcome. We're glad you're here to to help us with that plethora of knowledge you have. So, yeah, how is it different and is it harder now because there's not so much physical media that people are purchasing there? Are a lot of things that are different and, and a lot of things that are harder and a lot of things that are easier. So, you know, definitely the physical media is a major challenge because that was the major revenue stream for record labels especially and for artists. And so, you know, when artists don't have that and it becomes really hard for them to tour because everything is so expensive, whether it's gas and the bus and hotel rooms and eating out and everything. I mean, it just gets crazy.

22:49 And so artists really struggle. Even the biggest artists are downsizing a lot of their, the size of their concerts because they're just not drawing and, and it's just too expensive, especially when you have, you know, those huge buses and, and trucks and stuff like that. But any independent artist, you know, they're, they're really struggling unless they draw a lot. And mainly if they, you know, to make it as a touring artist is going to be on merch. I see it's it's always going to be on merch. And do the bands pay a fee to the venues that host them? How does that work? I've just, for those that don't know, like how does that work when you sign up to play at Webster Hall in New York City, do you have to a portion of the sale? Some venues will do that.

23:35 I always try to avoid that if possible. You know, it's, it's not, it's not rocket science to figure out that every, every little bit of that margarine that you give away to somebody else chips away at what you have to be able to survive on. And so, you know, I, I don't like it when the record labels take a piece of, of the action of the merch. I don't like it when the clubs take a piece of the merch. I just don't think it's it's fair to anybody and so I always avoid that. Right. And then that's when you know, T-shirts are now $50 instead of 25 like they used to be. Exactly. If we're talking about the price of a ticket and who gets what cut of that, let's say a ticket to see a band cost $50, what percentage of that would you think, give or take, would that band actually put in their pocket once you figure out all the expenses?

24:30 Yeah, I mean, first of all, a lot of that depends on what the agreement is with the venue because the venues usually take a portion of the ticket sales unless the artist is what they call 4 walling. So they're renting the room and and they're going to sell tickets and then they're going to pay for the rent out of the the ticket sales. So it's really hard to say what percentage that would be. But after all of the expenses and everything, if an artist you know, and it depends also on how much the ticket sale, how much the tickets are and how many tickets they're selling. So, you know, you can have a venue that sees 500 and if they can sell that 500 seats for $50, they're bringing in pretty good money. But if it's a venue that seats 25 or 50 or 100, you're not bringing in as much money.

25:13 So the percentage is going to be different. But overall, if you know, if you put a tour together, it's probably going to be 5 to 10% that is actually profit, if that. Wow, that's not very much, is it? No. And we were talking, you know, I had brought up streaming versus the physical. Often times with streaming, you hear they make a fraction of a penny per stream. So is it is streaming more about just getting the songs out there than money made from the stream? Streaming is pure marketing, is pure marketing. And nowadays the push is to get away from that. And if you've got a fan base, you only release your music to your fans, or at least maybe for the first two weeks or a month, you go to the fans 1st and let them consume it. And especially if you have a fan club, this is the way that most artists now are trying to generate a lot of money because you figure if you've got, you know, 1000 fans that are paying you $10 a month, then you've got 100. You've got $10,000 a month coming in mailbox money. And you do special things for them. And and that makes it really easy then to tour or to record or do whatever you want.

26:32 You've got all of this money that that is Cumber. Yeah. It, you know, it doesn't really cost you much maybe to go into the studio and record a single or something. But, you know, you can build a loyal following. And I know artists that have, you know, 5000 people paying them between 5:00 and $20.00 a month. And these are independent artists. So, you know, it's, it's the, it's the way to go. If you've got a following, even if you don't have a following, start building up. You know, you got to work your fans through a process. So you're going to get fans that just discover you. They're going to check you out a little bit. They're going to then they're going to test you out. They're going to go see your website or they're going to check out your other social media.

27:12 And your goal is to move them up the ladder to the point where not they're not no longer just intrigued, they're actually engaged with you. So you get them to sign up for your mailing list and then you can start, you know, when somebody signs up for your mailing list, which is the piece that most artists miss completely. When somebody signs up for your mailing list, they're basically saying, I give you permission to market to me. I want to know when you have gigs. I want to know when you have new merch. I want to know when you have new music coming out. And that makes a world of difference when you can capture people that way. Because if it's five to seven times easier to sell to an existing customer than to find a new customer, that's just, you know, simple sales math.

