The Revision Blueprint: How the "57th Version" Rule Builds Empires

After a career at the summit of the music industry, most recently as the Global Head of Country Music at Apple, Michael Bryan reached a definitive conclusion: scaling without soul is a race to the bottom.

In this masterclass on creative discipline and longevity, Michael reveals the Southern Drift manifesto, a blueprint for leaders and creators who want to build empires that last 40 years, not 40 seconds.

If you care about ownership, taste, and protecting your upside in a world obsessed with extraction, this conversation is your field guide.

In this episode, we break down:

* Why Michael walked away from one of the most influential roles in music
* What Apple taught him about restraint, integrity, and the long game
* Why algorithms cannot replace taste, intuition, and human curation
* How artists and leaders can protect their creative leverage in a culture built for speed
* What it takes to build something meaningful, high trust, and built to last

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Filmed in Nashville, TN
Produced: Stephan Hogan
Mavericks Media Co. Production

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Michael, welcome to the podcast. Michael Bryan is my friend and the former global head of country music at Apple. And he is here with me today. He left Apple six months ago. True. To the date, to the day almost. Really, like this week, yeah, for sure. And um, we're gonna kick it off a little different today. And Michael sent me uh something he wrote a while back. He said, Hey, what do you think about this? And I said, I think it's amazing. It's where my head and heart are are are at, whatever you want to say. So I would I asked him to come and read it and to share it to just like start our conversation. So um I feel like this is a part in a wedding where it's like, would you like to read your vows?

SPEAKER_02 0:47

I would like to read my vows. I and this is a a pretty vulnerable place to be because uh I have been staring at this and working on this and reworking on this, and like, you know, it's it actually kind of speaks to the theme of of of what I'll talk to to in this, but like a process of like putting this together. Um, and you know, I I feel like it it um the reason I feel vulnerable about it is is I'm just nervous that it could feel too much like it's it's about me. It's really about my thoughts about the art that we all love so much in the business. Um, so let me give it a shot. Um that's what we want flamed. If I get flamed, I get flamed, but no, we're you're already looking at Taren.

SPEAKER_00 1:33

You're not allowed. Not allowed. Uh no, this is that's what I want because I just we the whole thing is about the humanity of it. And a lot of times people are just afraid to say what they think.

SPEAKER_02 1:44

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

And I and I hate that, man. Because the on content, it's either like I saw this graph, it's like super polished content does good or completely unpolished, vulnerable content does good. And everything in the middle is most of what people post. So, like this is like you being able to be just honest, and I think that's very important, and that's the conversations that need to be had.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

The title is The Music Industry Has a Revision Problem. Subtitle We are optimizing for speed in a business built on longevity. Stewardship, not extraction, is how music lasts. And here we go. The modern music industry has confused speed with progress. We are living through the most democratized era in music history. Access is unprecedented. And yet, in the rush to maximize output, we've quietly devalued the very thing that made music matter in the first place: the voice of the artist. The industry built-in ecosystem, and I say that in quotes because I hate that term, that rewards constant visibility over careful listening, content over conviction, velocity over meaning. At Apple Music, I watched brilliant teams fight for years to get a single product right. They didn't ship the first version or the 10th version. They shipped the 57th version. Not because they were precious, but because they understood something fundamental. Integrity is the only thing that scales. The hardest decisions were never about speed there. They were about restraint, about protecting the core idea just long enough for it to become inevitable. That discipline is increasingly absent from the music business. The result is what I call a revision deficit. Today, artists are told if they stop posting, they disappear. Careers are valued in viral spikes. Songs are judged by their first 24 hours. Data is treated as destiny. But data cannot predict Johnny Cash. It cannot account for the gravity of Muscle Scholes, and it can't explain how culture moved from the Mississippi Delta into the rooms where Music Row once operated as a craft, not a factory. Those careers were built slowly by musicians who listened as much as they spoke, by storytellers who understood that the work comes first and everything else follows. Real music doesn't come from chasing relevance, it comes from proximity to truth. Six months ago, I stepped away from my role at Apple Music and stopped moving. I turned off the phone. I gave myself time to think and to tune into what artists have been saying quietly for years. They are not asking for shortcuts. They are asking to be taken seriously. That realization is what led me to start Southern Drift, not as a reaction to the industry, but as a return to something it moved too quickly past. Southern Drift is built on a simple premise that great artists don't need more pressure to produce, they need space, the context, and the support to build bodies of work that endure. That requires a different kind of discipline, less urgency, more conviction, fewer releases, better ones. It means working with the artists the way the South historically has, treating them as long-term cultural investments, not short-term content engines. Not everything should be accelerated. Some things should be protected long enough to matter. The American South has always understood this, not as a genre, but as a discipline. This region is the source code. It has produced a disproportionate share of the world's most influential culture, not by moving faster, but by holding the line, by treating musicians as culture bearers, not content generators. Somewhere along the way, we forgot that. We started treating artist careers like startups built for exit rather than heirlooms built to endure. The solution is not to reject technology, it's to recenter the artist inside it. Artists don't create to feed an algorithm. They create because they have no choice. And we rush that process when we flatten it into content, we don't just lose songs, we lose context, we lose lineage. Careers are not disposable. They are bodies of work, they deserve stewardship, not extraction, sustainability and strategy held together deliberately. Over the past several years, I've been falling in love with fly fishing. It's where I go to step outside the noise of the business. In fly fishing, the drift isn't aimlessness. It's alignment. It's placing the fly in the current so naturally that the river accepts it. This is how music has always moved through the south. Not forced, not optimized, but trusted. The noise has never been louder. The signal has never been clearer. The question is whether we're willing to protect it. That is the work now.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

I love that. And there's I listen better, close my eyes as I'm listening to it and knowing the original one you sent me in hearing that. Um I have this part of me for some reason that's pushing back on these ideas on uh I'm like, that's a great idea. But what about this entire huge framework that's been built on commerce over creativity, where the pendulum was once creativity and then it swung way too far in the other direction to make money? And you're basically saying, hey, like the fly fishing analogy like stillness is key in this whole thing. Space for the artist to create. Okay. What are your thoughts on how we get there? What does that look like? Because I couldn't agree more as a creative and the pressure that everyone feels, and the people that I talk to on this podcast, where you don't have one job anymore, you have seven jobs, one of them being a conscientious creator full-time, you know? Yep. And then fighting the the algorithms and all that. So where do you want to start with this man? Talk to me, because you're managing Charlie Warsham.

