Don’t wait for help, do it yourself. Just like you can record and distribute yourself, you can promote too.

If you’re waiting for a manager to start, don’t. A manager becomes interested when they see money. And at the beginning you’re not generating any. Establish a track record and managers will be interested.

Major labels only become interested when you prove yourself too, albeit at much higher numbers. Seven digit Spotify streams particularly. If you ain’t got ’em, they aren’t interested. Major labels no longer develop something, they make bigger what already exists, at a price.

A major will write you a check, but it could be the last one you ever see from them. Chances are if they’re interested, you’re already making bank in streaming. If you’re not hip-hop or pop, tread lightly, it’s doubtful there’s anything they can do for you except increase debt.

Decide who you want to be. A hobbyist, a touring musician or a superstar. This affects your path. A hobbyist does it alone and does not bitch, they’re happy to have a semi-career at all. A touring musician…it’s all about friends/relationships. It’s your local crew that will break you. Better to start at home than move to Los Angeles. And don’t move to New York, it’s over, real estate is just too expensive, and ever since Lucian Grainge decided to base himself out of L.A., the City of Angels has become the epicenter of the worldwide music business.

Big deals are no big deal. A TV appearance, radio play on your local station, all that used to mean you were somebody, now it just illustrates you’re on the road. It’s easier to play than ever before, but harder to make it. If you’re lucky you’ll have a series of breaks and one day you’ll wake up and realize you don’t need a day job and have a career.

Festivals, festivals, festivals. That’s where you gain traction outside your burg. But not the gigantic festivals, the Lollas or Coachellas, but the smaller ones, more specialized. The attendees are usually more attentive and if you’re good, word can spread.

Are you a recording artist or a touring artist? The fame is in the former, the money is in the latter. If you know how to play, it goes a long way.

Agent before label. Manager somewhere in-between. Bands break on the road. Hip-hop and pop break on the internet. To work on the road successfully you need an agent. It’s a Catch-22, you can’t get an agent to book you until you’ve proven you can book yourself and make money, just like you can’t get a job unless you’ve got experience. Figure it out, no one said it was easy.

Everyone can rap, not everyone is good and not everyone can be known. You play online, making virtual relationships, and augur for success. But even if you’ve got an online hit, that does not necessarily mean you can sell tickets. And everybody but the labels are interested first and foremost in tickets (and merch!)

Everyone will lie to you. No one wants to break a relationship. You can only trust yourself, sorry, but that’s the way it is.

Decide whether you’re a player or a seller. If you love Instagram and know how to promote, become an influencer or a PR person or a manager. Sure, new acts need to promote themselves on social media, but they do call it the MUSIC business. People are inundated with clever messages online, but you will only gain traction if your music resonates and is spread, and the only way you can do this is to create great music.

Go where people are not. The barrier to entry may be low, especially in hip-hop, but you’re competing with zillions of people. Better to find a genre and excel in it with a twist. You can always twist metal, country and rock, never mind smaller genres than that, like folk and klezmer and jazz. This is how Florida Georgia Line made it, by integrating hip-hop in their music. Never forget, music is as much cerebral as skill. In other words, if it were only about skill the chart would be dominated by Berklee graduates, and it’s not. Think. And if you can’t, align yourself with someone who can. Conception is the key to art. That’s how the Ramones broke, that’s how most new sounds break.

If you’re a singer who does not write… Good luck, no one has ever broken from “The Voice,” and they’re on television and can sing well!

Writing is a way in. Write a great song and not only can you play it, others can record it. Never underestimate the power of a great song. And publishers are always looking for them. It’s easier and more lucrative to enter the music business via publishing than recording. And once you’ve proven yourself as a hit writer, you can do the recording thing. This is how Chris Stapleton broke. Sure, continue to play, but once you’ve written hit songs, you get recording opportunities.

Demos must be professional, near-records.

Don’t make an album if no one is gonna listen to it. Just put songs up for free on YouTube, etc. and see the reaction and adjust.

Don’t pay big money for a nobody or has-been producer to make your recordings. You don’t have enough money to get it to sound right and they’re just doing it for the money.

