Michael Walker: So, if you’re listening to this then you likely already know that being an independent musician is a lonely road. And maybe your friends and your family just don’t fully understand why you do what you do, or why you invest so much time, energy, and money towards achieving your music goals. And especially early on, it can be hard to find people who really understand what you’re trying to accomplish and how to make it happen. So, that’s where ModernMusician comes in!

My name’s Michael Walker and I can understand and relate to that feeling. I’ve been there myself, and so has our team of independent artists. The truth is that basically everything good in my life has been a result of music. It’s the reason I met my wife, it’s why I have my 3 kids, it’s how I met my best friends. And now with Modern Musician, we have seen so many talented artists who started out with a dream, with a passion, but without really a fanbase or a business. And if they take that and turn it into a sustainable full-time career and be able to impact hundreds, thousands or even millions of fans with your music. We’ve had thousands of messages from artists who told us we’ve helped change their lives forever. It just gets even more exciting and fulfilling when you’re surrounded by a community of other people who get it, and who have shared their success and their knowledge with each other openly. So, if you are feeling called into making your music a full-time career and to be able to reach more people with your music, then I want to invite you to join our community so that we can help support your growth and we can help lift you up as you pursue your musical dreams. You’ll be able to interact in a community with other high-level artists, coaches, and industry professionals, as well as be able to participate in our daily live podcast, meet these amazing guests, and get access to completely free training. If you’d like to join our family of artists who truly care about your success, then click on the link in the show notes and sign-up now.

Tyler Herwig: Yeah. I mean, the power of community is almost indescribable, at least in my experience, I don't always realize the effects until way later. That was a big part of why I wanted to go to the mastermind in Orlando is I really didn't know what I was signing up for. I actually had to cancel a couple of shows, but it was like: I know that being around this group will likely impact and change me in ways that I won't see for years to come. You know, when you surround yourself with people that are willing to work just as hard as you are, or that have made mistakes that you're either in the process of making, that you've made yourself or that you are thinking about making, but haven't implemented yet, you can learn a lot from their experiences and that can change your path drastically. 

Michael Walker: It's easy to get lost in today's music industry with constantly changing technology, and where anyone with a computer can release their own music. I'm going to share with you why this is the best time to be an independent musician and it's only getting better. If you have high-quality music, but you just don't know the best way to promote yourself so that you can reach the right people and generate a sustainable income with your music, we're going to show you the best strategies that we're using right now to reach millions of new listeners every month without spending 10 hours a day on social media. We're creating a revolution in today's music industry and this is your invitation to join me. I'm your host, Michael Walker.

All right. I'm excited to be here today with my new friend, Tyler Herwig. Tyler and I just had a chance to connect here in Orlando, Florida, and he's just as awesome in person as he is online. Tyler, he's performed over 250 shows per year. He plays both at corporate events, weddings, and he's really like a living embodiment of what we talk about when we're talking about Modern Musician. So I'm really excited to have him on the podcast today because I think that hearing his story and how he's built a career for his music is going to be really inspiring for people. So Tyler, thank you so much for taking the time to be here today.

Tyler Herwig: Yeah. Thanks for having me. I'm really honored and glad to be here. 

Michael: Awesome. So to kick things off maybe you could just share a brief introduction about yourself and your music and what made you decide you wanted to join our Modern Musician community.

Tyler: Yeah, so I've been performing since I was 16 years old. It all got started for me in high school when I learned that girls like musicians. [both laugh] I know. It's crazy. And I was in love with this girl growing up and so I heard a rumor from a friend of a friend that she liked musicians and I decided that I was going to do that so I could impress her. And so I taught myself how to play guitar. And then I got this idea in my head that I would ask her to our school prom. And so I learned all of her favorite songs, got her friends and my friends together in the parking lot of a Taco John's and I put on this little concert for her. And at the very end, I asked her to prom and she said: no!

Michael: [exasperated] No! Really?? Ah man!

