Wyshmaster Beats:
If you are going to reach out to people, well, provide value before you ask for something. I mean, instead of just asking someone, "Hey, I'm trying to get on. Can you help me?", that's like, "Hey, I'm a graphic guy or something. I would love to do some free graphics for you if you could just take some time and maybe meet with me and help me with... I can't sell this or I don't know what to do with my music." Now you provided value to me. I'm like, "Man, maybe I need some graphic work" or whatever it is. Or maybe you do copy write for emails. It could be anything. Or maybe your songwriter, if you could provide value, that's going to go a lot further than you just asking for something.

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. So I'm super excited to be here today with Wyshmaster. Wyshmaster's a Grammy nominated multi-platinum producer who's worked with some of the biggest artists and companies in the music industry, like Lil Wayne, MTV, Nelly, Pitbull, Tech N9ne.

Michael Walker:
You also just mentioned that you literally had just got off a record with Tech N9ne and a ton more. And today, with someone, a lot of times I talk about this sometimes about yo, if you really want to look at what Emerson said of who you are, speaks so loudly, I can't hear what you say. And I think that, especially when you're looking for mentorship or guidance, that a lot of times someone's telling you something, then you want to kind of look at who are they that they're saying, yeah, what they say itself is one thing, but also looking at who they are is so important. So Wyshmaster's a great example of that, of who you are speaks so loudly that you're someone that I think is everyone that's listening right now should open up their ears and get excited to learn more about your story and how you accomplished this success.

Michael Walker:
And more importantly, for people listening to this right now, how can they learn from your lessons and be able to apply these in their own music careers. So, yeah, man, thank you so much for taking the time to be here today.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And thanks for having me, man. This is awesome. I look so tiny, man, because I couldn't get my camera close like you so I look like I'm this little guy in this tiny room right now.

Michael Walker:
It's pretty vibey. It looks cool. So for anyone that's listening or watching this right now, who maybe they've heard of a bunch of those artists you've worked with and maybe they've heard of you and they don't fully, they haven't heard your story yet, could you give us a quick introduction about who you are and how briefly, how you accomplished that?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah, so I go by Wyshmaster. I've been a music producer for about over 20 years now. I started actually making beats. So that's just how I start. I start, I'm sorry. I started as a DJ. So I'm from Chicago. So I spin at clubs and I used to make mix tapes and just cool stuff like that. And then I was, I was actually at this really big club playing some songs and I just noticed the reaction that night, it was just like, people were just vibing off those songs. I'm like, "I got to, instead of me playing songs, I need to create the music." So at the time I was really big into like Chamberlain, Neptunes, Dr. Dre, and producers such as that. And so I decided I'm like, "I'm just going to buy my first keyboard. I'm going to teach myself how to make beats just by listening to what they're doing." So that's what I did. So I picked up my first, I think it was a Korg Triton was my first keyboard.

Wyshmaster Beats:
I think I got a cheaper one before that, but then I upgraded to the Triton and then I started making beats and I really didn't know what to do. I had somebody like local artists in Chicago. So I did my own little label thing, but nothing big. And then I was like, "Well, how do I get this out to more people? How do I get it to the world?" And then I was online one day. I was working, I did security at this company, but I basically sat at a computer. So I'm like, I just went online all day and I found something called mp3.com, which is the original SoundClick. And I basically started putting beats up there. And because I saw the producers were up there and I started getting paid for the amount of spins or clicks I was getting and plays. So I was getting these little checks. I'd get a check for 60 bucks after like a few months. I'm like, man, "This is awesome. Getting paid for my music." And they stopped paying people.

Wyshmaster Beats:
So I decided to go through some emails and find all these different artists and like, "How much do you want for this beat?" And I started selling beats online exclusive and it got to a point where I was one of the most well-known producers online. I'm kind of skipping forward. I don't want to bore you guys. But, I had fans across everywhere, but then the economy started getting pretty bad and people couldn't afford my prices. So that's when I came up with the idea for beat lease. And so a lot of people that don't know that I'm one of the originators of beat leasing online. So, and that's basically you're making it affordable for an artist to grab a beat online and put it on their albums, streaming for under 50 bucks, sometimes 30 bucks. And from there, that's when I really grew my audience. And I started getting noticed in different countries. And then the first company that reached out to me that found me online was a company called Midway Games.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And they came up with this game called NBA Ballers, which was a one of a kind game where you actually not only played basketball against people, but you lived the lifestyle. So you upgrade your chain, your clothes and all this cool stuff. And they took me down, I was actually at, based in Chicago and they took me down to the studio and I got to see how it worked and all the different parts that go into it. And they said, "So we're basically going to give you these scenes and we want you to really be the person behind the music." So that was like my first big industry gig. I think I made like 25,000, which is awesome for my first major gig. And then so I ended up getting like 20 songs in there and then, or no 20 beats and then five songs in there. Anyway, what was cool is we used to tag our beats and they actually kept my tags on the beat. So anytime somebody play, it's like, "Wyshmaster," so people hit me up all the time and I remember hearing your name and then wait again.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And then from there I ended up doing some more games like N.A.R.C. and maybe NBA Ballers 2 and 3. And then I forgot L.A. Rush and a bunch of other games. And then I got noticed by a gentleman named Ludacris, who was working on his album called Disturbing tha Peace II. And I ended up getting a song on there. And then from there I got noticed by more people. Nelly, I started working with Nelly. I ended up moving to St. Louis and I worked with Nelly pretty heavy. I think we ended up doing like 30 something songs and ended up getting something, a couple on his album. And then from there, sky's the limit. I ended up doing a song with Lonely Island featuring T-Pain called I'm on a Boat. That's the song I was a nominated. Yeah, I mean, I worked with so many people in the industry. You already kind of mentioned them, but I mean, there's a huge list of, and this is all for me, this guy who just sat doing security that put his beats online.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And that brings me to my point of you can get noticed the more music you put out there. Instead of chasing people, people will come to you. If your music is good enough, it's going to rise to the top and as long as you're putting the hustle into it. And then yeah, from there I moved to LA and I ended up actually getting in education over 10 years ago. I was the first person put a beat making program inside of a college. And then I ended up doing my own production program inside of college here in Nashville, which I recently left. But yeah, but I've been in education. I actually coach a lot of producers online and yeah, it's been a lot of fun and still working in the industry. So like you said, I just finished up on Tech N9ne's album that's going to be released next month. So yeah, there's a-

Michael Walker:
That's super cool. I mean, I only have one question for you based on that. How did it feel to be on a boat?

