Jake Gold

Bob Cast. That's a good idea. I'm open to change, right I Actually, Jeremiah and I were looking that up in Santa Barbara and we saw that there were some other Bobs that say Bob cat Cast, which means it's totally legit. It's wide open. So I don't see why we don't call it the Bob Cast. That's a good idea. I have to contemplate that, have to run that through the mental filtrations. I know, I know he likes it.

I know he likes the idea of it. So, Jake as a manager, and once he gets on something, he's covered all three hundred sixty degrees, he's closing on you. I'm trying to trying to maintain a little bit of my own independence before I make a decision. Okay, Well, you know that's what that's what we do. We we surround the the artist with all the yes is before we actually approached the artist. That's all they can do is say yes. Correct, they'll because they'll have the what about?

What about? And you already have the answers. That's your job. That's what experiences teaches you. That's correct, amundo um Santa Barbara. I had never been there before, So what do you think you want to move there? Uh? It may be a little sleepy for me, right, I sleeping for me too, But people really become infatuated with Santa Barbara and they want to move there. There are even some people. The guy ran Universal Studios for a long time, he used

to commute to Universal City from Santa Barbara. Well, we left Wednesday morning and it took us maybe an hour and a half to get into West Hollywood. So it wasn't bad. I mean, people commute longer and living in New York. Let's be clear, if you go a typical commute time, you're never gonna be able to match that. No, no, not. If you're leaving at seven am, you're dealing with rush hour and the same on the way out. I remember I was mapping it from Toronto to see how long

it was going to take. And at the time I was mapping it, it was five o'clock here. It was the last Friday I mapped it, and it said two hours and twenty minutes exactly. Yeah, so it could take a lot longer. But there is a train too that goes like Jeremiah producer podcast took the train. But uh, you know, we live in Los Angeles. Were addicted to our cars, I know, I know, although as you know, more and more people are getting into the car. Well

that's another thing. I mean, we're not really discussing the conference here, but your car was unfortunately totaled. And you're a uber guy. We talked about that in the last party. Yeah, doing it all the time, you know, I love it. It's great, no responsibilities of a vehicle. I'm shirking all my responsibilities. It's wonderful at sixty. So we've you doing what happened in Santa Barbara. Well, I mean, it's it's interesting that there was yet great speakers. First of all, um, uh,

high level people, all at the top of their game. Um, I'm curious as to what do you think was the common thread amongst the five speakers that we had, they were available. No. Uh, the common thread was the personality. Someone else said that they were talking about the hustle. But um, music business is a very fluid business where your education and the typical uh notches in your belt

don't really apply. So all of these people to a degree were self starters, and they found their way to the music business and had achieved success based on their personality and their smarts as opposed to coming up through

the ranks of business or something else. I would agree with you, except in the case of Steve Boom from Amazon and Rob Glazer, who were academics, I mean Steve Booms and a lawyer, right and and and they all had jobs until until you know, as I say, in in the case of Rob Glazer whose chairman of Real Networks, he left college and he went to work for Microsoft. Okay, and that was before Microsoft was the monolith and it

ultimately became. But then he went on his own and he started a business, and he ultimately bought the Pro Bowlers Association and he became a VC so he was really doing his own thing. And Steve Boom was a lawyer, but then he went to work for Yahoo and he ran looped. So these were people who were finding their own way, as opposed to someone working for Ge or Xerox,

who just keeps on going up the ladder. I don't doubt that for a second, But I think those two chose Academia UM as their fallback because Boom was a lawyer, like he was a practicing lawyer. Well, let's start with raw. I mean, Rob is highly educated in computer reach. Even though he was not a coder at Microsoft or Real Networks, he was into computer programming against in high school and then he learned how to do that. You know, that's one of the great things about today's society. You know.

They call the guy who just wrote what color is Your Parachute? Recently died? The Ultimate job Seekers Bible, and he talks about transferable skills. It's like even myself, I'm an attorney. I practice law very briefly, and then when the Naster thing came up in the year two thousand, I knew all the law. Suddenly my law background was relevant. So a lot of these people, their training comes back in certain ways they understand even though they don't use

it directly. Like Rob Glazer, I found it interesting because uh, in the case of Daniel Glass, where he he wants everybody to have at least finished college to work for him, and and uh, and then you segue to someone like like Ethiopia who is president of Motown, who came from an academia family, uh, and didn't go to college. And it was interesting because Daniel Glass came up to me after that, that's Ethiopia have to have to marry him?

Of whose head of Motown? And uh, he said, if you remember what she said, she said she was offered a gig at u M at Universal Music Publishing and she turned it down and stayed for two years with the publishing companies. Who was out in Atlanta, and he said, that was kind of like going to school. It's a little bit of a fudging of the concept. And you know, we both we both love Daniel and we both think

the world of him. And he really is you know, you you had um, you had uh uh you had Superman schon a while back and and um, but Daniel Glass is as much Superman as anybody else. Like, the guy's a wonderful guy and you know, totally accommodating. He returns every email, he's that kind a guy, and I just find it funny that he'll fudget to fit his That may be true, But the interesting thing. The interesting thing about Daniel Glass is he trains all his people.

He doesn't want anybody with bad habits. So I remember going the early days to Glass Note Records office in Manhattan and there's one big room with like fifteen He's got more people. Now he's got forty people. But fifteen people are not one over thirty, Okay, So he teaches them his style. He does have a couple of people who come from somewhere else. This is what people don't understand about the entertainment business, is you are working seven He has a couple of people in Los Angeles. These

people are working around the clock. One of them came to the conference, and it takes that to make it, along with a lot of insights. I mean, Daniel Glass is very successful with his own company right now, but he had bumps in the road getting there. Yeah, but everybody does. I mean, that's the nature of entrepreneurship. I agree. But you know, it's a funny era in the music business because most of the people running the giant operations

never had skin in the game. Now, if you look on the promotion side at a g J. Marciano was an independent promoter and Michael Ruppino had a limited amount of time as a promoter. But everybody running the record companies never had an independent company as a promoter. I know, a club promoter boss says, you've never really a promoter until you've gone to the A T M At two in the morning to withdraw cash to pay the act. Well, it's an interesting thing because I I personally have a

bit of an issue. Maybe it's you know, because I've only ever done it on my own, never had a real job, like a job job, like with a paycheck.

But you always see that most of these record company guys that have been at record companies all their lives, that go to try and become a manager, because you know, at some point there's attrition at all these record companies and they all lose their jobs because they're the staffs are shrinking, and they go, well, I'll guess I'll be a manager because they say they know artists or whatever they think they know, and then they have to pay

their first career bill because they've never even seen one. They didn't even know what it looks like before. Uh, they've they've never you know, paid their own phone bill because it's been paid for like everything else has been paid for. And then they have to run a business and generate revenue at the same time, um, which they never had to do before, and most of them fail. Yeah, And and some of them go to work for management companies.

And I've encountered a few of those people, you know, with dealing with other acts when your Access Support Act or their Access Support Act whatever. And most of them have no concept of management. They're they're just like their their job at a management company is almost like their job was at a record company. They're not real managers, They're just another person that works there. Well, that speaks to another issue which started having by ten years ago,

which is the roll up of management companies. Do you believe managers should be independent? Well, I I think that it's a little different um in the United States than it is everywhere else. From talking to some of these managers that I know that became part of the bigger companies, a lot of them are basically running their own fiefdoms with a healthcare package. And and they they've kind of said to me, look, I take this I take. I become part of a bigger thing. There's a good healthcare package.