If you’re not a star, realize it. If you weren’t notorious in high school, for either fitting in or not, for the way you dressed or rejected fashion, the big time music business won’t be interested. Sure, you can earn a living touring, but don’t expect the infrastructure to be excited about you. Stars are born, not made. Hits are made, but the raw material comes first. Can you say David Bowie? Can you say Kanye West?

You should be discouraged, you should not be encouraged, music is oftentimes a lonely life with little remuneration. While others are working their way up at the company food chain, getting married, buying a house, having kids, you’re still living in your parents’ basement driving an old beater. If you’re not cut out for this life, don’t start. And if you are, you must be committed. Of course you’ll have moments of doubt, you’ll want to give up. Oftentimes the darkest hour is just before the dawn, i.e. acceptance and riches. But very few people see the dawn. Know this. How many elite players are there in tennis? Way more people want to play music for a living and there aren’t that many more spots. The work is hard and the odds are low and the spoils go to those who pay their dues and stay dedicated.

Grows.

Does not give the audience what it wants, but what he/she wants.

Refuses to repeat him/herself.

Is interesting in satisfying him/herself, not fans.

Are cutting edge, they lead the audience, not vice versa.

If someone doesn’t hate what you’re doing, you’re doing it wrong.

Challenges the audience.

Acts on inspiration, not desperation.

Runs on emotion, not intellect.

Will hear no more than they hear yes.

Are constantly told how to do it by people who can’t do it.

Doesn’t self-judge based on the money they make.

Knows when they do something great, they don’t need the audience to validate it for them, they already know.

Stretches. To repeat oneself is emotional death. And since an artist runs on emotion…

Refuses to look back unless they want to. Once you play to nostalgia, it’s hard to push the creative envelope once again, the world has labeled you a has-been.

Needs help to make it but must push back against that help.

Is inherently tortured. Needing to get their message/soul out. They don’t fit in. Their goal is to express raw humanity so that people can connect with it, they channel the zeitgeist.

Are always ahead of the audience and the critics. People are confounded by artists who do something for the very first time.

Don’t stay in their niche.

Are people first, not factories.

Are tuning forks. Their goal is to have their work resonate with the public.

Don’t change based on blowback or criticism. You must have a strong heart and ego to pursue artistry. As soon as you blink, you’re done. And the audience is unpredictable. Give people what they say they want and they often reject it. The artist wags the tail of the audience, not vice versa.

Is not a business, man. Unless their business is business.

Focuses on their art to the exclusion of almost everything else, they must do this. They have to surround themselves with people who get it/them. Because when the inspiration strikes, you’ve got to be able to work. And you oftentimes work at strange hours, when everybody else is already asleep, because you need to get rid of interruptions and the noises in your head to lay it all down.

Know the difference between selling and creating.

Is looking for a manager who will pave the way, obliterate distractions, convince intermediaries to allow the artist to do their thing.

Are abused. Because the artistic personality doesn’t fit in with regular society. The key is to have enough success to do it your way and only your way. To exclude the audience completely is unacceptable avoidance. The artist’s goal is to influence society, but this can only occur when there is intersection of the two. Sure, you can cut off the outside world, but this only works if you don’t complain about the lack of attention and money.

Tune in tomorrow, Tuesday August 20th, to Volume 106, 7 PM East, 4 PM West.

Phone #: 844-6-VOLUME, 844-686-5863

Twitter: @lefsetz or @siriusxmvolume/#lefsetzlive

Hear the episode live on SiriusXM VOLUME: HearLefsetzLive

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app: LefsetzLive

And they want you to know they’re in charge. Even though concomitantly they’ve broken the system.

We used to live in an era of authority. Oh, I don’t mean “authoritarian,” I mean we respected those who paid their dues, via education and experience, to tell us what was going on, instruct us and lead us.

But today everybody is a leader. And what followers there are are so deep into their beliefs that they hate you and what you do, whatever it is, if it impacts them at all, sometimes even if it doesn’t!

People used to know their place. There was a ladder, and if you chose not to climb it, cool, but don’t tell us what is going on, what to believe.

If you lived through the sixties…we didn’t get everything we sought, but society did change, the youth had power, and then these same youth became narcissistic greedmongers in the eighties, and the nineties were an economic triumph, and then the internet blew it all apart.