Tyler: Yeah, really. She said no. That broke my heart. The worst part was that all my friends immediately started making fun of me. That lasted for like, I don't know, 10-15 minutes until they got bored and they left. And I decided to do the only thing that a 16 year old boy with a broken heart would do in that situation: I ordered 30 tacos. I opened the trunk of my car and I sat in the trunk playing guitar, eating tacos, wiping my tears away with tortilla shells and just singing songs. And while I was doing that, this woman got off of work and was pulling through the drive thru. She heard me singing and she got out of her car and came and asked if I would sing at her wedding.

Michael: Wow!

Tyler: That was the moment that really changed my life because I went from trying to impress a pretty girl to: wow, I can make someone's day a little bit more special and more memorable by doing something I had learned to love to do. And so I started performing as much as I possibly could. And after about 10 years, I fell into a wrong crowd and that was when I started falling into some addiction and started making some really poor choices. Took some time to get better, completely stepped away from music, and then about four years ago, decided to redirect and start creating songs that might change people's lives and direct them away from addiction. And since doing that, I've seen this giant change in my music, my fan base, my connection with my audience, because I'm making music that is there to inspire and help people as well as tell my personal story. 

Michael: Wow, dang dude, that is an incredible story and it's actually kind of funny. My story in high school around how I started making music was very similar. And I guess that's, I mean, it's probably similar for a lot of dudes in high school, that you want to start making music for the chicks. But the real question is, what is she doing now and how much regret does she have? She has never gotten over the one who got away in that parking lot in Taco John's. [both laughing]

Tyler: Yeah, I know. I haven't talked to her probably since we graduated high school, but I do know that she got pregnant right out of high school and I think she has like 7 kids now.

Michael: Oh, wow!

Tyler: Hopefully she's happy, but I don't know. That's not my place.

Michael: We'll get her on the podcast. We'll figure it out.

Tyler: Yes, we definitely should. I'll give you her email after. [both laughing]

Michael: Oh man. Awesome. Well, I mean, talk about an interesting story to thank you for sharing sort of the ups and the downs and the challenges that you've been through, and I'm sure that coming back into music now, you have a renewed sense of purpose and motivation for the music that you're making. So maybe you can share a little bit about: how did you discover Modern Musician in the first place? I'm kind of curious about what your journey was like. I mean, a program like what we offer is a pretty big leap of faith and a pretty big commitment. So I'm just kind of curious about how you discovered Modern Musician and decided to take that leap of faith.

Tyler: Yeah, so that's actually a pretty interesting story too. So one of the Modern Musician coaches, Zach King is from Minneapolis, which is where I live and we used to play at all the same venues, but we never met in person, but I stalked him pretty thoroughly on social media and he ended up moving out to LA, but I saw that he didn't really have any stop in his career growth. And it was because he was doing Modern Musician. And so I finally reached out to him and said: what are you doing? Because I'm playing all these shows and I'm not getting the same connections. I'm not getting the same turnaround in my career and really looking at it as a business. And he said; I do this thing called Modern Musician. And so I started looking into it. I think I started to sign-up and watch the podcast a few years ago, and then my wife ended up getting pregnant. I was kind of thrown off kilter a little bit by that because we weren't planning on it and it definitely took us by surprise. But back in August, we decided that it was the time now to take my music from point A to point B and do whatever it took to cross that in between stage. And so I actually hopped on a call with Zack and decided that no matter how much it cost, no matter what I had to do, I was going to become a Modern Musician. And so I joined the program back in August of last year. And since then things have really, really taken off. My fan base has just exploded. Truly.

Michael: Awesome.

Tyler: So it's all thanks to Zach King.

Michael: Yeah, shout out to Zach for sure. And Minneapolis, we talked about this briefly when you were here for our Orlando mastermind, but that was kind of our stomping ground when we first started with Paradise Fears. So it's interesting to hear you… I mean, when you're talking about Taco Johns and those things I can definitely relate with that. So, maybe we can talk a little bit about your journey in the past few months, since you joined in August. What would you say has been your biggest takeaway, your biggest learning lesson? If you could go back to yourself and this is maybe even like pre-Modern Musician, just back when you were starting your music career. If you could give yourself one piece of advice around your music, what would it be?

