Kevin Breuner:
Oftentimes artists neglect the email list and that's where you're going to get conversions. So people convert from email, people read email. It's like their address on the web. And so I've talked to a lot of artists recently that they might have big social presences, but they don't feel like they're getting the same traction. For the amount of audience they have, they're not getting as much conversions or as much streams. And it's like, "Well, you got to bring the whole piece together." All those social platforms are doing their darnest to keep your fans from leaving there and going to your website or going deeper with the relationship with you. But getting email becomes so important because you have their attention and that's where people are more willing to convert and buy things or take action.

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. But 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 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, so I'm super excited to be here today with Kevin Breuner. So Kevin is a Grammy nominated artist. He sold over 300,000 albums, toured around the world. He's had songs used by the NFL, Peacock, ABC, in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and a ton of indie film productions. In addition to doing it himself, he's also the founder and host of the DIY Musician podcast, and he's leading the concept marketing at CD Baby, which if you're a musician who has your music on Spotify or Apple Music or anywhere online nowadays you've probably heard of CD Baby.
So he has a lot to share when it comes to both personal experience with being a DIY musician and also they have an amazing podcast and a resource around interviewing tons of successful DIY musicians. So of course today we're going to be able to geek out and dive into in the modern day of the music industry, because of the internet, because of these amazing breakthroughs, how can you fully leverage those opportunities to be a DIY musician? So Kevin, thank you so much for taking the time to be here today.

Kevin Breuner:
Thanks for having me, Michael.

Michael Walker:
Absolutely. So to get things started, I'd love to hear just a little bit about your story. For anyone who this is their first time connecting with you, could you share a little bit about how you went from your starting point to becoming a Grammy-nominated artist and selling 300,000-plus albums?

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, I'm a guitar player and I wanted to go study music and music business, so I went to Nashville to Belmont University, which was incredibly challenging. Being a music major was one of the hardest things I've ever done because you have to do so much, so much more than the average student does who's just taking a regular college course or major. But anyway, so yeah, I was there. Just immersed myself in the music community and that's all I wanted my life to be about, was about music business and playing music. And so just dove in, took a advantage of every opportunity that was there while in college. Right after my fourth year, I was actually on vacation at Disney World with a college friend. I got a call, they're like, "Hey, we're starting this band. We're interested if you would try out for guitar."
And it was some guys I knew for a while, I'd met them through my roommate in Nashville and they were a band that was forming called Small Town Poets based out of Atlanta. They had been various other bands for years and different lineup, and they were reforming the band as something new and needed a couple new players. And so I started playing with them and by the end of that summer, we were signed to a major label. This was '96, very different back then than it is now. Back then you had to have a label in order to go to market. Making a record was just too expensive. Back then indie had a negative connotation that typically meant your album didn't sound as good because you just didn't have the funds to make a high quality record. So yeah, we were signed and our debut album did quite well.
We had a bunch of number one songs for our genre, sold a lot of copies. That's the album that sold the most for us, and if you go on Spotify now, those will be the top tracks. It's like no matter how much music we keep releasing, the ones from the 90s are always going to be those top songs. But anyway, so I did that whole thing for a handful of years and like I said, had some success. We were nominated for a Grammy and a bunch of other awards, but the thing was, I saw very quickly we were the last to get paid and we were working the hardest. We were the last to get paid, and we didn't have a lot of creative control either, and it was our music. And so all the downfalls of the label system, especially at that time, become very apparent very quickly.
And so after a while I just decided, the band went on a little bit of a hiatus and I didn't even know if I was going to keep doing music. I ended up in the northwest and just started writing and recording like crazy. Home computers were starting to come along where you could actually record decent stuff and put together a band locally here in the Portland area. And that's when I came across CD Baby and started using CD Baby as a distributor and then got a job there and I just had my 17th year anniversary.