Wyshmaster Beats:
It feels great, man. I actually bought my first boat last year, which is what everybody always says, "Oh yeah. He made that song. Now he has a boat."

Michael Walker:
That's great. Cool, man. That's so awesome. So one thing that I think is probably through osmosis, even through being an industry for this long and from literally going from scratch to building up the career that you have, there's a lot of. I'd be curious on your perspective on what were the key leverage moments and what advice do you have for musicians right now who maybe are listening or struggling and they're kind of at the earlier stage that you were at and they're working on their beats, they're working on their music, but they don't really have a network built yet. They have limited funds, limited money. What are some of the most important things that they can do right now to reach the next level?

Wyshmaster Beats:
So one thing that I, I teach people from mistakes. So even though I told you this nice story of everything, there's so many bad things that happen to me during this whole situation, you know what I mean? One thing I would tell artists is first learn the business. Learn how the music business works. Copyrights. What does that mean? Publishing. Splits. If you work with somebody, which I definitely collaborate with people, that's one thing I would do. That doesn't cost you anything, but know how to do split sheets, so if something comes down the road, you both are paid fairly. On performance royalty organizations, make sure you sign up, understand what that is. Those are some of the things I didn't know and that's how I got screwed. So I ended up not getting royalties on some of the songs I did because I would sign them over. didn't know what work for hire meant. And some people still don't know what that means.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Work for hires, basically say, "I'm going to pay you outright for everything. You don't ever make back end money." And so that's not something that someone who is a writer who is writing music, you would not sign a work for hire. That would be an engineer or somebody that's doing the job and then from there they don't get anything off it unless there was a deal worked up. So that's, I mean, that's something you could do right now. You know what I mean? There's courses you can take or YouTube or whatever, but that's something you should definitely get into first is learn the business. And another thing, a mistake I made, I never put my best beats up because I always just think, "If I put my best music out there and all of a sudden one of these like Eminem comes along and is going to want that beat, I already put it out there. He's not going to want it." That's not how it works. You know what I mean? You want to put your best music out there.

Wyshmaster Beats:
So even as an artist or as a producer, you want people to hear your great music, because that's how you're going to get noticed. That's how you're going to gain fans and who knows, that great beat could end up in Eminem's hand through that way. If you hold it in on your hard drive and it never gets heard, music changes all the time, the style, genres, everything. Everything's always changing, and that beat might not have any relevance at that time if you hold it for a year. So yeah, that's what I say, put out music. I always hear artists like, "Man, I'm going to drop an album next year. I'm going to wait. I'm just going to drop a couple of songs." Drop all that stuff. Keep working. The more creative you are and the more you work, the better you get, the more you practice.

Michael Walker:
That's a really good thing that I'd love to drill into is that tendency to procrastinate on releasing the music or putting it out there because it seems like that is something that is really prevalent because it's scary to release music and to put yourself out there in your songs. And so I would love to hear your perspective on that. If someone is kind of at that point where they have a new song and they want to kind of put it out, but they also feel like, "Oh, I don't really know. What's the best way to put it out?", or they're kind of waiting for something to kind of put it out, what would your advice be to them?

Wyshmaster Beats:
And if you're really that worried, I mean, I live by YOLO, you only live once, but that's me. I put it out there. Sometimes I put beats out there. I'm like, "Man, this is very experimental. I don't know." Or even a song I do with somebody. And then people are like, "This is crazy." You know what I mean? And even will.i.am. I saw him at the BMI awards one time and he's like, "Everybody's like, man," this is when he had all of these kids, just one after another and like, "How do you know you have a hit?" He said, "I don't know I have a hit. I just put the music out there. I loved it. And it did what it did." And sometimes you have to do that approach. But if you're really at that point, you're like, "I don't know." Maybe you're a newer artist or something, maybe put it on SoundCloud and let some people hear first.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Maybe just send it to some, go into some, there's free music boards that have message boards and you can put your song on there and ask for positive feedback or any feedback and sometimes you're going to get haters. It's just going to happen. But kind of, you'll learn how to filter through that stuff because people are going to actually be jealous of you and they'll be like, "No, this sucks. You need to take this down." But when you start hearing people put it on social media and just kind of share it around, if you're scared, I guess even put on social, but if you feel it 100% and you really like what you did, I mean, I would say, just go all the way, put it on all the streaming sites, put it out. There's distribution, TuneCore, DistroKid or whatever, that's my approach. I put it out everywhere. But if you just want some people to hear it just so you could see if it's going to do well, I guess SoundCloud or something like that. But like I said, I live by YOLO.

Michael Walker:
Right. I mean, I think that there's a lot of wisdom in what you just said in terms of gathering feedback. It's sort of like, if you want to learn how to, let's say, do you have a goal and you want to be successful with your music career. It's kind of like shooting a basketball and making it into the hoop. Shooting the basketball is kind of like releasing a song. And if you just hold the basketball and you're kind of aiming the whole time, you're like, "Oh, like I'm going to like do it like this. And, oh, I've got all these plans to shoot this basketball." And you never actually shoot the basketball or it takes forever. When you do finally shoot the basketball, it's your first time releasing a new song or the first time shooting the basketball, then maybe you'll get really lucky and it'll just go into the hoop on the first shot, but more than likely you're actually going to shoot and it's going to like veer off to the right or, I guess, it's just not going to connect at all.

Michael Walker:
You're like, "Wow. Okay. Well, I guess the next shot, I need to shoot a little bit more to the left," and the feedback from actually throwing the basketball and seeing where it landed, I think is so important to aim and to figure out how you can connect more with the next.