I have a family and I want to make sure I'm covered just in case the ship goes down. And at the same time, I have an infrastructure and have to worry about an infrastructure. But I still run my own company and I just do a split on the revenue that comes in. Do you think it hobbles them in some way having that that as opposed to being completely independent, Well, I I think there's I think there's something for everybody. I think if you're a hustler, you're

a hustler. Um, Chris ru Is, He's He's the one that that became part of Chris was totally independent, it was motional easiest became part of red Light. I think I think probably you never know, and maybe down the road he'll either you know, moved to a higher position at red Light, or he may end up leaving on his own. Because at some point, I don't know what their their deals are, and I think some of them

are doing probably really small deals back to the mother Ship. UM, I wouldn't know, but I think for a while there, I think some of the companies were doing seventy thirty splits with with managers. Am I not right? You know most of these deals and I'm not privy to all of them. Certainly in the initial incarnation was they paid you a fee and then it was fifty fifty and you had to earn back against It was a versus commission,

which is kind of like an agency deal. Right. But the interesting thing you reference, and this is a political football in the United States. I remember I was, you know, I was in Canada talking to a woman who was thinking of leaving her major label job to go with an independent and using my US lens, I was, you know, saying that that may not be a good idea because I'm thinking about healthcare. Where in this particular case, she goes to work for the independent, doesn't work out, She's

still got her healthcare. That's always a concern in the United States. Yeah, if you know, if I'm gonna leave, what am I gonna do about my health care? You know, there's extended packages. I mean, we can get into that whole thing. Cobra is a limited time Ian healthcare is really a big thing. Certainly with Obamacare it was less threatening. That's being undercut at this particular point in time. But the real question is are you a self starter or

are you someone who needs the team to function? Well? I think you you you're building your own team. Anyways, from my experience from talking to dealing with some of these managers that work within these these bigger management firms, it doesn't seem like, you know, they're getting all that extra stuff that they're really still running their own things with not being a specific about different ones, uh, some are different. Some give you a lot more autonomy and

less support than others. And by the I guess for me, when there's no net, you have a heightened anxiety, whereas if you have a contract with the management company, you might at least say, well, things are not working. I got six months and it's always in the distance. Where if you're working for yourself every day you're waking up and you're thinking, okay, what's next. Is this gonna work? Well? In fact, I think that's kind of how it works.

And if let's go back to to Santa Barbara is most of the people that um that we're there, I think have that attitude. It's like you you live and breathe what you're doing because it's all yours. Well. I mean one of the great stories was Troy Carter who said before he signed uh Lady Gaga, he was Rooke and he was you know, uh, you know, selling or painting his wife's engagement ring in order to make the bills. And he took Lady Gaga out of the spaghetti warehouse

to celebrate. People have no that's where they met. That was their big meeting, he said. He took her out to meet at I thought it was a celebration. But but in any event, the point being, people have the impression that it's a constant upward trend and that is not true. No, And I've been doing it now. I started full time November eighty one, so I'm like thirty. Okay, So now is it easier or less easy? It's the same.

It's like it's a funny thing. You know. People talk about about how much the business has changed, and for everything that has changed, nothing has changed. You know. Um, we had to talk, uh, And I've been thinking about this because I knew, you know, we were going to be sitting down doing this. But people were talking about, you know, you continually bring up um and by Spotify standards rightly, so hip hop strive is the dominant force,

and pop is the dominant force. Um. But you know, if you think back to when um, you know, we had pop radio and rock radio. Uh if it it just went strictly on plays. Pop records were spun fifty sixty times a week and rock records were spun times a week, and so pop and those kind of that kind of music was always sort of more popular, which is why it was called pop. You know, we're all victims of our own experience, did you may we grew

up in a major market with multiple stations. You grew up in the hinterlands with only one station, But certainly if you grew up in the metropolis, and you know, and you're but at my age, baby boomer, Um, there was a switch certainly in sixty eight in the New York radio market, which was my radio market, uh, to

the FM band. And it wasn't until seventy three that Lie Abrahams came along and codified and turned FM into a kind of top forty format and then tracks with then crossover in the early seventies to AM four people at FM and the cars at FM ruled and then all of a sudden, MTV came in and it was what MTV played, and there was a resurgence of Top forty radio. So in Top forty moved to FM at that point to excellent point. I remember, you know, uh one point one Here in Los Angeles, they used to

be they used to be a divide. And I had a very funny story about that that happened to me when I was about fourteen, fifteen years old, as I had been at one of these ben are retreat things and I met this girl and and um, she was a year older than me, and she lived in St. Catharine's and she invited me to come spend the weekend in St. Catherine's with her and her family, which was, when you think back on it now, kind of weird.

Your fourteen, you're four you're fourteen years old, and you know, and and so I took the bus to St. Catherine. It's like an hour an hour and a half by bus, probably about an hour and a half two hours depending on the stops. St. Catherine's near Niagara Falls, so it's and if you drive it, it's like an hour fifteen

with no traffic back to traffic. And I remember it was the it was a Saturday night, and we were listening to the radio and I hadn't crossed over into FM yet and I was still listening to pop music on AM. But she was a year older and she was already listening to FM, and and it was like a moment where she kind of realized that I was too young for her because I wasn't cool because I wasn't listening to FM and she was listening to FM.

And then you know, within six months, I was now listening to FM and listening too much cooler music as a result. But after that weekend, she was like, she basically said, oh yeah, like we can't. We can't hang out anymore because I wasn't cool enough because I was like still listening to a M music. Well, the funny thing is, I don't think today your friends would be decided Capulli on music. That just illustrates how important music

was back then. We'll take a quick break and come back with more of my conversation with Jake Gold, recorded live at the tune In Studios in Venice Beach as we recap the Music Media Summit in Santa Barbara, California. This week. I'm speaking with Jake Gold in the last couple of months, Paul Rodgers from Free and Bad Company joined me in the studio, as well as Oscar winner Brian Fogel created the documentary Chorus here next week's episode. First by subscribing to the podcast on tune in, Apple

Podcast or your podcast player of choice. Check out the first thirty interviews, and please rate and review the podcast. Okay, let's get back to my conversation with Jake Gold getting back to the dominant and you make you bring up an excellent point with the analogy of uh Spotify streams

to radio spins. But for those of us who investigate the market, whether it be media base which is the radio charts or the varying charts on Spotify, I'm a huge rock fan and I cannot sit here and champion all these rock acts that are deserve attention or not getting it. But some of them are doing okay. You know, the War on Drugs is doing well, and there's a

bunch of rock acts that are actually doing well. And you know, I brought it up at the conference and even when when you were talking to Ethiopia and she agreed, is that Spotify doesn't do an album chart, and if they did an album chart maybe be different because all we see is is a song consumption chart, and by seeing a song consumption consumption chart, what we're getting is we're getting And because the chart kind of and the way they're algorithm works, it kind of becomes a self

fulfilling prophecy, so one begets the other. I think that will drive more plays over and over and again again and being put on more playlists. Plus, you know, it's an interesting thing. I have this band Common Deary. We've brought it up before. Um they got on to CBC Radio two. Now CBC Radio two has their own playlists on Spotify and it's got a decent amount of followers. Now. I saw our plays go up on those tracks because partly was on some other playlists, but also because it

was on the radio to play. One of the things I you know, which I wish, which I wish is that they had the media based charts, which are radio charts on Spotify. So far, none of the main streaming outlets Apple, Spotify, etcetera. Have put the radio charts on that. I would like that. It's great that they have that Canada. But you can put your own chart up. There's nothing to stop few a station can actually create their own playlist and put it up there, just like there can

be a Bob Left Sets playlist. But I asked about the you know I have. We'd have to get Troy here to find out what the real stories. In any event, they're not dominant there, and there's the lag. But you know, you bring up a lot of things. Although the acts you mentioned, the rock acts are successful, they're not culturally dominant the way the hip hop acts are. But I don't think we're in a heyday of rock music. Okay,