Michael Walker:
Super cool. Yeah, that's such a great perspective to be able to come from as well, being able to see the old model with record labels and experiencing how that whole process works and now being a part of CD Baby and being able to explore this revolution. So maybe you could share a little bit about that shift in opportunity and the shift and mindset that you personally went through and that you've seen artists go through away from this old model of needing a record label to distribute your music and now having access to tools like CD Baby and being able to get your music heard by potentially millions or even billions of people without needing a record label.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, I think the mindset is completely shifted at this point, but for a long time, and they're still artists that they start out on go, "I need a label." And the fact of the matter is, when I started in music, you had to have a label, otherwise you couldn't get access to the market. There was just no way. And so that was the major problem to solve for most artists. That and promotion. CD Baby helped eliminate the need for a gatekeeper to decide who gets to get access to the market or not. So I think it's been a long shift in artists realizing, "Hey, I have the tools I need to build audiences online and build fans online directly and grow my music career. And at the end of the day, that's what I'm wanting to do. The only reason a label existed for many of the functions for many years was because I couldn't do a lot of these things on my own, but now I can."
There's still I think, a value in a label at times, but the main shift is there's expectation now that as artists, you are building up your career. No one is going to come find you at some random club playing in the middle of nowhere and go, "This is a diamond in the rough. I'm going to develop this artist, I'm going to build their audience. I'm going to do all these things." That's just not going to happen anymore. Labels are coming into situations looking at it going, "Okay, how much have they done already and how can we take this to another level?" So the real shift, which is good for the artist, is that you need to be thinking about, "This is my career. I own this, and what is best for me in this moment?" Do I need some assistance to reach a broader audience?
Do I need to just focus on monetizing my core fans? All that's within your control. I think that was the main thing that really, one of the things that when I reflect about our times on a major label was that it felt oftentimes we were making decisions and acting as if this was not our career, that we were employees for other people and just doing as we're told. And I think that probably persisted with a lot of artists at that time or maybe still today, but it's like, "No, this is your career. These people are working for you, and if you don't understand what value you're getting, then probably not getting your value."

Michael Walker:
Oh, man, that's a powerful mindset shift. It sounds like the root of what you're saying is that part of this shift has come with a reclaiming of ownership or power, creative control, which in the past maybe was something that you have got diverted or diluted by being accountable to other executives, whereas now you have this ability to have more creative freedom to be able to express your vision in a way that you don't necessarily have those same gatekeepers.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, those people, I think it was interesting with both the first couple albums that we did on a label, which we're most known for, there was creative decisions made where they insisted we do stuff and we're like, "We don't want to do that." And they're like, "No, you have to do this." And then after we record, it was pertaining to recording a couple extra songs for the albums, and then after we did it, them being like, "Eh, nevermind." I'm like, "Yeah, that's what we told you from the first." Just the idea that there's this trying to manufacture something as opposed to just letting the fans hear it all and decide.
And it's a huge shift to where we've come from with what you see on TikTok where artists are literally writing a chorus that there's nothing else to the song. They've got a chorus, or maybe they've got a verse and they put it up on TikTok and depending on the response, they may finish the song or they may not. They may abandon it, where it's really this realtime A&R relationship with your fans just trying to decide what is going to connect and test, and which is complete opposite of the very protectionist mindset of creating the perfect product that's going to land perfectly on the perfect day, which is what the old label system was all about.

Michael Walker:
So cool. Now, yeah, it sounds like the root of this shift is this ability to directly connect with the fans and with the market not necessarily having the same gatekeepers and maybe less perfectionism. It's more about connection, it's more about fostering those communities. In this day and age where we have tools like CD Baby and the internet, and we have the ability to use social media to directly connect with new fans, I know you have a ton of experience both from the realm of major record labels, but also now specifically around DIY Musicians and this new model. So I'm curious in this realm where there's this explosion of creativity and freedom and the ability to release music in a way that wasn't possible before, what are some of the biggest challenges that you see musicians struggling with because of that explosion?