Wyshmaster Beats:
It happens to artists all the time. Sometimes artists drop a song, it might not do as well, but then this next song they do might have be the hitter. That happens all the time. So while you're finding your sound, yeah, just look for feedback and just take everything with a grain of salt, because there are people that use the internet as therapy and then they want to just talk shit. And you, like I said, you have to learn how to filter through that stuff.

Michael Walker:
Hmm. Yeah. That's so good. So one thing that you spoke to was how important it is to collaborate, how important is collaborate and co-write songs and obviously the music industry, especially, and really any industry, a lot of it's about learning how to build relationships and build connections with people. So how would you recommend that someone who maybe is a little bit earlier on who that doesn't have an established network or is looking to kind of take strides with their music career, but doesn't have a network yet, how do they start building these relationships with the people that are going to be instrumental in their success?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. So basically what I would do is reach out to people that you enjoy their music, go listen to, like I said, SoundCloud or whatever. Go listen to different artists and find stuff. Like if you're a producer, find an artist you want to collaborate or a song. If you're an artist find a producer that you want to collaborate or another songwriter, but just find people that you think is just as creative as you are, or you think that you could, if you're lacking in something, find somebody that can fill in that space. You know what I mean? And tell your story. I mean, don't be spammy when you reach out to people. People reach out to me all the time. And if they really, I feel like, gave me a good message and I don't care, I'll go listen to the song, especially with a link and send a link to your music so they can hear what you're working on. Don't just tell a story without having something there for them to listen to.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And even if you get one out of 100, like that one, that one in that 100 might be your ticket. That might be the one collaboration that you did that actually is going to do something for you. You know what I mean? And that's why I say sometimes it takes time. Don't expect everybody to reach back to you. Don't get mad at people like, "Oh man, they don't even like my music." It's sometimes I don't even listen to it. So that's why I said, take everything with a grain of salt. Reach out to people that you enjoy their music. And I'm not talking about go reach out to Eminem because chances are Eminem doesn't even run his own social media or whatever. But if you are a music producer and you really are trying to work with bigger artists, I wouldn't reach out to the artists on their social media, unless they're maybe not the biggest artists in the world. Go to their manager and find who their manager is and reach out to the manager and say, "Hey, I'd love to submit some music. Where can I send some stuff to?"

Wyshmaster Beats:
Sometimes you'd be surprised. They're like, "Yeah, send some beats or send some songs or whatever." So I'd say right now, just in the generation we're in, social media is the best way to reach people. Everybody's on social media, and there's a lot of artists read their messages, you know what I mean? Or managers or whatever. So, yeah. I just reached out to a guy the other day, he's a big violinist. And I said, I'd love to collab with you. And they came back to me and say, "Yeah, let's do it." So I told him my little story, what I'm doing and that's it.

Michael Walker:
Awesome. Yeah. It just seemed like that's one thing that can be easy to overlook sometimes is that we're all humans. We're actually real people and sometimes. I mean, yeah, if you're talking about Eminem or people at that level, then sometimes there are some major gatekeepers there, but he's still a human being and you can basically reach almost anyone if you have a game plan, you're willing to be persistent until you can do it.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Well, I was going to say too, and here's the thing is I talk to producers and artists all the time. They're like, "I want to work with this. I want work the Eminem and Dr. Dre, all these people." I said, "Why don't you find the next big artist? Because they're going to be the next person that everybody wants to work with." That's the people you find. Find talent that you really want to work with, reach out to them. You see they're kind of growing, they're working networking hard, or maybe they're super talented, but you see they're not out there. You help them. You guys create music and then you never know. That could be your next ticket on that can be your next Lil Nas X, you know what I mean, who picked the beat online and made his hit.

Michael Walker:
That's a really great point. Yeah. I think that's sometimes, I know for us with Paradise Fears, the one of the first producers that really took us to the next level was a guy named Jordan Schmidt. And at the time he was in a similar phase as us. He was kind of on the up and up and he hadn't. So we connected with him because he had engineered or he had worked on a couple of songs with one of our favorite bands All Time Low, but he wasn't like the main, like a big name yet, but yeah, we were able to collaborate with him and connect with him. And now he's just banging out multi-platinum songs left and right in the country world. And yeah, I think that what you just said is a really valuable piece of advice to not necessarily have to the big names. There's going to be more competition.

Michael Walker:
There's going to be more because they have an established brand, but if you can, I don't know, look at Wikipedia and see who are the people who helped produce a record that aren't necessarily the name recognition. Maybe that could be a way to start out and to collaborate with people who are working with the same artists.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. You can go to Apple Music and it'll show you like the hot songs coming out. And it'll be names that you don't really know yet that are just kind of blown up and you can reach out to them or go look at the charts on SoundCloud and all these different places and find the artists that you would really, really think can do something. And then, especially if you're bringing now your product there, you guys can do something together. That's collaboration.

Michael Walker:
Awesome. So you mentioned that you personally get a lot of messages from people who are reaching out. So I'd be curious if you had two hands and on one hand you have the worst kind of way to reach out, the ones that are just an ineffective strategy for communication that just get filtered out right away versus the one that actually just kind of cuts through that speaks to you, that actually can get a response from you, how would you compare those two?

Wyshmaster Beats:
All right. So here  let's do the worst. "Hey, my name is blah, blah, blah. I'm the hottest thing you've probably ever heard. Check me out. You can find me here." And it will say like, "Find me on Instagram" or something and they'll put their name. No links. And they'll say, "I could definitely put you on" or something. Didn't even do the research. Didn't look at what I did or anything, those types of things. Or just say, "Hey, we need to work. I'm going to be the next best thing." That's always like, "Come on." That's that's going to turn anybody away. Now that the good one is like, "Hey, my name is blah, blah, blah. I checked out your beats. I really like what you're doing. I would love to work with you. If you have time, please check out my song and let me know," something like that.

