Turning Forgotten Music Into Frontier-Market Cultural IP with Vik Sohonie

0:01John Lee Dumas:Boom, shake the room, Fire Nation, JLD here, and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire, brought to you by High Level, the all-in-one sales and marketing platform. Today, we'll be breaking down, turning forgotten music into frontier market cultural IP. And to drop these value bombs, I brought Vik Sohonie into EO Fire Studios. Vik is the two-time Grammy-nominated founder of Austin Auto Records, uncovering rare music and building frontier market cultural IP from Africa, Asia, and beyond for global audiences and investors. And today we talk about going from passion project to Grammy recognition, the future of music, unlocking cultural IP, going beyond content, and oh so much more.

0:38John Lee Dumas:And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Vic and our sponsors. Fire Nation, meet Hotworks, the number one boutique fitness franchise with 850 plus locations. They pioneered virtual workouts inside infrared saunas. With recurring membership revenue, a low labor, high tech model, and a proven franchise system, entrepreneurs gain a scalable business built for growth. Visit hotworks.net slash franchising to learn more. If you are building a real business, you need real infrastructure. High Level gives you website hosting, funnels, email marketing, automation, calendar booking, payments, and course hosting all on one platform, plus award-winning 24-7 support.

1:15John Lee Dumas:Get a 30-day free trial and my full bonus stack that includes a 15-minute private call with me and much more at highlevelfire.com, highlevelfire.com. Vic, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. How's it going, everyone? Thanks for having me, John. Something people disagree with about success. I don't know if people would disagree with this, but they probably don't consider it very often. I would say, in my own experience over the last decade, I would say the key to longevity and success is being more of a connoisseur and not an addict.

1:54I think what's preached today a lot about hustle culture and grinding, you got to sacrifice, you got to work hard. There's no doubt about that. But I think a lot of the behaviors and work methods that we tend to use, it becomes an addiction at some point. And all addictions lead down the same road. I mean, that's not to say that there's plenty of successful people that have addictions and succeed very, very well. but those addictions catch up to you. Whereas a connoisseur is, I think, someone who's a little more measured and extremely discerning. Someone who waits and evolves their tastes and is patient and is very discerning about who they work with, how they work.

2:31When it comes to recording music or producing music, you have to be very discerning about so many elements when it comes to that production. If you're making toothbrushes, you've got to be very discerning about your bristles. I mean, being extremely discerning, being a connoisseur will get you, you know, it might not get you there as fast, but you'll have far more longevity and success than becoming an addict.

2:51John Lee Dumas:Fire Nation, become that connoisseur. As we talk about turning forgotten music into frontier market cultural IP. And I want to talk about going from just a passion project, Vic, to actual Grammy recognition. So how did you morph from just this passion project that you had one day into a two-time Grammy-nominated global music label. Yeah, so Osnato Records, which is the name of our record label, which was set up in New York a decade ago in 2016. Actually, July of 2016, it was set up so 10 years ago to the month. Yeah, so quite actually just about a week, July, it was July 16th, 2016 is when we launched our first record.

3:37So, you know, it was the culmination of a lifelong journey, John. I mean, I grew up in many different countries around the world. And when you do that, when you have that upbringing, that experience, when you're so deeply immersed in so many cultures from a young age, you develop this very strong radar for authenticity. And what you notice is that the world doesn't really experience the most authentic versions of the countries you grew up in. And more importantly, the media narratives around the countries you grew up in are a world away from the authenticity, the rawness, the beauty that you know.

4:05And so that led me down a path of saying, I want to start telling stories that reveal a more authentic version of countries than what we see, what we read, what we ingest from all the different media sources that we have today. And I started working in journalism. I worked for major news organizations. But at the same time, I always had a love for music from a young age, collecting vinyl records, DJing. And I got a few opportunities to work with record labels as well. and so I decided to combine all of these three things you know the search for authenticity storytelling and music and what was born was Ostonado Records and I said you know I'm gonna go look for music in parts of the world that no one considers you know that good music may even come from right and so I started you know Ostonado Records began with music in Haiti Somalia Sudan Uzbekistan and the former Soviet Union and you know I started first by delving into the history of these countries.

4:59You know, I can't just show you music that's coming out from the country today. I want to give you historical overview. So we worked with these incredible archives, public and private archives, some of which had survived civil wars in these countries. And, you know, we were given access to these archives and I was able to curate compilations, one of which was Sweet as Broken Dates, which is what earned a Grammy nomination in 2017. And after that, we started working with, you know, newer artists to tell the world it's not just the history that's important, but there's newer stuff still coming out.