Kevin Breuner:
Well, it's a noisy market now. That's one thing that's challenging is that there's so many people that are able to access the market that it becomes hard to cut through all that noise. It's interesting because I have two teenage daughters and watching them engage with music, because they've only known streaming. In fact, I think one of them saw CDs recently. They've seen CDs, but just the whole idea clicked about we actually had these CD wallets with a CD Walkman, and we had to take all that with us. And it was just the realization of, "Oh, that was very different." Because she was saying, "You couldn't listen to playlists." I'm like, "Well, you made your own playlist and then burned them to CD." But anyway, just the way music has changed and people consume it is there's less rhythm to it as far as Friday's our international release day, but people are releasing music every day of the week, and it's not really in the rhythm and a pattern we used to where it seems slower and more methodical in the old school days and now it's just music's hitting you constantly.
So I really think it's about you've got to understand that connection with your fans. You've got to release content enough that people stay interested, but knowing that it's okay to disappear at times because people can't consume you a hundred percent of the time all the time. But that's why I talk more about with artists now having a season of release where you have this time period where you're dropping a couple singles, an album or EP, maybe some remix tracks, some live tracks. Just that it's this ongoing dialogue around content and other content that you can create to support the album and what's going on in your career at that time, whether it's shows or all the other different things you can be doing around your new release.

Michael Walker:
Awesome. There's something you said in there about not everyone's going to be able to consume you at every time, and for some reason my mind went initially to cannibalism, just people consume. So it sounds like what you're saying is one of the biggest challenges that's happened because there's this explosion of creativity and content online, is that it is a pretty noisy market, and so learning how to cut through the noise is a really important skill and learning how to connect with fans.
So I'm wondering what are some of the biggest, or the best strategies that you've seen or ways, mindsets or tactics around ... Well, let's say that someone's listening to this right now and maybe they've even released a few songs and they've had this experience of, "Man, I put so much work and energy into releasing these songs and I put it out, and then nothing really happened." And now they're like, "Man, how do I actually, just not just my friends and family, but get real new fans to actually care, actually start listening to it?" What are some ideas around how they can start cutting through the noise and building some of those relationships?

Kevin Breuner:
And by the way, I've had that experience many times where you release it and you're like, "Ah, the amount of time and effort I put into that. That's disappointing." It is challenging. The one thing is that, first off, I always have to remind myself that a well-balanced music career is going to be a long-term pursuit and for many, just a lifelong pursuit. And so there's going to be a lot of ups and downs. There's going to be times when it feels like things are connecting, there's going to be times where it feels like nobody cares. That's just natural, a part of the process with a creative field. So first of all, I just encourage people to have a long-term mindset. The second piece, there are a lot of ways to connect the dots and make sure that, one, you're doing things that people are going to care about or notice, just using tools and platforms properly makes a huge difference.
But also looking at it and how can you add value to the people that you're trying to reach? Oftentimes artists, it's like they're the person on the corner shouting to go do something, like, "Go listen to my track, go do this." And I'm like, "Hey buddy, I'm just walking down the street here." That's what it feels like a lot of times on social media. I think there's a lot of great examples now of people doing things interesting or just maybe some shifts on how people consume media that are, I think, beneficial to artists, but paying attention to what's working for other artists is also helpful. And knowing that there's room. We were just talking about how crowded a market it is, and I'm saying there's room for everybody. There's no shortage of people online willing to consume content, I would say.
So if you're able to get creative, pay attention to what other artists are doing, understand that you're trying to add value to other people's day, get them to stop and take notice and stop scrolling if you're on social. Or a lot of times with artists, it's also understanding that there's different platforms and especially marketing channels work for different things. And oftentimes artists neglect the email list and that's where you're going to get conversions. So people convert from email, people read email. It's like their address on the web. And so I've talked to a lot of artists recently that they might have big social presences, but they don't feel like they're getting the same traction. For the amount of audience they have, they're not getting as much conversions or as much streams. And it's like, "Well, you got to bring the whole piece together."
All those social platforms are doing their darnest to keep your fans from leaving there and going to your website or going deeper with the relationship with you. But getting email becomes so important because you have their attention and that's where people are more willing to convert and buy things or take action. So I think it's a whole bunch of different things usually with artists, but a lot of times it's not seeing the whole marketing picture, not understanding how certain platforms work well for one thing, but maybe not another. Not understanding that it has to be interesting for your fans, not just you shouting at them to go do something, because nobody wants that.

