How This Indie Publishing Company Got Over 100 #1 Hits

0:00I think there's really good times ahead for music. I think there's some challenges, but I think we're getting paid more than we ever had in certain ways through streaming and other sources. And this whole AI thing is going to be a big thing we have to unwind. But I don't think songwriters are going away. And I don't think anybody should be daunting like, well, I can never make a living in that business because of the economics. I think songwriters are earning more than they've ever earned right now. Now, it's a select few, so it needs to be wider. Don't get me wrong. But the ones that are doing well are doing very well.

0:33what's going on welcome to the new music business i'm your host ari herstand author of how to make it in the new music business third edition is out hardcover ebook audiobook however you find books you can find the third edition and a little update on that uh i am hard at work on the fourth edition of the book that should be coming out in mid 2027 uh there's still some work to be done But if you follow me online, you'll find I just submitted the first draft to my editor. So fourth edition of How to Make It in the New Music Business will be coming soon. Today, my guest is Chris Farron. He is the president and founder of Combustion Music.

1:15Combustion Music is a music publishing company. They also have a label division, artist development company. Chris actually started as a songwriter. So he is Grammy nominated. He's had, I believe, eight number one hits, pretty big hits across the board over the years, and then started Combustion Music in 2001. And they're responsible for developing the careers of Ashley Gorley, Song of Writer Hall of Fame inductee, Ashley Gorley, Matthew West, Brett James, Gordie Sampson, Jerry Flowers, Kelly Archer, Nathan and Caleb Falwell of Kings of Leon, Corey Kent, Matt Jenkins, many, many others. And today we talk a lot about music publishing.

1:59Now, Combustion is based in Nashville. They specialize in country songwriting, Christian artists, country artists, the majority of their hits. Now, Combustion Music has had over 100 number one hits, primarily on the country charts. So we talk a lot about what it takes and what it means to be a professional songwriter and what publishing is these days and how publishing has evolved and changed from when he started the company and was actively writing and producing music back in the early 2000s to today. They just got another number one hit song with Corey Kent just this week. So they're very active and very currently getting number one hits.

2:39Yeah, we talk all about the business of songwriting. We talk about how to get signed as a songwriter, what he looks for in songwriters, whether you know if you're ready to be a professional songwriter, how songwriter rooms work, how Nashville works in in terms of songwriter rooms, how the business and economics of publishing and songwriting work. And it is a very confusing topic. And he even said, as someone who's a lifelong songwriter, hit songwriter, and owns a publishing company, he's like, you know, you're gonna have to fact check me on that because, you know, they work with administrators and the business of publishing is very confusing.

3:15So we talk all about that. We talk a little bit about artist development. It's a wide range of conversation. We even touch on AI. talk about what he thinks about AI, how his producers, writers may or may not be using AI, what the labels have to say about AI. And they talk about kind of the how to get songs cut. And they have song pluggers, as he calls them in his company, and how a song goes from just being written to actually becoming a number one and how that gets cut. So it is a great conversation. If you're wondering how do songwriters get paid and what a publishing pays and publishing companies pay and advances and royalties and all of that, just the business of songwriting, this is the episode for you.

3:56You can find Combustion Music and everything about Combustion Music at CombustionMusic.com or at Combustion Music on the socials. You can find me at Ari Herstand on the socials, on Instagram specifically. Find all of us that make the show happen at Ari's Take. Right now, if you wouldn't mind, visit Ari'sTake.com, get on the email list. That's actually the best way to stay in touch with us. But right now, hit pause. Pause this episode. If you haven't left us a five-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, please do that right now. Those really help. And if you haven't, hit the follow button, hit the subscribe button, hit the thumbs up on YouTube if that's how you're listening to it.

4:33Leave us a comment on YouTube or Spotify. Stay in touch with us. All right, let's kick into the show. Chris Farron, welcome to the show. Hey, man. Glad to be here. It's been hot in Nashville, but it's nice now, so I'm happy. We're all cooled off a bit. Nashville, you know, Music Row, the country capital of the world. So I want to talk about, I mean, Combustion has now kind of positioned itself. You have so many great writers, great artists now. You have artist development. You have, I lost track of how many number ones you've had. I think it was over 100 or something like that. But this week we celebrated our 114th.

5:13We're number one this week with Kenny Chesney's song, and it's our 114th number one. Unbelievable. Congratulations. That's incredible. Thank you. Yeah. So, you know, this is, I'm so fascinated by someone like you who started as a hit songwriter, had so many hits yourself. why you decided to kind of get into more artist development. And I don't know if you call it, I guess, what is Combustion? Maybe, like, before we get to that, I'm curious. Like, Combustion Music, I don't know what it is. Is it a publishing company? Is it a label? Is it an artist development company? What is it exactly that you do?

5:54Well, first and foremost, we were a publishing company. We started about, we're celebrating our 25th year. And we were a publishing company. started by me as a songwriter at a time when I was feeling maybe less inspired as a songwriter and more inspired as a helper and a businessman. But we're first and foremost a publishing company, and then we've branched out into artist development. We have what we hate to use the word label because I don't really feel like we're a label, but we're kind of a label. We develop artists we put artists out and we have artists on our own label names so um in the last about eight years we've really gone deeper into that because it was something i think it was missing in our world or it's like true artist development so many labels weren't doing that they were just chasing stuff and they weren't really developing stuff and yes we saw a hole there and something that's what we did because when we were working with people the first thing we did was work on the songs and when the songs get better it's amazing the artist gets better you know so So we went down that route.

6:59So yeah, that's what we are. And how did I get here? I think your question started with how did we get here? And then I went to what we are. But I was in LA. I moved to LA when I was 21. I wanted to be a rock star, like probably you and everybody else that moved to LA at some point. And it was the early 80s. And I was a singer-songwriter at a time where everything up and down the strip was hairband. So it was a little bit left-footed for me, but still a great experience. And I had some good success and was writing and getting cuts. I was doing everything I could. I was singing jingles. I was doing movies.

7:37I was doing demos. I was singing on records. I was writing for people. I was producing demos, just kind of whatever I had to do to kind of get things going, you know. And I had a couple record deals, did some records that got some radio airplay, But it just kind of wasn't in the card for me. And my publisher at the time said, you know, you're like a singer-songwriter. And the only place that's really happening like that right now is in Nashville. You should go to Nashville. And I was pretty snobby about it. I was kind of like, I'm not country. I don't have a country bone in my body. I grew up in Washington, D.C.

8:10And they said, just go. Don't go for the music. Go for the songwriting. And I went. And I was blown away. I was blown away with the ability and the discipline and the talent. And so I realized that it was a really healthy place for me to kind of partially live. And I spent my time between L.A. and Nashville, most of the 90s, working there, working here, working there, working here. And then my daughter was born, and when she turned five, we had to put her in school somewhere. And we moved the whole family to Nashville in 1996, about there. And then how did I get here as far as from a writer to a publisher?