27:55 So if you've got them on your mailing list, that's a huge part, that's a commitment on their part. Now you can move them into the fan base into, into your fan club. And it's not a huge leap if they like what you're giving them as, as a, as a, an e-mail subscriber. And, and once you can do that and you can even do the fan club at, you know, $2.00 a month and then have other tiers that move up. But you know, your, your goal is to control everything. You're, you want to control the music. You don't want anyone else controlling that. Your goal is to control the obviously the, the copyrights of the songs. Your goal is to control the data. You know, the biggest challenge with all of the social networks, with Spotify, with anybody is it doesn't matter if you have 5 million fans on there, 100 million fans in there. You haven't got a clue who one of them is. You can't e-mail one of them because they they own the data. And yeah, so if they own the data, then you're just borrowing that list.

28:55 You know, when, when TikTok was going away, so many people were so scared because that was their entire living. If they had all that data, they had anyone, everybody on the mailing list would have made a difference. Hey, guys, We're going to go switch over to here. So switching from streaming to radio, is radio still relevant in today's world for independent artists? It's, it's relevant, but it's very expensive. It's very expensive to get a radio promoter. Now somebody like Lovejoy, they've got a big following. They've got a lot of people following them on Spotify. So they would have an attraction to radio. But the hardest thing for an artist is to reach all of those radio stations. You can pay for services.

29:36 There are, there are services like Play NBE and their Play Direct that'll reach out to these different radio stations for you radio, unless you have a radio promoter and you're paying them big money. And the reason they're big money is because every one of them has their own target area that they work with. So you'll have your New York guy who works the, the main stations there and then you'll have the guy that works Northern New York or something. And so you're paying a whole lot of people and to infiltrate, you know, a radio station that's owned or is, is basically, you know, pretty much owned, whether it's physically or, or, or just bought by the major labels, you're not going to have, you know, a good shot at getting at the major stations.

30:20 So you're going to be on, I mean, you're yeah, you I think you're going to know where you're going. College stations are a great, are a great Ave. to go. Unfortunately, again, the challenge with college stations is that the students are usually the ones that do the programming and they change every year. So every year you're starting from scratch or every two years to build relationships. Everything in this in this field is relationships. It's relationships with the radio stations, the programmers, it's relationships with the venues, it's relationship with booking agents, it's relationships that your manager has. It's all relationships because there are so many people flooding the market every single day with content and, and a lot of it good.

31:05 Not a huge percentage, but a lot of it is good that you have to do something that makes you stand out from everybody else. What about fans, the good old, you know, calling into the radio station or emailing them or texting them? Is that still effective? That's very effective. I mean, they want to please their their audiences and, and if it's an appropriate radio station, yes, fans can definitely help in that kind of a campaign. And it can help by finding out who's the programmer at their local college and passed that information on. So basically, I mean, it used to be a street team, artists would put a street team together and they would put out posters and stuff like that. And, and sometimes that still works. But most people are sticking with digital right now. But yes, you know, mobilizing your fans to help you out in all these different areas, to tell you about a, a venue that you should be playing to introduce you to a new owner or to introduce you to somebody they know that works at a radio station or somebody that works at the local festival or fair or something like that.

32:12 All those kind of things make a world of difference. When, when, Because right now, you know, unless you have a record label and you're paying a marketing company and you're, you're, you're paying a publicist and everything, you don't have the money to reach everybody. So you're doing it on your own. It's coming out of your time, it's coming out of your pocket and everything. And, and that makes it very difficult. So if you've got the fans on your side and they're helping you to get the contacts and the resources and and create the demand for you, you know, it's the same thing with, you know, having enough fans calling a festival saying that we want these guys to play. Yeah, Lovejoy has said we'll, we'll play where the listeners are.

32:53 So they just need to know and see where the listeners are. But they are just recently signed with Warner Record because they're with Warner Record. Does that, I'd imagine, help with airplay. I, I had heard something about an ad. Tomorrow's supposed to be the ad date for radio stations. It's a new term I've just learned for their newest song, pay and display. So how does that work? Ad dates and new song. That's the official day. They can tell the radio stations this song will be available on this day. Do not play it before this day. So that's your ad date. That's the date today. Add it to their playlists now, a lot of songs take a long time.