Michael Walker:
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Absolutely. Yeah, so it sounds like one is fully appreciating the value of having your own list or your own audience. Using using email as an integral part of your marketing strategy, which is something I've found too. It seems like social media is maybe more on the surface, or because it's public, because everyone can see it, it's a bit shinier, so it makes our egos feel good if we get boosted or get numbers there. But it really is the CRM or the email is really where the core of the engine, the conversion engine, the monetization engine, to a degree where it's not even close. Maybe the exact stats, but I feel like the last time I looked up it was something to the key of 75 to a hundred times more profitable to have the email list than it is to be selling stuff directly on social media.
It begs the question, so the followup question to that would be ... Because yeah, I think that what you're saying isn't necessarily that you should never use social media, it's just that email needs to be a core part of your strategy and maybe that we need to have a strategy to get people off of social media and connect with them on social media and then move to email. So maybe do you have any references or things that you've seen, creative ways or recommendations for how artists can start approaching the strategy of growing their email list and how do we reach fans who are actually interested in joining my email list?

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, I think there's a lot of things you can do. For one, I think the basics is to make sure all the platforms are connected. I just did a big cleanup for my own stuff and I was encouraging other artists to do this, but oftentimes, well, I'm working with an artist and we logged into her Instagram, it's linking one place where TikTok is linking some other place and the website's not optimized. And so it's like, "Okay, first go see where you're sending all your fans and make sure it's even clear that if they land someplace that they can get on your email list." So whether that's updating your Linktree, if you're using Linktree for the link in bio. All those things. So first you got to make sure the pipes are running in the right direction because oftentimes artists might try something interesting, but then there's some disconnect along the way where they lose people and it's not clear on how to convert.
Because I think oftentimes that's one of the issues. We're trying to say a lot and we don't make it clear, I just need you to do this one thing, so here's how you do it. So starting there and then trying to create fun and interesting incentives to get people off platforms. So that artist I'm working with, before Christmas, she wrote this great Christmas song last minute before Christmas. It was way too late to distribute it and have it in the pipeline for the Christmas season, but it was still a great catchy song and I said, "Hey, let's just record this and use it as a lead gen item to get email addresses off of social." And then we ended up, while we were demoing, we couldn't decide on which direction to go with it and so we created three different versions that were very different stylistically.
And so we made those into MP3s, put them in a SoundCloud playlist, and then used our marketing platform at CD Baby we have called show.co and used that as a, "Hey, here are the Christmas song," and there was a little story behind it and we got about 50 email addresses off of that, just that one post. And so for her, this artist had basically no email list. And so this was a start. This was a way to start pulling people off social and thinking of more ideas like that. What are things that you can do that can get people interested, get them involved in the process, feel engaged. In that particular instance, we asked on social, "Which version do you like better?" So we're involving them, we want their opinion, "Oh, there's different versions. I want to see which one I like." I've done things like that.
I've done things for my band, Small Town Poets, we did one that was very successful that said, "Hear the song that got us kicked off the stage once," and it was from a true story of when we did get kicked off the stage. Obviously that live version they would hear would not be the one where we got kicked off the stage because we did not finish playing the song. But it was one of those things where there was like, "Ooh, what happened? What did these guys do?" And so that, I probably need to post that again, it's been a while, but every time I post that we usually get a couple hundred email addresses.
So things like that that are intentional at trying to do something interesting or creative where there's a conversion point that requires an email address is a great way to do it. I will say it seems like TikTok is the worst one for this kind of stuff. The way TikTok works and just the way people are just endlessly scrolling. Which they do on other platforms, but the way TikTok functions, I've been using both TikTok and Instagram a lot lately and there's definitely advantages to Instagram as far as when you want somebody to leave platform and convert.

Michael Walker:
Interesting. Cool. So it sounds like in general, one great strategy for growing your email list is thinking about exclusive content that doesn't exist publicly anywhere else. And having that gated behind an email address so they can get access to it, whether it's a unreleased custom song or in your case it was a holiday season song or maybe it's an unreleased song that's going to be coming out soon if they want to get early access to a song, to hear the demo or hear something could be interesting. But in general, just having something valuable that the only way for them to get access to it is by going to that opt-in page.