SPEAKER_02 8:18

Uh we are managing Charlie Warsham. And Charlie is really the ethos of what, you know, if somebody says, hey, what is Southern Drift? Um, it's an artist who uh cares so much about the art and has done it the hard way, the long way, the strategic way, um, that's put everything they've had into something to get to uh a point where they are universally, you know, beloved in this town. Um so Charlie has, you know, just sort of take you back. Um he's one of the first artists I met when I moved to town in 2012. Um I came to town to uh to run radio stations for iHeart Media. Um I had been in radio forever. And uh we sort of get to town, and there is a very massive sea change happening in country music in that moment. Um Charlie had been signed, I think a year or two prior and making music. And, you know, his his North Star musically is Vince Gill. Um and, you know, I think I think the way Vince shows up as an artist and as a person and with the sort of heart is is how Charlie has sort of modeled his his career. And so he's making great, authentic, real country music. Um, and then uh I think right after this, and maybe it gets to your point, um, right after this, this is when the you know, the massive movement that was bro country really unfolds. Um and that changed how we market music. That changed how we, you know, that was really the first era of social media um changing the game in country music. I can remember seeing Florida Georgia line having, you know, a thousand Twitter followers. Um, and then crews exploding. Um, that was at the same time that Charlie was making this really unique, um, authentic country music, authentic to him. Um, and then this sort of mass thing happens with those guys, FGL, um, who were brilliant uh writers and artists in their own right, um, and Sam Hunt, and a whole sea of, you know, you could put Luke Bryan in there um for parts of his career. Um, this whole sea of of change that then became like the beginning of what I think are viral moments, you know. Like I could remember writing on a pedal tavern with Florida Georgia line, um at their first single. Um, I think they had they maybe had just signed their label deal um with Big Machine at the time. And they, you know, were figuring out how to like go uh find fans out there and playing on the road. And we rode from Music Row, um where the radio station um was at the time, WSIX, and we got in the Pedal Tavern and rode over to like Losers. And I don't know if you remember, they had this song called um Round Here, and Around Here had that fireball whiskey. And so we all did fireball shots, like you know, insane people. Um, but but I I think that you know, there is this push-pull um for art versus commerce, and I think the dichotomy of Charlie Worsham versus an FGL in the moment um at that time kind of starts to articulate where things have gone. I mean, there are really talented people who are wildly popular. There are also really talented people who no one's ever heard of before. And I think that one of the things that I'm I'm seeking to help is like, you know, like I've I've got a Starbucks uh cup here, um, and I'm drinking tea uh today. I'm usually a coffee drinker. Um I mentioned to you earlier that my my great friend, mentor, and you know, one of I think our industry's most important thought leaders, a guy named David Messias, who founded 30 Tigers. He and I have been having these really like deep intellectual conversations, intellectual on his part, me just nodding along as an East Tennessee boy with a public education. That's me right now. I'm right near message and and and uh David had made a point to me very recently, and you should talk to him, by the way. Such a great, thoughtful human being and and just a great leader. Um, he said, you know, uh I think one of the problems that we have right now is that Spotify is kind of like Starbucks. Um, you know, they're built for scale, they're built for volume, they're built to sort of keep you kept coming back longer and to keep you listening longer. Um, you know, the algorithm has become the measure of success. Um, you know, and I think that um Starbucks makes a great cup of coffee that a lot of people love. Um, Spotify makes a great product. They changed and helped uh, you know, remonetize the music business. There is absolutely no doubt about it. But um, we're in a place where um, you know, simply maximizing for an algorithm um really puts you in a position where uh where true art gets overlooked. Um and you know, and I and I think I even saying true art, I feel gross saying true art because uh what people you know create that works well in an algorithm is also art. Um it just uh is I think I'm challenged by the the idea that it's it's for a specific purpose, not for you know, sharing your your heart necessarily, you know? Yeah. Um and it's it's a really tough topic. And I think there's so many people in the industry that are trying to figure this out. Um, but you know, that that whole algorithm, you know, what works in an algorithm versus what works in um in a live setting um is is a big uh gap a lot of times. You can obviously have a hit song that people scream along to live, but there's some connection points that sort of happen um in a place where I really want to um you know to help focus to get some of that sort of back.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

I'm just thinking about this on scale. This is where my mind goes. Yeah. It might just be how I'm wired and it might be from the conversations that I have on this podcast. But what I see when I think of Nashville right now is I think of deliberate decisions positioning people to become brands and release music that can be mass consumed, commercial hit songs that can go on to that artist selling out a stadium that can generate hundreds of millions of dollars over the span of that musician's. I think of like a Morgan Wallin. Yep. And so I juxtapose that model like where you have to if you're a radio station, if you don't want to play Morgan Wallen, you have to play Morgan Wallin. There's these artists in the format that are just superstars. Yep. Let's rewind back to you're from East. East Tennessee, yeah. So the history of country music is rooted where you're from. Yeah, Bristol. And if you look at if you watch that Ken Burns documentary on country music, which I'm sure you have, and I have, everyone needs to watch it if you're into country music. That whole thing never started as a let's sell at stadiums. And at some point I don't know what the point was, it got us to where we're at now. Yep. And I guess at the end, in any industry, the desire is always going to be more and more and more and more and more on the fiscal side. Like how much revenue can we generate? Yep. The thought is nice in that let's give artists more space, let's then let's let them create works of art. But then at the same time, my other thought is how's it gonna go anywhere when you're in a model that's designed for a brain that's trained for an algorithm with a short attention span? That's my immediate reaction. It's like, this is a great idea, like world peace. You know? Or is it just sidelining? We're not trying to do the stadium thing.

SPEAKER_02 17:09

We're taking everybody wants to get their art out to as many people as humanly possible. And right now, the at the at the very highest level, that's in football stadiums across America and around the world. No doubt about it. I would love to have Charlie Worsham headlining a stadium um somewhere in the United States or around the world, especially in in London. I would love that. Uh, he loves the UK, loves to travel internationally. I would love that. And I think that um if it happens for him, it will be for different reasons than it happens for for others. I think that there is this content factory that exists to um to you know force uh you know listening through the algorithm.

SPEAKER_00 17:57

Um did you see that at Apple? Like were you part? I mean, you had to like because we talked about Spotify, but I would imagine like looking at playlisting, you see a lot of the same songs on Amazon as you would on Spotify. Of course.

SPEAKER_02 18:11

I mean, it's sort of commoditized at this point. Like, you know, all the DSPs are, you know, like imagine the the beauty of this. Um, maybe beauty's the wrong word. Uh you can for 11 bucks a month, 12 bucks a month, whatever it is now, have the entire history of recorded music in your pocket um to listen to whatever you want. Well, that all of those things are pretty much the same across the different DSPs. It's all of the same um catalog of product. And if you look at the different playlists, today's country on Apple versus Tot Country on Spotify, um versus uh you know, Country Heat on Amazon, I think that you're gonna find that that the hits are the hits. Um they are mostly the same. Um and so the the differentiators for um I think for each of those platforms is to try to present it in a different way that's that's you know unique to you know their subscriber, their sort of fan base that they're trying to build.

SPEAKER_00 19:13

So your job at Apple, like you guys have, had the podcasts, um, you did videos with artists and kinds of different kinds of things to be able to highlight in a unique way the artists, uh, as would other people that are or sorry, other DSPs that are in the market doing Yeah, I think there's a you know, um let me let me give you uh as much as I can.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

Um, you know, I've I've been out now for six months. Um I think that, you know, at least in in my understanding and the differentiating point for Apple was always about human curation, right? Um, a love for artists. Um, you know, like Apple is kind of at the the intersection of um, you know, technology and the liberal arts. And um the the really compelling part of how they built that brand over a very, very long period of time outside of music, inside of music, um, was uh cultural relevance. And I think that the design around um trying to uh more humanize, you know, a platform that does have the same product as other, you know, they're they all have different features, but it's the same essential catalog, right? Um, you know, Apple Music Radio, from my perspective, and the reason that I joined to help build it um for country music was to tell those stories and how have you know artists uh you know to to a pay them um to uh come in and tell those stories and to give them an opportunity to connect in a different way, you know, bring playlists to life, if you will. Um but and I'm I'm super proud of you know being a part of that and and helping um bring that along. There's so many incredible people that work there. There are so many incredible story be stories being told on a daily basis. Um, you know, some of the best interviewers in all of music. But but I think as I understand the strategy, um, it was really all about trying to set it apart, you know, humanizing um the differences um between the you know the platforms by letting the artists tell their stories. And I think that all of those platforms have their own focus areas. Spotify is incredible at social strategy, so good.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

What kind of coffee shop would uh Apple be?

SPEAKER_02 21:45

Oh, that's a really good question. I I think that um I think Apple's a bit higher end coffee shop for sure. Okay. You know, like I really like Crema and and you know, there's one in Nashville and one in Brentwood. Um, you know, I also like You know, the pour over that you can get at the well. Um what kind of coffee shop are you going for? Um with Charlie. I I think we're trying to hit um, you know, people that really care about coffee, um, and people that really enjoy the taste of it and the smell of it and the way it feels um and the way it makes you feel. That's what I think we're we're targeting with Charlie. And you obviously have talked to him at length. Um, you know, I I think that um I'm actually a little uncomfortable comparing him to coffee now that I think about it.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

Um, but I get I think it's just a fun comparison because you used the Spotify Starbucks thing, which is very easy to understand, two household brand names, one that we all use or consume on some level. And then when as we kind of narrow that funnel down and we work it into the like the ethos or the the idea that you have and that you're implementing in your company, who is the target market? Who are those people? And uh I think it is the person that might be like, I've had a lot of coffee, and the more coffee I drink, the more refined my palate gets, and the more I want to try new coffees. Yes. And I tried that I tried crema, and it was like, at first to me, it tasted kind of fruity, but I went back and I like tried some more, and I realized that light, light roasts are different than dark roasts. And then I got into it more, and I started to understand the beans and where they came from. You know, it's like you kind of get this refined palate when you get into something.

SPEAKER_02 23:39

In the original, I don't know what I called it soliloquy, but manifesto the manifesto that you sent me.