33:35 They take creating demand and everything for them to work their way up in the radio stations playlist. I mean their songs that take months to work their way up. So it's not like it happens today and it gets on every radio station. The difference is that when you're signed with somebody like Warner, they have the relationships with the radio stations. So they can say they have leverage. They can say we're not going to let you play this artist unless you play our new artist. We're not going to let you have fascinating. We're not going to have, we're not going to let you have our this artist play your concert, your local concert, unless you have this artist open for them. So there's a little politics going on there. It's all politics, so. They've already been playing the song on a lot of stations. I've been tracking it on sound charts. So, so that's exciting that even before that, that date, it's already been playing, I think over 100 since August 22nd when it was released.

34:30 So and Alt Nation. What do you do you have an opinion on Alt Nation or SiriusXM and their value? Because they had put them on their Advanced Placement list, but then they don't play. They haven't played the song yet. Maybe they won't till tomorrow, I don't know. Probably not until tomorrow, but yeah, I mean, you want to be on, especially on Sirius FM. You, you, you absolutely want to be on there. XM sorry if you can get on there, because there are ways to to do that and and a lot of it's relationships, you know, working with somebody who has a relationship. The bottom line, everything is working with somebody who has a relationship. You want to get in magazines, you want to get something written out with you. You want a publicist who has relationships. You want to get on Radio SiriusXM, any of those.

35:12 You need people who have. Interviews, I would imagine would be valuable if they could do a little short interviews, you know, like a press junket, sure. Absolutely, absolutely. And and that a lot of that the band can do, you know, if the band is willing to do an interview or if they're going to be coming to town, they should go into the studio, you know, offer to do an in house interview. That makes a world of difference because you're building relationships. This industry is not about how many people you know, it's about who trusts you. That's really. It's about who trusts you enough to open the door for you. So you can have, you know, you can have the whole world can know about you, but you may not get that one gig because nobody actually trusted you enough to give you that call.

35:57 And it's the same thing even on a smaller scale or much smaller scale, where you're trying to do something and there's opportunities and you know, you're a good fit, but you can't get your foot in the door. You don't have the clout. But if, if somebody trusts you enough to say, oh, you need to call this this band and then they open the door for you, then you're going to get in because it, it's all relationships. So either you have the relationship, your team has a relationship, you know, or your fans have the relationship. What's good about Lovejoy? They were sort of like a quiet time, a dry spell, so to speak, where they lost some momentum. But they have awesome things under their belt, like they received the MTVUK Push Award at the beginning of 2024 and they played Reading leads Lollapalooza.

36:47 They headlined Summerfest this year at their stage at Summerfest. So I guess I would imagine those things, their resume that they've built up also help. Yeah, they're reaching, They're reaching more people. They've got much better content to put online when you can show something from Lollapalooza and stuff like that. I was, I was looking at some of their videos and stuff and, and it gives you credibility. It gives you huge credibility. But there's one thing I want to mention that is important for the band to know. Well, actually, it was actually one of your questions. What does the what kind of music do the fans want? Things have changed drastically with social media being the main way that people discover music.

37:29 And they don't discover the music first. They will hear the music first, then they want to know more about the artist. They want to know if they have something in common with them because the fans are getting bombarded, just like Spotify's getting bombarded and the fans are getting bombarded with all kinds of content. So that's why the algorithms try to pinpoint somebody that you're going to have something in common with that somebody. You like this artist and so you'll like this artist, but they want to know if they have something in common with you and then they will listen deeper. So, So what, what artists need to do is they need to know their fans well enough to know what to write about, what to say in an interview, what to, I mean, all of the things, all of the touch points, you know, you're building a brand. And I look at all of the different touch points every time that the name or the image or the music intersects with a fan.

38:34 What does that look like? And how is the fan going to react to that? And so as long as you're consistent with that and you're doing it long enough and you're reaching people, you will, you will weed out the ones that don't like you. And there's nothing wrong with that because you don't want them necessarily anyway. You will. You will build up that fan base that is very, very, you know, loyal. Loyal to you. Yeah. I was going to say rabid fans, but it didn't. Sound. Oh yeah, they have that too. They were rabid. That just didn't work. No, I mean it, it's, it's really important for for the artist to understand that is the way that fans connect with you. And that's what they're looking for. They're looking for an emotional connection.