Kevin Breuner:
And you can use contests, you can do all sorts of things. I think the challenge is depending on how new you are, the newer you are, the more creative you're going to have to get. Because the more known you are or the more diehard fans you are, they're going to convert no matter what. Those diehard fans, if you ask, chances are you already have their email address, but then just saying, "Get early access to a song," to a diehard fan that's interesting. To someone who's never heard of you before, "I don't need to get early access to a song from an artist I've never heard of before and don't care about." So it's trying to tell a compelling story that intrigues people, and there's lots of ways to do that. And it varies depending on artists because I think one of the things that certain people struggle with now is that it's helpful if you're good on camera, if you're good on video and can use that medium effectively. If you can't, that's challenging for some people because that's becoming more and more a part of what's expected.

Michael Walker:
Right. Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. Even the fact that we're having this conversation right now live on Zoom across the internet, hundreds or thousands of miles away, is pretty miraculous. And it seems like there's one of the biggest pieces of this revolution is the ability to connect in a more present, to be more present with people. And videos seem like a great way to be more present because well, it's a clone of you in a sense. It's a replicated recording of you. But even maybe a step further is live-streaming or directly connecting in the present moment with people. So maybe we could talk a little bit about live-streaming, but even before we get there, I would love to take a step back.
Because you brought up a really good point, which is before you even are converting a listener into a subscriber, usually you know need to have built some sort of relationship or you needed to introduce yourself. If you go straight for join my email list, they might be like, "Who are you," or, "Why should I join," if it's for an unreleased song. So maybe have you seen any creative strategies or do you have any ideas for that step before inviting someone to join the email list? Let's say that we're just looking for exposure, we're just looking to initiate that initial contact with a new fan and we want to reach the right people who are going to actually resonate and care about the music, but how do they take that initial step to introduce themselves to a new fan?

Kevin Breuner:
That's a good question and I think there are some general answers I think. But then also I think what's helpful for the average artist is if they look at the things that are uniquely them and they look at highlighting them or understanding how their story can connect with others. So when looking at audiences, so if I'm just starting out as a brand new artist, I think oftentimes we miss some of the more obvious starting points for an audience in that we think all about people that like a certain genre and we play that genre. But oftentimes some of those first early fan connections are people that have maybe a different story of relevance with you that makes him want to come along for the ride. Maybe, so I'm just going to go with this example, it's going to out me as someone who loves playing disc golf.
So during the pandemic, my bandmates already played disc golf, but during the pandemic we all got really bit by the bug. But I've noticed, and this is all going to make sense, trust me, that that community's a very tight community. People love meeting other people that play disc golf and you're instant best buds. And what I've noticed, because that whole world exploded during the pandemic, is that people then there's artists that they have come play at some of these big tournaments and the artists they pick are artists that also like disc golf. So it's the big connector and thing that makes people want to be fans is not the music, it's this fact that we share this other thing in common and oftentimes that's a really easy way to fans that are just your early diehard fans, is some other thing in common that you have.
I think we see this a lot. I think this is why all these early case studies about NFTs I think are the exact same scenario in that you had artists that were already in that world and so people who love NFTs wanted to love those artists that were already in that world and they had that connection with. And so those early success stories around NFTs were really based around the fact that those people like NFTs, not because it's the wave of the future for all music creators. So anyway, I think some of those early diehard fans can be based on other communities that you're a part of, whether it's a cause you believe in, whether it's just certain things you're passionate about, other hobbies and such, that those can be real entry points into early fans. Obviously you want to go after music fans as well, but I think those other audiences that you're already participating in oftentimes get overlooked.
And those are typically the places where you can come off more natural as well and more authentic without just your shouting, "Go do this, go do that." It's people that are predisposed to really want to support you and like you. So anyway, that's where I think a lot of people don't look enough, especially when they're first starting out. When I first started working at CD Baby, that was one of the things that blew my mind is that some of our top sellers at that point, we had somebody ... This is when we were doing digital distribution and selling a lot of CDs. CDs were still one of the main things we were selling. We had this artist who all her songs were about horses and every album had a picture of a horse on it.
She would sell her CDs for $20 bucks and she was selling them by the truckload and they were all people who loved horses. And we had the same instance around sailing. We had the same instance around all these different topics where it's people writing songs speaking to a community and that community going crazy for it. So that was one of those things that when I first started working here, that really opened my eyes to the connections people feel and the way into music isn't just them browsing the genre section on their platform or at a store or whatever.