Tyler: Probably the one thing that I would tell myself if I could go back in time is: start collecting email addresses. I didn't realize how much power there was in email marketing in terms of connecting with your audience, making offers, and anything from selling a CD or a starter pack to some of the high ticket offers. I kind of kicked myself for not collecting emails since August, even though I had been doing music for over a decade. I definitely think about how much different my career would be if I had had email addresses and fans that have been following me and I've stayed in contact for 15 years. I’d probably have like 100,000 emails by now. But it's one thing that I would recommend to anyone take seriously is get contact information and stay in contact with your fans, even if you have to take a break and step away from music for a while, it's okay to be authentic and open with those people and say: Hey, I've got to do this, but I'll be back. You'll hear from me soon.

Michael: Awesome. Yeah, that's a great piece of advice, that rain catcher and if the rain's falling down, then you want to make sure you have something to capture the rain with so you can stay connected with those people. Awesome. You know, one thing that you had mentioned was that you've had some success with some of the higher ticket offers and things like weddings or corporate shows. I think you had mentioned that you actually had someone come in from your ads that purchased a high ticket offer from you. I'd love to hear you talk a little bit about your experience with that. In particular, I think that high ticket offers for a lot of artists are challenging because it kind of brings up a sense of self worth and “do I deserve to charge a thousand dollars or more for this”? So I'd love to hear your journey and perspectives through being able to offer those and provide that value to your fans.

Tyler: Yeah. So it was just actually a few months ago I had a pretty new fan come in and purchase a custom co-write song with me. And she found me through one of my ads and we ended up connecting a little bit. It turns out that her boyfriend actually is an employee at one of the large corporations that I do a recurring corporate event for. And so I felt really comfortable that we just had so much in common. And she ended up telling me that she's always wanted to write a custom song. And so I said: how much would you feel comfortable spending on a custom song? I've never really co-written with a fan before, so you set the price and let's make it happen. And she said she was willing to pay $2,500 to sit down and co-write a song with me. And so we hopped on 2 zooms. The first one was very much an interview. Just tell me about your life, your life story. What do you want to get out into the world as music? And that lasted probably an hour and I ended up taking notes and I honestly typed most of what she said in the ChatGPT. Kind of the base of the song for me. A lot of chat GPT songs, they're not very good right off the bat

Michael: Yeah, they’re kind of cliche-ish.

Tyler: Yeah. And I'm not the most experienced co writer in the whole wide world, but I figured having a framework to get out what she was trying to say and then putting a true human touch on it, and then kind of going back and forth with her. Like, do you like this line? Do you like this line? We put together a song during our second zoom call within, I think it was about 45 minutes. We had it done. I came up with a melody the next day, recorded it as a voice memo on my phone and I sent it to her. And she was ecstatic, just super happy that she got this thing. And I kind of made a little video on my phone to teach her how to play it. So if she ever wanted to learn, she would have an instructional video on how to play the song as well.

Michael: So cool, man. Yeah, I mean, it's one of those things that I think it's easy to take for granted as musicians, that because we know how to make music it's something that feels very intuitive, but it really is like magic. It's magic to everyone that just kind of watch what you create. I remember Eli that was on the podcast a week or two ago and was describing his experience with custom songs and about how one of the songs he wrote was with a fan who wanted to honor their grandma. It was like her 100th birthday. And so they played the song at her 100th birthday party around her whole family who came together to experience that moment together. I was like: dang, that is so cool! And you can kind of provide that experience for someone. The song is really special. It's kind of a priceless thing to share. So it's really cool to hear your story about how you were able to do that for one of your fans as well. How do you encourage someone who is listening to this, who, maybe they're interested in doing these custom songs, but maybe they're a little bit scared about the offer of like: how do I present this in a way that doesn't come across a salesy, but comes across in the right way. Do you have any advice just in general about mindset for how they can create a higher ticket offer?