39:16 I mean, Ed Sheeran, somebody did a a cover of one of his songs. I forget which one it was and and she did a such a great job on it that he actually invited her to come to to meet him and they, you know, he sat in the living room and just sent Samsung. That's cute. That's what you look for, looking for that kind of relationship, and every fan was envious of it, but every fan watched it every single time. Every one of those videos went viral. Oh, you know what we for the first time ever, they're offering on this tour VIP packages, which is like among humongous. Yes, they are. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure the the label has a lot to do with that because the label likes that. And what the label is doing is bringing in those relationships that the artists need.

40:02 They're bringing in like this and booking agents and they're bringing in all the relationships to meet the band. The meet and greet is the biggest to draw of the package and another way to bring in some extra money. It's not, you know, the. The extras they're throwing in aren't pricey, but they're exciting and everybody wants them. That's it. You got to give the fans what they want. Yeah. And it's interesting. I've been tracking their ticket sales, not by numbers, but just what I can see, like can I still get a ticket? And I would say 2/3 of their VIP tickets for their tour are sold out. So there was clearly a big demand for that, which is nice to see. But we were talking about fans a little earlier on, how fans can help the band by making requests on radio with a band the size of Lovejoy, who isn't, you know, tiny.

40:55 They're obviously bigger now, but they're not huge huge either. And they're really just now trying for their big break with their first debut album. Are there any other ways of supporting a band of this size that you would suggest versus somebody who is really just starting out from the ground up? Well, given given the age group that that they have, I would say one of the biggest things they can do is to use their music online, use their music in their videos. So create a video with Lovejoy's music in it, because that triggers the algorithm that makes them move up the the ladder and preference and more for you pages and stuff like that.

41:37 So that's a real big part of it. If there is, if there are any podcasts that they should be guests on, if the fans have know of that, no matter how big or how small it is, it's that's a great way to, to help the band because again, it's, it's reaching listeners that they might not normally listen, they might not normally hear them. I mean, I'm 70 years old. I like their music. So it's not just appealing to 13 year olds or 15 year olds, you know, I mean, they've got to reach everybody. Yeah, no, it's not just teenagers, as Leslie and I can attest. To We can thank our teenagers for introducing them to us. I know, Leslie. Will agree with me is her and I and some other people in the fan base might be really pumped up or like, OK, let's do this, let's support them.

42:21 Let's get out there and do all the things. Let's, you know, make a bunch of Tik Toks and let's call these radio stations. Sometimes it's hard to get people motivated. Take it for granted that it's always just going to be there and. But we know how the crucial this time is. We're the band, so it's, yeah, we just want the easier it is and the more fun it is. And I guess easy is the big easy express how valuable it is. So they feel like it's they're really doing something, I think. It's important to to realize the difference between radio and social media. With radio, it's repeat. The songs are repeated over and over and over again until you have no choice but to get them into your brain. They, you know, they just weave their way into your into the fabric of your brain and, and next thing you know, you like them.

43:10 But but with social media, people hear 3 seconds of a song and they scroll 3 seconds. You know, they watch 3 seconds of a video and they scroll. So it takes a lot of impressions. Somebody has to hear that song a lot of times before they actually before it actually triggers. So they usually say that in sales or in marketing, it takes 7 to 20 impressions. So to see a commercial on TV 7 to 20 times before the audience actually, you know, it makes an imprint in their brain and they actually know what they're talking about. And so you don't have that opportunity on TikTok unless you're creating a whole bunch of content.

43:52 If you're not the one creating that much content, the fans have to make that up. The fans can do that. They can keep you on people's For You pages and get that song heard over and over and over again because it's played in all these different videos. And we've tried to Angie's had a good idea of pushing It doesn't have to be that clever or creative. And if you don't want to show your faith, it could be your dog running around because funny animal pet videos are popular, that kind of thing. Something's really unrelated. Yeah, pick something out of the lyric that you can depict. It doesn't matter. But they, the audience, the the viewers have to hear it over and over and over again for it to stick, for them to start to, for them to even stop and say, oh, who is that?

44:37 We feel this weight of the pressure of this album. Obviously not as much as they do, but I really do take, we really do take it on upon ourselves because we have a captive audience and yeah, we want to utilize them. And I like you were mentioning there used to be St. teams to hang Flyers and things. We've sort of Angie's done that for sure, and we've had other fans do that where they'd hang Flyers with the QR code or the Spotify link, make stickers and stick them around in cities. Yeah, every little bit helps because it's it's those touch points. Every one of those is a touch point. And you need enough touch points for somebody to say, oh, what's that song? Or who's this Lovejoy that I see everywhere? I haven't heard any of their music, but I see their name everywhere.