8:50I started, I was writing, I was having a lot of success, and I kind of understood what it was, and I realized the value of songs and publishing, and I kind of learned. I sold one of my own songwriting catalogs, and I kind of understood the business of publishing. I kind of got a quick lesson. I never studied it. I'm not a business guy by trade, but I just kind of had a knack for it. Sure. Sure. And I, so as many, as many companies do, I don't know if you realize it, I'm sure you do, but when a writer has a certain level of success or a certain, you know, leverage, amount of leverage, they offer the writer a venture where they say, hey, you can sign other writers that you can tutor, so to speak, and put under your wing and that you can win when they win as well as win when you win.

9:34And a lot of times it's kind of a vanity thing for writers where like, Like you kind of get this thing, but you're not sure what to do with it. But I realized that it was a point in my life where I was in my 40s and I was kind of like I'd written a lot of songs and I was starting to feel a little, not burnt out, but I felt like I've got to be honest with you. I felt like I'd written my best songs. And each time I would go to a room, I go, I'm not sure. I think these younger guys are better than me. And I think I'm not saying I can't be wise and didn't always write a good song, but my batting average started to go down.

10:06and I realized maybe this was an avenue that I should really embrace a little bit more. So in 2001, Combustion Music was officially started, and we had an office and one staff member and me, and we said, let's make a go of this thing. And I kind of thought I'd rather have this little army of songwriters out there that I could kind of manage and tutor and mentor, as opposed to just me going out every day with one song and hoping I came back with something that mattered, you know? Sure. And it proved to be a good decision because I liked it a lot and I was pretty good at it. And from there we went.

10:47I mean, the first two writers I signed, I've told this many times, but the first two writers I signed were The Kings of Leon and Ashley Gorley. So I started off on a pretty good— Not bad. Not bad start there. So it was kind of—it was pretty cool. It was pretty cool. and I realized that maybe this is something that I should really dig deep. I kept writing for a little bit, and I still write every now and again, but I never wanted to compete with my writers. I never wanted to feel like they were competing with the boss for a potential placement, so I never signed myself to my own company, and I never had any of my songs in the mix within our company.

11:26It was separate, and I just realized I really loved it. It was more satisfying. Songwriting is tough, man. You get 95 no's to every five yeses, you know, and that's a lot of rejection. How have you seen the publishing industry evolve since starting Combustion in 2001 to now 25 years later where we're at today? How has the publishing industry changed and evolved? Drastically. Drastically. I mean, because obviously it's changed the music business, but not only the publishing, but definitely the publishing. because we don't sell records anymore. So it's really, especially in country music, it's really radio becomes a much more obviously important part of, it always was important, but now it's even more important.

12:16And then obviously streaming is hugely important. So those were two, radio had always been there, but streaming didn't even exist 25 years ago. So not only figuring out how to monetize it, but how to embrace it and how to utilize it. But then once we realized how important it was to hear to stay, it was like, all right, now how can we, how does that change our model as far as what we can pay a writer and how much a song will pay and how much a hit song will pay versus what it used to pay? And so it was a complete paradigm shift. You know, I tell people that aren't in the music business all the time, and I think it's a pretty good analogy when you think as recently as, I don't know, before there was streaming, say when the CDs were still big right in the year 2000 probably, right?

12:58That was how you got your music probably. And so if you're a kid and you're, I know growing up, my big thing was always I would buy a record a week. And so, and for, and records back then cost, say they cost seven bucks and you got 10 songs, right? And then I'd buy four records a month, which is 40 songs for 28 bucks. And that's what I got. And now that same teenager can pay$9.95 a month on Spotify and get a gazillion records. Right. And so that difference in the paradigm of not only the access, but financially. I mean, you go, how can we get a million songs for$9.95 a month? We used to only get 40 songs for$28 a month.

13:41Right. And thankfully, everybody's navigated it. And obviously, rates have gotten better and people understand it. But as far as, you know, publishing company can't stay in business if they can't make money. So first, we got to pay the writers so they can write the songs. but then how can we make our money back is obviously essential. And trying to navigate what, you know, you used to have a song on a platinum-selling album that was just an album cut, and it made a lot of money. That just doesn't exist anymore. There were songs on albums I bet that you listened to that you had that you probably never even listened to.

14:14But if they were on a platinum record, the songwriter made a pretty good hunk of dough for a song that probably never got listened to. Right, and that's a great point, because in the album era, in the CD era, and even before that, and, you know, the vinyl records, you would buy that album. You said, you know, seven bucks or 20 bucks or whatever it would be that someone would buy the album. And then, of course, there were mechanical royalties, and those were earned for the songwriters on that album, whether somebody intended to buy the album for the hit song they heard on the radio, or they intended to buy it for the, you know, track 12 that no one ever heard or anything.

14:51It didn't matter. A sale was a sale. A sale was a sale. And the number one song, the first song on the album got paid as much as the last song on the album. Exactly. I don't know what I mean. Exactly. It was all equal because you buy the album for whatever it was and then the mechanical royalties were earned equally for every song on that album. Whereas now today, as we know, people can choose to just stream that one song and they don't have to stream. You know, as we look at the stream, numbers, they're not streaming the other songs as much as the hits. Equally. Right. And so they get paid less.

15:25So that was a huge change in how we financially structure a business, you know? Right. So I'm curious. I mean, you mentioned, you know, I want to talk about the publishing business a little bit because a lot of people aren't really familiar with how this works. You said, you know, we as a publisher have to pay the writers and then you're going to hopefully make your money back or make some money from the songs that your writers write and that get cut. So break it down. When you say pay our writers, what does that mean? How do you pay the writers? Do they get paid when they sign, when they write a song?

16:05Do they get paid by going into a session to write? Are they just getting paid when they get a cut? Are they just getting paid when they reach a certain, you know, get a hit in the radio? Like break down how writers actually get paid from a publisher like you. Yeah, sure, sure. There's no hard and fast rule, but I know in Nashville and NLA, I've had a bunch of publishing deals myself. So they all walked and talked similarly in the sense that you find a writer that you believe in, whether they're a baby writer who's never had anything going or whether it's somebody who's had success. But obviously, the more leverage you have as a writer, the more you can demand.

16:37But for the instance of this example, let's say it's a new writer who's never had any recordings, any cuts. And I find that person, he or she, and I'm interested. And I go, wow, you're great. I'd like to work with you. Typically, what we do is sign them to a multi-year deal with options, which is usually our option. Like, we'll pay you for a year and then we'll get the option to pick you up. But if you're not delivering, we might drop you. And then we try to determine what, it's two things, what a baby writer's worth in this format and what that person kind of needs. Like, you know, our goal is never to like, if someone says I need$100 ,000 to live on, I'm not going to give you$100 ,000 because that's what you say you need.