Tyler: Yeah. A couple of things is first, I would say: affirm yourself that what you're doing is valuable and your fans will reflect that value. I think it's okay, it's just my personal opinion, I think it's okay to be a little flexible on price. If someone tells me they only have $800 as opposed to $2,000, like I'm happy to write a song for $800, that's fine. So I think, have a minimum that you're willing to really hold to, but also be willing to serve your fan base. And then one of the other tricks that I recently started using is: I offer my Intune survey to my fans first before I get them to go into my starter pack. But with the digital download of my starter pack, I actually included a songwriting guide. So I started just a really simple, basic songwriting guide that prompts all of my fans that are interested in purchasing anything to plant the seed that they could write a song one day too, and I think that be very fruitful when it comes to making high ticket offers in the future.

Michael: Super interesting. Yeah. So, basically, in the initial welcome sequence with the starter pack is what we call it, then you have a section where they can submit some prompts to write a song. And is that connected to the survey that is meant for inspiration where it says something like: sometimes I like to write songs that are inspired by the stories of fans in the community?

Tyler: Yeah, that's exactly it.

Michael: That's awesome. That's cool. I mean, we added that like to the base templates probably like six months ago or so, but I haven't heard a lot from people who are using that in practice. So, I think that's super cool. I think there's a huge opportunity to not just have the custom songs, but also just to hear the stories from your fans and see what is it that they're going through right now. And you know, what are they thinking about? What are their challenges? What are their goals? I'm curious, how many of those surveys started coming in and what does the experience look like in terms of the responses that people are sharing? Tyler: Yeah. It was probably 2 weeks ago that I started offering the survey before the starter pack in terms of my sales sequence and my messenger campaigns. But since doing that, I probably get between 10-13 responses a day on my Intune surveys. My email is flooded with Intune survey responses. There's all sorts of feedback that comes from that. And it's really helped me as I'm looking at… I just launched a new song actually yesterday and one of the most valuable things that I've been taking away from it, are: who are their top three favorite artists? Cause now I can see like these are probably the artists I should be targeting the most because this is what all of my fans say.

Michael: Awesome. That's cool, man. I mean, we're geeking out about this in Orlando just a few days ago, getting the Intune survey set up. But yeah, there's something that I've noticed as a pattern between our most successful artists and just like people in general, like yourself, is that they are very fast action takers and they just get stuff done and put it out fast. Erica Mason was an example of that. Like we had lunch at one of our masterminds in Hawaii and later that night, she took this 30 minute conversation we had, sent out an email to her whole audience, which was about 24,000 email subscribers and sold out of 30 spots for retreat at $2,000 a piece. The speed at which she did it was, I was like: man, that's incredible! And what you just shared right now, you're like: yeah, like we just did this in Orlando, but not only did we just do it, but I actually put it into action, and now I'm getting 10 to 13 Intune surveys per day. Really awesome. So, I'm curious in your experience… I mean, obviously you've been through some different ups and downs in your personal life and in your career, likely in your journey with Modern Musician as well. What have been some of the lessons that you've learned through those ups and downs, through the challenges you've been through? For anyone that's in one of those periods right now where they're kind of going through one of those downs, how do you recommend that someone is able to overcome or work through or heal, if necessary, from some of those challenges?

Tyler: Yeah. I know particularly in the past when I felt like things aren't going my way, I tend to commiserate and I would encourage people to really remind yourself that when you feel like you're at rock bottom, you're given a decision to either put down the shovel. You can always get lower, but at a certain point you can put down the shovel and start figuring out how you're going to get out of whatever situation you're in and persevere through it. Whether that's emotional issues or personal life issues or issues with your business, you can decide how to get out. And then again, like you were just saying, take quick action. You might make a different mistake, but at least you're not staying in the same mistake. And sometimes you have to do a hundred things wrong before you figure out the 1 thing that's going to be right.  And that's definitely been my experience over the last several years is just make all the mistakes, but fall forward. Fail forward and just get to the next spot.