I wouldn't say we're I don't think. The fact is is that, you know, knowing, look, I managed the biggest rock rock act in the country for many many years, and you know we got we never got played on pop radio. We only got played on rock radio. And I can only tell you that our our check royalty checks for airplay, compared to some of the pop acts who weren't selling nearly the amount of ticket and doing nearly the amount of business, or even for that matter,

selling nearly amount of records. We were selling um albums, um. Their checks were probably bigger than ours because of airplay. Yeah, but that was a different era and a different paradigm. Everything is different now. Now you bring up a number of things. One thing that some of the label people brought up in Santa Barbara that I've patently disagree with is the concept of the album. Okay, I believe that fans want a body of work. If I find a track I like on Spotify, immediately go on and see

what else has got the most streams on Spotify. I don't care what album it is. I might check whether it's from the most recent album. I might triangulate that way, but you know, I'm getting it. On a business level, I want to hear good music. You need a continuous, uh drip of product. Now, maybe you record it all

at once and you drip it out. I mean, but the concept of a once you know, once a year, once every couple of years, and then I think it's incredibly dequated and based on issues that people say, well, it has to be an album so we get publicity, right, Okay, So so let's let's back up. Let's back up fifty years. Okay, that's how the Beatles put out records exactly. Well, so what has changed is what I'm trying to say now. But the irony here is the public is leading and

it is the producers and the business infrastructure who are behind. Okay, the public is jumping genres and listening to singles. So so what happened when the when the Beatles put out records, they put out a bunch of singles, and then they put out an album, and then they put out another bunch of singles, and then they put on an album,

and they were putting them out every six months. Well, the interesting thing is, like any business, it's like the computer business in the last twenty years and music business then they were constantly pushing the envelope. And when you when before a business is mature, it's very exciting. Like ten years ago, we'd be sitting here talk it about our devices. Did you get the iPod? What size you have,

flash memory, etcetera. People don't talk. People don't even talk about their phones that way at this particular know, they may be talking about the cameras. That's the biggest thing on the So so the point and then you saw, because I know, Jake, you're not gonna be able the next year. The camera's gonna have three lenses, so you may have to get a new one. Contract to be up in another year and I'll get anot of you

get another photo. So in any event, Uh, the problem is we don't have enough innovation in the non hip hop world. I remember when you got a vinyl record. Vinyl record held between eight and thirty six minutes of music. Once you got below beyond like four, you had a sound degradation issue. You can push the forty. These days you can push. Most people don't because of the high quality pressings. I'll put it on two discs, but that's not even my point. People stretched to fill that limit.

And on vinyl records there were essentially four key cuts. Oh, putting track on each side, closing track on each side. You knew that acts put their best stuff there, and you checked it out. When we went to the CD. It was every It was too much to begin when you knew the opening track was supposed to be good, and at the end of the CD era they would say, well what about the fourth track? Fourtra I didn't even

get there. But at this point in time and for a long time, UH CD holds almost eighty minutes, So artistically, an album which was under forty minutes suddenly jumped to sixty minutes because of the format, not because anybody had anything specially new to say. And I think we have this new format of streaming, but the artists or lunites

and kept in the old paradigm. As I say, not the hip hop acts, not Drake putting up missed mix tapes, you know, other people starting with mixed tapes and SoundCloud, etcetera. But all the other acts can't stop complaining that we will not go back to where we once were. So even my own acts and I any act I talked to, when they asked me about, oh, we're gonna make an album and we're gonna do this, I say, fine, you can go in and record an album, but don't release

it that way. There's no reason to release three tracks at a time. Release two tracks at a time and keep the flow going. Part of it is also that you know, every time you release a new track, you can get another hit from the blogs, you can get more media attention. You put out ten songs, you get your media attention once and then it disappears. If you if you put out a track a month, you're gonna get media attention every month, and there's more to talk

about because there's something new all the time. This is interesting to what degree it will affect the visual business. Like I'm reading the newspaper before I come here, and it happens to be a Friday. They must have reviewed in excess of twenty movies. Yes, and I'm laughing. I said, some of these movies are interesting. I'm never going to the theater to see these movies. And when they hit UH TV services, I'll forget they existed. First of all,

the newspapers out of touch. They should be reviewing television. Secondly, there should be day and date so there could be ongoing word of mouth. Get this publicity on television shows. Well, it's a funny thing. I was. I knew you were going to bring up movies and culture, but you know, May the fourth be with you Today is May the fourth when we're recording this and Star Wars is out and they they finally timed it to put out the new Star Wars with UH with UM with May the

fourth and last year. Right, No, it's there's a new Solo Star Wars today. Solo. Isn't that the new Solo movie? I can't even And it's actually it's my brother's birthday and he's like a big girlfriend's I know it is and and and he's a big tech nerd, and and he loves Star Wars. It's just so happening. Born on May the fourth, it's so weird and uh and uh because he's you want to talk about technology, He got a new sixty five inch four K TV and he

loves it. He just can't stop talking about the only thing. I have a five K Mac. And it used to be YouTube showed four K videos on all browsers. Now they switched it only to their own browser, which is Chrome. And I was watching a video yesterday and granted only like you know, eight inches from the screen, and I

was watching in four K's just great. Yeah, well he's watching sports and he's upgraded his Netflix to four K and Amazon Prime and like you know, he literally has his house set up like he's he's uh Captain Kirk and he's running the Starship Enterprise. You know, where was I and somewhere and we're talking about no, no, But I was somewhere in the in the last week, maybe in a hotel where they had a TV so big that I said, this is almost as big as some

of the small theaters of the seventies. Well, but but that's what it feels like. Um, the hotel I'm in has two giant TVs, one in the living room area and one in the bedroom area. And when you think about the distance you are away from the TV in in in in comparison to being in a theater, it's it's probably almost as big. And I was at a hotel in Vancouver, was the first time I've ever experienced this for the junos, and they had Netflix on the TV and you just logged in your account. I've heard

about that. I know a lot of people travel with a firestick. Not to get in legal issues here, but I know a lot of people travel with a jail broken firestick, and you know, they watched their own things. The other thing you can do is we're getting to this technical stuff. I had a flatter rio a little while back, and now Netflix is downloadable, so I downloaded to my iPad like twenty hours worth of stuff, so you're never shut Now. They really upgraded the plane, especially

the one to Miami. We're really deep into this travel talk. And it used to be that was the old seven thirties seven and you know, with the old seats, and you know you couldn't see anything. But it's better now. Yeah. No, I mean, and all the airlines have their own thing, but but they're gonna take out all the visual entertainment because they think people. I mean, I would rather not travel with the iPad because I'm traveling with so much crapple already. And I got the laptop, I got the Kindle,

I got the bows, headphones, etcetera. I don't really want to add something to the pile. But by the same token, I tend not to watch the movies on the plane anyway. That's where I watched the movies that you're talking about that you'll never watch those that I call them plane movies. That's a good plane movie. Yeah, Like when you see the ad for do you read the review, Oh, that will be on a plane soon, and that's a plane movie. To me. Those are there's certain movies there it's like, oh, yeah,

I'll watch that on the plane. But when you're flying here, Cannon, if you're upfront, it's it's a nineteen inch screen. Wow. Like especially this flight Toronto l A. It's it's uh, it's life flats, it's it's a whole other thing. So I did that flight to Sydney. UM from Toronto. You flight Toronto Vancouver, Vancouver City. That's sixteen hours. You're up front, you're you're in your own pod, and there's like it's a nice way to let's not get too class oriented.