Wyshmaster Beats:
It's like you introduce yourself, you kind of took interest in something I'm doing and then turn around and gave me a link and said, "Look forward to hearing you soon" or something. You know what I mean? You're not like pushing me to like, "Hey, let's do this now" or something. So, chances are most of those I listen to.

Michael Walker:
All right, let's take a quick break from the podcast. I can tell you about a free, special offer that we're doing right now exclusively for our podcast listeners. So if you get a ton of value from the show, but you want to take your music career to the next level, connect with the community of driven musicians and connect with the music mentors directly that we have on this podcast or if you just want to know the best way to market your music and grow an audience right now, then this is going to be perfect for you. So right now we're offering a free two week trial to our MusicMentor coaching program, and if you sign up in the show notes below, you're going to get access to our entire music MusicMentor content vault for free. The vault's organized into four different content pillars, the first being the music, then the artist, the fans, and last but not least the business.

Michael Walker:
When you sign up, you'll unlock our best in-depth masterclasses from a network of world-class musicians and industry experts and the most cutting edge strategies right now for growing your music business. On top of that, you'll get access to our weekly live masterminds, where our highest level of Modern Musician coaches teach you exactly what they're doing to make an income and an impact with their music. Then once a month, we're going to have our MusicMentor spotlight series. And that's where we're going to bring on the world's biggest and best artists, coaches, and [sessile 00:21:28] musicians to teach you what's working right now. And one of the most amazing parts is that you can get your questions answered live by these top music mentors. So a lot of the people that you hear right here on the podcast are there live interacting with you personally. So imagine being able to connect with them directly.

Michael Walker:
On top of all that you'll get access to our private MusicMentor community. And this is definitely one of my favorite parts of MusicMentor, and maybe the most valuable, is that you're going to have this, this community where you can network with other artists and link up and collaborate, ask questions, get support, and discuss everything related to your music career. So if you're curious and you want to take advantage of the free trial, then go click on the link in the show notes right now. Sign up for free. From there, you can check out all of the amazing contents, connect with community and sign up for the live masterclasses that happen every week. This is a gift for listening to our podcast for the show. So don't miss out, go sign up for free now and let's get back to our interview.

Michael Walker:
Yeah, that's super valuable. I think just to have that contrast and to know what's the right way and what's the wrong way. So man, what else would be? So when you reflect on both yourself and the artists that you're working with right now, I mean, especially because here's something that we could dig into. Things are changing so quickly in terms of 10 years ago, 20 years ago, the way that the music industry used to be with record labels and now with the internet and with independent, really you can directly distribute your music and reach people. If you're in, we're going to talk a little bit about looking out into the future, and obviously there's some things that are it's the future so we don't know what it is yet.

Michael Walker:
But knowing what you know now based on kind of your experience and based on the things that are shifting right now, what do you think are some of the biggest opportunities that are kind of like waves that, if you kind of swim along with the wave now, rather than doing what most people do and kind of trying to chase a wave that's already past 10 or 20 years ago, never catching up to it, if you're smart and you're kind of looking at what's about to crest and how can I get this momentum and shoot forward, what do you think are a couple of opportunities like that?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Well, I know that there's people to whom this is going to sound boring, educating yourself and that's why I said, first thing, learn the business, just the basics, because let's say you do get something, you don't understand how it works, you're going to get screwed over. I mean, there's so many. A lot of people that don't do music are the ones who are going to try to make money off of you and they understand it. So they're going to say, "Hey man, I'm going to do this for you. And, you'd only have to give me like 90% of your publishing. I just had lunch with Justin Bieber the other day. He's really interested. I played him a couple of your songs." Boom. You get, sit down, you get all excited. And he's like, "Yeah, you just got to sign this" and then you sign it. And guess what? Let's say that was a manager. All he has to do is sit on his hands for the next year and whatever you're working on, he's going to get paid off of.

Wyshmaster Beats:
That's happened to me. So, they throw these big names and it's take you to a nice lunch and hunt wine and dine you and then they turn around and do something. That's why, if you know the business, you understand how that works. Also learn your craft. Technology's on your side now. You don't have to. 20 years ago, you'd have to rent a studio. And it might be 50 to $200 an hour and to get the engineer and you're going to need top of the line mics. Now they make such great microphones for, I mean, under 500 bucks, under a few hundred bucks now. Learn your microphones. Learn how to use a microphone so you can record yourself. Learn about mixing and even how to make your own beats or even how the beat process works, so you can talk to a producer when you're working with them or find a producer, you know what I mean, to work with. But once you have that knowledge, I'll just talk about Nelly. Nelly has millions of dollars, but he knew engineering.

Wyshmaster Beats:
He's not an engineer, but he knew how to talk to his engineer. He'd sit there, "Hey, I need you to do this with my voice. Or I need you to add a little EQ or put a little tune there, or I need you to turn me up here." You know what I'm saying? He understood how to talk to his engineer, which made his songs come out that much better. The next thing I want to say, and this is for all artists, producers, whoever, you need to learn marketing. That's the way. If you want to talk about the way, if you know marketing, you could sell your music. All right. That's understanding social media, understanding even the email process, as an artist, why would you not want to build a fan base of emails that you can email any time that you have a show, a release, anything you're selling, merch, whatever it is that you can at the same time simultaneously just send this bulk email and let your fans know?