SPEAKER_00 23:47

Didn't didn't did you say something about like it would take 10 listens? I don't know if you did. I did not. Okay. I read this somewhere or was talking to someone where it was like, it would take 10 lessons to a track on a record before you fell in love with it. And what you're saying is the system set up for it to be not the first 10 listens, which could have been 40 minutes of listening time. Yep. It's no, no, the first like 30 seconds is that.

SPEAKER_02 24:20

Oh, absolutely. I mean, there there is an entire um, and I think this started in in hip hop in particular. They were realizing that uh longer songs were causing more skips um in Spotify in particular. And so there became a movement, and this is probably five, six, seven years ago at this point, where uh it became shorter and shorter songs. It's the hook up front, as soon as you can, you know, get to the hook of the song. Um, and I think there's value in that. And I think there's um, and I think it scares me too at this at the same time. Like, I think when you're adjusting the art um for the delivery platform in order to like there's reasons to do that, but it it just doesn't align with my own values of go make the best art you possibly can, and then we'll figure out how to to help market that and help tell that story.

SPEAKER_00 25:16

Tell me about some artists in history who went and made the best art they could without thinking about an algorithm that come to mind.

SPEAKER_02 25:26

Chris Stapleton, the Traveler album. Um, I got to hear that um because of my position at the time, um, you know, running radio stations here and and my friendship with with the great uh Dave Cobb who produced that record. I got to sit with Chris, just me and him one and one on one, listening to this this record. And that was not made for commercial intent. That was, I'm sure he was, you know, thrilled that it became such a massive success. Um, but there was a cultural moment that that entered that into the zeitgeist, you know, at the CMAs that year with with Justin Timberlake. But, you know, I can remember him going, Man, you heard this old George Jones cover, uh, Tennessee whiskey. And you know, I'm I did so I did two covers on this record, and and he talks about, you know, for the love of George Jones doing Tennessee whiskey. Um, like that's different than let me put the hook up front in this thing so that it'll feed the algorithm so that I can get more consumption and make more money. That's a different um approach, I think.

SPEAKER_00 26:34

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SPEAKER_02 27:21

I I actually don't know uh uh, but I don't think to I think he was making great art for the sake of making great art because he had to. That's what I think.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

Yeah, because well, he had written so many hit songs too on the songwriter level. Yep. And he had played uh what's his bluegrass? The steel drivers. Yeah, steel drivers. Um, so he like that good corn clicker.

SPEAKER_02 27:43

Yeah, Rainbows Never Die. Yeah. Some of the best music ever recorded in my face.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Seriously, dude. Um, so for me, I'm like thinking about Stapleton. I don't I remember when I first heard it, it was just someone that texted it to me and I listened to it, and I was like, Well, this is so different, this is never gonna work on country radio. Right. This is at the time I would but I would say like the bro country movement was still kind of happening.

SPEAKER_02 28:09

Yeah. I mean, that was as probably 2015, is my yeah, we just hit the 10-year anniversary of Traveler list past year. I think it came out in May of 2015, is when it came out.

SPEAKER_00 28:18

Okay. So a decade ago. Yeah. Plus 11 years. Let's say you got Stapleton, you got this unique thing, it's way different. He made it kind of an organic way with his buddy Dave Cobb, and it became a global phenomenon. Yep. Stapleton, because of that performance, I can't drink you away, I believe it was. Yep. That Justin Timber, like giving him that opportunity was like the thing that changed.

SPEAKER_02 28:45

Yeah, it was Drink You Away and Tennessee Whiskey Together, kind of that's what it was moment. I was in that room, like everybody in that room knew what had just happened in that moment. I just got chills thinking about it. But yeah, I I think I think really the intent, um, as I understand it, and you know, I like I don't know Chris Stapleton. Um, but I I do know um what I've seen him say about that period of time and that music.

SPEAKER_00 29:14

Um, you know, the connection to Vince there for him as well. Absolutely, as is Charlie. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 29:21

And I think I think similarly, Charlie and and you know, and Chris were are were and are both universally beloved in town. Like the industry was cheering so hard for Chris Stapleton in that moment and still cheers hard for him because he did it the right way. He showed up with a huge heart. He um, you know, like man, you don't want to sing next to Chris Stapleton in a writer's round in one of those days. I mean, like, um crazy. And every like every single person knew the level of talent that that that is and was. I I feel the same way about Charlie Wersham for different reasons, you know.

SPEAKER_01 30:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

Um back to our coffee shop analogy. So when me and Haley travel, like I was telling you before we started, my favorite thing is to find the little coffee shop, the local roaster. I love it. And there's something special and sacred, and then I'll remember that spot and I'll be like, oh, I want to go back to this place, but I'm more excited about the coffee shop than I am the location, just because of uh I'm I love vibes, I love coffee, I love everything about it, man. There's just something special about it. It's like a great record, and I I like that analogy, so we'll stick with it. But um the what I'm kind of curious about is first off, Stapleton's remarkably talented. So you have to have the talent, yep, you have to have the songs, and you're not saying like anybody can do this. What you're saying is there's a lot of talent that's not being heard, yep, that I believe in. And we also see a shift in music consumption to my knowledge, in terms of well, I've said this before, but like just human consumption. We want less smartphone usage, there's apps on your smartphone to make it not smart. There's dumb phones, yes, or whatever you want to call those ones that just do basic things. People are using iPods now, people are using cassettes. Vinyl sales have gone up 19 years straight in a row. They did like 1.0 billion last year. Uh, the vinyl spots here in Nashville are slammed with pressings, like they are just scaling at massive levels right now. And a vinyl, a record brings me to my question and brings me to my point, which is it forces you to sit and listen to the work of art that the artist intended versus a single. We're in a time where we are hungrier for authenticity than we've been in a long time. Because we've hit such a climax of what can I believe and not believe? This is AI, this is fake, uh, the Gen Zers, and I don't know what the generation coming up after them is, but it's like a lot of them are not doing the social thing. We see so many like cultural movements of people like kind of saying, I I don't know what to believe, I don't know what's true, and I kind of want to go to a record store. My buddy's son's a Gen Zier through and through, and he goes with his buddies and they go hunting for records.

SPEAKER_02 32:40

Yep. And I have a 17-year-old daughter who loves vinyl, she loves the experience of it, she loves to like light a candle and play a record on her little record player in her room and not be on her phone.

SPEAKER_00 32:54

That group of people, they are the next people that are buying concert tickets to go see artists. So break it out for me in terms of what you would love to see. And I know you talked about how it's been in your manifesto, but what do you want to see moving forward if you could be the one that had your hands on the controls?

SPEAKER_02 33:24

So um let me try to break this down uh a little bit uh further. So I grew up working in the radio business. My dad owned an AM radio station in East Tennessee. That's I started when I was 14 years old talking on the radio. Um and was in love with the radio for a very long time. Worked all through my 20s, um, moving market to market, trying to get, you know, five more grand and a better title and climb the ladder. Um, and one of the things I've I've now been out of terrestrial radio for over a decade. Um, and one of the things that I saw coming um with that particular business um is that radio used to tell people what was cool for a long time. First it was DJs, then it was program directors. We, you know, told the audience, we think this is awesome. You must listen to this, check it out. Um, and then they started to ask the audience, what do you think is cool?