Not everybody listening to but listen, listen. Like I I paid for that ticket, and it was like I was treating myself. It was like I'm gonna do this, Like, um, if you're flying for sixteen hours and I'm a big guy, I'm not. And I was with a manager for dinner last Friday night, and he travels an unbelievable amount. If I mentioned the acts, you'd know who he is, and

I'd rather not do that. UH. But he got deep vein thrombosis, and he suddenly realized that's what Richard Nixon had, where you get a blood clot from flying so much and not moving. And he was supposed to fly to UH on a one hour flight. He said, I'm just gonna cancel. Went to the doctor said, if you've taken that flight, you would have died. Is that you would have been fine on the flight, but walking around thereafter it would have gone to your heart. At the blood

clot that would have been it. So now he has to. Now he's on blood thinners and he has to get up on the plane and walk every four hours. And I'm always thinking about that myself walking on the plane. Well that if you're flying big enough planes, his plenty room. Yeah, but usually you don't want to get to be if you're sleeping on the plane, you don't want to the guy I want to get up every four hours. Yeah,

well we're on a sixteen hour flight. You're sleeping like you would at home anyway, So you you do, you're sleeping. We'll pause here for a brief moment and come back with more of my conversation with Jake Cole. For those who attended the Music Media Summit in Santa Barbara, where a conversation with leaders in their industries. We have Jake Gold here this week, Canadian manager extraordinaire, to help put

all the conversations into context. But if you missed any of them from Troy Carter at Spotify or Ethiope at Motown or Steve at Amazon Music, listen to them all on the Bob Left Sets podcast and please join us next year in Santa Barbara. Now we're with Jake gold. Okay, let's go back Amazon. Amazon. Do you think it really

is the sleeping giant? That? Absolutely? I mean, just like people to this date don't know that you can sink tracks to your phone via Spotify, such that if you're out of cell range, you will have music as long as your device has juice. Uh. You know. I've discussed this with Steve Boom ahead of Amazon Music previously, but he went into further depth in Santa Barbara. How they do it, there's what's called metadata, metadata, or the identifying

factors about a record. A track, you know what label, who the artist is, and you know who wrote it. But they have developed much more or have entered much more metadata at Amazon. And what this allows you to do is ask your Echo to play playlists, which it then creates on the fly, which is much more granular. You can say, uh, Alexa, hopefully it's not Alexa. This room is going to go off. Alexa play rock tracks from nineteen. It can do that so on other services

where the playlists already has to exist. List here it is making the playlist on the fly. I like to I like when you when he said play sad songs, sad rock songs from x Y specific. I mean, uh, you know, there's this sounds complicated, but if you're in the ecosystem, it's not. If you have Amazon Prime, which over a hundred million people have, and you have an electa device, you can you have music built in. It's

just you can't call out the specific track. And if you pay three echo you can call out the specific track. And if you pay ten bucks a month, you can have an app, just like Apple Music and Spotify, and I have all those apps. And I noticed in the past week that Spotify went to voice control, but Amazon has electra control on their app on the phone. So I'm there with the engineer from Amazon Music and I say, he says, play happy fun music from the sixties, and

it did. So then I say, play the pressed songs from the eighties and and then of course you know, and you don't have to tell Morrissey. It was just a list. But the funny thing was two things. You're not say ALEXA to the app. You can just say it, and although you push the button and you can see the little circles, you know it's ready. But the other thing is it said, you know, I forget the exact lingo. What it does you know, Sorry, we don't have that yet,

and he said, say depressing. Then it came up and not depressed. They're still working, but they're doing all these things. I mean, I have not heard that Apple and the Amazon are doing. But just last night for this morning, I got this song stuck in my head and I called out to the Echo show to play it, and I was thinking, how I've listened to that song a lot recently. It's an old song called back where I've Come From by mac Mcinally there's a famous hit version

by Kenny Chesney. I even liked the live version even better. And so I've listened a lot on Disraeli, which is you know, CD quality, And so I'm listening on the Echo and a good enough for me even though I have all the high end equipment. It's just amazing. It's just the convenience of it, like you're already there and okay, so let's let's talk about because you and I have had this conversation a couple of times and and I'm I'm I'm not sure what my stances on it yet,

but i'd like to get your opinion on it. Is the only one that offers a free tier is Spotify, and Spotify is the predominant um streaming service right now and half of their half of their subscribers are free tier. So do you think, first of all, that's skewing the data data on on the most streams. So no, I mean at this point in time, they just released their numbers a couple of days ago and they added four

million subscribers since they paid or free paid. So the paid subscribers as we speak here is bubbling under eighty million that's paid, whereas Apple has forty million and Amazon doesn't tell you, so there's another fifty plus million there were free, but they break it down. No, but there I think as many free on Spotify as there is. There may be, but I thought I read like hundred

and sixty millions. I don't know. But the thing is they're the only ones that offer free and now they've they've they've done all these upgrades to the to the mobile app to allow you more access on the free tier than they did before. So is the movement because they've gone public to go to drive more revenue on the ad side, or they trying to get more conversion. I mean, they're obviously conversion. There's a lot of issues. They're starting with the ad side. Historically, the ad side

has not generated that much revenue. One might argue that they're not sophisticated enough in that area. Spotify, and they're making progress. Let's go back to the history of Spotify. When Spotify originally came to this country, even when it was in other countries, it was free on the desktop and you had to pay on the mobile. Correct. And I try to be fear in my assessments. I haven't written any songs. I'm not getting paid at all. I don't have the stock at any of these companies. But

that seemed a fair demarcation. And then Daniel X said it was going they were gonna have a free tier on the mobile device. That seemed to step over the line to me, but he showed me the statistics that it caused conversion. Okay, which is the ultimate goal. Going back to the beginning more, let me stay there. Unfortunately, have to go back in time. One cannot forget how big a problem piracy was before Spotify, and the free

tier essentially eradicates piracy. Is Michael Eisner one said ten percent of the people will never pay forget about that ten percent, But other people because I can venience, they won't do that. So this is pretty much eradicated piracy along with YouTube. And I believe the free tier Spotify would have had even greater penetration if it had launched

two years previous when it did in America. It didn't launch the two thousand eleven and wanted to launch earlier, but one of the major companies would not get on board, and it was in that window that YouTube became so popular for music. However, at this point in time, a lot of tracks have more streams on Spotify than they do on YouTube. But if you go now, so what people don't realize is the free tier on Spotify is hobbled.

You can't go in and pick one track. You might be able to pick an album, you might be able to pick a playlist. It's ultimately frustrating. So you have the ability, but it's also an incentive to pay well. This announcement recently about enhanced free tier stuff, I mean

on the mobile. I think at the conference Troy put it well, they want to personalize as such, the you feel welcome, so that when you turn on the app, the songs and the identity you have you want to hear this is deep into the Spotify ecosystem, which most people are aware of this point, but having brought a company,

I think it's driven by the echo nest. Every week they put out these personalized playlists, and they want the people who are non paying customers get a taste of that so they'll feel comfortab when they want to pay. You know, we can't say what the results are of this latest change because it's too new, but everything they have done has increased conversion. It's just like Steve Boom talking about Amazon. Once they get people using the product and they hit up against the wall, they then pay well.

But their first earnings came out Spotify, and everyone took a look at it and to stop drop ten that day, And I think partially because now everyone's seeing how this company's run and they're still losing losing money. Now revenues up, but they're still losing money. And you know, and you've written about this, that the more subscribers they get because of the payout, the more money they lose. And and I guess we even had to talk about it in

Santa Barbara. At what point does that turn? What's the line where they go from paid subscribers actually pay for the business to run or or or is are they getting so big that eventually they're gonna have way more leverage with the labels and the label they're gonna end up paying less because the labels are gonna need them more than ever. You've got a lot of things going on there. Let's start with Uh. The issue is that if you listen to Spotify, they are in a lost

position because they're investing so much in growth. That is a kin to Netflix, Okay, because you want to double down now to win the war at the end, and there's certainly a war and streaming although an Amazon did that too exactly and then but in the sales earnings call, Daniel lex said it was not a zero sum game. I don't really agree with him. I believe one force will one of the streaming services will be dominant. Your point about scale is a huge one. The more people subscribe,

the more costs go up. That is why I believe that Spotify is best as part of another company. Who might that company be? Amazon does not have a long history of buying other companies. Apple should have bought Spotify long ago. The only one who can really afford it is Google, and Google has had one after another non starting streaming services. They're just starting a new one that they will always talk about the telcost with telcos have

hit a wall. I don't really see that now. The other thing they have said in the investor Day and Troy did say in Santa Barbara, okay, if you follow this, uh, when Spotify launch, essentially seventy page really sixty nine points something of revenues went to rights soldiers in renegotiations over the last two years, most of them were completed about a year ago. UM, they have lowered the percentage they pay to the labels. They labels are agreeing to that

because they want Spotify to succeed. As we've seen in the last two years. At this point, the majority of revenue comes from streaming services. So if you hurt your number one distributor in trouble now, Spotify will also say they will gain advantage by being such a large distributor. Just like anybody, whether it be Best Buyer, Amazon or Walmart, you can drive down costs because of your volume. But baked into all the statements is they put it in English.