5:27and we spread all over the world, West Africa, East Africa, the Caribbean, Central Asia. We've released music from several countries and it really was born out of this passion to tell different stories, to reveal a more authentic side of countries that we don't really see. And as fortune and good faith would have it, it earned us two Grammy nominations, one about a year after we started.

5:53John Lee Dumas:Let's talk about the future of music, Vic, because I feel like your fingers on the pulse for all the reasons you just shared, and of course more, because you are seeing and believing the future of music actually lies outside of traditional Western industry hubs, what we grew up listening to on the quote-unquote radio. So what is that shift that is happening? Before we talk about the music shift, we got to talk about what's happening in the world. I mean, this is for any entrepreneur, not just for a music entrepreneur. If you're doing anything global in scope and ambition and scale, you want to be you know really tuned in into the massive historical shifts that are happening under our feet in the world today so very simply you know for the last few hundred years the west has been on top western culture has been on top most of the world grew up for the last half century listening to american and british music but that obscured a huge world of music you know coming out of africa asia and south america and we are shifting into a world now in which the roadmap of opportunity is changing.

6:52Opportunity was very clustered and centered, you know, in New York and London for music, but now it's shifting everywhere to Rio de Janeiro and Lagos and Nigeria and Nairobi and Kenya and Mumbai and India and elsewhere. I mean, we are moving into a post-Western world, and you don't have to take my word for it. There is a phenomenal report that is written by the U.S. intelligence community called Trends. They have Trends 2030s, Trends 2040s. This is a really sober, in-depth report that tells you what's going to be happening in the next decade. I recommend all entrepreneurs of any kind who are interested in where the world is going so they can plan their opportunities read this and in the very beginning of the report it says very clearly we are entering an era for the first time since 1750 so the last two three hundred years in which the destiny of the world will be more decided by the people's countries and economies of africa asia and south america the developing world the emerging world once what was called the third world uh you know is going to play a much bigger role.

7:46And that is going to trickle down into culture. And you're seeing it right now, too. I mean, first you had K-pop, right? Korean music, which was, you know, going worldwide, had a huge, was hugely successful. But that still, you know, drew a lot from American pop formula. So you could almost say it was a very Western-adjacent music. But now you have Brazilian music, which is going ultra-viral on TikTok. And Spotify has just come out and said that it's, you know, it's growing at a faster streaming rate than Korean music is. You have Nigerian Afrobeats, which is constantly, you know, topping charts.

8:17You have South African music, which is selling out shows all over the world. There is a fundamental shift happening in the world, and it is playing out in music. And we saw this shift happening a decade ago. That's why we said we wanted to, you know, of course, I'm not saying that it's going to happen to the countries that we went to. It's going to happen anywhere. You don't have to go to Somalia, Sudan, and Haiti for this, you know, to find music that's going to reshape the world. but anything from these three continents that have you know had their music largely obscured for the last you know half century are now rising up and and uh you know you can see this most clearly on tiktok where the newer generation is conferring value to this music the music that's going viral on tiktok is brazilian music it's african music i mean one of our tracks from our grammy nominated compilation of somali music just last year uh a song that was recorded in 1988 we reissued it in 2017.

9:07It got a Grammy nomination in 2018. In 2025, it charted number four on TikTok, one of the most viral songs, viral African songs ever. So, you know, you can see the map in front of you, what's going viral. It's not so much Western music anymore as it is African-Asian and South American music.

9:22John Lee Dumas:So I want to talk about actually being able to unlock this cultural IP because, you know, it's one thing to find it, Vic, but it's another thing to kind of like unlock it and share it with the world. And of course, you just shared what happened with TikTok and now we have these platforms that we never had before. I mean, they used to just be like the top nine at nine, which is what I grew up listening to on the radio. Like those are the songs that we were exposed to. Now it's like we have the world at our fingertips. So how did this rare music from places like Somalia, Sudan, Haiti, the former Soviet Union, how did it become valuable, cultural, intellectual property?

9:54Right. So I think at first we got to define intellectual property for people listening, right? So intellectual property is an intangible asset that derives from human creation. So you've got to think of stuff like copyrights, trademarks, patents. This is all intellectual property. There are a few countries in the world that deeply protect intellectual property, and there are a few countries that don't. But in the Western world, for the last, let's say, couple of decades, a lot of the manufacturing was outsourced, particularly in the case of the United States, it was outsourced to China, elsewhere in Asia, right?

10:20But the West held on to the IP. So if you manufacture, say, a luxury bag in China, where does the value come from? It comes from the brand name that's being slapped on it in Italy, France, or the United States. It's the IP that is putting all the value on that item. If you put your name or you sell your name to put on a hotel, as a very famous person has done, all over the world, what are you effectively licensing? What are you selling? You're selling your intellectual property, your brand name. So the West recognizes the value of intellectual property. More and more countries now are recognizing the value of intellectual property.