45:22 I see their poster, you know, why are so many people lined up in front of the club? Why are, I mean, I mean, all, all of these different things, every one of them. Why are they getting all this press? You know, why did they just get a bump in their Spotify? Everything, all those touch points register in somebody's mind that this is somebody I need to pay more attention to. So St. teams still still have a, they still have a value. Have a huge value. Without them, who's going to you know, I mean, there's nothing. There's nothing there. And the hard part is keeping. The hard part is keeping them. If you're not, if you're not in front of them all the time, they're going to go find somebody who is because that's what they crave. And we need to find another artist who's in front of them, another artist who will get on Zoom once a month for you to pay $5 a month.

46:09 But you know, somebody who will get on Zoom and they can actually meet you, you know, meet you. That's because that's what they crave. When you were talking about fan clubs run by the bands themselves, I've seen a ton obviously, because I that's all I search up all the time. Are all these anything fans, fan club, fan everything. There's tons of apps now coming out. Is there anything you've seen that you like what they're doing or you think the old school like emails and that sort of content? Or do you see things going like that actually working? And do bands need their own app that's like the Lovejoy fan app or is it these third party ones?

46:51 Is that I don't know if you have any opinion on that or if you have experience with any of that. It depends on on how dedicated your fans are. I mean, yeah, you're right. There's a whole bunch of apps out there. It all started, you know, with with Patreon being the biggest one. Well, it started way back. Like Pledge Music was one that was, you know, 1520 years ago. That was the first real artist fan club site. So then, you know, Patreon, you know, has taken over for a lot of that. But Patreon is very limited as to what it does. It works and a lot of people do well on that. A lot of people just make, you know, an extra three, $400.00 a month on there. But all they're, you know, doing is posting a little bit of extra content and, and they're getting paid for it. So it's, it's, it's buying their guitar strings and stuff like that.

47:38 You know, I mean, you can look at it from a lot of different perspectives, but it could be your main income that allows you to go and play a gig that you want to play, but they don't have the money to pay you. You can, you can go do a festival or something like that. Instead of having to go over here where you're going to make $2500 tonight. You can go to a festival for free because you know, you're going to be in front of bigger audience and you've got money coming in mailbox money. As far as what works, I would look at the artists that are most successful at that. Taylor Swift being, you know, the ultimate in building the Swifties and how she how she relates, how everything that she does relates directly to her, her fans is done for her fans. And she serves them in ways that no other artist has, and therefore that she's got the most loyal fan base.

48:24 And and it's not done necessarily with an app. I feel like the label, I think we're already seeing the positive effects of it. For example, sometimes Leslie and I will just Google, you know, just Lovejoy or the name of their new song pay and display and we'll see all these little random articles. But you can tell that they were all taken from what appears to be a press release. So and that's something that we've never seen before. So I really think that Warner is. We're starting to see the. It's starting to see the. Yeah, yes, the fruits of the labor, Yeah, yes. I think, I, I think that they're going to invest a little bit, which which is nice to see and I mean. Nice. They're just well deserved.

49:04 Yeah, I mean, these guys might have, you know, almost a million listeners on Spotify, but they're still, they're still relatively small, having played all these large festivals and whatnot, but. Still the early stages. Of their career, yeah, yeah, it's they're really just starting to breakthrough here, so it's nice to see those things happening. Yeah, 1,000,000 listeners is cool, but you like I had one artist that I was managing and we did a a four month PR campaign for an EP that he was coming out. So every two weeks we was putting out a new single and then we released the EP and we got him from 3000 monthly listeners to 150,000 monthly listeners in that four months. And then the campaign ended and he didn't have anything new to release And literally within two months he was down to about 10,000 and it's dwindled it from there. So, you know, the monthly listeners is great. It, it means that you're going to make some income. They're going to make maybe $3000 off of 1,000,000 streams. You know, I mean, it's just, it's not, it's not a ton and, and it's got to be kept up.

50:24 You know, people have to want to keep listening. Well, if it good stuff. I mean a lot. I've looked at it. I'm working this documentary with a lot of classic country artists from the Sixties, 70s and 80s who have a million listeners. OK. It's amazing because they're not in, you know, they're just their music. Was that popular? That's great. I just Speaking of the older times or even for me and Angie music videos, it makes me crazy because they've lovejoys clearly spent a lot of time and money and effort on their music videos for this album and there's like mini movies and actually they're all going to connect into a trilogy.