You could understand the world prior to the internet, now you’re not sure what is going on. And every time you look, you’re insulted, you’re late to the game, you’ve got it wrong, to the point where you push back and say no, I do know, or lick your wounds and stray from the fray. Yes, the most important thing in the twenty first century isn’t money, although that is very important, but personality. Are you willing to get in someone’s face? Are you willing to stand up to criticism? Are you willing to bark back? Are you willing to do and say what’s expedient? Then you’ve got a chance.

We didn’t expect it to be this way, especially after the fall of the wall, the end of Communism, we expected harmony to reign worldwide.

But this didn’t suit the purpose of the most narcissistic. And the funny thing is once people got their freedom, they surrendered it, it was just too scary to go your own way on a big scale, better to leave your adventures to the small screen, on a computer or smartphone.

So we were always waiting to get to the show, but now baseball is not only not America’s pastime, the only people who pay attention are fans, the number of which is dwindling. The World Series used to be everything now it’s barely a thing. And playing baseball in November is like skiing in July. The timing is wrong for all but diehards, and the conditions are not optimal for skilled geniuses to prevail.

But then action sports died. As well as ESPN. The X-Games was a thing, but now the Olympics have surfing and skateboarding and once you kowtow to public opinion, you’ve lost it. Kinda like STEM studies. The liberal arts are history and college is a bona fide finishing school for business students. It’s a rat race, and if you drop you, you can’t even survive, you can’t pay the bills.

And of course there is overarching change, like the on demand culture, that the oldsters still can’t quite get a grip on, for decades they were told acquisition was key, that he or she who died with the most toys wins, and now kids don’t even get driver’s licenses, never mind cars, and we’re supposed to care about your expensive iron? We rent what we need when we want it. And the badges of honor are where you’ve been, what experiences you’ve had, and the number of followers you’ve got.

That’s even more important than money, your horde. Which is paraded on your Instagram or Twitter account. This is where you prove your worth. And maybe you can turn it into cash, but for those who grew up in an era where you had to have skill to make big bucks, it’s hard to fathom a world where you can game the system and become rich on nothing. Credit the Kardashians, they were there first.

And they represent the “beauty” tribe. You know, remake yourself with plastic surgery until you fit present norms of beauty. But what happens when hair comes back after you’ve eradicated it, when thin lips are in, when thin eyebrows are in… You’re lost in the past, but this represents how we’re all living for today. The Earth is gonna burn up, and supposedly Social Security is gonna dry up, and if Jesus doesn’t come back to save us we’re screwed anyway, so we might as well party like it’s…

Not 1999. But Prince O.D.’ed, Tom Petty too. Used to be that was seen as tragic, now all it gets is a shrug of the shoulders and endless Twitter tributes. Yup, the stars are just like us, addicted to opioids.

And we’ve got a President who lies at will, oftentimes multiple times a day, but he wants to keep his Twitter count up, he too is playing the game, and those inured to the old game are flummoxed and left out, losers.

And Trump has illustrated those left behind, and racist, want their say too. It’s not only rich people in the Republican party… They want government off their backs while they invade your life and tell you when and where you can get an abortion, if you can. Which is head-spinning if you’re a Democrat, but you can scream all you want, you can’t get your message out.

No one can get their message out. Even Taylor Swift. She nailed the marketing game two years ago, but two years is a long time, especially in an era where everything is forgotten almost instantly. They shoot up the school at Columbine, kill kids in Newtown, and it’s part of the social fabric, even though there are people denying it ever happened. But I dare you to name the mass shootings since. There are too many. It’s like following baseball to know, that’s right, everything is its own vertical, and it doesn’t translate to the mainstream. The media keeps on telling us we live in one homogenous country but this is patently untrue. The coastal elites used to call the vast middle “flyover country,” but today they’ve got a zillion channels and high speed internet and they’re just as sophisticated as the coasts and they can’t stop telling the coasts they’re wrong. California is a disaster, even though the truth is it’s on an economic run. We live in the land of perception, where you need a campaign to get your message across, being right is not enough, you’ve got to sell it!

And all the destinations are a shadow of themselves. Number one on the “Billboard” chart? Only relevant to the record companies and those who might appear there, which is a fraction of musicians. Opinion piece in the “New York Times”? Only read by dedicated “Times” readers. A larger tribe than ever because of digital distribution, but with smaller influence than ever, because the news does not spread. Only rumors, gossip and disasters spread. The whole nation is the 10 o’clock news.