SPEAKER_00 34:24

Um and you could call in and request.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

Yeah, call, request it, and and and and then it got to the place where there was so much research being done um to uh sort of show up uh and and make sure you're giving the audience what they want. So you ask them what they want and then you give it to them over and over and over and over. Um, I don't know if you see where I'm going yet. Um my very big fear right now is that the algorithm is about to do the same thing on the streaming platforms. Um, so so again, we used to tell people what was cool, used to be able to say, hey, you know, culturally this is important and this is a moment and you should pay attention to this. Then we were like, hey, what do you think is cool? Let's give you that a lot more so you can listen longer, um, so we can get more money because the ratings are bigger. Um and so we basically dumbed down the the tastemaker discovery point, the, the, you know, sort of that moment. Um, and again, my huge fear right now is that all these platforms um are, and I think it's quite obvious, building a taste profile on what you listen to, the signals that you send. And I'm sure there are thousands of different data points on on you. You listen to this, you skip that, you save this to your library, you um, you know, you started this one, you favored that artist. Um, then it gives you more things that are similar to that in order to keep you listening longer. So passive listening. That's the same thing that radio did that it ended up causing them to give up the discovery position. It ended up causing them to sort of give up relevance, cultural relevance, um, and and it has caused the revenue to tank ultimately. Um, you know, my my fear is that there's not enough tastemaking going on generally in in the business, you know. So I I sort of circle back to your your question. Um, you know, what I'm trying to do with this company is find the very best artists that I can to represent and give them the space and the support around them um to to let them create the things that and then and then we'll let the chips fall where they where they may. Some of them will be gigantic, some of them will uh be gigantic in their own hometown, right? And um my hope is that um by taking care of the person and taking care of the art, um, you know, in a way that that allows them to get their truth out versus, I mean, can you imagine the Rolling Stones going, um, man, let's create this thing so that the algorithm um, you know, will feed it to more people and their taste profile. Can you imagine that? Um, you know, you it and like they're and I think that the the ones that are truly successful are not really doing that, but there's an awful lot in the middle that are, and it just scares the crap out of me. Um it hurts my heart for for people who, you know, can't do, don't want to do anything else. Like I think artists are artists because it's all they want to do, can do, you know. Um, they have to do it. And so um, you know, so much of the attention of an artist day right now is focused on what time am I gonna post? How am I gonna post? What am I gonna do? You know, they're a content engine versus uh, you know, uh a creative uh actor, right? And it really hurts my heart. And so what I'm trying to do is find that balance. Like I think if you make great art, there's a there's a better than likely chance that the the commerce will come from that. And it's my job to find the commerce um on behalf of of the artists that I think are great. Um, and and that's sort of the mission, I think, of Southern Drift.

SPEAKER_00 38:32

As you grew went through that radio history. Yeah. And then there was the act that was signed in the early 90s by Bill Clinton, the consolidated radio, uh, the Telecommunications Act.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

Yeah, 1996. Oh, 96. That caused, you know, uh people to be able to own eight radio stations in a given market.

SPEAKER_00 38:55

Yeah, and now it's like what, seven dudes like basically control country that own like the majority of stations. There's like a very small number.

SPEAKER_02 39:02

There are there are really like three companies that own the majority of them, and there's some outliers. Um, but but more than that, there are only a few tastemakers that get to make the selections for all the things. And it's um it's actually not dissimilar from the algorithm now that I think about it. There's a there's a device called a PPM or a portable people meter that people carry with them that tracks ratings. And it's only in the top 50 markets, um, but it's designed to uh you know pick up what you're listening to in a given moment. And it goes back to this company, um, Nielsen, um, that um that then measures and gives you know radio stations results and then gives advertisers the ability to, you know, spend money against one of whatever those whatever audiences they're trying to reach. Um and so I think that that one of the places where I fell and fell out of love with programming radio stations and trying to build those audiences is that um we got to a point where we would instead of trying to do things to make people tune in, we would try to avoid um things that created tune out. And that's what's happening in algorithms, in my opinion, as well, right now. You listen to the post Malone album, at the end of the post Malone album, autoplay starts and it gives you stuff that they think you'll like that's close to post Malone. And um, that has actually driven considerable consumption um because you know it's it's a it's a passive lean back listening uh where they just want to make sure that you listen more. Um, you stay on longer. It's not dissimilar from you know the algorithms that make up uh all the social media platforms, TikTok. They're trying to get you to it's a it's a sonic algorithm. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. And I think I think that um based off your taste profile. So it's gathering data. Yep. What did you listen to? What did you, you know, what did you save? What's in your library? What did you search search for? What did you skip? You know, did you wait 30 seconds before you skipped it? Did you wait 60 seconds before you skipped it? I think all of those things are being tracked, and it's not unique to any one platform, it's all the platforms. I think Spotify probably got there a lot faster than the others. Um, you know, like their tech prowess is is pretty substantial. Um, and they've changed culture because of it. But I mean, think about it. Even five years ago, editorial playlists um were the measure of success. Um, new you get on New Music Friday on Spotify, and that meaningfully changed your career um in the moment. I think those days are are you know long gone at this point. I think that the um you know, the consumption that comes from those, um, you know, I think it's been sort of well uh uh well advertised that that you know a playlist is no longer a strategy, not that it ever was, um, but yeah, if there's if there's something I could I could you know convey to artists out there um that are that may be listening to this and trying to learn a little bit about the way the business works, like the you know, the idea that you can get on a playlist and it changes your whole life is just not a thing. And it doesn't matter the platform. You know, editorial curation is so wildly important. Um, the people that do that at those those platforms um care about the music and they care about trying to expose new artists. Um, but I do think that the the the value, you know, on the consumption side is now much more heavily tilted towards the algorithm and it scares me.

SPEAKER_00 42:44

I know for me when I'm listening to like a uh if I check out the Hot Country Plus every once in a while, which I don't do, I it's like my quarterly lesson.

SPEAKER_02 42:55

Yeah, when we see the state of country music. Yeah, where yeah, and then it's pretty good right now, by the way. How about the Ella Langley record? Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

Ella Dandelion, come on, yeah, shout out to Joy Beth Taylor. Right, so good a lot of that, yeah. Ella and and um the thing the thing that I'm so interested about because my heart is so much where your heart is. And then I've I've had so many conversations in the last two weeks with like movers and shakers and in country music in the music business from particularly from the publishing side. In fact, this week I had two meetings and it was interesting because it's all like you know, we make money on number ones. We have to have writers that are writing hit songs. We have to have number ones, number ones, number ones. Radio. Number ones at radio to make any money for for like the writers. And in the event, like um, let's just say Charlie um owns his masters, he would make more money. Or like, yeah, if you're an independent artist, you own your masters, you make more money. But the likelihood of you going to radio and going to number one on radio is an independent artist is very slim. Yeah. Slim to none. It's happened like once, I think, maybe. Yeah, Drew Baldridge. Yeah, I think Drew did it. Um, but the interesting thing to me is all these guys I talk to, they're and even with the writers that they sign, they're not looking for artists, they're just looking for people that can write commercial hit songs that are better than the other people's writers' commercial hit songs that the other company that they can pitch to the artist. And it's just that's how music rows operating. And you said, what was your words? You turned it went from uh something to a factory in your manifesto. Um, it's like uh tin pan alley, yeah, kind of a situation, almost.

SPEAKER_02 45:10

Yeah, I mean I think like I mean to a certain extent, um a lot of music row sort of studios, like you you walk in, there are session players who are absolutely incredible and they're there to get a job done for a period of time. And if they can make more music, they can make more money. And if they can, um, and it and I think that works across all the different functions in the in the music business. Um, you know, I I think it's right now it feels like you go schedule, whether it's music row or somewhere else, you go and schedule your five days in the studio or your seven days in the studio. Um, and you go and you got to get those things cut because there's the budget and here's what we could, you know, and and so that I think that's what I mean when I when I say like the the factory side of it. Like what I would love to see happen, and I know you know economics uh plays a huge role here, but like the idea that you could go and say, we're gonna go, you know, Almond Brothers and Muscle Schultz, good example. We're gonna go take over this studio for as long as it takes. 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, whatever it is. We're going to make things, we're gonna walk in and um hang. You know, I think that, you know, the commercial aspect of it all is always going to, you know, rule the day. Um, but I think it it does put us in a position where it's harder to get the refinement that you need when you've got four hours to cut this song. Or the clock, you know, ticks and it's like, well, uh, those three guys gotta go, and there's the next thing. Like that, you know, I think the patience and the ability to sort of take more time to make great things, um, you know, does does worry me. And that's that's always been part of what Nashville is, but I think it's it's more and more that way now. Um, you know, and I think there's there's also other ways that it's happening. People are making songs in their bedroom that go to number one, right? Um, so there's there's sort of that. But I think that the the system um is is more and more designed for the quick hit, um, the quick moment. We got to turn this thing, turn and burn, let's go, you know? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:26

When you talked about revision Apple, you said you guys would spend years on something and it would be like revision 57 or something.