17:19But if there's extenuating circumstances like, hey, I'm coming here, I need somebody to pay for my travelers. And we really believe all that stuff comes into what we pay, but we would pay in advance, a monthly advance. So they would get a hunk of dough that hopefully gives enough money to live. Meagerly, maybe in the beginning, but enough to put a roof of their heads and pay the bills. And then in return, we would own a certain portion of their publishing. And I don't know if we have to go deep, we have to go, but a song is divided into the writer's share and the publisher's share. The writer can never not be the writer of a song.

17:55You've heard stories back in the 50s where there was writers that sold the song for 500 bucks and someone else put their name on it. That hopefully will never happen again and it shouldn't happen again. But then since they've made a way where a writer can share, can sell a portion of his song without having to take his name off of the song. And that's the publishing share of the income. And so as the publisher, we negotiate for all or a portion of his publishing interest, once again, based on their leverage, status, history. But once again, in the case of a baby rider, say we would give somebody, just for example,$40 ,000 a year.

18:36Then they'd get that every month. They'd get$4 ,000 or$3 ,500 a month, whatever the math is. And then we would collect the income, any of the songs that are earned that they wrote for us. And as the income comes in, we get to pay ourselves back first. So it's kind of an advance, meaning that you've got to pay it back. But if you don't ever make it, you don't have to pay it back. Sure. And and then once we have become whole, then we split based on a different percentage of the income, any of the income after that based on the particular deal. So that's that's the short form kind of stories. Make sense?

19:10Yeah. And you said, you know, if we use this example of thirty five hundred bucks a month that you're paying them. So it was a 40K year or something like that. Now, is it just a year contract or is it based on number of songs that they have to turn in? It's a year. It's anything that you have written in that year. But there is a minimum. There is a minimum. So you can't sign with us and then check out and say, I'm taking my$3 ,500 a month and not writing any songs. But the minimum is pretty simple. It's typically, I think our minimums are usually 12 songs per year, which really isn't a lot. You know?

19:49Yeah. But boxing, it's 12, 100 % songs. So if you co-wrote it, it would be 24 songs. If you three-way wrote it, it would be 36 songs. But it's still not asking a lot of a professional songwriter. Most of our songwriters will easily, easily, easily write 100 songs a year. So it's just a base that we don't pay somebody and they check out. You know what I mean? Yeah, no, that makes sense. And, you know, what they earn on the back end, I think that, you know, we have a very smart listenership and people are extremely savvy. So I would love to go a little bit deeper on that because, I mean, you mentioned, and this is where the confusion lies.

20:27I mean, you mentioned kind of there's a quote unquote publisher share and a writer's share. But that's, you know, it's not, I don't think, as simple as that because, you know, the way that ASCAP pays, I can see you're an ASCAP writer with the ASCAP rewards behind you. I'm an ASCAP writer as well. You know, ASCAP, the performing rights organization here, is only collecting performance royalties when the song is played on the radio, etc., etc. And ASCAP will cut checks. 50 % goes to the publisher, and then 50 % goes to the writer. A lot of writers think that that's all the money that a song earns, and that's it.

21:03And there's no more money that comes into, you know, publishing. Now, we know that's not true. We already talked about mechanical royalties briefly. Now, mechanical royalty organizations like the MLC or any of these mechanical rights organizations from around the world, they don't do the 50-50 thing like ASCAP does. They give, here's all the money going to the publisher, and then you, as a publisher, decide, how am I going to slice up all that extra money that's out there that's not from ASCAP? So maybe if you could just break it down how all the money that comes in that's not from ASCAP, how does that get paid out?

21:40Because I've always been a little bit confused as all the other money like mechanical royalties or sync or anything else that comes in. Yeah. Well, first of all, I know this stuff, but check me on some of this because I'm not an absolute expert on the economics of songwriting. You got it. But I'm pretty sure I can answer that question not only honestly, but also effectively. So you're right. The publisher basically has the rights to the song. So if you sign with me and you sign and you become a combustion music songwriter, we are the ones that administrate your songs for you or we would hire an administrator.

22:20But administrator just means the one who's looking after the income. And you're absolutely right that the income from radio and airplay, the performing rights, BMI, ASCAP, CSEC, they split it up between the writer and the publisher so that a writer, many times a writer, if he's being paid and he's in debt, if it all went to the administrator, they wouldn't see any money from the hit. at all. So at least if you get your writer's share on performances, which can be significant, you're really seeing the benefit of having had a hit. But on the other side, everything else, typically, everything else that's collected, and there's a lot of things.

22:53There's mechanicals, there's streaming, there's sync, there's all kinds of other income that would flow through the administrator who basically works for the publisher. But the deal is pretty clear. It's not like arbitrarily we say, we get a dollar, we're going to send him 10 and keep 90 cents. It's very clearly in their contract specifically stated of every dollar, I'm simplifying this, you might get 60 cents, you might get 40 cents, you might get 80 cents, depending on your deal with us. So it's not like it's arbitrary. It's definitely not arbitrary. It's definitely, it's just that money comes in and it's like, okay, they had 50 % of the publishing on this song, on this sync fee, $10 ,000 came in.

23:39So$7 ,500 would be credited to their account. 100 % of the writer's share and half of the publisher's share would be credited to their account. Now, if they were unrecouped, it would go towards that. But if they were recouped, then they'd get a check for$7 ,500. Does that make sense? Okay. Yeah, I think so. So you pretty much, you designate kind of all the money that comes in as 50 % of all the money is going to come in is going to be untouched by you. And whether a check gets cut directly to the writer, like how ASCAP or BMI or CSEC do, or that money comes to you, you're just going to take 50 % of that and you're going to send it to your writer.

24:19And then of the remaining 50%, then you have, you decide to split that up a different way? Right. Oh, that's interesting. Yes, but we wouldn't necessarily send the 50 % right to the writer if he was unrecouped. Do you follow that? Like, in other words, if I gave you$50 ,000 and you hadn't made any money yet, your share would have to get, your money would go towards recouping that debt before you'd see any more real money. So it really is just like maybe, you know, you're keeping, I guess, like 25 % or like, you know, Combustion's Cut or something is like your commission is 25 % to 50 % or something like that.

24:57It could be as low as 10 % if the writer was really, really hot. And it could be as high as 50 % if the writer was baby, baby, brand new and didn't have any leverage or any history. That makes sense. Sure. So, no, that makes perfect sense. So I want to talk about development and how you develop your songwriters and what it means with a songwriter. Like you referenced kind of a baby songwriter, maybe someone that you just really believe in. They're a great writer. But maybe they don't have any cuts. Maybe they're just really talented. What do you do with a writer like that? How do you help develop a young writer like that?

25:35Well, I wish there was a one-size-fits-all because each writer is different and each person is different. But we like to kind of refer to it as our boot camp, as kind of a writer's boot camp. First of all, we set the expectations that if you're a professional songwriter, that's what you should do. And so hopefully we're paying you enough that you're really focusing on writing every day and that you're setting aside a certain amount of time to do that as opposed to just dabbling at it. A lot of people, I can't tell you how many people will come up to me and say, oh, my son's written a song. He's written 15 songs.

