Building a $100M music empire

Hi,

Let’s jump right into it. This week’s newsletter highlights some of the gems shared from Russ’ new interview with a podcast called The Managers Playbook.

The conversation has tons of value applicable to artists, creators, their teams, music professionals, executives, and more.

Let’s dive in ⬇️

The Managers Playbook was founded by Mauricio Ruiz - a music executive who I’m fortunate enough to call a friend and colleague. Mauricio used to manage Jessie Reyez, ran one of the most successful music video production company’s in the early 2010’s (+3 billion views), and has a wealth of knowledge, insight, and wisdom into the inner workings of the music business.

I’ve always been a fan of Russ interviews and feel like I leave them with more wisdom and inspiration than when I started. This one had lots of takeaways I really appreciated.

1) Being late to your own party

“You run the risk of being late to your own party when you sit on your music for too long.”

Russ explains why he’s not a fan of holding onto music for too long, with one of the reasons being that it’s so easy to become less enthusiastic or excited about a song the longer you go without releasing it, yet that song could end up being massive for you.

That song could also be a bridge to another opportunity or connection point in your career if it was released at the right time and hit the right person or audience. That bridge could’ve leapfrogged to the next opportunity.

Artists: it’s important to be smart, strategic, and thoughtful with your rollouts but don’t overthink it! Ready, fire, aim. Make a plan. Release. Evaluate what works. Keep it moving.

Professionals & creators: Towards the end of the interview, Mauricio mentioned how he’s been wanting to do this podcast for almost 7 years. He’s in no way late to the party but it’s so easy for us to sit on an idea and hold it for too long.

2) Be prepared

Russ talks about taking over 6 months to record 26 individual songs and a full album before going on a run and dropping one song per week. He wanted to be prepared and knew that if one of those songs connected, he would at least have more music in the stash to continue that momentum and not rush and scramble to create and lose steam.

Artists: The 1 song per week strategy won’t work for everyone but being prepared does. You can be prepared by recording a lot of music, creating content, and having a plan together before releasing to ensure that if something does connect, you’re ready to go.

Creators: The same thing applies - if you’re a YouTuber, a podcast host, content creator, etc - you can avoid putting yourself in the position of having to scramble by just simply being prepared. Stack up content, record multiple episodes, etc so that if one connects, you can capitalize on the momentum.