SPEAKER_02 47:34

Yeah, I here's the thing. Um, you know, and and I I I certainly don't ever want to speak out of school. Um, I still respect the people there. Um and and the company the company as a whole. Um, one of the great things about it is the the the number of times they said no to something, you know, it's like there's a pretty big gap between good and great. And you gotta say no to a thousand good things in order to get, you know, a great thing. And I think that's a quote from from Eddie Q, who heads services at Apple. Um, you know, but but it's a sentiment that really, you know, is hard if you're on the receiving end of the no, but is ultimately the right decision. And so when I say, you know, you don't ship the first version, um, you know, there are so many brilliant people that are making products that change the world, and that but there are so many products that are on the cutting room sort of floor that never made it out the door. Um, and so I think that the the sort of the thesis that I have is that we need to do more revising um to get to a better product, and then ultimately that better product will have commercial viability. And my job is to find the commercial viability once I can give the artist a space to create that product.

SPEAKER_00 48:57

What is the difference between, because of revision, between perfectionism and stewardship?

SPEAKER_02 49:05

Ooh, that's a really good one. Um, I think that I think that you have to have a little of both, actually. Um, I think that um, you know, stewardship helps sort of marshal along and and provide the resourcing and the time and the space to um to get an idea to the best version of itself. I think that perfectionism, most of the best artists and best creators are often perfectionists and are and and hate to give up that final, like hate to say it's done, hate to say it's finished. Um, I think there is a uh scarier part of perfectionism, um, which which you know prevents you from getting out of your own way um and knowing when something is great. Um and I think that the most creative people I know uh, you know, are sort of are challenged by that. So stewardship to me is more of the the people helping you get to the the thing. Um you can obviously steward an idea along um as the creator yourself and and are, but but it's the it's having the um the time and attention and focus to to make sure it's the best it can be. Perfectionism on the other side of that really can um can just be paralyzing.

SPEAKER_00 50:23

So my follow-up question to that is about protecting the core idea long enough for it to become inevitable. Yeah. Not premature. So what does that look like?

SPEAKER_02 50:45

Yeah, that that goes back to the um, you know, the number of versions, you know, uh that goes back to uh that to that line that I wrote in that that piece, very much inspired by things that I heard um over, you know, time at Apple, um, specifically around the way um Steve Jobs, and this is he said this in in many public interviews and videos, um, would would continue to sort of refine, refine, refine. There's this sort of notion of rock tumbling. Starts with a bunch of edges, you know, and over time and revision and you know, that process of breaking things down, you get to something that's really smooth, right? Um, and polished. And I think that that idea is a is a through line in in art uh as well. Um, and I think that the the the people that are are willing to to to keep trying to improve, um, you know, and and know the right moment that it's done, um sort of become the elites in whatever their field happens to be, you know. So, you know, you ask about, you know, staying with that idea long enough. Um, like there, there is a there is a moment where this thing's complete and done. And, you know, at a company, at any of the big tech companies that work in this sort of multiple, like, you know, matrix management environment, meaning there's different functions that all have to lock arms and agree on a thing before it becomes, you know, the final idea. Um, you know, there's lots of different stakeholders that you have to get aligned around that, that sort of thing, right? Um, and you know, a core group then looks at it and goes, okay, I think we've, I think we're there. I think we're there. Um, but uh there have been, you know, mistakes across history, um, you know, with lots of different product rollouts at lots of different types of companies where they just hadn't thought through the thing um quite long enough for it to become inevitable. Um, you know, it's like had they kept revising, kept cutting, kept focusing, kept editing, um, you know, perhaps it couldn't have got it could have gotten there. And so, yeah, I think I think that that that process is um is is where the tr where the truth sort of comes.

SPEAKER_00 53:10

I feel like there's a monopoly on music in a way. Just due to the fact that all the DSPs play the same songs on all their big top playlists on what's fed to people. By definition, isn't a monopoly basically uh you're owning the complete share of the market and there's not competition to it. Is that a fair definition? I think it's close enough. Um, because that that just in an unfair way. Yeah, like Ticketmaster just got uh there was some lawsuit against him. You probably saw that uh they were determined to be monopolizing ticket sales. I wonder if there's gonna be a like tech reaching point that's a breaking point, just like there was in ticket sales, just like there is in music that'll open the door more for the organic stuff. But I'm I I'd like to know, and for the audience, um, people that are maybe independents, that are working really hard on refining their craft, or that are starting to put out music on DSPs independently through like Tune Core or Distribution Service. I'll just use myself as an example. I'm someone that worked really hard, wrote a record, me, and you were like, all right, I've got this new company Southern Drift. We stand for these pillars. This is us, we're not a Spotify. What we're for is letting the artist be the artist, not not uh putting the pressure on them, but letting them have the clarity and the freedom and the space to create. I love you back to your fishing thing. Yeah. Everything's too noisy for artists, so to be able to cultivate a space that's uh not noisy is really special. And I think a lot of the great things happen in stillness where you have time to actually think. And being in this town, it just feels very noisy when I look at the music business side of it. It's just like it's stressful. So I like living outside of Nashville.

SPEAKER_02 55:27

Yeah, there's a lot of pre a lot of pressure, I think, on artists and a lot of pressure on everybody who's in the business trying to earn a living doing it.

SPEAKER_00 55:36

There's a lot of pressure, man. So like if I let's say I had that record or whatever, and you were like, Stefan, I love what you're doing. I want to sign you to Southern Drift. Now, what are the in your position and designing a new model that's your own thing, where you're like, we're gonna do this our own way. This is what I've seen happen through my career. Now I'm able to pivot and take what I think and what I believe in, what are what are my convictions and apply this to a framework that's going to be my business moving forward? That'll probably inevitably shift here and there, as do all businesses. Yep. Um let's say you signed me, but we don't have the the funding of a Sony or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 56:25

So exactly what I have going on with Charlie Russians, what you're saying.

SPEAKER_00 56:29

So exactly what you have, but it's just another version of that. Yeah. You're like, I have this artist, I believe in them, but we don't have millions of dollars to get to country radio. What are the strategic steps that we can take? And the reason I asked this, even though it's a super long question, is because I think that it needs to be asked because right now I feel like the only way to that stadium success is pretty much that label side. So without the millions of dollars, how do you do it? And so are there things that you're discovering that are moving the needle for you that you could share with us?

SPEAKER_02 57:10

Yeah, I so I I think that if if I had like one central point of failure um that I see most often with artists, it's it's a true lack of storytelling. Um and so and and I'm gonna say this really, really broadly. Storytelling um changes uh your ability to connect. Um it's it's you know, the most successful people in the world are great storytellers. The way they can um, you know, uh bring something closer to you as an idea, um is uh is a difference maker. And so I, you know, just in the day-to-day of of working on an artist like Charlie or working artists on an artist like Stefan, um, it's really getting to the core of like who is this person? What do they want to say? How do they want to say it? Um, and then uh pulling every lever that I possibly can out of relationships, people that I know, um, you know, being able to pull financial levers uh that I have to be able to hire the right, you know, outsourcing and you know, to to really enhance that storytelling, whether that's video or social um, you know, sort of strategy at a at a certain sort of level. But I think that the only way I can sort of go and fight for that is to believe an artist's vision for what, you know, their idea of what they what they wanna what they want to do. I need to be aligned with that vision so that every day in a hundred different conversations that I'm having in order to move one thing forward that moves three other things forward, um, I can clearly articulate, you know, that that vision, mission, um, and value. Um, and and so that might sound buzzwordy um a little bit and jargony, but I think that at the core of it, it's like the belief allows me to have the energy um to just be relentless in pursuing um every single opportunity that that sort of comes. So good example. Um, on, you know, we had a great moment with Charlie um on this first single of this new project um that was written by Laney Wilson. And Laney sang background vocals on it and you know, agreed at very near the the last moment to come on as a as a featured artist. And I think that happened because of Charlie's relationship with Laney. And I think that that happened because um, you know, Mandolin is such a smart, you know, manager and she's supporting her client at at such a high level um that she knew when to push, knew when the right moment was. And and I try to do the same thing to always be respectful of the moment. So we're fighting above our weight because we've got some help from Blaney Wilson on this first single. Um, we're gonna have some help from others later on down the line on this album rollout. So it's like you have to be scrappy and strategic and creative, and all the things it takes to actually make the art, then the people around you have to go and build that world around that that art. And so, I mean, it takes hundreds of phone calls and hundreds of text messages and emails and standing on your head, you know, to get attention on a thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:57