Michael: So good. Yeah. So being willing to show up and try things, and fail, and fail forward, make mistakes. It's like Thomas Edison I think said: every wrong step discarded is another step forward.

Tyler: Yeah.

Michael: I mean, maybe in that vein, if you feel comfortable talking about this or sharing it, as it relates to your journey through it sounds like a really challenging time or a dark time with challenges with addiction, how do you bounce back from that? What allowed you to be able to change the trajectory of your life when you were in the middle of that? 

Tyler: Yeah, a big part of it actually came from, I don't want to bore anyone with too many details, so I checked myself into a recovery treatment center. And when I got out of that facility, I moved into a sober house where I was living with 14 other guys in a 4 bedroom little house. It was basically like going back to college, but when I was in the treatment facility, they told me that I would likely never be able to perform music again, because I was always performing at bars, breweries, wineries…. Places where people were drinking or doing drugs and doing the things that I probably shouldn't be around. But when I moved into the sober house, a few months in, became very close friends with one of the guys. He was actually the best man at my wedding. And he challenged me to start writing songs specifically about not doing those things, write about my experiences, and then go to the places where those people were; where the people who might have the same problem I had are? Go there and sing songs about how that wasn't the right thing for you and share that experience. 

Michael: Wow!

Tyler: And so when I started taking that approach and really being authentic and vulnerable with people, I saw this big change. And every day that I do that, I mean, I perform almost every single day, I'm gifted another day of recovery afterward, which has been a really cool experience. So I would encourage people, no matter what you're going through, whatever the struggle is, be authentic with your audience at live performances, at virtual performances, and see what changes happen because you never know who needs to hear your story.

Michael: Man, that's so powerful. What that reminds me of is a quote. I can't remember the exact words of the quote, but it might've been Joseph Campbell who described that our greatest purpose or greatest gift or blessing in a lot of cases becomes if we can think back to our own lives and when we were in our darkest moments or our rock bottom moments, like who did we need and what did we need help with, like at that point. And then later on being able to become the person, become the thing that we needed and be able to help give that gift to other people. Huge blessing. Along those lines if I remember correctly, you shared an example from one of your fans who had reached out who was sharing about the impact that your music had made. Could you talk a little bit about that?

Tyler: Yeah. So I released a song back in January called Enough. And I wrote this song when I first got sober as a way to make amends for a lot of the mistakes that I had made and a lot of the people that I had hurt. So it's a very stripped down, very raw sounding and very emotional song. And I released it, started plugging it on social media everywhere I could, making all the reels and TikTok videos. I had a guy reach out to me who was a new fan, never talked to him before and expressed that he was struggling with addiction as well. And we had a series of phone calls talking about my music, my experiences, and he ended up asking me if I could help him get plugged into the recovery community and into a treatment center. I haven't heard from him in about 6 weeks. So I'm hoping that's a good thing and not a bad thing. But it was really cool to see: when I'm willing to be open and authentic, that not only can I do something that I love, but I can actually change or potentially save someone's life just by writing and singing a song, just by putting it out there into the world. And again, it'll find the right people.

Michael: That's powerful, man. Thank you for sharing.

Tyler: Yeah.

Michael: Maybe, maybe you can speak a little bit to just the power of community and surrounding yourself with people that motivate you to be a better person. I'm curious if from your experience and the journey that you've been on, what you think the role of community and your surroundings have?

Tyler: Yeah. I mean, the power of community is almost indescribable, at least in my experience, I don't always realize the effects until way later. That was a big part of why I wanted to go to the mastermind in Orlando is I really didn't know what I was signing up for. I actually had to cancel a couple of shows, but it was like: I know that being around this group will likely impact and change me in ways that I won't see for years to come. You know, when you surround yourself with people that are willing to work just as hard as you are, or that have made mistakes that you're either in the process of making, that you've made yoursel,f or that you are thinking about making but haven't implemented yet, you can learn a lot from their experiences and that can change your path drastically. Actually, at the mastermind I was able to connect with a few other artists that told me they had tried some of the ideas that I was about to try and do. And they were like: don't do it! Don't do it! It didn't work for me. It might work for you, but maybe try something else first and see if the new thing works. That could end up having an impact on my career for years to come because I just avoided 1 mistake all through creating a connection with someone else.