26:05and you go, yeah, that's great, but that's some feat that no one else can do. And you go, our guys write 200 songs a year. And that's really not because we're asking them to do that. We're asking it. It's like it's just going through the motions of doing the work, getting better, lifting weights. It's like a muscle. You're just getting better at it. And we're not asking them. We're not slave driving them to write another song, write another song. We're just saying work at it. If it takes a week to write the song, but spend the week writing that song and the effort of the craft to get better at it.

26:38And it's not so we have 200 songs that we can throw against the wall and hoping five of them will stick. It's just – that's just what you do. Songwriting typically doesn't take that long. And especially if you're co-writing with two or three people, 95 % of the songs in this town get written in a day, if not shorter. So if you go in the beginning of the day, you should come out at the end of the day with a song. And so back to your question of what do we do? We try to analyze their strengths. Are they a lyricist? Are they a melody person? Are they a track person? Are they a kind of overall person?

27:12Are they a great vocalist? Are they a song interpreter? What's their skill? We try to ask them to get better at the stuff they're weaker at. But also it's okay now to have, you know, there's plenty of guys that are just lyricists. And there's plenty of girls that are just melody. And there's plenty of people that are just track guys now. So the responsibility has gotten divided, but ideally we want our people to – we want our guys and girls to be able to do everything because we think a true songwriter really should be able to write a song by themselves. Now, if they write better songs with other people, that's fine.

27:43But having the skill to know what a good lyric is or to know what a good groove is or the appropriate groove and not just be someone who sings – somebody who just comes in a room and sings pretty melodies or someone who comes in a room and just spouts poetry. There's a real difference between putting the song together. And the more you have of the other skill, the better you get at everything. So we put them through and we just try to teach them every nuance and put them with the best people and critique them honestly. And see, hopefully, a pretty steep progression in their quality of their songs.

28:16Teach them, not the economics, but the logistics of songwriting. Like, we don't always have the luxury of just getting in a room and writing whatever pops into our head. It needs to be somewhat targeted. It needs to be somewhat, why are you writing this song and who are you writing it for and what genre and how can we better give you the odds, the best odds of saying, hey, if you're going to write a dance song, you probably should write a dance song that has this kind of feel or this kind of person or this person's looking as opposed to just writing a random dance song and going, now go get it recorded.

28:47You know what I mean? So we try to really teach them how to be specific, intentional, and super, super committed to the craft of it. And then it's amazing how the good ones can get a lot better really fast. So I'm curious, you say like you're using we a lot, as in we teach them, we do this. Tell me what that means. I mean, are you, do you have, like you called it a boot camp for a session. I mean, is it like they're going to school? I mean, do you have sessions where you're sitting down and you're lecturing and you're saying, hey, do this? Or is it really you're pairing them up with more experienced writers who know all this stuff and they, as the collective we, they're kind of teaching them through their wisdom everything that you just said?

29:29All of the above. I have a staff, a creative staff of people that are song pluggers and song publishers, not necessarily songwriters. I am a songwriter, but none of my staff is because I don't want to – that just gets confusing. but they have great instincts and great ears and great noses for what hit songs and what great writers are and like I said we're in the business of you know it's funny I don't want to we're not in the business of sacrificing art for commerce but if we don't make money nobody stays alive you know so we try to really balance that line between we want you to write the music you love and stuff that you find artistic but we also want you to win and so that you can keep doing that and make a living at it.

30:13And just, I'm not sure many people have the luxury of saying, I'm just going to only write a song when the muses speak to me on every other Thursday at four o 'clock, and I'm going to write it about dogs. And you go, okay, great, but we can't do anything with that. So we try to be real about, if you want to stay in this business, we got to have a certain level of success so that we can afford to keep paying you and you can afford to keep paying your bills. So we try to teach them that. Many, many young songwriters are just kind of like, I just write whatever comes to my head. And you go, okay, that's great.

30:44But maybe narrowing down the scope, maybe kind of focusing, maybe if I told you write a song for Keith Urban, you might go, screw that. I don't want to write a song for Keith Urban. But you also might go, that's kind of a cool challenge. And you go study Keith Urban's music and you go, man, this little groove I got going sounds kind of like a Keith Urban thing might do it. And some people find huge inspiration by narrowing down the scope of what they're supposed to write or what we want them to write as opposed to just I write whatever the music hits me and whatever it takes me and I'm going to get baked and smoke a bunch of joints and just write whatever I want to write.

31:20That's nothing wrong with that. Don't get me wrong. I'm not so sure that's a recipe for making a living in the songwriting business. Yeah, so, right, you're professionalizing the craft here, which makes perfect sense. It's a business after all. I'm curious, like you used the example of write a song for Keith Urban. I'm curious how the business of songwriting has evolved over the years in terms of like maybe did you notice historically there were more songs that were being written in rooms and then being cut by artists that had never touched the songwriting process and are not credited songwriters on the track.

31:59We're not in the room. Has that changed? Are there more? Is it these days? Are you finding that more artists actually want to be in the room from the jump and want to be co-writers on the track that they're releasing? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that's threefold. I mean, absolutely. There's hardly any artist, rarely an artist now that doesn't want to be involved in the songwriting. Because I think for threefold, they want to make sure their voice is being heard. And as an artist, they might not write the song, but they have a point of view. They have things they want to say. So if they can be in a room with people that are professional at it, maybe they can craft something that works.

32:38And it's something that becomes real and much more personal to the artist than just some song he was foisted upon him. Not always the case, but that's been going for you. I mean, Elvis Presley never wrote any of his songs. And Kenny Chavsney never wrote any of his songs in the beginning. But now he's a bona fide, solid songwriter. And he writes a lot of the songs. He doesn't have to. Sure. But he feels more connected to those songs probably. So that's only natural. He'd go, I kind of helped write it. I want to record it. also there's an economic reason there's a lot of money in it if you're if you're an artist of stature that your own songs on your own records have value so yeah a lot of them are not greedy but just it's smart economics to get i want to be involved in the songs that i'm going to make hits so yes there's that level too so i think there's two valid very valid reasons of why they do and it's much more prevalent much much more prevalent now than it's ever been you know it used to be a In L.A., when I lived in L.A., most all writers, almost all artists wanted to write on their records.

33:40When I first started coming here, there were still a lot of artists that didn't write. George Strait doesn't write his songs. You know, a lot of the old-time guys didn't write their songs, but they were great interpretive songs and they were great singers. But it's hard to find an artist now that isn't, at least in some part, a part of the songwriting process. Right. Which is a bad thing. It just means we've got to get our writers with those artists if we want to get on their records. Well, that was exactly that was my next question is when I know a big part of a publisher's job is to get your writers into rooms with artists or the writers or producers or, you know, just setting your writers up for the best chance of success and success being get getting hits, you know, get hits cut, get songs cut and get those songs on the radio.