They don't necessarily say in English. I don't mean not in Swedish, but in a comprehensible fashion. They are anticipate painting there will be a growth of independent unaffiliated acts. Those acts get all of the revenue. So if you sign a deal with a major label of the sixty odd percent, you might be getting ten, which is on a dollar six cents. So are you well, let me let me just fens one second. Whereas if you're an

independent act, you're essentially getting all sixty. You know, you have to pay a small fee of tune Core CD baby to get up there an aggregator, right, but they want, they expect and they want to drive more of that business and pay them less. They haven't made it a put on an exact number. Whereas right now they're paying sixty percent to the independent act. They'd like to pay less of that, increasing their margin, and they are thinking there's going to be more chance the rapper type acts.

I don't disagree. I think that's that's already starting to happen. You're seeing that all the time. There's tons of people like me who are working with with young bands who don't want to do a deal or don't think the deal is to right time because there's no leverage and we're able to get our stuff out there and hiring. But if they're paying you sixty five now and they start paying you sixty, which is huge on their end, I don't think you're gonna be freaking out. Probably not.

But as I say, so, that's all the margin they have to deal with. As I say, five percent on their end is gigantius right right now. And I agree, But I also think that that um so, maybe there's an argument that says we should all be investing in the CD babies and the aggregators because you know, if the independence is moving in that direction. I mean, there's a whole bunch of someone I know sent out an email to a list of other managers um and said

I'm about to do something digital. Who's who's your best digital distributor? And every single one of us on the list, it was ten of us responded and we all named a different company. Yeah, that's also a business doesn't scale that well. I mean, it's just distribution and it's a small piece. And say, but you know, don't if those

people don't know. With aggregators, they charge at one time fee or an the annual fee as opposed to the number of times there are some that charge of Some of those offer more services though, so they offer they charge a percentage, and then maybe they'll offer some marketing or whatever. But most of them, you're right, it's a flat fee and it's an easy access and they get

it up fast. You used to Ingestion used to take forever, you know, when you were with the label, it was like, oh, we need all the metadata three months in advance, and blah blah blah blah blah. Now you go on to c D Baby or tune Car and it's like in two weeks, less than two weeks, I've had stuff up in five days. Well, I had this experience last week. I was writing about an album, Open Skies, which came out r c A, was not on any streaming service.

You know. Two days later, somebody emails me it's on Apple Music. You know. It just just blew my mind. And then I heard from the label they added it just that fast. Well, it's it's interesting you say that, because I was looking for a record the other day on Spotify and on Deezer and it wasn't on either of them. What record was it? Mad Man Across the Water? I could not find it on Spotify, and there it

was on Apple Music. Unfortunately, when you can't find something, especially on Spotify, the search is not fantastic, and maybe that was you have to search in a different way. I've had this happen again and again. I have this happen with open Skies on Apple. Somebody send me the link. I click the link. I could listen on Apple, okay, but if I searched on Apple, it wasn't there. Well, I searched on Spotify and and every other out in John record was there. And in fact, they had the

track Madman Across the Water on another record. Well, I might say, without pulling my Modify, without pull him up my device. Right now, I think that's probably a search issue. I run into that all the time. Where did I search on a track and I don't get it? Searching on the band's name, I don't get it. And then I put the two together. It's is. It's better than it used to be, but it ain't perfect. But it was right there on Apple Music. It was. It was

a weird to Apple Music. The other thing that they're doing is they've just rolled out in beta the Apple Music for Artists, which is what Spotify has had for a while. That is a data program just just for the audience is not that sophisticated. So so one of the bigger complaints that the business side had, the artists and the labels, was that Spotify was wonderful in supplying

us with back end data. And it was the agents love that you could see where your spins, where you could look at the different markets city by city, country by country, You could look in the twenty four hour basis, a seven day basis, a twenty eight day basis, and a since inception basis, and you could get all this

information from them. Apple gave you no information. And I think one of the reasons that the labels were really, you know, gearing towards Spotify so much, is because they were providing back marketing data that that everyone could use. Apples decided um, and I think I saw it at

Pole Star. In fact, was the last time I was here where Apples said they were going to roll it out in April, and now they were going it out in data for artists to be able to access their data, and the labels are going to be able to access the data, which Apple never gave us before ever. On sales on CD sales or downloads of of albums and

we never got that information. They would report it to sound scan and you could sort of extrapulate it at a sound scan, but you couldn't get that granular, granular data that Spotify has, and I think they're trying. They're basically saying, Okay, if we're gonna play this game, the streaming game, and work with our partners, meaning the people that are supplying us the content, we're gonna have to uh start supplying the data and uh we'll see. I mean, I it's funny because they gave me, uh for for

my tune two acts. They gave me uh log in, and I logged in and looked at everything and nothing came up. It was like page So it's still in data and it'll probably they're probably working all the bugs out, but when that data starts to come through, it'll be interesting. On another note, Um, there was a bit of discussion about it. I forget who you were talking to. Wasn't Boom. You were talking to Boom about this, Steve Boom about

how different genres are doing different services. That's an interesting thing. The manager of Garth Brooks was at the conference, and I know him, and I've previously discussed you know why is in Garth brook On Garth Brooks on other streaming services and they have an overall deal with the Amazon which benefits Garth and Garth has been on the road and uh, but they alerted me to the number of streams they were getting. And then it begs the question

what is the audience for these varying services? Once again, there's a free if you have Prime, there's essentially a free tier for Amazon, so certainly prior to Apple Music's getting the king for Prime. Yeah, but it's it doesn't feel, you know, the old cliche, doesn't feel like you're pick okay, And is Spotify for at one point early adopters in hardcore music fans and as Steve mentioned, you know all as we sit here, he didn't say that hip hop was strong there, but a lot of other genres are

much stronger on Amazon. That's an interesting question. Is it a self selecting slice of the populace? It is a is it a better representation of the populace. I don't really know, but I do know we are going to an era where all your music will be voice controlled and they are the leaders on this now The interesting thing is they do not have a closed door policy like Apple. If you have an Echo, you can make

Spotify the default service. It doesn't have to be Amazon Music, okay, And they allow Sonos to bake in the Alexa chip into their one product. I mean that's the son has a speaker there, they have they have a speaker right, and Apples coming out with their speaker Apple speakers here, but it does not work with any other music format

other than Apple Music. Now. Uh so nos wants to be flatform independent, and they will also get to the point where they'll speak with Apple Music, but the services don't. I mean, it ultimately comes down to who's got the most stuff. We get an email every Friday if you have an Alexa talking about all the new things that you can say or ask ask Alexa. Whereas I don't use Syria on my phone. Do you use Siri? I have by have friends that use it when you when

they're driving. Right, it's just too inaccurate. I mean, I don't want to retype every email. And everyone who's got a home pod says the same thing. There's been a lot of reviews of the home Pod. The initial reviews of the home pod said it was the best device. Then there were issues of weather in terms of audio quality. Then there were issues of what was the test set up, and a lot of people read other tests where they said the Sons product, which is significantly cheaper, UH, sounded better.

And I don't think that, you know, none of these devices sound so good. It's not like a BMW Zeppelin or anything. No one's gonna pay that price. I think Apple has missed the market here. I always go back to the UH, the example of the nineties when a well was burgeoning. Microsoft said they were gonna have a new product call the MSN network, and everyone said, oh, it's gonna come kill a O L didn't at all.