Um I wonder if because the way that you just described that being scrappy, using the resources you have, the relationships that you have, which is huge. I mean, the music business and most businesses are relationship-based, yeah, and which is really cool. Actually, I did I kind of dig it.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:15

But it makes it different than independent artists who has none of that.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:19

Yeah, yeah. It is, and is it was that you're gonna be your point? Well, I was gonna say, like, so my biggest musical love is the Laurel Canyon stuff and the history of Laurel Canyon, yeah, and those artists that came out of that. And Tom Petty, man. Yeah, dude. Petty, brought the there's some cool documentaries on it, and then how all the artists would just get together and they would write and they would create, and how David Crosby kind of held the keys to that whole thing, and Crosby says Nash, one of my favorite groups of all time, and the Eagles and Jackson Brown, and just the whole thing, Linda Ronstadt, all that like SoCal music that came out. I I wonder if they're they're not like they weren't thinking about the algorithm, like your Rolling Stones thing. None of those guys, none of the people that are the best, whether the Eagles just went like 50 times platinum for the Eagles' greatest hits. They were not thinking about social media, they were trying to write great music, learn how to write great music, be a great band, and I know that they got signed and had a great manager and all that, but there's a I think a huge scrappy piece to it that has gotten bypassed for a lubricated system. I completely I completely agree with that, and I think that so it's almost like we're going, you're you're you're going vinyl, you're flipping it from like the the digital to the analog in your business structure almost, which is back to but I can also play in those other spaces and pull those levers and yeah um and turn those knobs.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:00

And so I think the balance of of both of those things, like I think the the creation of the art needs to go back to the vinyl um mentality, right? Yeah, which is you know thoughtful, intentional, strategic, uh, you know, really trying to get to the heart of that refinement, you know, and pure curated and pure, right? And then from there, we can go and and you know sort of put fuel or start the fire and then put fuel on that fire with all of the modern, you know, sort of technology and techniques. I have a deep understanding of of why it works the way it works. I just disagree with it. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:42

And I think that's cool, man. And it's hip. Someone at some point has to be the one that decides to do something different.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:51

Well, I mean, you know, I've I've had corporate handcuffs on for a really long time. You know, I have been in a corporate job with a direct deposit every two weeks since I was 22. I'm now 48 years old. Okay. The last six months is the first time that I haven't collected a paycheck and have uh put up a bunch of my own, you know, uh resourcing in order to make a go at this. Um, and I have never been more energized, um, never been more excited about, you know, I can wake up today and decide we want to do something differently and lean into that. I can, you know, wake up tomorrow and hear a song that changes the entire game and shifts culture. And and I can decide I want to work on that. And I think that um I think that spirit of wanting, you know, just a deep desire to do things differently. Um, you know, and let's be honest, nobody really knows. We're all guessing, we're all trying to figure it out. Anyone who tells you they know are full of shit. Um, that's just the reality. Um, and but given a lot of um, you know, experience and seeing a lot of things and you know, like the data inputs that that creates in your brain over time, I think we got a better than than average shot at really helping um some artists that um that will matter to audiences and fans, you know.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:29

I I see, like Charlie said on my podcast, and I'll butcher it, but he basically said if you don't know who you are, other people might decide that for you, and you might not like who 100% they decide you are. And that happens at labels. My buddy Caden Smith was signed. They're like, you should do your hair like this, you shouldn't do this. There's people that are signing them, it's like you need to lose weight, you need to do this, we're gonna send you off to this. And like they create a brand and a person, and it's a creation and a mold. You have all these voices and you're young and you're listening to all these people tell you what you should and shouldn't do, but you take it as gospel. Yep. And I hate that. I think it's disgusting. And I think what what I when you said real, uh I think you believe I think you said real artists. Did you say that earlier? And you corrected it because you're like, they're artists too. Yeah. But I totally got what you were saying, which was basically this it's not fabricated, it's honest. It's honest. And I think that's what we're hung hungry for. Yeah. Uh is honesty, man. Like, again, back to we don't know what to believe. You watch one news station that is on one side, yeah, and one on the other.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:43

Neither really details, you know, completely different story.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:47

Yeah. No, no, we're honest. You don't know who to believe. One of the beautiful things about music is that it's something that is bipartisan that we can all love. And uh it is when you dig into challenge that for a second.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:01

Okay. Um, yes, it's bipartisan. It's not at all.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:05

It's because Bob Dylan was at the Martin Washington.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:10

Yeah. And also it's like, I don't know about you, but it's really hard for me. Um, when I know uh, you know, whatever sort of level of of uh politics behind something. Um like I I have a hard time not like not knowing that after I've learned what their what their politics are on a given thing, right? That's hard for me. Um but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:33

So if you knew my political views, it would be hard for you to work with me. Is that what you're saying?

SPEAKER_02 1:07:37

That is not what I'm saying. Um what I'm saying is like uh I I think that you know, when people show you who they are, believe them, right? And I um I've definitely had things where I was like, wait, what? That person who had this polished image of a thing that they've built over time is not actually the thing um that I thought they were. Um like it becomes heartbreaking and I can't hear the songs in the same way. Um and and I think it actually goes back to, let's take politics out of it, it goes back to your your sort of previous um assertion, which was um, you know, the difference between, you know, truth and fabrication, you know, like like did we make this thing in a lab, or was this thing sort of birthed into existence from a place of honesty?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:30

Yeah, you know, was it like you sent them out into the wilderness and said, Go find yourself?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:36

Right. It's like come back with a beard and a song called Traveler of Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:42

Yeah, and a job of a line. Right. Yeah. But that's I guess the bipartisan thing was like culturally, we could go to different cultures, but we'd all connect over music, no matter what we believe. For sure. That's the thing that I would I guess I'm getting at. And so um, Taryn, there's this lady I heard about you talk about um this mystery woman that may or may not be in this room. How did you guys meet and what's the story there?

SPEAKER_02 1:09:14

Um incredible story, actually. So Taryn would describe herself, sorry about this, uh, as the Asian knockoff version of my wife. Um so Taryn and my wife Kara have been friends a long time, a decade. Um, they had a similar at the same mentor um in in business and life and became friends, and they're both uh recovering lawyers. Um and they are What do you mean by recovering lawyer? I mean, don't practice. Um our trained attorneys um have practiced at different times, but don't do it anymore. Um uh because at least I can't speak for Tyron, but I can speak for Kara. Um I shouldn't, but I will. Um I think it was soul sucking for her to, you know, lawyers a lot of times do not get uh a call with good news. You're not calling a lawyer with good news most of the time. You're just not. So they get paid okay Yeah, they get paid great. Um, but I think you know, my wife was a was a IP and trademark attorney for a long time and then you know, tried to get out of it and did some other things, and then came back in. I actually met her because she came into uh a job I was leaving. Um, she came in to do business affairs at CAA, the town agency in town that I worked at for a number of years. Um and so she was an entertainment lawyer uh in intellectual property you said? She did IP and trademark, and then she came in and and you know, uh, I think she she's certainly not an entertainment lawyer by um by training, um, but came in and and reviewed a lot of the you know, touring agreements, that kind of thing. But anyway, um back to Taryn. Um Kara and I had been talking for a while about, okay, I'm gonna start this company, what am I gonna do? How are the and she just at one point was like, you know, what about Taryn? Um so Taryn has history as a uh was it a business management firm for a long time, has been a CFO at another uh really prominent management company, has a huge heart for um for giving back and um recruited me onto a board of uh the family and children's service uh about a year ago. Um if you in Nashville uh dial the number 988 um because you're in really you know serious uh need of help, suicide, what have you. They're the people that answer that call in Davidson County. Um and they've been around a long, long time. And she recruited me onto that board. We started to get to know each other even better. Um, and when this sort of came up, we I just started asking her questions and before long, it was like, oh, we have to work together. So Taryn's our COO and GM and is the first official hire a couple months ago. Um, and then we have uh another person that has just started this week. Um, and that person is named Jordan Isbull. Um and Jordan is uh our VP of marketing, and she's also uh the executive producer of the God's Country podcast, which we are now representing. Um Jordan is uh gosh, one of the funniest, smartest, um, best relationships I have ever like it's been around. I've known her about 10 years. Uh we met when I was at CAA. She's done digital marketing, had her own firm, been a day-to-day manager. Um, but she's been leading marketing at uh Virgin um in Nashville for the last several years for country, Christian, and kids music. Um, but bright light, incredible human being. Um, and so she has just started and we are off for the races. She is the queen of storytelling and you know, having some scale um there. I mean, Charlie does the Mississippi on the map podcast, which is great stories from the state of Mississippi, also does the um the 50 years from home with with Vince Gill um that he's hosting this year. And so, you know, I think how to cut on that. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:10

I know that's uh I got to watch Charlie talk about me. It was kind of cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:14

That was very cool. Um, when did you when did you actually record that or write that song? Like um, when was that? And was it did you write it with Vince?