Michael: Huge. Yeah. One thing that's coming back to mind is the hot seat that you did where there's a opportunity or there's a question mark and I think it was like a 12,000 potential opportunity that you could invest into. It sounded like as you went into it, you kind of already knew what you felt like the answer was, but you weren't really sure about it. I mean, we can share that, that example briefly.

Tyler:Yeah, so, kind of a long story short, and to give a little bit of context, right before I started Modern Musician, I signed a development deal with a record label in Nashville. It's not a full blown, like, record deal. Basically, you invest money, they help you write a song, produce the song, and then they'll push it to radio. And so I ended up releasing a song called “Living in the Last Days” with them back in September of last year. It charted to 8 in the US on indie country radio and I think 4 in the UK on indie country radio. So it charted really, really high. But I got 0 return on my investment. I didn't see an uptick in my social media. Didn't see new emails, new fans. I just got some really cool bragging rights. And they recently came back and offered me a very similar deal for $12,000, but with 3 songs, 2 push to radio, and I was really torn because since starting with Modern Musician, I've realized that if I put $12,000 into my ad spend and marketing myself, I have the ability to see an ROI or even truly make money. As well as get thousands and thousands of email addresses. And so during the hot seat, I pretty much just asked everybody, guys, what would you do? What would you do if you were me? Cause I know that charting on the radio is cool, but you know, 12-24,000 more email addresses seems cooler to me. And they all encouraged me: believe in yourself. Push yourself, do the work, and see what's going to happen cause likely you'll get another opportunity to work with a label or this label again, if you really want, but getting those fans yourself will feel so much more satisfying and gratifying in the end, if you're willing to put the work in. And actually later that night, I increased my ad spend for my ads by like $15, which… It's wild. It'll add up to be about $12,000 by the end of this year.

Michael: That's awesome. Last week when we were chatting, I forget what your average cost per fan was in terms of your ad spend, but what's the number like cost per lead right now?

Tyler: Yeah, it's about, it's between 52 and 58 cents, depending on the week right now. I mean, that's easy math, easy math, but round it down to 50 and we're looking at 24,000 email addresses in the next 12 months instead.

Michael: Yeah. I mean, that's, that's wild. That's so cool that you can basically reverse engineer and look at that cost per fan and likely as you scale up your campaigns, you should expect the cost per lead to go up, orobably. You could keep it down depending on split testing and whatnot, but even if it went up to $1 cost per lead, that means 12,000 new fans on your email list, which is probably worth… I've heard that 1 email subscriber is worth around 10 social media followers. So it'd be like 100,000 legitimate not-bot followers, but real engaged people on your list, which is pretty dang awesome.

Tyler: Well, and if one in a thousand people is taking a high ticket offer priced at $1,000-$2,000, that's me potentially doubling my money as well. 

Michael: Yeah. I think you're doing something right there, Tyler.

Tyler: It’s good motivation.

Michael: I think you're onto something there. Maybe, Tyler, you could share some thoughts around monetization. It's one thing to be getting leads that are coming in, but to actually make it sustainable or profitable, we need to have offers and in particular, some of the higher end of the offers seem like those are really key in terms of making a profit. I'd be curious to hear your feedback or thoughts as it relates to that question of: how can we best serve our fans and make sure that the value per fan is high enough to make it sustainable? 