So Apple where it's been late to the market, certainly with products that are not significantly better, also at a higher price, they're nonstarters. Well, I don't think you know, you talked about who would buy Spotify. I don't think Apple will ever will because because I don't think, I don't think, and I trust certainly in Europel. I also think that you know, in light of you know how

they operate. You know, Spotify operates where everyone has can can access Spotify, So nos controller, all of those other things. If Apple gets to the point where they buy Spotify and try and mold you know, blend it in with and folded into Apple Music, They're gonna have subscribers. But because the way they operate, where it's like, you know, everything has to be through Apple, it would hurt them, I think. I don't think they get the benefit of

it the same way. I'm not exactly sure where you're going, But at this point in time, if a pre existing service were to buy Spotify, it would be less for technology and more for the raw subscribers. Would it would be strictly for the subscribers, you know. Um, but let's go back to Santa Barbara for a second. Um do you think that, um that Real Networks? I mean I use Neil Real Networks sometimes because I'm have a PC, a desktop PC, but everything else I have as Apple. Um.

I don't know where that's going. Like, what what is the for those people who have not listened to Rob Glazer's podcast? Uh, you know, yes, he admits in the late nineties, Uh, real Player was the default player on audio and video for your desktop computer. They were ultimately undercut by Microsoft and Apple and ultimately Adobe et cetera now and we're going to a new generation. But he did say they have a very strong presence in China

and they do have other products. Okay, So to sit here and evaluate the value and the road map of real networks, I don't think I'm qualified without having Robb here to literally say every product, which I knew you were gonna say, which is why I'm gonna let's talk about China. Okay. I knew you were gonna talk. I knew you were going to mention and I actually sent you an email today about the biggest app being downloaded off the app store form, which is a music driven

app called TikTok is that what it's called. And that's China, and and it's it's got more downloads off the App Store than any other app. And it's a music based app,

music and video based app. And that's the company that owns that is the same company that bought Musically And so are we all just pretending right now that they're all gonna be this dominant, But you know this one's gonna be dominant in Amazon is gonna be dominant, and then someone from China is just gonna come in and just just gonna be this tidal wave, excuse the pun, that's gonna just take it all over at some point.

This is a much larger issue. You know, you have the benefit of living in Canada, but we have turmoil in the United States. And I was watching Bill Maher show on HBO last night and they were discussing the fact that Germany is the most respect acted country in the world right now. We can argue about that, but what do we know about China. China makes all our products. If you've got an Apple, aptops made in China, maybe made in Taiwan. Is most of the clothes you're wearing.

And they have a vast population. And if you look at what's going on and the days of dominance in the United States seem to be in the rear view mirror, okay, and we don't attack the underlying problems. Yes, we have innovation in Silicon Valley and it's about intellectual property. By the same token, we have visa issues where we don't allow foreign engineers to come here and live such that

India is becoming a hotbed of technology. Uh, innovation. This is dangerous stuff to talk about in America, especially since the culture changed. Are you saying we can't talk about this today. No no, no, no no, we can definitely talk No. Nine with the Iranian says bom bomb I ran. Now it's like the sixties, but it's flipped. Are you with us or you against us? So we have a great divide in America economically and people wanting to jet back to a past that doesn't exist, whereas China is

all about pushing the envelope of the future. So the question is is they're gonna be a music service coming in there is? I mean this did come up. John Boil did bring this up. But if you've been following ten Cent, which is the biggest music service, ten percent of off Spotify, they that is on the verge of going public and evaluation approximately the same as Spotify. That is something to watch for. That is not a short

term thing. It's like Ali Baba versus Amazon. Okay, Ali Baba when public, Ali Baba is much vaster than Amazon, although Amazon makes a very significant proportion of their profits from their web services division, which is not something they're selling to the you know, not something the average cloud stories and uh, this is going to play out. I mean you have to ask Americans Okay, are you willing

to pay more for a flat screen? Okay, so at this point in time, because if terrorists they're talking ten or fifteen dollars to fIF no hanging here, hanging fifty dollars more for American I'm just talking in general the American mentality, which then impacts Spotify to the point being, are we going to play for the future. It is a globally economy, and therefore if we pull back from

a global economy, it's only going to hurt us. One of the benefits of Spotify and one of the reasons why they've been in a negative position all these years, and Daniel like has told me, is they're so busy investing around the world at this point in time. China is still dealing with piracy. Okay, for a long time. China is the new performance market. We're all gonna go

to China. Then the government seemed to crack down on what could be sung and needing playlists in advance, and people kind of backed off from that, just like investment from China. Okay, they were they were gonna be sales of movie theaters. Now China said no. So China maybe a self contained market with a vast population. But whether ten cents or Ali Baba expand to the rest of the world, I'm not sure that's going to happen. Well, and remember no I said it earlier while you were talking.

But you know, Spotify is a Swedish company. It's not an American company. So you want to talk about um, you know, American companies and and you know, you know what, what's happening in America that's not an American company. And then wait a second. It was in a lot of other markets before it came into the United Eights. Like I was dealing with Spotify in the UK and in Europe with clients before it was even launched in the United stuff. But they listed in on the stock market

in New York. So yes, there's still the majority of technological innovation in the United States, but it's not the only place, right So back to Glacier. Maybe he knows something we don't know. Maybe there's something going on where but China. You know, this is like you talked to certain acts. It is not glamorous to go to a lot of these countries, but it pays huge economic dividends. Yeah, I had a client. I had a client go to China. He was fortunate because they asked for lyrics and he did.

He did instrumental music, so he had no issues with lyrics. Um. And he had a great time and he said the audiences were amazing, like amazing um. And you know, but you know, forgetting China, which is a market onto itself, just going to Europe, Okay, it's costly South America and you have to go multiple times to establish a beach chat it you can say it's costly, Okay. The difference between you know, okay, let's look at geography. You live in New York or Toronto where I live on the

East Coast. You know, it's takes almost as long to fly to l A as it does to London. Yes, okay, so once you're there, then touring through Europe, you can go to a lot of countries the same as you can tour America. And so the the initial cost is the flight, but after that the concert. You know, it's it's not cheaper, it's I wouldn't say it's cheaper, but you're also earning euros as opposed to you know, you

you're more familiar with this. I certainly know talking to major acts that they talk about the cost relative to income that you can take home is less, but that's also there's a human cost. The act actually has to go there, Okay, and especially when you're an established act in America, we're already too busy with your recording, live dates, etcetera. To go develop these markets where you're essentially nobody is.

Although now because of these worldwide services you can have a greater chance, but you're really building from a small base. A lot of them don't want to do it well, but you're always building from a small base. And the fact is is what happens is is a lot of them don't want to do it because they're fucking lazy.

And here's what happens is they forgot that if you were a band from upstate New York, you worked Rochester and Buffalo and Albany and in those places, and then you gradually spread your base out and then you were a Northeast band, and then you were a Northeast and a Southeast band, and then you moved into the Midwest, and gradually you work your way across the country. And if you did it right, it took you a certain amount of time to get there. It's no different than

the manager. We're not sitting here the act. You have to convince the act. I mean, I I know, And let me tell you something. I had plenty of acts that said they'd rather be in Brussels then in cans A city. And anybody who's gone to Europe and spend time in some of the most beautiful places in the world and culture and people and how how people, how people love music there and it's way different than sort

of this. It's it's not necessarily the glam thing. But when you go to those places and you experience that kind of life, at some point you say, well, I'd much rather build my audience in Europe than than go through certain parts of Well you're not. You're although you're a dual passport holder holder, you're living in Toronto with

a much more worldwide view. You're listening to my conversation with Jake Gold, manager The Tragically Him and former judge on Canadian Idol, recorded live in the tune in studios in Venice, California. I hope you're enjoying listening to this episode of the Bob Left Sets podcast. If you want to hear sound bites, you check out videos and photos of our guests go to at tune in on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Now more of Jake Gold as we discussed

the music industry today on the Bob Left Sets podcast. Okay, before we get to the end, any more things you want to bring up about Santa Barbara? Well, um, did you did you feel that you got to ask all the questions that you wanted to evolved a lot of these people. These interviews were very lengthy, but I still had questions, not because I was afraid to ask him, but just because you can't ask everybody everything. It's very important.