SPEAKER_00 1:13:24

Yeah, I wrote it with him at his house. Uh I don't even remember. I have the um it's a long time ago. Do you know? I don't know. Wow, all I know is that he called me and he was like, Hey, cutting our song. I know where it's gonna be in a track list. And I was like, sick. This is my first cut. He's like, Well, it's a pretty good one to have.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:51

Yeah, you're gonna get a first cut, get a first cut with Vince Gill. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:55

Like, you know, so it was really exciting, and the crazy part about that quick side story is I was in this guitar competition with Vince Gill. I met him, I met Larry Fitzgerald, his manager at the time. Yep, and the song that I played was Eliza Jane in the guitar competition. So that's the one I soloed over. Long story short, fast forward um 10 years almost, I get that phone call. He releases a record. I had an instinct that the cover was going to be the white guitar that he played on Liza Jane, which was his famous white telly, and then it was, and then I was also had an inclination that yeah, like that would be the track that was the one that they put at the end of each of his EPs. They put one of the old hits on there, so that was on there, and it was crazy because it was this full circle moment of me going from me playing that and holding his guitar and playing it all the way to having a song on the EP with the same guitar and the song I played 10 years prior that led me to it. It was just such a weird full circle moment, which was really cool, man. But Charlie's done such a good job and knows Vince so well and has so many stories, and um, yeah, Vince is someone I look up to a lot too, because he's the kind of person that you should be in this business. Yep, and that's who Charlie is, and that's yeah, Charlie very much is um, you can tell, and I think mentorship's really important. I feel like Charlie's really been mentored by Vince in an awesome way. Yeah, and Marty. Yeah and just you know so we talked about the revision, yes. And a revision deficit. 57.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:48

That's actually a number. I it's probably not 57, but that's the number that I always use when I pull out, like, you know, uh 57 times. Yeah, you know, I don't know, it's something that's kind of in my brain, kind of ingrained there.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:03

One of my favorite parts that you said in this was uh you went back to the gravity of muscle shoals. I it cannot explain how culture moved from the Mississippi Delta into the rooms where Music Row once operated as a craft, not a factory. Yeah, those careers were built with emphasis slowly by musicians who listened as much as they spoke. Yes. If not more. I've often heard the wisest person in the room is the one that says the least. And I got this tattoo. Yeah, dude, and I got this tattoo. It says, be quick to listen, slow to speak. Because we all have that problem.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:50

I absolutely am challenged by that every day. Um, and I I really am trying hard to um to listen more than I speak.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:01

Last question. Six months ago, I stepped away from my rollout music sound movie. I turned off the phone. I gave myself time to tune in to what artists have been saying quietly for years. They are not asking for shortcuts, they're asking to be taken seriously. When you turned off your phone, which I find to be really refreshing.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:32

And very hard, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:34

I got two phones for that same reason. Was one is literally two people have the phone number, and my wife's one of them, and then my mother-in-law, because I I have to separate the two, but you turned off your phone when you did that and you stepped away and you're fishing and all that, and you gave yourself room to breathe and to be able to think. What was not even just related to music and career, but what was the biggest thing that you feel like a light was shined on in your life?

SPEAKER_02 1:18:09

Ooh, that's a really tough question. I the first place I go to is that um I've absolutely been driven by more, better, faster, uh, higher level next rung on the ladder, um, next opportunity, more money, you know, more success, more notoriety. And the reality is that very little of that actually actually matters. Like very little of that actually matters. And um, you know, one of the reasons that I I got to a place of wanting to step away from, you know, sort of a corporate environment and and wanting to to move on um to to build something. Um, you know, two really big moments happened in the last couple of years for me. Um the first, about a year after I was a month after I was named into the the final role I had at Apple, I had three over six years. Um, but the final role, um, a few weeks later, uh, a person that had worked on my team at direct report, um, her name is Corinne Barlow. Um, she had been diagnosed with cancer um a few months prior, and things looked to be moving, you know, in a good direction. She was in remission. Then it came back, and within I call it 90 days, she was dead. Um, she was 42 years old, um, single mom, two teenage kids, and I'm a few years older than her, and she just was my right hand for years. I mean, I probably I I I know there were many, many days I talked to her more than I talked to my wife because of everything we were doing and trying to build. Um, and that just like hit me in the gut. It was like, oh my God, what am I doing? What am I spending my hours doing, my days doing? Um, that was the first like sign that, okay, I've just gotten promoted into this role. Uh man, I'm not sure it's going that well. Um, and this has just happened, and um, I'm really starting to rethink. Well, a couple months later, um, another very close friend, like my closest friend in the music business for 25 plus years, um, the person who's been there for every single career change, every single, you know, you need advice on some of the person, the person that, you know, sort of ushered me into Nashville and walked me around. Um, her name is Leslie Simon. Leslie, um, I've known since we were babies in the business, a couple years older than I am. Um, she had had breast cancer over a number of years and it had come and it had gone, and she was in remission, then it was back. And I think the last time that she had gotten the sort of the rediagnosis that it was back, I was with her in Florida. Um, and I get an email from her in December, um, a couple of months after Corinne passed away that was like, you know what? Um, it's back, it's bad, and I'm not gonna do any more treatment. And at that moment, it was like, okay, well, I've had this thing happen with Corinne, this thing happened with Leslie, you know, and she ended up passing away a couple of months later, you know, was able to text with her, you know, within a couple of days of her her passing. And I immediately like pulled the ripcord at that moment and went on leave at Apple. Apple is really great about um just incredible benefits and resources for people in those moments. And and I took uh I think 30 days off and came back in and during that time decided uh this is not gonna be for me anymore. And I don't know at that point what it's what it's gonna be to build, and I don't know if am I gonna do am I gonna work somewhere else? Am I gonna go do something on my own? I don't know. Um, and you know, over the course of several months we figured out how that was how the exit was going to happen. And um, and so it did in October. Um and that's when I sort of put the phone down. I went to the water. Um, took my wife on a trip to to England. Um, you know, she deserved it. Like, you know, there was a big portion of my time at Apple that I was managing, you know, very large teams um with direct reports around the world. I mean, I had people that were reporting to me directly who were in London, who were in New York, LA, Nashville, um, you know, with teams in, you know, lots of Europe, Australia, etc. Um, and it was all-encompassing all the time. You know, you never are off. It just it's just not the way it works. Now I'm never off, but I'm never off doing things that I want to be doing for the reasons that I want to be doing them. And that feels really different, you know. 5 a.m. in the morning, I'm bouncing out of the bed, and I've never been able to say that in my life. I am not a morning person, but I got an idea at 5 15 about what we're gonna do with this next thing for Charlie or this next thing for, you know, the God's country podcast, or a couple of other clients that I can't share yet, but I'm really excited about. Um, and then it's like off to the races, and Taryn's responding by seven. Um, you know, we are on it, and I love the act of of, you know, building and creating and finding a way to help. And that's what I think I was sort of put on the on the earth to do, and that's what I'm gonna spend the rest of my career doing.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:41

There's nothing like losing someone that will make you re-evaluate. Yeah. And I love what you said that none of this really matters that much. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:56

Yeah. I mean, there were there were times where I would look and go, uh, okay, so the only people in the world that care about this thing that we're talking about right now, which is total bullshit, are the six people that are on this email thread that have been going on the same email thread for the last four days. What are we doing? What are we doing? Um, and you know, I just want to spend um spend life uh and enjoying doing things that that light me up with people that I love. Um, and with you know, supporting people that I also love. You know, but that's that's where I am in life. And maybe that's just part of getting older and you know, having more experience and getting kicked in the teeth a bunch of times before you kind of realize, oh wow, this is what matters.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:46