51:06 It's really neat. But it's so disappointing that MTV feel like I'm a curmudgeon here, but it's so disappointing MTV doesn't show music videos anymore. And I know that maybe it's because consumers consume on YouTube now more, but don't do you think that it would be of, like, a huge value to artists if there were a channel again that just played where you could just keep your TV on and have music videos playing all day And then you'd sort of like, by osmosis and repetition, observe new artists in that way, Yeah. A lot of the networks have that. I mean, on my Roku, I've got probably 30 different channels that I can just watch videos from different genres. So, so they they definitely have them. OK, I didn't know that.

51:50 I just thought MTV, you know, everybody always says what happened. It used to be music, television. Now it's silly show and they the VMAs, but they don't show videos. It's just so strange, Yeah. No, I I didn't. I didn't know that either. We have to promote that and work and publicize that. And no kidding. As far as fan driven promotion that fans put together themselves without any outside help from the band, are there any big no no's when it comes to putting something like that together? Is there anything we should not be doing? Well, obviously the biggest thing is infringing on their copyrights. Yeah, sure.

52:35 That and then saying anything that puts them down or puts them in a bad light, even if you don't mean to do it. You know, anything like that would would be a challenge. Most of what you're going to see, you know, if you repost stuff that's online, then it's already online and you won't have a problem with that. Most, most of the stuff you won't have a problem with what you cannot do. Some of the things you can't do is like use their image to market something else, like to market your services, you know, might be able to, you'd have to get permission from them to, to do that. But it's, but it's pretty much staying away from the copyright infringement things that they don't want out there, things that you know a photographer took and you don't have permission to, to, to put to post it. And trust me, they will come after you. It's interesting that you talk about posting things that might put them in a disparaging light, because I think sometimes there's a lot of fans that post things and maybe they're trying to be funny, but they don't think about what they're posting and the way that it could be interpreted there. Is, I mean, it's the same thing with all the comments that you get and everything.

53:44 Those negative comics make a difference. They make a difference in the algorithms. They make a difference in the in just the whole demeanor that the whole bands, you know, the way they feel about themselves. That's a good question actually. With regard to negative comments, do you feel it's best to ignore, respond, delete, block? Like what do you? How's the best way to handle that? Ignore or delete. Do not respond. You don't want to give them the attention. That's all they're looking for. They want somebody, want to get somebody riled. Yeah. So don't take the bait, OK? Yep, don't take the bait. Yeah. Sometimes, yeah, they'll move on to somebody else. We try to keep our advice fan focused, but sometimes it's like you want to like grab them, do VIP packages. Oh good, you did it so.

54:34 If the fans can ask for the stuff that they want, you give them a way to ask for it, or you do a survey and then you pass that on to the band, then maybe the band will get the idea, but the label will also help them guide them on what the best practices are. And I never thought about that, Leslie. I bet there has to be somebody from the label that's on the Reddit keeping an eye on and sneaking. People are saying they're. Tracking the social media, they're tracking everything. They're tracking every time you use one of the hashtag Lovejoy or hashtag one of the band members every time, you know, they're, they're using services like social blade and stuff that, you know, will track everything and, and the engagement by the hour, whether it goes up and goes down.

55:18 You know, we made this announcement. He was on this TV show. Did it, did it bump, you know, give us a spike in the social media. I mean, they they they manage all of that. And so, yeah, anything that you can do to get the attention of somebody on the team makes a world of difference. And instead of talking directly to the band, you might be talking directly to the manager who's telling the band what to do. Leslie, you have a question on here that I think is really great. What are some common misconceptions about how artists earn a living or define their success? There's a lot of people that think if you're able to go overseas and do a tour, quote, UN quote, a world tour, that you're rich and you've got all this money to throw around. And we know that's not necessarily the case.

56:00 What are some common misconceptions about how artists actually make their bread and butter? Well, you're pretty much hitting on it. You know, touring is a very, very expensive endeavor. And a lot of times it takes like a label to give you an advance to, you know, tour support to be able to do that. Sponsors, they have to go and get sponsors to be able to afford to tour because you can't do it on your own. You can't you just can't pay those kind of bills and, and makes enough money at the venues, especially if you're not always the the headliner and you know, you're doing a lot of opening acts and everything. You're making very little money. You're making money off of your merch. That's basically the the big thing that you're doing.