Michael Walker:
That's super smart. Yeah, it sounds like what you're saying is that one of the tendencies is to always look outside or look externally for those fans. And maybe a good starting point for everyone is rather than looking to build completely new relationships with people that you don't know, take a step back and look inside and look at your existing network, your existing community and people like your friends and family and the specific communities that you're a part of, whether it's disc golf or you love horses or anywhere where there's this energetic communities coming together. And that if you can connect with those community groups that you're already a part of, especially then you have an easier task of building those relationships because they already know you to some extent. And so that's a great place to start rather than neglecting those people who are a part of your core of who you are and trying to find completely new people from scratch.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, and that's key. And again, this is when you're thinking about just starting from the beginning, where do I look? There's a lot of other communities people might be involved with. A church community, a social organization, all sorts of things where they're not necessarily the well you're going to go to all the time, but when you're starting out, these are people that already have some sort of relationship with you on some degree and are probably going to be more interested in diving in early on. I think start you there. I think there's lots of opportunity with advertising these days where it can be very affordable. You put together a couple of nice short videos, you can reach new audiences that way.
I think a lot of the platforms are very affordable and target pretty well. I've actually been testing a little bit of that on TikTok and it's really cheap and it seems like it's dialed in pretty well. For my personal TikTok, it's mainly artists I'm looking to engage with because I've put out content as well. And so I was curious, am I just going to get a bunch of bots or garbage accounts? And it seemed about 85% of them were artists and the kind of people I would want following me and want seeing my message. So some of these things can be pretty affordable just to throw a few bucks to gain a few more people to keep the energy going and all that.
I think another thing I would highlight is that I think when you're starting out, especially when it feels like you're trying to manufacture some of that momentum, I think we get afraid to try things twice. And even just in marketing our music in general, not being afraid to put out a similar video twice or similar message twice. You don't want to do it right next to each other, but I've seen that TikTok and such, they work differently. So having a similar video go up a couple times doesn't necessarily hurt you negatively. Where some of the older platforms, if you repeated content, it would sometimes negatively impact your account.

Michael Walker:
Got it. Yeah. So one thing that you brought up earlier that I think is a really great lesson when as it relates to starting to explore these different platforms too, was around just looking and seeing what's working right now for other artists. You are looking at, what is the quote, success leaves clues? And so going to TikTok or going to somewhere else or better yet, I think it's such a service, having resources, like what you offer with the DIY Musician and podcasts, you can basically can have this curated content from people who are sharing what's working right now.
So do you have any thoughts around that idea of, there's a few books that were written about this idea of steal like an artist and obviously we really value our authenticity and originality and you never want to just rip someone off, but there is that balance of taking something that's working right now, a model and then making it your own. So I'm curious if you have any thoughts or recommendations around how someone can dial in that process where they can use models and references and they can learn from what's working, but at the same time be able to do it in their own voice in a way that's unique and authentic.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, I think first off, finding a lot of artists that are doing interesting things online is a first step. I've been doing that more and more myself as well, trying to find artists that are doing interesting things. And it doesn't have to be just high performing artists. I think that's one thing that's actually probably easier to see what is really being successful on a platform when you see an artist that has a smaller following, but then they have a video performing very well around their music. Because you know it's not fame or notoriety driving it, it's the fact that people are connecting with the content and responding and then therefore the algorithm is benefiting them. But following a lot of artists and seeing what's working and what's not working. And it's okay if you fail because when a social media post fails, it's like it never happened because no one saw it.
So you might see it there on your feed with zero or very few likes, but no one else saw it, so don't worry about it. So I think trying a lot of things, and seeing how ideas that work for you. For example, in our latest episode of the podcast, we talked about how to build anticipation for your music. And the premise that we're working with is that there's difference between informing and building anticipation. So we tend to, in our marketing efforts, and this goes across the board, not just music, we tend to tell people information like, "This is coming out this day, this is now available. Go do this." That's all information that doesn't do anything for me. Unless there's that fame or that celebrity built in, the idea that something is happening that I'm releasing new music doesn't really mean anything to most people.
So how do you build anticipation and that turns the equation around how do I make this fun, interesting, so they look forward to it? And in that episode, I broke down this artist, Walk Off the Earth. Love Walk Off the Earth, they make amazing, amazing videos. And it's one of those things where I watch and I go, "Dang it, the geniuses." I'd never be able to do this. I'm trying to get them on our podcast, because I want to know how much time and effort they go into planning those videos because it looks like they just woke up one day and said, "Hey, let's do this."
And I'm sure a ton of effort goes into them behind the scenes but they look effortless. But they just do all these creative things around the music. And so the single that they just released a couple weeks ago, I counted nine plus videos that they made all of them different, but they were all just the chorus as well. But they were interesting. Visually and musically, they kept changing up how they did the song very, very different. And I don't know if you remember them, they're the ones that did that Gotye Somebody I Used to Know, the five people.