Tyler: Yeah. So, I mean, I think you just said it. The key to monetization is to make offers. Your fans can't buy something they don't know exists, so make offers frequently. You can always phrase it in different ways and say you're running a sale or a discount, or here's a promo code, which you can set up in StreetTeam. There's a lot of things you can do there. I also really like using scarcity to my advantage. When I put out a new song, I immediately start doing pre-sales for limited edition single CDs. So I put one song on the disc. I print 100 copies of it and say: once these 100 copies are gone, this product will not be coming back. You got to buy it now or you'll never get one. And the value isn't in the CD itself. if you want to go stream the song, you're going to listen to it on Spotify or Apple music or something like that. But to have a collector's edition item where there's only 100 of them. And for the fans that really believe in me and in my music, they buy them immediately. So with this new song that I launched just yesterday, I started doing pre-sales a couple of weeks ago. I sold 30 of the 100 copies almost overnight.

Michael: So, wow, super cool. Yeah, there's something there that's really interesting around the scarcity or the limited edition amount and connecting that to your inner circle, connecting it to your music relics. I think it's an area that we want to lean into more this year with the Street Team system. For example, if you had a release, and maybe you did a bundle where there's like 1 of 100 copies, and in addition to them getting like a physical 1 of 100 edition of something, maybe it comes with a 1 of 100 relic edition, that's like the digital collectible. And maybe it also comes bundled in with a year of access to your inner circle at that platinum tier. Yeah, I would love to see… I mean, you in particular Tyler, since you've already started to establish this model of doing drops or doing releases with limited edition. Let's work on getting something connected with the relics and with your inner circle. I personally would be interested in picking up one of your relics, like a gold or platinum relic and all bragging rights in your inner circle, but I think it'd be really cool to connect what you're already doing with those physical drops with the digital collectibles as well. 

Tyler: Yeah, I agree. And just for you, I'll offer you a discount for my platinum relic. It's only $5,000.

Michael: [both laughing] Oh, is that all?

Tyler: Yeah, that’s all!

Michael: It's a tax write off. Yeah. Awesome. Well, hey Tyler, man, it was great connecting with you in Orlando. I mean, there's certain people that you spend time with them in person and you just immediately know your state of presence, your state of being. You’re super, super sharp. There's a lot of like.. I could just sense like you're a very intelligent and just good hearted person. So it was great connecting in person. I'm really excited about what you've built and the potential for you as well. You're kind of like at this budding stage of your career. So really excited for you and grateful to be a part of your journey. And yeah! Any final thoughts or words that you want to share with the audience before we wrap up today?

Tyler: I would just encourage people to just try a new thing. You know? Don't be scared it's not going to work if it doesn't work, almost, good. Cause now you know a new thing that doesn't work. So get out, try the thing, make the song, release it, make an offer. You got this!

Michael: Awesome. So good. Yeah. I mean, maybe I want to personally listen to your song Enough cause that song sounds like that encapsulates one of my personal core values or messages that I want to be able to share with my music, which is that you are enough. What is the key takeaway from that song, and, and I'm curious if that's connected to what we're talking about here as well.

Tyler: Oh goodness! I mean, that song, like the whole hook of that song is that you told me I wasn't enough, but you gave all that you had for me. So it's a song, it's going to make you cry. It'll probably give you flashbacks of ‘Nam.

Michael: [defensively] That’s an inside joke there!

Tyler: And that kid on the bridge.

Michael: Oh man, June, are you out there right now? Are you listening to this, June? Oh man.

Tyler: Pluggin June. Oh man. No, definitely check it out and feel free to let me know what you think. It is a really raw, authentic and pretty sad song. But when you know the full story of where I was and now where I am now, to me, it's almost a happy-sad. Because you see how things have turned the corner. That's the other cool thing about some of those raw authentic songs that you can put out is when you share your story after the fact, your fans get really invested in how you changed; how you turned that corner. And that'll create an amazing connection. 

Michael: Awesome. Well, Tyler, Thanks again for coming on here live to share your story. And let's give a virtual round of applause. Give a Yeeaah!

Tyler: Yeaaah! 

Michael:  \Hey, it’s Michael here. I hope that you got a ton of value out of this episode. Make sure to check out the show notes to learn more about our guest today, and if you want to support the podcast then there’s a few ways to help us grow.

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