Advice for starting out in the music industry
By Monkeynut Entertainment Founder and Managing Director Elliott Frisby
"I’ve been working in the music industry for the last 22 years. When I first started, I wish someone had told me that to make it big I needed to think of myself as a business. The music and entertainment industry is an industry like any other. You have an obligation to yourself as an artist to learn how business works. It’s essential to learn, especially if it’s not natural to you.
Know your brand
You need to know what your brand is. This is some of the best advice for starting out in the music industry. What does it look like? What has your brand got to say? It all boils down to the same golden rules as in any other business. If you don’t look at yourself as a brand you’ll always end up being the person who slots into someone else’s success.
Now, it’s okay to support others– and to occasionally even do it for little or no payment - as long as it gives you some status to use to your advantage later on. But you have to think about it with a business head. For example, I played guitar for Robin Gibb on many occasions, which I absolutely loved and looks great on my CV, but I didn’t earn a penny from it. However, I ended up making money from it by using it as credibility to get other work. But you must think: ‘How can I utilise this situation to further my business?’
I always say to the people that I’m training to sing or perform better, ask yourself:Who are you? Where have you come from? What’s your product, your genre? What is your style, your image? I’ve always been known to wear flares and cowboy boots, after spending a lot of time in Nashville in the mid-2000s. Some people might think that’s cool, others might think I look shit. Do I care? No - because that’s my look, it’s who I am. It’s how I feel confident.
If you want to carve out your own unique path, you also need to ask yourself: What have I got to say? What’s my mission statement? How do I want to market myself? What do I want people to know me for?
If I’d done a business course in my early career, when I was eating baked beans out of a can for dinner, I might have had more money for food and not just alcohol! In the end, the turning point for me came after watching YouTube videos and webinars on how to market myself and how to make money as an artist. I’ve just started doing a series of similar videos with Mike Read on how to succeed in the music business. Watch the first one here and subscribe for more: https://youtu.be/keYneLogArM
Build your team
Once I was earning more money, I was able to outsource my biggest stresses - finance spread sheets or marketing, for example - to someone better at it. I love paying people to help me. Let people help you build your business by paying them to do what you don’t enjoy but they specialise in, even if only for a few hours a week. Then you can concentrate on doing what you do best.
Make sure you pick the right people to work with, though. Some people can appear to be more than they are, then use you to make themselves look better. I once signed to a publisher with the promise I’d get to release my own songs, but I ended up playing guitar for another artist instead. I was told all the right things, but it never happened. In fact, it knocked my confidence so badly that I buried the songs I’d spent years working on, thinking I was only good enough to support someone else. Once I left this employment, I bounced back even more determined than ever. I wrote more songs, got involved in a couple of releases and proved to myself that I could do it.
In this industry, it’s easy to be charmed into something that’s not right for you, with people saying what you want to hear, flattering you yet manipulating you at the same time. Listen to your instincts if they’re warning you about someone.
Ask questions when you meet people instead of only talking about yourself. Let’s face it, in the entertainment industry most people love talking about themselves. But you want to get to the truth of who they are, not just the façade. Then you will know if they’re genuinely the right people to have around you. That’s some of the best advice for starting out in the music industry that I wish I’d known at the beginning.
I always come across as professional and confident but, in my early career, deep down I often felt alone. Any friends I had weren’t supportive or ended up being cutthroat competitors. But if you’ve got competition, I say make friends with them and keep them on side, so you can stay up-to-date with what they’re doing and get ahead of the game. You may just find yourself working with them!"