Wyshmaster Beats:
And that's the next thing is capturing leads. Capture people that could possibly want to be into your music and that you could form that relationship with. And then follow up, of course, is part of marketing too, is follow up with people. If they're interested, you need to constantly chase them and let them know about anything new you're working on. And the last thing I would say is this, especially in the new wave, is diversify. All right. As an artist, most of the time you talk to artists, they think, "Oh, I just need to make songs and put them on an album and release it and get streaming money. And that's it." And it's like, have you ever heard of sync placements? Do you know you could sell your songs? Do you know you can get a ton of sink money from having a song in a movie or a video game or a TV show or anything? And that's part of collaboration. This is a really good gem. Go look up publishing companies, all right, you can find tons of them online, and then you could see their list of writers.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Those are the people you need to reach out to. All right? And those are the people are going to answer you more likely and say, "Hey, I would love to work with you and work on a song." Guess what? They're already signed to a publisher. If you guys make something together and they pitch it and ends up getting picked up, now you have 50% of that song, depending on what you wrote. That's what I did for probably the last five years. I started reaching out to the writers and making songs. And then not only do they have who you could pitch to, now you have who they could pitch to. And then, you're more likely to get a record on something. So yeah, definitely diversify, no matter what you do. As a producer, same thing. You don't have to just make beats for artists. You can write for movies, video games, TV shows movie scoring, whatever it is. So yeah, that's what I'd say the way it is now marketing and just getting yourself out there.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. 100%. And I love marketing. I think that marketing, I mean, really, I think entrepreneurship and marketing is really about finding a need and finding where you can provide value and you can provide a solution to that need. And that's just how the world moves forward. It's based on those needs. So I think there's a very powerful process involved with entrepreneurship and marketing and love that gem that you shared about reaching out to songwriters. That's brilliant. And specifically the ones that have publishing deals. So that being said, I think that one thing that really ties into what we're talking about with marketing and that ties into building a network and building relationships is really this reaching out process or reaching out system, or just being in the habit of every single day, one of your most important tasks that you do being to reach out to new people or follow up with the right people, networking.

Michael Walker:
So I'd be curious if for you, is that something that you just sort of have fallen into or you just do that naturally? Or is it something where you actually have like a system where it's like either still currently or like for a while, you reach out to X amount of people per day? How do you keep track of that?

Wyshmaster Beats:
I have, mine was kind of a branch thing, but early on in my music career, I had very bad anxiety. It was not easy for me to get in studios and stuff because I'd always thought like, "Damn. These are artists that are way better than me. They're not going to like my tracks or whatever." And then it turned into like fear of flying. So I got opportunities to go to different countries to go work with people. I never did it. And I think, and then just overcoming that, I was just like, "You know what? I can't live like that anymore." So I overcame the anxiety and then I started just reaching out to people. I'm like, "The worst thing they can say is no. Or the worst thing about going to studio, we don't work on something," which most of the time you'll work on something, but it just might not be a good song. It might not get released or whatever. And when you start realizing the worst thing that people could say is no, it doesn't matter to you anymore.

Wyshmaster Beats:
If you reach out to somebody they're either not going to hit you back or they'll say, "Hey, not interested." Most times they won't even say not interested. They might just not hit you back. But, like I said, you might get that one out of 100 that does. So I, as somebody like me, mine was more of a branch thing. I reached out to a few people and then it just, from there, it was like word of mouth. And that's how music is. I mean, that's how the world works is word of mouth. "Hey, who made that track?" "Oh, that was Wysh." "Oh, where can I find him?" "Boom. Here's his number." Same as the artist. "Who's that artist?" "Oh, that's dah, dah, dah. You can check him out on Spotify." You know what I mean? So I think once you start reaching out to enough people and you start getting your music out there, enough people hear you, then that word of mouth is going to get you to where you need to go.

Wyshmaster Beats:
But if I'd said numbers, I mean, why not? If you could take 30 minutes to an hour out of your time, reach out, just send out a bunch of emails or send a bunch of messages, DMs and stuff and see what happens, but find those people that you want to work with. Don't just, just because it's a name. Find something that maybe you like about them. Maybe you could tell them about that in your message and say, "Hey, I love your work. I love what you did on this song. I would love to work with you. I think we have a similar style" or something like that. You know what I mean? Then it's a little more personal. It's not, "Hey, this is blah, blah, blah. I'd love to work. Hit me up." It's like, no, that's not going to work. I spend an hour a day on my emails alone, which do you think I love doing that, but I do. I email every single person. I don't hire a team for me. I do all my own marketing.

Michael Walker:
Wow. That's awesome.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Time management is very important.

Michael Walker:
For sure. Yeah. And I love what you said about realistically, what's the worst that can happen? If you reach out to someone and they say, no, then you're no worse off than you were before. So it's like either they say yes or you're just at the same place that you were before. Except even I think there is a lot of wisdom to the idea of planting seeds, especially if you're willing to play the long-term game and you realize it's not just about a short term win or short-term fix, but it's about building a long-term relationship. And it's like, you're not going anywhere. You're going to keep working at it until you're successful, then there is a cumulative effect of like reaching out to all these people and planting the seeds. Because over time, even if they subconsciously, the first time they got an email from you, they like, I don't know, filter it out or they're too busy or whatnot. If you keep showing up and you keep growing and you keep being consistent and reaching out, then that seed eventually kind of blossoms into into an actual plan.

Wyshmaster Beats:
No one's going to be going around, "Oh, this guy Wysh keeps hitting me up. Man, don't work with them." People don't go around doing that though. I mean, everybody says a black ball in the industry. There's no such thing, you know what I mean? And I was also, I forgot I was going to say, but yeah, just you have to try it. You know what I mean? Like I said, someone who dealt with anxiety for many years who made a lot of mistakes because of it, it was in my brain, you know what I mean? It was me telling myself I couldn't do it or I wasn't good enough or put fear in my head. And then you find out what's the worst thing that could happen.

Michael Walker:
Right. That's a powerful question.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Maybe on an airplane.

Michael Walker:
That's a powerful, powerful question. I think, especially for anxiety, with anxiety it's like, "Okay. Realistically, what is the worst thing that could possibly happen in this situation?" and coming to terms with that like, "Okay. I guess, hmm. Yeah. If the plane crashed right now, that would suck. I would die. I don't want to die, but that's okay. Everything's going to be okay."