Give me give me a question for each of them that you oh god, I mean, I don't want to go through each of them, but give me give me a couple that you felt. I mean, I really don't, just because I don't want to tax my brain at this particular point, because I don't think the information will be that relevant when you get down deep into the rabbit hole. The most of the questions I wanted to ask these people were more technical questions. I don't mean

literally technology, but they're enterprises. How do things work? They talk and you get stimulated and go, okay, well, if I'm in this situation, what about this and one of the number as opposed to the essence. I believe I got to the essence of all these people. I think you got to the essence of all the people. I'll tell you what I missed. Okay, what I missed is um and less less the Steve and Rob, but more Daniel,

Ethiopia and Troy is the now. It's like, you know, Ethiopia, if you're gonna launch an act today, what's your what do you do? How do you roll it out? What do you do? Saying with Daniel, what are you looking for? He touched on it here and there what we try to build with these players, But there wasn't any kind of if I'm gonna launch an act today, these are the steps we take. These are the people on the team that I think are the most important. UM questions

like how important is pressed these days? Is it that important? Are the blogs more important than the press? Are blogs? You know? I read a piece the other day that said, you know, blogs are less important than ever because the playlists are the new blogs. Um, those are the kind of things I think all those are excellent questions. I wanted I wanted to learn those kinds of things and then when it came time to ask the questions, and you know, I asked a question to every single one

of them because I'm definitely not shy um uh. When I was asking those questions, there was I could have sat there and asked them five more questions, um. But nobody asked those questions in the room. Nobody asked like, well, how are you going to roll an act out today? When I asked Ethiopia about would you rather have an act like um, a logic that's already something happening, or a chance to rapper then starting from scratch, she didn't

really give me a good answer. I think she said, well, it would be good to have both like it was. That also usually depends on economics. You know, sometimes the acts already established, they want deals. But on the side, when I was talking to Daniel about a couple of acts out there that we're indie that we're now being trying to be signed, he mentioned me, he goes, now there's bidding wars for those acts, and he goes and some of them have gone up to like six and

eight and ten million and fifteen million dollar deals. Now he said, the bidding wars are back in again because of the ability for artists to do it on their own now, which is a really interesting dynamic, very much so. But the other thing about it is it is harder to break an act than ever. So Daniel touched upon

this in his presentation. We've discussed it previously. If the act delivers a record without a hit, and I don't mean a hit that's necessarily something's gonna run up the top forty chart, but something that's reacting in the marketplace. If they don't give him something to work with, he sends them back to the studio, and if it gets to the point where the act is frustrated, he says, you can walk. I'll release you because it's so much effort on behalf of my team that I cannot work

with something that won't make it right. So everyone needs needs that one track, that um is a traveler that travels the world on their behalf without them and that. But it hasn't that always been the case, hasn't it been? Yeah, that band is one hit away from being huge, wasn't That wasn't the used to in the eighties and the nineties, in the seventies, you know, But the problem is before

they had that one track. They were somewhere now before that one track, they're kind of nowhere, yes and no, yes and no. I I think nowhere is a is a relative term. You know, you live in Canada. There's a lot of benefits of Canada. Less population makes it easier to spread than the thing you have to We have a huge country. No I'm talking about in terms of mind share. You have government help in the radio

and production whatever. That gives a leg of some size up, whereas in the country of three hundred million in America, we have none of that government help. Radio is harder than ever to get on. It is very hard to get started. It's really hard to get on the radio, and Canada these days as hard as anything. And they're all looking to see how you're doing on the streaming services before they take a shot. So now it's like

like they're set. You've said it many times where their second Now they're looking at the streaming services because that's their new call out research. They don't need to do call a research anymore, you know, And Chris Ruth said this in the Logic podcast. You know, the Logic was on the Grammy Awards and there was no bounce on streaming services, the audiences on streaming, and it would behoove radio to get closer in time. That's one of the things that's killing it. Who wants to listen to four

month old music? I don't think. But that's the other thing. I don't think there would be a bounce on the streaming services after um because most of the people have already heard the songs that used to be. If you play the Grammys, you got a big thing. You've got a sales bounce. But streaming is not the same. And that's a stream is it's a different thing because the stuffs available. So any other topics we haven't covered, I see,

I think we're pretty good. I mean, anything you want to talk about that happened there that you felt there was the social aspect that had nothing to do with the speakers, which is, you know, in a world where we can communicate so easily on our devices, people underestimate

face to face contact. And one thing I knew describe interviewing these people, a couple of whom I'd only met briefly, and uh that you have a preconception who people are and then you start talking to they're really somebody different. And how many, and I think all of them though was a pleasant surprise. Everybody certainly was was good some

of them. You know, as I as I say, you know Rob Glazer, you talked to him for about a minute and a half to say, this is a really smart guy person and you don't talk to Ethiopia along to be in transpire personality. One of the things she said, if you know, we talked about the me too moment shows if a guy you know starts uh pushing the hope, she checks them. And I had to say this, she

knows how to be sass. It was funny when she was talking about that time where they're in the hotel room and she started taking all the knives and putting them underneath the pillows just in case, like she's she's a listening to. Really impressive. Thirty eight years old, already been the president of Motown for four years. Um so at thirty four years old being the president of Motown Records, I always wonder where something like that is going now.

She very much comes from the creative side. While she was a publisher for a long time, write Jody Gerson came from the creative side. She's now ahead of Universal Music publishing, but you you wonder what the next role is for Ethiopia. You know, they're famous people going back in history. John kalodn Are one of the most famous A and R people, never wanted to be a president. One of his contemporaries, Gary Gersh now works at a G in the promotion game, but he wanted to be president.

Became president of Capital Records. So I got into a little bit that with the Ethiopia we didn't really uh plummet too great depths. But you know, what is the upward mobility? Begging the question less about Ethiopia than women in general in that what is the upward mobility of the path for women in the music business which has traditionally been a male dominated business with rough edges. Well, we touched on that the last time, and I don't I don't know if we need to go there again.

Um not that I don't want to go there. I just think we already kind of touched on that. And I think, you know, we know that there's big movements in Canada. There's these fifty fifty movements where it's like all boards across across all the different organizations in Canada are being pushed to have women. It is artificial on the surface. But if you go to America to title nine, which is about many things, but primarily in the eye of the public, about sports teams in college. Okay, we

have professional women's hockey, we have professional women's basketball. We pay attention all things because the change of the law. So even though people might say, oh, let it be organic, sometimes you need the pressure of the law. You yeah, you need to push well. Um, And remember Bi Billy jen King started in tennis that movie Battle of This

of the Sexes. Regardless of the the whole idea of that movie, which was her and Bobby Riggs and that crazy exhibition, the thing about that movie was how she created a w t A and took on That shows the power of the individual. And we see that especially in the arts, but also with Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Bezos, etcetera.

And I'm waiting for that, not only business in business, in music business, but artistically, I'm waiting for someone who's gonna go against the grain, gonna say no as opposed to yes the sponsorship, gonna stand up for their identity, create music that doesn't sound like everybody to say Gaga did that kind of I would say Gaga broke electronics ounds on top forty, but that's already a different era. Okay.

So the question becomes, especially now streaming is amped up the importance and popularity of hip hop, what is the new sound? What will it sound like and how will it infiltrate? The other thing which people don't realize with the barrier to entry music so low that the quality has to be increased. So if you are a great lyricist and you're a great player and a bad singer, things are gonna be really tough for you right now. You're gonna have to find some of those things. Well.

The barrier to you know, the bearer to success used to be lower. People don't like to hear this. You know, I can't play in the NBA. I'm not tall enough. I accept that. Used to be if you couldn't sing, you had to accept you wouldn't be a singer in the music business. Plenty of plenty of people out there that I wouldn't call them singers that do fairly well well. Most of them, though, broke in a different era. I mean today, I mean this is you know, dicey territory. Okay.

