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DEF JAM CEO PAUL ROSENBERG STEPPED DOWN TO LAUNCH UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP JOINT VENTURE GOLIATH RECORDS. MAZZY STAR CO-FOUNDER/GUITARIST DAVID ROBACK DIED AT 61.Are You Experienced?
It’s easier than ever for artists to become big online. But things can get complicated
for the “friendagers” trying to navigate a daunting industry — without a rulebook
BY STEVE KNOPPERI
N MARCH 2018, THE
Indiana-based singer Omar
Apollo got his first national
break: an opening slot for
the British soul band Jungle on its
Northwest tour. There was just one
problem. No one on Apollo’s team was
old enough to rent a vehicle. Apollo’s
manager was a 20-year-old former
Atlantic Records intern named Dylan
Shanks, whom Apollo had met on
Twitter. “I was like, ‘Oh, my God, this
is amazing!’ ” recalls Shanks. “But then
it was like, ‘How do we do this?’ ”
Shanks’ story might sound familiar
to the staggering number of young and
inexperienced artist managers now
winging it through the music business
as they run the affairs of their suddenly
trending clients. Careers take less time
than ever to go from SoundCloud viral-
ity to the stage, where tours need to be
booked, backing musicians need to be
hired and, sometimes, visas and work
permits need to be secured. That’s
where it gets more complicated.
“When an artist gets their cousin
or the guy down the street or one
of their boys to manage them, they
do it because they trust their guy,”
says Wendy Day, a consultant who
once managed the rappers Twista,
C-Murder and David Banner. “But the
person doesn’t understand the music
industry, they don’t understand how
or when the artist gets paid, and it
becomes a clusterfuck.”
This can be a bigger issue for youngrappers, says Day, since they tend to
build internet buzz faster. Managers
looking at online popularity often book
clients into 5,000-capacity venues —
skipping the crucial 2,500-capacity
rooms that can pay $5,000 to $25,
a show. “Those small venues,” says
Day, “are where the artists cut their
teeth and hone their skills.”
Of course, pop music manage-
ment has always been something of
a fake-it-until-you-make-it business:
Irving Azoff was in his early 20s
when he took on REO Speedwagon as
his first client in the late 1960s, while
Pat Corcoran was still in college
when he began managing his friend
Chance the Rapper. Now, however,
there are only so many experiencedmanagement executives to pass on
their knowledge, since college grads
during the post-Napster downturn
and the 2008 recession eschewed the
music business. Even now, as stream-
ing fuels double-digit growth, retain-
ing executive talent remains an issue.
And as the industry rebuilds, today’s
rising class of self-taught managers
will have an outsize role in shaping
the future of their industry.
Label executives are getting frustrat-
ed because they must rely on today’s
less experienced managers to execute
their marketing plans. One label ex-
ecutive calls them “uninformed” and
“untrained” for setting up gratuitous
DJ gigs to bring in cash at the end of
grueling tours, or failing to schedule anILLUSTRATION BY RYAN SNOOK FEBRUARY 29, 2020 • WWW.BILLBOARD.COM 1 5