Wyshmaster Beats:
You have a better chance of getting in a car accident.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. That's definitely true. Yeah. So I think that that'd be a really valuable thing to talk through though, because you're definitely not alone in having struggled with things. I mean, I know I used to struggle with anxiety. It was mostly like social anxiety and that was, I mean, that was a really difficult thing to overcome. I was very in my own head and kind of always like overthinking and very nervous. And so I'd be curious about your journey with anxiety and for you, what helped you to get over that? And for anyone who's listening to this right now who maybe they also to some degree, I think all of us to some degree have anxiety and [crosstalk 00:33:37] some it's unhealthy.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. I have a lot of anxiety and there's some people have a social, they can't leave the house. And I think it comes to we're stuck in studios where we're not around a lot of people working on music. And that was my whole life. I mean, I've been in studios, only a few people, and then you start getting out there. Even when I got into education, I'm like, "I got to teach 20 people in this room right now?" I think what help me deal with it was first you'd really just have to believe in yourself and just tell yourself, "What is the worst that can happen? If they don't like your music, somebody else will.? And you'll notice that somebody might not like your song, but the next person in might love it. They might say, "Hey, I have an idea with this. I know how to turn this into a hit." That's what a good producer is going to do. See I'm a beat maker, but I'm also a music producer.

Wyshmaster Beats:
My job is taking something and making it better and working with you, from the creative side of it, to the overall song. And even with beats, if you're a producer and you play a beat or something, sometimes they'll shut that off in five seconds. And you'll be like, "Oh my God." You're devastated. And then you don't know. What if I'm in the studio with Nelly and he just broke up with his girlfriend and I'm playing him all these love songs. He's like, "I'm not on this shit." He's going to skip it. You don't know what they're going. You don't have to buy this right there. So you can't take it personally. And then next day you might play the same track. And he's like, "Oh, I love this. Why didn't you play this for me?" And you're like, "Dude, I just played it." That happens all the time too. So overcoming that, just putting yourself down and saying like, you're just not good enough or people aren't going to like your music. I think that helps.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Exercise, I think is huge. I'm not going to tell everybody to go out there and run 50 miles, but putting those endorphins inside of you and just waking up in the morning, just going for a walk at least. Sometimes that, I don't want to say sometimes, that always helps the anxiety for me. If I'm feeling a little anxious, just going out for that walk, sweating it out is great. I think just in music in general, you're getting creative and stuff. I'm trying to think what else. I think it was just mindset and just like I said, exercise and just realizing that the worst thing that could happen is not the worst thing in the world. So talk to other people. Find somebody that you trust and kind of, you don't have to sit there and tell them everything, but just maybe tell them what you're going through. You're just like, "Man, I feel like this," whether it's a brother, sister, wife, husband, whatever, or a good friend, just tell them about it.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Don't hide it either. You know what I mean? I hid it my whole life, like I was embarrassed. I'm like, "I have a disease." It's not a disease. A lot of people deal with it. People dealing with it in different ways, but sometimes talking about it I mean, it's really good to get it off your chest and you're going to feel a lot better.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. 100%. Yeah. I think with anxiety, especially, it's something that tends to thrive in darkness or tends to hide and like you said, there's an embarrassment around it. And so shining a light on it seems to evaporate. It's kind of like, I've heard this analogy before of that it's kind of like a fog, where fog, it can really like be super cloudy. It can seem so big and it can just surround like, "Wow. I can't even see where I'm going." But if you condensed all of that fog into actual water, it would fill less than a cup of water. So yeah, I think that there is something really powerful about the idea. The mind can really blow things out of proportion.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And what happens when people go into panic mode is their body's actually fighting what they think is going on. So if you tell yourself this is going on, your body's like, "Oh, I got to fight this. I got to get this out of my body," so that's why your heart goes fast or whatever. And I think that's when people just freak out, they just don't want to go anywhere. And one thing I think, too, what I told myself when I used to get panicky sometimes I just say, "You know what? How many times have you gone through that? Has anything ever really happened?" You know what I mean? No, it hasn't, you did it to yourself. So it comes with just experience. And like I said, try those things and you're not alone because a lot of people in the world, but especially in music, deal with it.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. Yeah. And one thing I want to reiterate, too, that you said that I think is really powerful is going for a walk.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah.

Michael Walker:
It's something that I feel like I've noticed this habit from a lot of who I think are some of the most intelligent people who've accomplished some of the most incredible things like Albert Einstein was like a huge walker. That's just part of his thing. He would go for walks regularly throughout the day and Steve Jobs as well. And there's even a book called The Spark that really ties into what you're saying about exercise and just movement and walking in general, where they did a lot of science around when people would go for walks or when they would go for runs. It's actually what got me to start running. I never would have thought that I would enjoy running. I always grew up thinking that running was the worst part of every sport. Why would you run for fun or just for any reason?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Running's not my thing, but yeah, I know what you're saying, but then now you enjoy it because you're like, "Okay, now I see what it does." I like lifting weights. That's my thing. I'm like, I love it. Great.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. Yeah. And I think that that book, The Spark, was a big piece of that because it really spoke to what we're talking about. It talked about the brain science of, it's called BDNF and BDFN, or I'm totally probably butchering that. But the point was that they actually did these studies on people before and after they went for a walk and they gave them tests and the people who had just gotten back from a walk performed 35% better than people who were just like sitting down for an extended period of time. So the takeaway was going for a walk does a lot of really healthy things for our brain, not just for our body.

Wyshmaster Beats:
It gives you energy and motivates you. I mean, and we're creative people, so that's what you need. You need to fuel that stuff.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. Awesome. So one thing that, it sounds like you have a ton of experience in that I think is a really powerful thing to master as a musician is one, reaching out and finding people to collaborate with. But then the actual process of let's say that you're collaborating with a songwriter to write a song. What would you say are like some of the best practices to be the best collaborator that you can be and to show up and provide value for the other person? Let's say that you do get an opportunity where it's like, man, like you actually have a shot where you're meeting with someone who has a publishing deal and they're a level ahead of you. How do you make sure that you're really fully prepared to make the most out of that opportunity?

Wyshmaster Beats:
If you're working in person, definitely show up on time or early. I hate when people show up late. Then you're like, you have this little thing like, "Man, I'm going to work with you but like, it's kind of annoyed with you right now." And listen, all right, don't be the egotistical person in the room that said, "Oh, it has to be like this. No, this is it. This is," you know what I mean? Listen, be open-minded, especially when you work with another writer. Don't be afraid to put out your ideas. I know a lot of people do. They hold back, like, "I don't know if this is going to be good or whatever." And just, yeah, I mean, and be as honest as you possibly can. And whether you're working with an artist, producer, anybody, you have to be honest because if you're not, that song is going to be the one that gets hurt, not you, I mean, well, which is going to turn going to happen. That's another mistake I made when I worked with bigger artists.