34:29So tell me about the approach when you're putting rooms together and sending your songwriters out and getting them in rooms. How do you approach that? Yeah, so it's funny. Never has that been more important than it is now. And you'll hear times all the time that if somebody works on your calendar, I control their calendar or I book their calendar. It just means they're basically the gatekeeper to that person. And then them along with the rest of my team. Like, so we'll say, say you're a writer for me, Ari, and we're going, okay, what do we, who do we want Ari to write with? What do we think is a good fit?

35:06And that's very something we discuss internally a lot and go, and obviously you have people that probably you go, hey, man, if you could ever get me with so-and-so, I would love to write with so-and-so. Or if you could ever get me with Keith Urban, I'd love to write with Keith Urban. But we try to be realistic. Obviously, everybody wants to write up. So if you're writing up, that means the guy you're writing with is writing down. You know what I mean? So it's a balance to – because that guy's had more hits than you. It might not be better than you, but he has more credibility than you. And he's telling his publisher, I want to write with somebody better than me who's got more credibility than me because the high tides lift all boats.

35:43So it's a delicate balance where we have to advocate for our writers, be realistic about the expectations. Like if you came in here tomorrow and you said you wanted to write with Ella Langley, I'd go, it ain't going to happen. but maybe we can get you there in a few years. So no matter how bad you want to, and no matter how good you think you could be in that room. So yes, it's very strategic planning of who you write with, what's your strength. Once again, if you're a lyricist, we make sure we don't put you with another lyricist. If you're a track person, we make sure we don't put you with another track person.

36:16And quite frankly, it's kind of silly, but it's almost like a big, we're like a big dating pool. Like in other words, we're matchmakers. we're trying to match you with the great thing and that the match will stick. And we always say to the writers, like, we can only get you the first date. Like, if I hook you up with Joe Schmo and you loved it and Joe Schmo didn't, he's probably not going to do it again, no matter how badly you want to do it again. You know what I mean? It's just like a date. Yeah, yeah. That person didn't see the value in you in the room. That gets back to us. And then we have to tell the writer, hey, I want to write with Joe Schmo again.

36:50Go, sorry to tell you Joe Schmo's not interested. He gave it a shot. It didn't work. Sure. Yeah. And so it's a constant battle of how we build your career, put you in a better status of songwriting co-writers, but also co-writers that we think will work. Like many, many times we'll say, I really think you should write with this person. You go, who is that? I've never even heard of them. They go, trust me, they're just, they're no further along than you. Maybe they're even a little behind you. We think you should give it a try. And if you do and it works, you love it. Just because someone's had more hits than you doesn't mean they're better or worse than you.

37:27But we also – that all has to come into the equation of the other team going, why should we write with Ari? He's never had a hit. We go, because he's great. You know what I mean? Yeah. So tell me about that. So when you're putting these rooms together and let's say it is – well, first off, what do rooms even look like these days? You reference kind of a track person, a lyric person. Is there always an artist in the room? And if just like, how is it three people? Is it five people? Is it two people? How do you put these rooms together? It's all of that. But typically, yeah, you know, the demo process has gotten so fast and so important.

38:05And some of these guys that are we call track guys are so fast that everybody wants to walk out with a demo, you know, at the end of the day, like, would you write? So the days of somebody walking out with just an acoustic guitar vocal that they recorded on their phone, that still happens. But most of the time, there's usually someone in the room who's good enough at recording it quickly and making it sound pretty decent quickly. So this isn't one size fits all, but typically it would be like, let's make sure we have a guy who's a track guy slash producer. let's make sure we have someone in the room that is a great top liner which means melody and lyric and let's make someone in the room that can sing so that we can have a demo at the end of the day if not doesn't have to be the greatest singer but a good interpreter of the song so that hopefully we at the end of the day we not only have a song but we have a demo that we can immediately do something with so it's very strategic in the sense of like i said i'm not gonna if you're a top liner which means you write basically lyric and melody, but you don't do tracks and you don't sing, it wouldn't make as much sense to put you in another room with another track top liner.

39:14Does that make sense? Yeah, totally. Now, if there isn't an artist in the room or maybe the songwriters in that room, they're thinking, man, this song would be great for Ella Langley or this song would be great for, you know, Keith Urban or whomever, how do you then approach getting that song cut or even considered by an artist who wasn't in the room initially? And then do they want to later participate in publishing? Do they all get into a room and then revise and edit the song? Or how does that all work? Once they have this demo from just the maybe three relatively unknown songwriters that you think is a hit, what's the next step?

40:02Yeah, once again, every step is different. I'll have to say in Nashville, it's changing, but having lived in both coasts, but back in LA when I was writing in the 90s and early 2000s, if you wanted a super big artist to record the song, chances are they were going to want a piece of the song, whether they wrote it or whether they're not. Kind of old-school extortion, kind of like, if you want me to record it, you've got to put me on the song. But if it was a big enough artist, it's worth it. I mean, you just go. And maybe the artist would say, I changed a word or I changed the bridge or I put a little different melody on something to justify that they were a writer.

40:38But less that way in Nashville, becoming a little more that way in Nashville, but way less that way in Nashville. Typically, if an artist didn't write it, he doesn't put his name on it. But how do we get it to someone if he didn't or she didn't write the song? We go through their manager, their record label, their agent, whoever we know that might have a relationship with them that our guys have a relationship with, and say, hey, I've got a killer song that I really want to play for you for Keith Urban. And if that person has enough juice and likes the song enough, it usually finds its way to the artist, and then ultimately the artist will say yay or nay.

41:14So it's really just a relationship thing that we, and many times we'll hear from the label, hey, and I keep using Keith Urban only just because we started with that name, not because he's, but like, if Keith Urban's label, which is Universal, says, hey, you know, Keith, he needs one more up-tempo song for, to finish this record, he doesn't have it. And the word will get out. And so we hear an up-tempo song that we think is right, we know we have access to take that song to Keith Urban's label. And maybe, just maybe, they'll want to cut it. and Keith wouldn't say I gotta have a piece of the song that's not the way he operates but if he loved it he'd cut it he's recorded a bunch of songs he wrote that were hits and a bunch of songs he didn't write that were hits so he's just he's in the position I'm gonna cut the very best song I can find and most artists are that way too they're not gonna put out one of theirs that they know is worse than something that they could record of someone else's so that's a good thing and that's the way it should be Yeah.

42:17And now, I mean, you're in an interesting position that you also kind of have a label side of your business and you have artist development and you have artists on your roster. So I'm curious, just like, how is your approach maybe different when you're thinking about your artists and the artists that you represent? do you treat them I mean I'm assuming most of them I have seen a lot of them are songwriters as well probably all of them they all are yeah do you get pitched songs for your artists and yeah is it a similar approach just on the label side as a publisher you're a salesman you're a seller and as a label you're a buyer so it's nice to have the other shoe where someone else is pitching you something It's still hard, but yes, we definitely get pitched.