Michael Walker:
I do remember that one, with the guitar?

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, that was their big breakout where they went crazy viral. Well, that's their whole thing. They do all sorts of crazy videos like that. Some of them are just more straight ahead than playing music. A lot of them are them using weird instruments or they have this one guitar that's as big as me. It is seriously seven feet tall then. So leading up to the release of their single, they were just playing the hook. And that's another thing, artists should just play the hook. No one needs your 32nd intro. On social that is, they don't need this 32nd intro. They don't need all that stuff, just play the hook. But they had all these different unique things that they did. One of them was like the video you see, it comes down and you're scrolling. They're sitting around this table that's covered with all these melons and there's all these electrodes and the melons and they were using them as basically drum pads and synth pads because when they touched it would short out the circuit.
And so there's some interesting things going on visually, but then they're playing the song with this fruit and it sounds really cool and that's something where you're like, "I'm going to watch this and it's a hooky song. Now, I like this song." So almost using it how in the old school days radio was used where a single would drop a couple months before an album came out, it would play on the radio. Ideally it'd get in a heavy rotation, you're hearing it and they beat you down and so you finally the song, and then you start looking forward to the actual album coming out and the tour and all that. And I think how TikTok has evolved, it's almost just like that now. It's thinking about how do I get that little radio hook in their head just one more time.
In a creative visual way that changes it up enough that people will stop if they like the song and so they hang around for it and then they're now the song's in their head, and now I can start building that anticipation towards a release because now they care. When it's just information coming down their feed, they don't care. But now they've heard it, they've enjoyed a few videos, it's stuck in their head. Now they're like, "Okay, I'm looking forward to this." Now I have them and that's an opportunity to really make the release stay special.

Michael Walker:
Super smart. Yeah, it sounds like, one thing that comes to mind as you described that is that classic principle of if you want to offer a block of cheese for sale, then the way to do it isn't by trying to pawn off the block of cheese immediately. An this analogy, the block of cheese might be your album. But instead you take a little snippet of cheese and you stand outside the store with a sample of a little bite of cheese. And if they like it, then they might go by the whole block of cheese. And it sounds like TikTok could be a good way to have a little block of cheese and just take the best, delicious, most tasting piece of it and do it in a way that people can enjoy. And then from there you might share the full album.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, and I think the other thing, by thinking about quick creative hits of the song, it's also what I think I see working a lot on TikTok specifically is people saying, "Hey, are you this type of person? I wrote a song for you," and then going right into the hook. Because oftentimes people go, "Oh, I identify with whatever you just said and now I'm going to check out this song, but you only have my attention for another two seconds, so get to it."

Michael Walker:
Yeah.

Kevin Breuner:
It's sad on some level, but I also think it learning to self-edit is good. And learning how to communicate in a way that, because being able to get to the point is helpful in a lot of places. People always talk about what's your elevator pitch? And they say that because there's moments where you get on a literal elevator with somebody, it's happened to me at a conference just a couple weeks ago and they said, "What do you do?" Well, you only got a couple floors. You got to be able to spit something out and make sense. And if you're still can't figure out, it's like, "Yeah, that was confusing. I'll see you later." The elevator doors open, you're gone. As opposed to getting, "This is what I do, this is the important things to know." And I think in our marketing that's helpful in a lot of ways. So being able to self edit and understand what's really going to grab people's attention is helpful.