Wyshmaster Beats:
I would sometimes be like, "Well, they're bigger than me. I'm not going to sit there and tell them I don't like this shit." And then all of a sudden, the song just turns out horrible. And it's like, this is not going to make the album. We just wasted all these hours and I could have just said something. And it happened to me one time. And after that, I was like, "I'm just going to be honest." And you don't have to be insulting, though. And that's another thing when you work with, if you're collaborating, don't insult somebody. You don't have to like, don't use the word whack and be like, "Oh, that's shit sucks," especially when you're creative, that's that throws an artist off, a producer, whoever you're working with and that's it. They're just going to be turned off after that. So, yeah, I think those are my main things. If you're collaborating with somebody online, it would be the same way, but maybe meet up on Zoom instead of just saying, "Hey, I'm going to send you a track, you do your thing and send it back."

Wyshmaster Beats:
Have a meeting and talk about like, "Let's come up with what's the idea? What's going to be the subject? What are we going after?" You know what I mean? It's good to actually put like a plan together when you're creating a song. And that's why I love that studio vibe. Don't get me wrong. Sometimes I send a beat and they make a song and that's it. But being in a studio actually collaborating with somebody, it just has that great, you know how it is, it sets that great feeling and that creativity that's in the room. So, but we have Zoom. Use Zoom.

Michael Walker:
Absolutely. Yeah. I think that Zoom is such an awesome opportunity. With Modern Musician, yeah. We have a team of 24 coaches and all of us work remotely and my business partner that I worked with for like two years, I feel like I knew him like a brother. We had never met in person until like a year and a half later. So being able to reach out to people like you described and making that a part of just your regular process and going to a Zoom meeting, I think is a really powerful opportunity because you don't have to live in LA. You don't have to live in Nashville. I mean, it's great to be in person. It really like, yeah, it was great to meet them in person, but Zoom.

Wyshmaster Beats:
But this gives you the opportunity, you know what I mean?

Michael Walker:
It really does. Yeah. To have the FaceTime and to really interact and connect with people.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. I mean, I've coached thousands of producers online and I mean, Portugal, Spain, or wherever it is, it's so cool. And then you get all these people and then you just vibe together. You're all talking about different stuff and to me, that's what education is, is just learning from others. When I first got into education, you couldn't have told me students can teach me anything. I'd be like, "What are they going to teach me?" Man, they would like, "Hey, have you checked out this new song or this new style of music?" And it opened up my mind like, "Damn. I'm actually becoming a better producer from helping others."

Michael Walker:
Yeah. 100%. Yeah. I know that there's a lot of science and studies around the impact that teaching other people has on your own ability to learn to the point that if you teach someone else how to do something, then you're actually probably the person who benefits most in terms of learning. Having to communicate it does some things in your brain that really helped you to dial it in.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Exactly.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. Cool, man. So I know you have a ton of experience. You really have like a community of producers that you serve in a big way. And you've connected with a lot of producers and you've seen some of the common challenges, the common mistakes. And I think that there's probably going to be a good amount of people who are listening or watching this right now who are producers themselves. So, I know that there's going to be quite a few people who are here who are looking or interested in production, but probably mostly from the kind of singer songwriter point of view, or they want to learn how to produce themselves so that they can, if they do start working with another producer, they're able to kind of hold their own or communicate the way that you talked about Nelly being able to communicate with the engineer. Where would you recommend kind of starting out, if someone wanted to take their production and maybe self-production to the next level?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah, I mean, I'd say, I mean, of course practice. I don't have a course right now. I'm actually working on it right now. So I'm actually working on a full production course online where I'm going to teach beat making, marketing, advanced beat making, stuff like that. But right now, I mean, there's courses out there I'm sure that teach you beat making. And if you're already making beats, I would follow the, because so many producers are doing YouTube videos now, follow the producers that you like or the ones that you know are selling a ton of beets. Look, they're showing their skills. They're showing these tricks. Watch what they're doing and educate yourself through going to charts and finding the top producers online. And you go to beatstars.com right now, it'll tell you all the top beat sellers. That's a huge gem. Listen to what they're working on. See what is the hottest right now.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And I'm not saying copy them, but maybe find something that you could do that sounds like that or that's in that genre of music and use that to put online and learn marketing techniques. It doesn't have to be beat selling marketing techniques. It could just be how to market, you know what I mean, how to market e-commerce, how to sell music online or sell something online. You know what I mean? I'm really big into funneling, so I know funnels are awesome. I mean, I guess that's pretty much it. Just learn these things. Just keep educating yourself and keep practicing. I think that's the number one thing from being in education and teaching producers and stuff is if you don't hold them accountable, they won't work on it. And I think that's the thing that's wrong by just watching videos is a YouTube video's not going to hold you accountable.

Wyshmaster Beats:
And that's what I think it was great about, if you had class tomorrow, I'm going to hold you to them. I'd be like, "Did you work on it? How many beats did you make today?" And you're like, "Oh, I only made one" or whatever. "Dude, I told you to make five. What's going on? Do you want this? Do you have a passion for it?" And I kind of like bust their balls a little bit, but yeah. I mean, I guess that's what I would say is like, just keep educating yourself and get better at what you're doing.

Michael Walker:
Yeah. Yeah. 100%. So, I mean, looking forward to seeing the course when it comes out. Let's definitely stay in touch and yeah, I'd love to contribute and help you when you're ready to launch it and maybe come back, circle back and share it with people.

Wyshmaster Beats:
I'll be interviewing you next.