43:11I produce some of the artists on our label too. So as a producer, I get pitched the songs as well as the label we get pitched the songs. Because typically that's who you pitch. If you're looking to get a song recorded, you go to the manager, the producer, the label, or the artist. And anyone on that team that you can get to, people are sending songs to. And so we get songs. But we also, you know, we've mostly signed writers that if we've done our job right, we've signed them as songwriters first. And we've taught them to be better songwriters than they were. And their quality of their songs. And then as they've gotten better and as their music has gotten better, the quality of co-writers they get has gotten better.

43:54So the quality of everything just gets better. So our writers mostly record their own songs, not because we wouldn't, but because their songs are good. right you know what i mean yeah nobody knows what they want more than the guy you know the artist if he's the songwriter so yes we definitely get pitched songs we definitely have cut songs there's a song that we just had a number one song on cory kent that was a song that was completely pitched as an outside song so oh but obviously we prefer it if they wrote it because we win more if we write it but hopefully we're not greedy enough so that's a good point yeah yeah yeah so I'm assuming that's Empty Words, Corey Kent?

44:34No, no, no. Empty Words is—no, he wrote that. There's a song called This Heart that was a number one about eight or nine months ago. Oh, got it. Okay. And Corey didn't write that song, and none of our writers wrote that song. And it was just pitched to us, and we went, this is a great song for Corey. I think we should consider it. Okay. I do see he's not listed as a songwriter on that one, right? because I was going to say Empty Words, which is kind of at the top of the charts now. And he is a songwriter on there. Right. Well, there's, gosh, I'm seeing five songwriters on there. So I'm curious, even maybe in that case, was that something where all five were in a room or did these other songwriters write it, pitch you, and then Corey's like, you know what?

45:18I want to get back in the room or something like that. They were all in a room. They were all in a room. They were all in a room. Yeah, interesting. You mentioned, you know, the track guys. We want to make sure there's a track guy in the room and everybody wants to leave with a demo these days. I'm curious, how is AI playing a piece in this? And what is your position as a publisher, as a record label, as an artist developer with AI music and generative AI music when it comes to any part of the process? Yeah.

45:56I think it's a slippery slope. I'm a fan of it as a tool. I'm totally not a fan of it as a crutch. Many labels are saying don't pitch us anything that has AI on it. We don't want to even be tempted by something that might not be – because if it's AI, the jury's out I think legally. Once again, I'm not a lawyer, but who actually owns that? Who owns that work? Who wrote it and who owns the master of that work? Because it was created by a synthesis of everybody that went before. So everybody kind of is a part of the song, whoever's made music in the history of music. So I think it's a great tool if you walk away.

46:41I think it's a great tool for producers and songwriters when they're going, as they're working on a song and we're going, man, I'm not sure about the feel of this song. I'm not sure about the groove. It could go more reggae. It could go more this. It could go more that. And so if somebody wants to pop it in and say, well, this is kind of how it would sound if we went this direction, I think that's a great tool because you're just kind of like auditioning stuff. If you start using it and relying on it, I think it's horrible. And thankfully, most of us in the business that have pretty discerning ears can pretty much hear it off the bat if it's AI or not.

47:17And it doesn't mean it's bad. And it doesn't mean it won't get to a point where we won't be able to tell. But there's just a sonically, a little bit something that you kind of go, that sounds AI. And usually, I'm right. And in that case, you just kind of go, like if my writer wrote it and he goes, don't you love this? I go, yeah, now go do your own demo. Use this as a template. Use this as maybe an inspiration, but don't use – we're not pitching this. So not even for demos. You won't even pitch an AI demo. I'm not saying we won't and we've never, but we're hearing back from labels. If you pitch them an AI demo, they're going to be pissed.

47:55Yeah. We don't want to be swayed or tricked or whatever by something that might not be yours. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. You know what I mean? We don't want to get into the legal hassle of who really owns it. And is it a sample? Did they change the melody? Did they change the lyric? You know, all of a sudden. So I think it's an incredibly good tool. And it's unbelievable how good it's gotten. And it's only going to get better. But I don't think it should replace the human experience. Because ultimately, the reason why music connects with people, because it is human. And I don't think robots are ever going to make music that connects as good as, I sure hope not.

48:39I sure hope not. Because then what do we have left as humans? That's right. So you referenced this at the very beginning, catalog sales. And you talked about how you sold a piece of your catalog and stuff like that. um i'm curious now uh are you seeing much uh like are there catalog sales i mean we hear the headlines of catalog sales happening all the time and these you know wild numbers uh the conversation that you have with your songwriters and your artists about selling their catalog what are those conversations these days and are you facilitating any of these types of sales um i could talk about this for uh hours but i won't um so when i was living in la and i was in my 20s and uh i didn't know anything about anything and i've got i had a publishing deal and and in the deal because my lawyer was able to negotiate for me i don't know how i got a piece of my publishing even even as a very first-time writer which wasn't that unusual in that in la But I probably got a better deal than I deserved.

49:51But I was happy, you know, as far as the money I got. But I got half of my publishing from day one. And the mantra back then amongst all of my songwriter friends and stuff was, man, if you've got publishing, don't ever sell it. Don't ever sell it. The worst thing you can do is sell your publishing. Hold on to it like grim death for as long as you can. And that's what everybody said. But they were saying it out of kind of like a control thing, not because they'd done the math. Because they were just like, don't give away your songs. Don't give away your songs or don't sell your songs. And so I believe that.

50:25And fast forward a few years and I wrote some songs that were on a big record. And my publisher said, hey, if you want to sell your publishing on those songs, we'd buy it. And my instincts was, no, no, no, no, there's no way. I'm not selling my publishing. Then he sent me over this like little offer. And I went, I was astounded by how much it was. And I went, holy crap. So then I did the math and I said, well, this song would have to sell them this many records and they'd be this big a hit. And maybe over the next eight years, I'd make what they offered me. And I went, would I rather have that dribbling in over eight years or would I rather just have that hunk of dough right now and just say, all right, those songs are kind of gone.

51:08I still, as a writer, I'd still make something. So they're not gone forever. and I realized at that point that it made I was I think I was pretty wise in that sense to go I can do a lot more with that money right now as long as I don't blow it as long as I don't go buy a Ferrari as long as I don't to not only further my career but better my life than to just wait for that money to come in one tenth of a time every year so against I went against what everything because my mathematical instinct said, this makes sense. And so when I did it, I went, and it did make sense. I bought a house, you know, and otherwise I wouldn't have been able to buy a house.