56:41 Just because they have a million followers on Spotify, that is not paying a whole lot of bills. It's definitely not paying. It's not going to pay for enough for them to record another album. It's just, it's frustrating, but it's, it's the truth. Artists, artists make their money off of merch and especially if they control the merch. So depending on the record label deal, they may have to pay a percentage of the merch to the record label if they're part of a 360 deal. But, you know, if the artists can control the merch and the artists can control the fan club so that they're the ones that are collecting the e-mail addresses and they are the ones that are servicing the fans, then then their income is solid.

57:24 But outside of that, everything else is vulnerable. And what about, you know, buying music? I know when a single comes out or a single is about to come out, this is something I just thought of. That's like every time they announce a single's going to come out this day or an album's coming out this day, we say pre save. That means a lot to the people in the industry to see pre saves or pre-orders. And then we encourage them to buy the songs and download the songs. I would imagine that's valuable and I know we just found a resource you probably are familiar already, station head, a place where you can have listening parties and it's connected to your Spotify. So there's no copyright issues and the participants can actually buy and download the songs while they're in the stream and communicate contact, you know, communicating with you. So.

58:10 Everything is engagement, engaged with your fans and and on the fan side, engage with the band because every time, every time there's an engagement, it's tracked. So if you pre save a song, then that tells Spotify when this song comes out, when it's the official release date, the ad date. We need to add that to this playlist and this playlist and this playlist because it's already this popular. So their algorithms are looking at that. If there's nobody pre saving it, they're saying, well, you know, we'll see what happens, see if it goes viral somehow. But they don't, they're not proactive in doing that. And Spotify will get on your your side. They want you to sell more, they make more money. They want people.

58:54 When bands have a deal with Spotify where I had this with that cheer and I had a Green Day and I think other little bands where I'll get an e-mail from Spotify saying because you're a fan of Green Day, you can get this limited edition T-shirt only through, you know, this link. Thank you for your support. Thank you from Green Day or whatever it is. I wish I would love to see them do something like that. That's where that's where the relationship from the label comes. In and the download and like I remember Angie, you saying not just buying the song but downloading it. Is that does that make a difference if someone buys a song and then forgets to download it because they usually stream it or is there more value in playing the thought song?

59:39 Like how does that? That's a good question. I don't really know. I mean, not that many people are buying the song anymore, unfortunately. So that's not a huge income for the artist, but you know, they are definitely obviously buying vinyl. What's interesting is that I don't know what the number is it something like 85% of the vinyl this bought has never played. It's just kept as a collector's item. And Angie? Sounds about right. And so, you know, it's, you need to, you need to do everything as a fan, you need to do everything you can to trigger those algorithms. And that means watching YouTube videos. It means using their, their song in your video. It means sharing and reposting, sharing and reposting everything.

1:00:28 All of those things trigger Spotify or TikTok or Instagram to say, oh, we need to push this more because it's popular. You've. Given us like a wealth of information. I can't wait to watch this back and. Take note, this is amazing. I feel like I could talk to you forever. You're so knowledgeable. And I have to say, I was looking at your website the other night, briefly looking through the online program. And obviously I have nothing to do with the music industry, but it all looked so fascinating that I wanted to like go through it myself just to learn about everything you can. You can get a two months, two week, you know, free trial. There's a lot of good information from from people on there who talk about their fan clubs and talk about, you know, and, and talk about, you know, switching gears and how they had to try to move their fans from loving them for this to loving them for that.

1:01:19 I manage an artist with 25,000 followers. Most of it she built because she's known for her comedy skits. But she is a singer, a great singer and a great songwriter and an actress. And so we're working really hard to get everybody to know about that too. And not everybody's going to love her music. So we're going to lose some people because it's not all comedy. She's still doing the comedy, but but you know, it's a balancing act and everything. So if an artist wants to change a little bit of direction, change a band member, it doesn't matter. Add a band member, everything is going to affect how people perceive it. Is it still the same as it was? Well, I thank you. I thank you for your time and. Absolutely, my pleasure.

1:02:01 Thank you so much. We really appreciate it. You bet. All right. Take. Take. Care. Thanks so much. Thank you all for listening today. I hope you enjoyed this interview. Please leave us some words in the comments, send us an e-mail, go to our website lvjynation.com anytime and we'd love to hear your thoughts and if you have ideas for other interviews, other guests we could have on the show. Until next time, until we hear from next time, when we hear from Dave about the gig, take care and keep streaming. See you later. Bye bye.