Michael Walker:
That makes a ton of sense. It's almost like, I don't know why I keep coming back to this analogy, but it's almost like if you have this big block of cheese, and a bit of it is moldy, then you want to make sure you're not accidentally trying to give them the moldy piece. You have the little block of cheese that you know is the most delicious, best tasting stuff. If you have that crafted, then hopefully people will, if they enjoy it, and you have a path for them to get the full block of cheese, then they'll get it. But it is important to get a really delicious piece of cheese because people are walking down the aisle and there's billions of pieces of cheese that they could eat everywhere.

Kevin Breuner:
Yep, yep.

Michael Walker:
Well this has been a really cool conversation. I appreciate you coming on here, Kevin, and sharing some of your wisdom from you being in the industry for a long time now and seeing some radical shifts and how things happen. Maybe the last question could be around upcoming trends or future things that you think are interesting. Obviously the future hasn't happened yet, so we don't really know, we're just drawing tea leaves. But I'm curious if you see any certain trends that you think are upcoming right now that if someone happened to be listening to this right at the right time, that they could maybe swim along with the wave and catch that momentum?

Kevin Breuner:
Well, I think one thing that's interesting, it feels like there is some trends in the fan community, almost like people have said it a couple times, I've seen it in articles, we're in a post-streaming world or heading into a post-streaming world and what does that look like? And I think the thing, there's a couple things happening. We are in a streaming world, but we're also in a post-COVID world, which COVID broke a lot of people's habits and ushered in some new ways of doing things, but it feels like there's renewed interest in the fan community for really supporting artists and even a renewed interest in things like downloads or having a copy of your favorite album and things like that. And I mentioned that just because it seems like that it's a real opportunity for artists that to really understand that there is monetization options available to you that make you more money than streaming.
It seems like the fans are trending in some of those directions more and more. We had over the pandemic, band camp exploded and they start doing those music day, the first Fridays or whatever they were doing, and they were driving tons of download sales, tons of physical sales. And so I think we've seen some resurgence in some of the interest in that, especially from diehard fans. I think what was interesting about the whole NFT conversation, that sparked for a bit, seemed to have died down for a while, but was that to me, the general NFT idea was still too confusing for your average fan, but what it was reinforcing is the idea of ownership of a file and having that file and being part of a community and buying into a community.
I feel like there's some trends happening in that way where belonging to a community people are more interested in and feeling like instead of being on these big wide social networks that are public, more smaller communities, we see that with Discord and stuff like that. And so I think all those are opportunities for artists to really build a tribe around their music and the experience of their music. And I think people are primed for that again. It seemed like that was where things were going, and then streaming just felt like, "Well, it's all there. It's all out there and it's just playlists from now on." But it seems like people are open to moving off the streaming platforms to other forms of relationship with the artist.

Michael Walker:
So good. I'm actually looking forward to catching up with you after the interview just about what we're working on with Modern Musician with our software and we have a platform called Street Team that's basically designed for the exact purpose that you just talked about, about building fan community with what we call their inner circle. So they have different tiers of access and they have, call them music relics rather than music NFTs. Mostly because NFTs, like you said, are just, I don't know, they were a hype word for a while. They also were really confusing and complicated, but we're calling them music relics, but the music relic basically is a key that grants a fan access to an artist's inner circle. And it's a really exciting way, I think, to take these music assets and create something that's valuable for fans and plugs into what you're just talking about, about giving the artists and the fan a relationship or giving them certain status through that. So looking forward to catching up about that.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah.

Michael Walker:
Yeah, man, again, thank you so much for coming on here and just for what you do. I have a ton of respect for CD Baby and DIY Musician. I know how big of an impact mentors have made on my life in all sorts of different ways. And I can see the ripple effect that you guys are having on the lives of so many musicians. So highly encourage anyone that's listening to this right now to go check out the DIY Musician podcast and plug into that community. And yeah, man, thanks again for taking the time to be here today. Like always, we'll put all the links in the show notes for easy access, so you can click on the links in the show notes to go check that out.

Kevin Breuner:
Yeah, thanks for having me.

Michael Walker:
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. First, if you hit subscribe, then that'll make sure you don't miss a new episode. Secondly, if you share it with your friends or on your social media, tag us, that really helps us out. And third, best of all, if you leave us an honest review, it's going to help us reach more musicians like you who want to take the music careers to the next level. The time to be a modern musician is now, and I'll look forward to seeing you on our next episode.