51:45So it was like, you know, as long as you don't blow it, if you use it for something that's... So at that point, I realized, okay, catalog sales isn't a dirty word. It's not this big, ugly thing. It could have a perfect, it could have a real purpose to your life if it makes sense at the right time as a songwriter. Fast forward to the fact that back in the early 2000s, and when the market was the stock market was really bad in 2008 especially there was a lot of money out there looking for hedges against um to make returns when the stock market and bonds and all that stuff was really in turmoil and they realized hey you know songs they kind of earn they just earn whether good markets are bad they just kind of earn and they're kind of a hedge against inflation they're hedging against down markets up it's just another investment tool for some big firm.

52:32So all of these people started coming to buying these assets, you know, intellectual property assets, because it became part of their portfolios. So all of this opportunity flooded into our markets going, hey, we're going to give, we'll give you 10 times what you earned last year on that song. And I'm generalizing hugely here. But, and for a lot of, that kind of looked pretty enticing. And the multiples were high because they were coming in and kind of overpaying and just wanted to be in the game. And so everybody in the world started going, I want to sell my songs. I want to sell my songs without much thought into, is it the right time?

53:06Is it the right market? Have I written enough? Is the catalog big? Is it just one song I'm selling or do I have a body of work that I'm selling? And all that really affects the ultimate price of it. So anyhow, it's become an unbelievable buzzword so much that we have – we've had writers that as soon as they had a song hit the charts at number 40, said, will you buy my publishing? We're going, you don't even know what it's worth yet. Right, right, right, right. But it's just become a knee-jerk reaction, the opposite of when I was saying, hold on to your publishing, hold on to your publishing. It's more like, let's sell it.

53:36Let's sell it. Let's monetize it. Let's get that money. So have we facilitated it? Yes. Combustion is sold. Every five years we sell our catalog. We keep going, but we sell. So I've sold Combustion's catalog of numerous times. I've helped some of my writers sell their catalogs. I've sold my own catalog three or four times. I've sold some other catalogs three or four times. How do you sell your own catalog three or four times? You mean different songs? Different groups of songs. Yeah, the songs I wrote from 1995 to 2000 was one batch. The songs I wrote from 2000. Sure. You know what I mean? Have you noticed a difference in pricing with streaming these days?

54:16It's a different way of evaluating the company, but I don't know if it's still income is income. So you go, if you wrote a song where they're, and if$1 ,000 came in from streaming versus$1 ,000 came in from radio, some evaluator might put slightly different metrics on those, but ultimately money is money. So it's like, how much did the song earn in the last year? And then they come up with some, how much they think it's going to earn the next few years. And then they put a value on the life of the song because then you're going to own it for a while. and you know every song that's ever written it has peak earnings but it still pays something even I have songs that I wrote 30 years ago that still pay something they don't pay a lot but they pay something so so the income stream never really goes away it drops yeah but it doesn't yeah right I guess it's it's more um even more so on the uh the master set which is I'm curious like we talked about previously you know uh 30 years ago you buy a cd and that sale is just once whether the person listened to it a thousand times when they took that CD home or they listened to it once and threw it away.

55:24We don't know. There was never a way to track and there's never a way to there. There was didn't used to be a way to earn on those repeat listens like there is now. And so at least not, you know, I think previously when there was a hit, especially like a one hit wonder, they would sell all their albums, you know, that first year because it was a hit and then it would drop off. And five years later, there were no more sales. There was no more revenue. for that, at least on the master side, you know, and if it's off radio, then there's no publishing, there's nothing. Whereas now it's kind of like you get a song on a playlist or you get the algorithm to grab onto a song and with streaming, it keeps going, even if it hasn't been a hit for decades.

56:03So I guess I'm just curious in terms of how the economics have shifted in that realm because of streaming, if it's just evaluated differently because of that. I think so, because every song ever written is available. You know what I mean? It used to be if you wanted to go play an old Beatles record, you had to go find the record. You know what I mean? Now, like if you want to go play an old record, you just so, I mean, everything's available. Everything's at your fingertips. So obviously old catalogs have, it's been a huge resurgence to old catalogs because if you want to teach your daughter about how great Aretha Franklin is, you can just go listen to everything she's ever recorded.

56:39And your daughter would typically have never had access to that 20, 30 years ago to even discover who Aretha Franklin was. You know what I mean? So as a result, those old catalogs have brought a lot of new life to them. So that's been a really healthy thing for our industry because the accessibility of all this music. You don't have to go buy an old, you have to go to a vinyl store and buy a vinyl Aretha Franklin record. And so, yeah, it definitely affects the way they're evaluated because they're going, we're not hoping somebody's going to go buy these old records. We're just hoping they're going to go listen to some of these on the streaming services.

57:16Right. So it just gives the songs what we call a longer tale. Like the songs and the masters, it gives them, they don't just stop. You know what I mean? They don't just all of a sudden go. Somebody can always find them. Somewhere in this world, somebody's probably going to listen to that somewhere for the rest of our lives. You know what I mean? So it gives, it's going to earn something for longer. So it has to come into the valuation because you're saying instead of collecting the income for the next five years, that might be decent. The income might be decent for the next 15 years. Yeah. You know what I mean?

57:51Yeah. And, you know, the buyer has an incentive to possibly put some money into marketing these catalogs. And we've seen that happen. And we see songs pop off all the time now on trending sounds on TikTok from songs from decades ago. And then they have a whole new life and they start earning again without having to then reprint the CD or the records or anything. It just, yeah. There's no cost at all. It's just maybe some marketing, but yeah. Right. No, you're absolutely right. And that a lot of old songs are, that's why, you know, if you buy a catalog, you just don't know. I mean, anything could happen.

58:28Somebody could go cover a song that was 20 years old and make it a hit again. So that's always been a little bit the case. Totally. But more common now than ever. Sure. So I know there's a lot of young songwriters listening right now, and they are wondering how do they get started? How do they get a publishing deal from Combustion or from anyone? You know, maybe they live in Nashville, maybe they don't. Maybe they live in Nebraska, you know. What is your advice to young songwriters who want to become a professional songwriter? How do they get started? Yeah, I wish it was as simple as do this and it will work.

59:10But I think the thing I use is I'm at a point in my career where I have a lot of friends who have 20-year-old kids. And they'll call me up. And they might not be in music, obviously. And they'll go, my son or daughter is eating up with music. They freaking love music. They're just can't, you know, and I think they're really good, but I don't know. And I go, usually what I'll say in those situations, I go, are they really good? Are they just, everybody loves music, just loving music. I'm not so sure is a criteria for making a career at it. And they go, no, no, I go, but are people talking and buzzing in the high school like, Jimmy, man, his band is freaking unbelievable.

59:48Or Jenny played an acoustic guitar at the talent show and blew everybody. I mean, like, how good are they? You know, are they just pretty good? Because you get into pretty rarefied air when you become a professional songwriter. And I don't say this in any, pat myself or ourselves on the back. But as far as real professional songwriters that raise a family and make a living and send their kids to college on their songwriting, there's about as many of those as there are professional baseball players. Sure. And so if someone says they're good and they're a baseball player, you'd say, well, was the team, did the team go to the state championship?