One but Bob Dylan, he did make it originally as a writer, but it'd be very hard for him to make it as a singer today. The breakthrough was when they started to play his records on Top forty radio, which was years after he started. Leonard Cohen wins Male Vocalist of the Year at the Juno Awards and says, only in Canada could I win Male Vocalist of the Year. And that kind of says it all. One more thing I want to talk to you about, which was how

did you feel? Because I know you like being the spotlight, but you really are reluctant person in the spotlight. About those guys that came from Australia and Sweden and that because they're big time readers and they knew they'd have a chance to actually meet you, they flew thousands of miles to come and have a chance to be one of the guy the guy from Sweden was complained to me that he's written to you so many times, You've never used any of his stuff in mail bag, and

he thought, forget it. I'm just gonna show up and I'm gonna talk. And he was the guy that kept asking the question, Peter really nice guy, and I thought it was really funny that these guys had flown in from all kinds of places just to be able to sit there and say they met you and talk to you. How did that make you feel? Well, First, that's the power of the internet. Second, I'm still metabolizing it. I really have a hard time finding a place because my

parents always told me I was a ship head. So it's hard to be a ship head and have these people do this spend time, money, devotion. I I'm still trying to figure out how to you know, accept it. Well, remember we went around the room and everyone got to say who they were and where they're from, and how many of them said I'm just a big, big fan of Bob's a big reader, and I thought I needed to be here. Well, the other thing about it is the nature of what you're going to be the next

Coachella won't matter who the guests are. I don't like that. It doesn't have a good ray like anythink. I think there'll be a better one. But when you think about like Glastonbury and Coachell and the festival, I mean, obviously we know Coachella took over, the didn't take over, but took their lead from Glastonbury, where you know, you could go on sale without the acts and it would sell

out because of the event. You know, we hope, you hope to get the Music Media Summit to that point and it won't matter who the who the speakers are as long as you're they're doing the d I certainly hope that. I mean, one of the luxuries we have at this point in time is the group is not so large that we all can't connect. But this is kind of like my newsletter. I continue to march in

my own direction, even though it's against the grain. I announced the conference, I heard from all the usual suspects. Let me run a panel, and I said, there, you can come, but there are no panels. Okay, I'm interviewing. In addition, I'm interviewing differently from everybody else. I mean, Barbara Walters was classically she had limited time for him. She was classically gotcha, Okay. Other people posit questions based

on their research. My goal is a to get the person's story, because I believe unless you know where someone is coming from, you don't really know who they are. And to make them feel comfortable enough that they'll tell stories. This is you know, this is not why I do it, but it's something I've noticed. They'll tell stories that they haven't told previously. It's like, um, Troy Carter saying he was briefly unwelfare the one check and then he realized,

I can't do this. This is insane. And those are the things you want as opposed to the usual stuff. I mean, I'm reading the newspaper today and it's all about hype. Oh, the movies coming out, so we'll have a story on the person who acted or made them. Who gives a funk and they're and they're also media trained up the ying yang and then that's all. That's a whole other thing. So I'm with you ad there. I mean, I thought that the stuff you got out of Troy was great. The stuff you got out of

Ethiopia was great. I think you got their stories and I think that's why one of the one of my favorite interviews you ever did was an Aspen when you interviewed Rapino. And I've known Michael Rapino since like I've known him a long long time and I've spent time with him and talked to him. But there was stuff that I found out that day that I did not know about the guy. Well, you know, I got an email at the Chef Gordon Post podcast. Same thing. People

who work with Sheep said, I never knew that. But as I say, with Rapino, everything is so confrontational. They expect you to go there. What do you know in these conferences, these public company CEOs, they're not going to make news. They literally can't because of all these filings, etcetera, etcetera. So you can't focus on that. So most of these conferences, the foremost thing is how can we make money? I mean, in terms of music conferences outside of America, a lot

of them supported by the government. This is something different, you know, the way you're talking, I would certainly like to blow it up bigger. But what I liked about it is, as I say, every day I get email from people. Every day I turn on my computer, I find out I'm God and I'm a ship heead okay, But going to Santa better to be loved and hated than ignored. We know that true. But we're going to Santa Barbara. I'm anxious. I'm in front of the group,

I'm interviewing people. I don't get a grade after I'm and I can see in today's era, you're talking, people are on their devices, etcetera. You're worried whether you're getting people's attention. So the last night, when everybody was ultra positive and loving, that shocked me. It really did shock me. And it made me realize that a vast majority of the people who emailed it on the ship head really has nothing to do with me and everything to do with them. But that's always been the case, I know,

but it's when it's personalized it is difficult. I mean, I have a guy who emails but that, but that's the Internet in general. I mean, you go on Twitter, you see what Twitter, but you know that this that same person that says you're a ship head wouldn't sit across the desk like we're sitting right here and say you're a ship head. I agree. But if you are insecure, and most people in this world who were playing heavily in terms of visible your age, you're still feeling that

way like you haven't. You haven't is not thick enough. But my my skin is thicker than anybody I know in the music business. I can't speak to acts, so the acts are traditionally thin skin. But as you continue to I remember at you know, in the nineties, I would go into the psychiatrist and talk about the bizarre things that happened online. People would have no idea what I'm talking about. Okay, Now, even Jimmy Kimmel does mean tweets. Okay, but there's still stuff at the end of the envelope.

And there is stuff, you know, I don't want to say that it's politically incorrect, but you know that you're gonna get pushed back on just from writing. You know, when when you're watching Bill Maher, he immirely shuts the

audience stuff. There was some moments in in Anna Barber that I think made a few people uncomfortable, right, And as I say, and it's funny, you know what I'm talking And one of those moments, I said, if we were here across the table, I am I'm not I'm probing to open someone up so they might tell you something you don't know. I'm not looking for an answer

that I can be trumpeting on TMZ. It's okay, but if you as you know, to give these specific example, I had a car, this car I still have this relatively new and I was talking to a friend in the car and I pulled a U turn and it hits some branches. Little did I know. I thought it was just a bush, but it was a very They chopped the bush down so that the branches were very stiff, and it scratched my car. Now, let's be care if you get a big clear, if you get a big den,

your car gonna get it. Appeared in this case there were a ton of scratches, but they didn't all go through the paint. I was upset b I went to get an estimate twelve dollars. I wasn't gonna get it by that stuff they sell on TV in Okay. I wasn't gonna pay twelve. So I once again, I go to the therapist and I'm upset about this, and he goes, if you don't go up to the edge, up to the line, you'll have no idea where it is. Sometimes

you go over. But if you're so anxious that you're not going to go to the line, you're not gonna live your life fully. So that's a great lesson. And my car was scratched. But the same thing when you talk to people, if you don't ask some probing questions, you won't find the good stuff the new guy. And let me ask you a question about the car being scratched. Why does it matter? Do you think people are gonna look at your car and say, oh, Bob left Sets

drives a scratched car, Like, does anybody really give? I don't think I ever drove a car that I didn't scratch. Believe me. It has nothing to do with a third party opinion. That's not it. This is a whole another podcast in order to explain it. It has to do with my identity and O C D and you know, and other things. And as I say that that that's very interesting stuff to get into. But and it's not that I'm gonna louctant. We'd have to do at least

another twenty minutes. Okay, well then I think we're almost done here. I think, you know, I think we could go on forever. It's been very productive for those people listening. I think you've gotten the full story. But we're off the high of a three day conference in Santa Barbara, reviewing the speakers in the experience. I have to thank Jake who came in for the conference and came in to do this podcast. To an update to do an update. Until next time you're listening to the Bob Left Sets podcast.

Thank you Jake, Thank you Bob, the Bob Left Sets Bob Cast. There you have it. That wraps up this week's episode of the Bob Left Sets podcast, recorded live at the tune In Studios in Venice, California. I hope you liked this conversation with Jake Gold. As always, I'm interested in your feedback, positive or negative. You can reach me at Bob at left sense dot com. Until next time, I'm Bob. Left Sense can think of and me reason, and I don't know me exactly