10:56Places like the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia are putting huge protections on intellectual property because they want that kind of investment to come to their part of the world. But Western intellectual property, cultural intellectual property, music IP, already has high value. And this is validated by the fact that major financial firms in Wall Street, companies like BlackRock, hedge funds, are buying music catalogs. they're buying the music IP because they've recognized it for what it is. In the financial world, it would be called a long-duration cash-flowing asset because the royalties consistently generate cash flow every month, every year.

11:33And they have properly valued Western IP, stuff like the Beatles catalog. But where is the value or who has valued all of the music IP that still is entering the global marketplace from places like Africa, Asia, and South America? this remains extraordinarily undervalued right yet the demand for it is absolutely exploding because you know tv film movies video games anywhere you think music can fit maybe even in a in a department i mean you know in a brand store um there are so many places now where music ip can be licensed for usage more so than ever before um you know this music that we have produced we have seen that it is rising in value and yet it is still extremely undervalued because it is not you know considered part of the western intellectual property sphere and one thing i always like to you know when i'm in licensing negotiations is there's always a debate about what is the market value of this music what should you know uh someone who's licensing it be paying and you can't walk into an exchange like the new york stock exchange and say okay what is the value of somali music there is no marketplace that sets the market value it's all done in these opaque you know closed door negotiations so i always tell people when we're negotiating you can't look at the historical streams or you know where it comes from or anything like that you have to simply look at supply and demand the demand for these sounds is growing rapidly and the supply is scarce this is rare music how many people in the world you know uh can offer you this music can offer you the the clean license for this music it takes a lot of work to build that intellectual property to get the the rights paper from the authors the composers you got to track them down.

13:14You got to find them if it's older music. And of course, if it's newer, you can work with the artists to administer their IP. But we're talking about scarce, rare intellectual property. That's where its value comes from. And it's a simple supply and demand game. And I think the value in the next decade or so of African music, Asian music, South American music is going to absolutely explode.

13:33John Lee Dumas:Fire Nation, a lot to talk about when we talk about the beyond content, mission-driven work. What's next and more when we get back from thanking our sponsors? Building a great website often means choosing between speed and quality unless you choose to build with Framer. With a visual design canvas, responsive layouts, and integrated CMS and built-in hosting, Framer is the pro AI website builder that gives businesses everything they need to launch professional websites quickly and efficiently. Whether you're a creator, a startup, or an established company, Framer helps teams move faster without sacrificing quality.

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16:34John Lee Dumas:Visit highlevelfire.com and start building your something today. Vic, we're back. Let's move into beyond content because we're talking entrepreneurs. We're talking to small business owners. So why? Why should Fire Nation stop thinking in terms of content and start thinking about ownership, rights, long-term IP value? IP is the game in town. Like I said, you know, for the last few decades, Western economies have been exporting their manufacturing or outsourcing their manufacturing rather. And the IP has become even more valuable. This is where most Western industries derive a great deal of their revenue from, you know, in terms of music, let's just look at music because that's what I've been in.

17:17IP is the game in town. The music business is now an IP business because so many of the revenue streams have been constrained by things like streaming um where is the value coming from you can buy a record for 25 you license a song for that record you know whether it's for a tv show or a movie depending on the size of the production for 25 000 you're talking about a thousand x difference you know in in in in revenue streams here so ip is the only game in town and this is this is for actually any business you're you're you're doing before you get into it You don't only look at, you know, what am I selling?

17:53What is my profit? What is my loss? You're looking at what is my long-term intellectual property value that I'm building here? Is it my brand name? Is it a patent that I'm designing? Is it a trademark? Is it, you know, the compositional rights of a song? You know, I think when someone starts a record label, they might think, yes, I want to put out all this amazing music. Yes, please. You know, the music should be the centerpiece. Your philosophy of the music should be the centerpiece. But think about the long-term IP value. in the case of music or in the case of many businesses what you want to do is you want to earn I mean own or administer rare assets so what we have after producing 10 years of pouring our heart into producing music from all over the world we have a portfolio of incredibly rare intellectual property assets that we can license and that we want to increase the market value from and that we want to continue to grow because it is like I said it's a cash flowing asset it's something that's not very recognized as such music but there are assets in every business.

18:47Where is the IP behind that asset? Can it be monetized for the long term? And what I will say is, you know, there are many things that shape the value of these assets. So if you look at music, for example, I think geopolitics and, you know, things that are just happening around the world shape cultural demand and they shape IP value. Let me give you an example. So the last compilation or music we released was called Synthesizing the Silk Roads. It was a compilation of 1980s music from the former Soviet Union. Amazing disco, funk, and rock. People didn't know this music existed. What a great story to tell, former Soviet Union music.