1:00:25Was your son the standout pitcher? You know, I mean, like there needs to be a real discernible talent that's starting to be realized. That's what I'll tell you. You can't just say, I love it. It doesn't mean you can't bloom later. It doesn't mean you have to be the world's greatest singer, musician, or whatever. There just needs to be some sense of there's a connection to what this person wants to do they're good at. And they're really good at it. And so that's the first thing I ask. To answer you, to be your own best critic and go, am I as good as anybody I grew up with? Am I starting to stick out above the rest?

1:01:02I think that's a key metric to be kind of your own best critic and then short of that there's always people, you hear stories about well, you know, I was working on my daddy's farm and all of a sudden I sang a song and the next thing I know I should be good those things always happen I'm not saying there's not many exceptions to the fact that you were the high school standout I'm just saying if you need to know how much you love it you need to have a certain sense of how good you are at it and then if both of those things pass the sniff test how much you're going to work at it and how dedicated you are to do it.

1:01:34And you hear all the time, this is a 10-year town, or people come here and they think it's overnight success, and you find out they've been banging the streets for five, six, seven, eight years. I would definitely go to a music center if you can afford it, even if just for a visit, whether it's L.A., New York, or Nashville, and try to glean everything you could. There's all sorts of organizations, songwriters associations, Nashville Songwriters Association, ASCAP, BMI. And just learn and study and really kind of dig into what makes a song good and kind of do the stuff that's work. It's not just necessarily the fun part of being a songwriter.

1:02:10It's the work part. Like studying the craft, why is this guy's song so good? Learn from the best, study the best, and then write. You got to write. And there should be no excuse for you not to write if you really want to do it as a career. And if you're saying, well, I can't afford a guitar or I don't know how to play the chords or whatever, then you need to overcome those hurdles. You know, you need to learn the chords. You need to learn or whatever. And then just the effort is undeniable. Just there's no, you know, if you work that hard, you're going to get better. Now, if you become better to be good enough to make a living at it, it remains to be seen.

1:02:48But the answer I say was just unbelievably be real with yourself, focus on it, write with everybody you can. Even if you write with somebody shitty, you'll learn something from the process. So don't use an excuse, I can't find anybody to write with, or I don't have any songs, or no one around here knows it's any good. And then if you're feeling all those things and making excuses that you're in the wrong place, find a way to get to Nashville. Find a way to get to L.A. Nashville being the most welcoming, I would say, of them all because it's smaller, it's more condensed, and people are much more open to just having a meeting with you than I think in L.A.

1:03:22or New York. and it doesn't have to be country music I just think it's a really welcoming place still and I love that about it Totally I don't know if that answers the question because there's certainly no answer if I knew I'd do it everybody would be a great songwriter but I think being real being really real with yourself and then show the work ethic is and then showing your stuff around playing I mean playing open mic nights I mean every place has those kind of things Right. Typically, if you're really good all the time, we know, man, I heard this guy in Omaha. The word gets around. Yeah. Yeah.

1:04:02Yeah. No, that's great. And right. I think, you know, everybody listening to this is like, I do pass the stiff test. I am the greatest ever. I am the best. Why are people paying attention to me? Where's my publishing deal? Chris, I think you're going to get a bunch of emails being like, I'm the best that ever was. Will you give me a publishing deal? So I think, you know, I think it's hard to be objective about your own work. And, you know, you know better than anyone. And so I think getting out to a hub like you mentioned, and you'll learn pretty quickly when you're amongst the greats and you're amongst other people who are grinding.

1:04:36And, you know, you may be the greatest in your small town or even in your state. but then you get to Nashville or LA, you'll be humbled pretty quickly when everyone else is better than you and they are more successful and everything. And you can either use that as inspiration to become better. Or find a new career. Or find a new career. Or give up and go back home because it's too daunting. Totally, I've seen it both ways. Invariably, there's songs on the radio that we all roll our eyes at. Like, oh shit, how did that piece of crap get on the radio? Look, it's just been playing with us. And so if you tell a young writer that, they'll go, this song is certainly better than that song.

1:05:15And you go, yeah, it is better than that song. And they'll go, but that song was a hit. Don't compare yourself to the worst that's out there that's successful. Compare yourself to the best that's out there that's successful. Absolutely. Because the worst out there that's successful, there's myriad reasons why that could be successful. And it could just be because they had a billion dollars in their family to put behind it. And that's something you can't really control. But what you can control is your work ethic, like you said, and you can control who you write with. And there's a lot of stuff that you can go to there.

1:05:47And then, sure, there's going to be the anomalies out there that just, you know, come out of nowhere because they have privilege. There are songs that we internally look and we go, God, when a piece of shit like that goes up the charts, it just makes our job that much harder. Because everybody goes, mine's as good as that. And we go, yeah, it is as good as that. But we're not signing that. Sorry. Yeah. Totally, totally. Totally. Well, Chris, thank you so much. This has been a great conversation. I really appreciate all of the wisdom that you impart and how transparent you were. I have one final question that I ask everyone who comes on the show, and that is, what does it mean to you to make it in the new music business?

1:06:24What does making it mean?

1:06:29Ooh. Well, you put the new word in there. For me, making it was when I was still in my 40s where I was like, I didn't even know. I was doing well, but I think most musicians by nature are pretty insecure because we know how fleeting the success can be. So there was a moment where I was like – I remember I had a very clear moment where a song came on the radio that I wrote and produced. And then the song right after it was a song on the radio that I wrote and produced. And I had this moment. I took this big deep breath and said, I think I can make this work. I think this is enough of a validation that I might be here for a few minutes.

1:07:07But in the new music business, I think it's just learning technology, learning the, I mean, being facile at all those things that, you know, Pro Tools and things that go into making music these days and understanding those tools. And then if you ask me, what does it mean for me to make it in the new business? It's very satisfying. What does it mean for someone else to be? I think it's just a matter of what your own goal is your own goal. If your goal might be to have one song recorded, if your goal is to make a million dollars, it's a different goal. What does it mean to me? To me, it means still being here after 40 years of doing this and still being somewhat relevant.

1:07:49To you or someone else, I think it just means that you're making quality work that people are recognizing at some level. And hopefully, it's on the upswing. Because I think there's really good times ahead for music. I think there's some challenges, but I think we're getting paid more than we ever had in certain ways through streaming and other sources. And this whole AI thing is going to be a big thing we have to unwind. But I don't think songwriters are going away. And I don't think anybody should be daunting like, well, I can never make a living in that business because of the economics. I think songwriters are earning more than they've ever earned right now.

1:08:23Now, it's a select few, so it needs to be wider. Don't get me wrong. But the ones that are doing well are doing very well. and hopefully that trickles down to even the people doing in the middle doing pretty well this episode was edited by ruben zarate with music by brass roots district and produced by all the great people at ari's take