So everything you used to want to be is devalued. If you’re into it for more than money, i.e. fame and recognition, it’s now impossible to reach everybody, you cannot get acknowledgement, the game has not only been disrupted, someone pulled away the board and all we’re left with is our game pieces.

The center does not hold. Even though Democrats keep telling us it’s still there. Give the Republicans credit, they line up behind Trump, because they realize there is no center, only charismatic leaders with tribes. You don’t infect people with facts, but personality. Facts are fungible, personality is forever, which is why you can’t admit you’ve made mistakes.

And mainstream culture is whipsawed. We go from male abuse of women to women controlling the dialogue with men not allowed to stand up and debate the issue. Kaepernick stands up for his community and then Jay Z gets in bed with the overlords. A$AP Rocky is guilty and our President says to let him go, to forgo another country’s laws. And this Greenland nonsense… Why don’t we make it easy and just buy China. It’s a good media story, and it’s everywhere so more people believe it, but it will never ever happen. Ain’t that today, it’s all about a good story.

So no wonder we’re looking for strongmen. We want someone to lead us out of this mess. And these rulers tell us if we give them all the power, they will literally fix everything, health care, welfare, business…everybody will have their own home and plentiful food and a job…meanwhile, this is a trifecta that’s hard to get these days, but despite all their naysaying, putting down of other tribes, deep down inside people are optimistic, they believe in change, no matter how delusional.

Everybody can’t have everything, but they believe they can, and if they can’t it’s got to be somebody’s fault…the immigrants, the rich, the corporations, the government. It’s never your fault in America, and if per chance it is, you just apologize and go to rehab and your followers forgive you.

And the old guard still plays by the old rules in the old game, even though it’s got no resemblance to today. “Billboard” Top 100? DNC centrism? Hell, there aren’t even any ratings on Netflix, which is a good thing, because it all comes down to what is good and what you want to watch. But if they eliminate likes from Instagram… How are you gonna make it? It’s like likes are part of your brain, your DNA, you probably put them on your college application. But why go to college at all when you can make bank as an influencer, like Olivia Jade, whose parents wanted to buy prestige with a USC degree. Meanwhile, Olivia Jade is living a jet set life and the rest of us are in the back of planes that crash because Boeing had to make money and the government provided no oversight. But we keep hearing the government is bad and regulations need to be eviscerated.

Confused yet?

This is now. When you’re not sure of your motivation. But chances are you don’t have a regular job, you’re a contractor or a gig worker so you’ve got to constantly be working. Ever found an Uber/Lyft driver without a dream? Ask them, they’re all gonna be rich, they’re working on it.

So there’s no center, everybody’s deluded and they keep trying to shout you down. They don’t want reasoned debate, they just want it their way. But they’re running on emotion not knowledge, and when confronted with knowledge they reject it, excoriate it, because it makes them feel small. It’s not only the underclass, can you explain to me why the wealthy are such anti-vaxxers, despite all the documentation saying otherwise? And they think just like they live behind gates, their kids won’t get measles, they’ve got too much money, and even though they’re atheists they believe God will protect them.

No one can save us, not immediately. For now, it’s getting worse. We’ve got to agree on the facts, agree that everybody can’t be rich and famous and that we’re in it together. But now the whole world is positively tribal. We’ve got smartphones but we’re living in the Middle Ages. It’s gonna take a long time to get out of this mess. Once you give everybody a voice, which is what the internet did, you end up with chaos. And the only people saying to secede from the scrum are those addicted to their smartphones anyway. False prophets.

But we’re lacking any real prophets today. And your history is easily searchable, so if you were a bully in kindergarten your entire future is in the dumper.

Forget grades, you’re being rated on personality, emotion, soft skills in an era where they keep telling us it’s about hard skills, i.e. the aforementioned STEM.

Being nice and altruistic might make you feel good, but don’t expect any kudos for it. If you want to win today, fire up your social network and promote yourself. You’re the best ever! Even though we can no longer quantify “best.” But we should buy what you’re selling even though you’ve got no portfolio, YOU DESERVE IT!