I love that you said that. I echo that sentiment and the bell is ringing right as we wrap up. Um Michael Bryant, where can we what should we do to support your artists as we wrap up close? Um, because Charlie obviously he's doing great. He just released that single, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:17

Yeah. This weekend, um, if if you should happen to have uh tickets to stagecoach, Charlie would be playing banjo for Post Malone Sunday night. Um, that's really incredible and continues to be a theme where we just get a phone call that's like, hey, is Charlie available to play whatever this thing is for whatever this thing is? Because he can play everything. Because he can play everything. Then he then right after that you'll see Charlie playing guitar uh with your hero and his uh Vince Gill um on a bunch of shows. Uh we got a really cool uh tour in Mississippi um with the Parchman Prison Band um at the end of May, which is a heart life moment.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:55

Um that was on and they were on his podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:57

They were on his podcast, and that changed his entire existence. And we are going to go tour with that band um throughout the state of Mississippi for several days. Gonna play at the Grammy Museum. Um, there's going to be a family day at at uh Parchman where basically families of prisoners get to come into the the prison one time a year um for four or five hours and sit and have a picnic and hang out with their family member. Um and we'll be there that day with Charlie. And, you know, without a guy like Charlie, that kind of thing doesn't happen. But yeah, CharlieWorsham.com, Southerndrift.com live now. If you want to do something to help Charlie Worsham, um you know, and and and this will be a little trick for artists as well. One of the most important signals that you can have your fans do is save a song to their library in Apple Music or Spotify. That sends a bigger signal than than other things. If if if people are active, it's it's the difference between active listening and passive listening. Save that, play it from your library, search for his name. If you do those things, it's just gonna help um with with gaining more exposure. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:11

That's good to know. Yeah, insider trick.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:13

Little insider trick. I uh, you know, it's been publicly discussed many, many times, I'm sure, but uh so I'm not giving away any uh inside baseball. I don't know any anymore anyway.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:25

Hey, my last question. I do have to have you tell the story of uh uh your Zane Lowe interview while you're on this podcast. Um because I'm a Zane Lowe fan. I think he's a great interviewer. Yeah, and it was just your high one of your hiring things at Apple. And so you when you Oh my gosh, I can't believe I told you that.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:44

That was a can you can tell that story? I can tell you that story. So um I was uh I was still at CAA and I was in Los Angeles for the Grammys. I gotten a call from Apple. Um, and I was under like a nondisclosure because, you know. It's it's cloak and dagger stuff. Um, and you know, this this brilliant, brilliant um leader at Apple named Jen Walsh was the person that hired me and she was walking me through all the process of the people that you need to interview with. And it's a gauntlet. I mean, up to and including, you know, Oliver Schuster is the head of Apple Music and now that of you know TV um and sports and all kinds of other things. Um, and she's sort of shepherding me through this entire process. And she's like, look, at a certain point, you're gonna meet with Zane Lowe. And I'm like, I am such a fan girl of Zane Lowe. I like that guy is in it for all the right reasons, one of the best interviewers to ever do it. Um, and uh, so I'm at the the Apple offices in Culver City, and um, you know, there are normal offices and then there's like Zane's office. Zane has like an artist, he was at the time heading artist relations in addition to his um talent role. And it's course, you know, there's not a desk, there's not a computer, it's just a lounge to talk and have conversations. So I sit down and he's wearing his sort of classic beanie, and we're in and we're talking about um uh you know a whole bunch of things, and he's asking me, you know, standard like getting to know you kind of questions. Didn't feel like an interview, like a job interview. It felt like a, you know, like he was interviewing me on his show. And and I stopped him and I was like, Man, can I ask you a couple of questions? And he goes, Yeah, sure. And I said, Tell me this. Um, you had an interview that you did with Billy Eilish and Phineas, and it was on like a park bench in Paris, and there's people like walking by, and you know, I'm really curious how you get uh so comfortable with an artist that you can ask some of the hardest questions and they don't feel hard. And he's like, What do you mean? I was like, Well, you kind of asked Phineas how how hard it was to have wanted to have been the artist um at the beginning of all of this and be chasing this career, and then end up being, you know, an artist in your own right, but really the producer and partner to your sister that's now this global superstar. I thought that question was one of the most incredible questions I've ever heard because it it like the trust you have to have to be able to say something that might be really vulnerable to somebody in that moment. Um and he kind of sits back in his chair and he goes, uh this meeting is over. And he stands up and he walks out of the room. We're like 18 minutes in. Um, and he goes so then I hear from Jen who says, Oh, you just killed that. Like Zayn is says, you know, uh do not pass to go. This is our guy, he has to be the guy. We're hiring him. Um, and he I think because of um, you know, my ability to see him in that moment, he was able to go, okay. I think I see this guy as well, and I think I know what his heart is, and I think that's what we need to do for artists in in the country music space. So it was a wild thing. I'll never forget it. Like, that's my dude. Um, you know, one of the smartest guys ever.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:21

So he just gets up, walks out, and gets up, walks out.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:24

I'm sitting there, like and you don't know if he's pissed or not. I have no idea. Uh it's like, did I just, oh man, I think I just totally blew this huge opportunity. And and what he, I mean, he literally stood up and walked out of the room. Um, you know, and I think what he said to Jen was like, he gets it. Um, you know, you guys feel good, he's the guy. Let's do it. Like it was just it was just one of those things, but yeah, I can't believe I told you that story. Almost nobody knows that story. I guess more people know that's true now.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:53

Um, but he told it to me because I I got you, I did a Zane Low on you at breakfast.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:59

Yeah, that's right. The very chin strokey, you know, even yeah, dude. Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:07

I pulled my own. How are you moving in this world? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:11

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:12

Dude, I appreciate you coming on and sharing uh not only about your history and your past, but where you're going, giving some advice that I think artists desperately need. Uh, they also need the encouragement of this. Is there a place people can go and read this?

SPEAKER_02 1:32:31

Uh it's gonna be on the website. Um it's it's actually gonna start a new uh blog, and I'm saying it out loud because I'm gonna hold myself accountable to it. Um, it's gonna be called the drift. Um, I want to talk about things that are going on in the music business and the trends that are happening, the things that I'm seeing, um, ways to help. Um, you know, it'll be free, not some sort of like subscriber substack play. It's it's really gonna be about trying to share some knowledge that I've gained over a long period of time and also like reacting to things that are happening. Like if I were writing one today, I might react on the Ticketmaster um, you know, live nation piece. Um that may be something I react to.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:11

Oh, you're awesome. So are you, Stefan? And I'm so stoked for you. I'm stoked for the freedom that you guys have. I don't remember the exact terminology you used, recovering, I believe it was.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:24

Recovering lawyer, yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:26

And uh maybe for you, recovering um whatever you want to call it, because there's the recovering executive recovering it, yeah, recovering it.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:38

But um, I'll tell you this, man. I'll tell you this. We are going to have more fun doing this than um than just about anybody. Like that's that's my goal. And I believe that if you put some relatively smart people in a room having more fun, I will bet on fun and um you know, plus that strategy all day, every day. I think we're gonna do some really great things for artists, and um, and if not, we're going to have a blast either way.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:09

Stewardship, not extraction, is how music lasts. I'm excited for you guys. Uh, love what Charlie's doing. I'm excited to see what is going to happen with your company. Uh it's you, Tarant, and there's Jordan. Jordan Iswell, yep. And the three of you are all and there's more that I can't say yet, but there's more. There's another person who doesn't have to be a little bit more than a lot of people. You're building the the not the team that cannot be stopped. Yep. Well, awesome, man. Thank you again for being here. And um, you guys, if you enjoyed listening, please smash that subscribe button. It's like the uh version of saving it to your library for YouTube and um Spotify and all that. Share it to your socials. And I think Michael said something really important, which was the fact that there's a lot of things that we get consumed by. We don't know how long or short life is, and I think it's really important that we take life one day at a time. And a lot of the problems that we have that we feel like we're wrapped up in are not as big as we think they are, and it's important to love the people that we have now, and uh I feel like your heart is awesome, and I hope that you guys get that vibe as well. Do something kind for someone this week, buy them a Starbucks while you're in the drive-thru or uh crema or anything, and we'll see you next week for the next episode. And just statistically, over half of you aren't subscribed. So, again, please do that. Share it to your Instagram story if you love this stuff. And um Michael, thank you again. Thank you, buddy. Appreciate you.