Michael Walker:
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I'll be looking forward to that. This has been a lot of fun, and definitely appreciate you taking the time to come on here and share some lessons that you've learned. I think that, yeah, kind of circling back to the beginning, if you are listening to this right now, or you're looking to take your music career to the next level, then probably one of the number one thing that you possibly can do is to find people who've accomplished the thing that you want to do, or people who've had that success and just surround yourself with them and just either directly reach out to them and connect with them, find out how you can provide value to those people and just get in the same room as them. And maybe what that looks like at the beginning is just listening to podcasts like this.

Michael Walker:
But yeah, I think that you're a great example of that again, of who you are speaks even louder than what you're saying. What you're saying is also great. But also just that comes from the roots of your story and who you are and the experience. So, yeah, man, that's just a long-winded way of saying appreciate you. And thanks.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. I can say one thing, too. You just said it. You said provide value. I think that's a key takeaway is if you are going to reach out to people, well, provide value before you ask for something. So I mean, instead of just asking someone, "Hey, I'm trying to get on. Can you help me?" That's like, "Hey, I'm a graphic guy or something. I would love to do some free graphics for you. If you could just take some time and maybe meet with me and help me with I can't sell this or I don't know what to do with my music." Now you provided value to me. I'm like, "Man, maybe I need some graphic work" or whatever it is. Or maybe you do copy write for emails. It could be anything. Or maybe you're a songwriter, just, if you could provide value, that's going to go a lot further than you just asking for something.

Michael Walker:
Absolutely. That's the ticket. That's the ticket, for sure, is figuring out if you're asking yourself the question, how can I provide value or more value in this situation, then you're way ahead of the game. You're moving in the right direction. And yeah, that makes it probably 1000 times more likely that you're going to get a response. If you reach out to someone and you've done your research to figure out how can you provide value to that person, and you've just offered to provide value. You could even do it when you're early starting out, just to do it with no strings attached where it's just like, if someone just reached out to me right now and was like, "Hey. I've got a lot of experience at editing videos and, or I've got an experience with this thing. And I just wanted to reach out and say I really like what you're doing and I want to be a part of it and I'd be happy to. Here's some of my work. I would love to connect more and help you out with doing this." 100%, they'd cut through the noise.

Wyshmaster Beats:
That's what I'm saying. Providing value is always going to go a lot further than you just asking for something and just saying, "Oh, I need help." "Okay. Well."

Michael Walker:
And a good example of that too, is there's a person who's really is a fan of a new music project that I just released the first couple of songs for and it's a brand new project. And the first songs that I've released in a couple of years since I stopped touring full-time with my band. So for me it was really exciting, but also kind of scary. Now we also have this platform with Modern Musician. I want to be a good role model for our artists as well. And I'm really excited and grateful for how it's gone for the first couple of songs. We've done a live release party. But there's this guy named Don Semse and Don is, yeah. I think every artist has a Don Semse has someone who's just all about it and just like the ultimate fan of the music. And, his profile picture is like him with like the graphics and the background. And he was a great example of someone who just showed up and was just like, "How can I provide value? I want to be involved."

Michael Walker:
And now I'm actually doing coaching with him in exchange for him doing some executive assistant work for me personally. And it definitely wouldn't have happened. For me to do the type of coaching I'm doing with him right now, it just wouldn't happen at all. The only reason it's happening is because he reached out first and he was so focused on providing value that now, and also I think that he comes from very humble places. He lives in a trailer park right now. And he's really looking to transform and to grow. And I see him and I'm like, "Man, he's going to be a great success story for Harmonic Human," which is a new coaching program that I'm planning on launching with the new music project. And so the point was exactly what you just said, that focusing on providing value is the key thing, I think. It's the way to build relationships and to long-term win the game.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. I mean, I've had music producers reach out to me and say, "Hey, man, I would love to. I really need help selling beats and I really want to be a music producer. I would do anything, help you with whatever you're working on just if you could help me." I'm like, "All right, cool." So, I mean, and then I'd bring them on. I'd say, "All right. What you're going to do right now is you're going to upload my beats for the week." And I have people like, "Nah, man, that's not helping me at all." I'm like, "Okay, forget it." Some people don't understand by helping me do that, you're going to learn the process of what I do. So people think, "Oh, well that's just free labor." It's like, "No, you're actually going to learn the way." Just like it's the Miyagi technique with karate kid. You know what I mean? You might be working with him, but actually, he's teaching you something in the process. And I think that's tough.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Some people just can't get past that. They just want you jump in and be like, "All right. Yeah. So first thing you want to do is just put your beats up and then people are just going to buy them. There you go." You know what I mean? Some people are looking for just that special button to push.

Michael Walker:
For sure. Wax on, wax off.

Wyshmaster Beats:
Right.

Michael Walker:
Good stuff. Well, hey man, again, I super appreciate you taking the time to be here and to share some of the lessons that you've learned and for anyone who is listening or watching this right now who wants to connect more or reach out to you directly or just stay connected with what you're doing, what would be the best place for them to learn more?

Wyshmaster Beats:
Yeah. I was going to say, if you want to check out my website, wyshmasterbeats.com, that's W-Y-S-H master beats.com. Hit me up. Instagram is the best way. I get back to people on there. It's just Wyshmaster Beats. I am doing something amazing right now. It's an offer for artists. It's five free beats that you can release. You pay me no profits, you keep your royalties. And all you're doing is putting your email in and you're going to get some cool emails with value and you can find that at wyshmasterbeats.com/freebeats.

Michael Walker:
That is awesome. Yeah. Thank you for doing that, for putting that together. I think that's super. I that's a no brainer. So we'll definitely put the links in the show notes and the description, so you can go check those out and get the five free beats. And hey man, appreciate, appreciate you coming on here. And I hope you have a great rest of your day.

Wyshmaster Beats:
You, too. Thanks for having me, man.

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 you want to support the podcast, then there's a few ways to help us grow. First, if you hit subscribe, then I'll make sure you don't miss a new episode. Secondly, if you share it with your friends on your social media tag us. That really helps us out. And third, best of all, if you believe it's an honest review, it's going to help us reach more musicians like you who want to take their music careers to the next level. It's time to be a Modern Musicians now. And I look forward to seeing you on our next episode.