19:22But I also produced that album not because the music was fantastic, but because I knew the IP value was in demand. Why? Well, we had a war between Russia and Ukraine, and that told me there's going to be a slew of TV films, maybe even video games that are set in Russia or set in the former Soviet Union. Guess who they're going to have to call or whose door they're going to knock on when they want authentic music in there and who can license it for them cleanly. We're, I believe, the only label who can do that. So, you know, you have to think in terms of rare IP, where is that coming from for your business?

19:54Where is the IP asset value for your business? It doesn't have longevity. Every business owner has got to be thinking about IP. It's soon going to be one of the few games in town and it's already one of the most lucrative games in town.

20:07John Lee Dumas:So what's next, Vic? I mean, you have your finger on the pulse. You're here every day working, figuring things out, understanding what's happening now, what's happening soon, what's going to be happening in the future. So looking ahead, what is the next decade of music, culture, and specifically frontier market opportunity? What will that look like? You know, you have to go back to what I was saying about how geopolitics shapes cultural demand and IP demand. So if I'm looking around the world today, of course, you know, as I've been saying, you know, you want to look at places in Africa, in Asia, in South America, in just terms of opportunity, not just music, you know, the next decade.

20:44Just look at Africa, for example. Africa has 55 countries. It has some of the fastest growing economies in the world. It has the fastest growing middle classes in the world, the fastest growing consumer classes in the world. By 2050, one in four people will be African. By 2050, among the largest cities in the world will be Lagos and Nigeria, Kinshasa and the Congo, Addis Ababa and Ethiopia. I mean, if that is not opportunity, I don't know what is. That's why there's so many influencers now, you know, fitness influencers, other influencers going to places like Nigeria and India. These are huge populations that, you know, are going to define a lot of the future, whether it's music or markets or whatever you're into.

21:17You got to have your finger on the pulse there. But I would say, you know, geopolitically, you've got to look at what's happening in the world. You know, I think, you know, if you look at strategic interest, capital flows, energy, all these things that have nothing to do with music, they still define where ears are going to be turning to. So I look at a country like Argentina. You know, Argentina is somewhere that is going to be a major supplier of oil and gas in the next decade. It's a place where a lot of capital is flowing. Billionaires from the U.S. are buying homes in Buenos Aires. There's something happening in Argentina, right?

21:50clearly. Is Argentine culture going to stake its claim? I think so. If I'm a music entrepreneur, would I, you know, get on a flight to Buenos Aires to see what's going on there? I think so. I look at someone like the Middle East, yes, all, you know, in turmoil currently, but there is a country called Iraq. And I remember 2003, 2003, very vividly, and that country has rebuilt itself. And it has one of the most amazing electronic music scenes going on today that not a lot of people know about. And if I can get there and, you know, export that music around the world, I think it can go viral on TikTok.

22:20You know what I mean? So this is what I'm looking at. I'm looking at the future through a lens of where is interest flowing? Where are the tides of history flowing? Where is capital flowing? And that's where the future is. And like I said, read that Trends 2030 report. It'll tell you everything you need to know.

22:37John Lee Dumas:Fun fact, I actually spent 2003 in Iraq myself as a tank commander, 23 years old. So that brought back some memories for sure. And Vic, what would the one key takeaway that you would want Fire Nation to get from our conversation today? And we talked about a lot of things beyond content. We talked about what's next. We talked about unlocking cultural IP, the future of music, passion project, Grammy recognition. What's the one thing you want Fire Nation, our listeners to walk away with from our conversation today? Expand your geography because the roadmap of opportunity is expanding rapidly. and the more you know about the world outside of the Western world, the greater your chances for enormous success in the coming decade.

23:16John Lee Dumas:Fire Nation, you're the average. Of the five people you spend the most time with, you've been hanging out with VS and JLD today, so keep up the heat. And for links to everything we talked about, visit eofire.com, just type Vic, V-I-K, in the search bar, the show notes page will pop up with everything, how to contact him, all that jazz. And Vic, what's a direct call to action? If Fire Nation wants to learn more about you, where would they go? What would they do? what do you want Fire Nation to do to take action today? I think a great way to start is just have a listen to our catalog. You can go to ostinatorecords.bandcamp.com and our 20 records are up there from all over the world.

23:48I think there's no better way to learn about the world than through eating people's food and cuisine and listening to their music. So dive in there and hopefully it'll give you some ideas for entrepreneurial opportunities all over the world.