Interesting stat. If you are independent and own the rights to your music you can earn $4,000 per million downloads on Spotify. Now lets get into it.

The music game is hard. Similar to acting, there’s so many people that want to do it that the competition is crazy.

If you ran a simulation of 1,000 lives and were a dentist in each your income would be high across the board. If you did the same trying to be a rock star you may be worth millions in one and struggle in the majority. But we’re here for the big swings, so if you’re unbelievably talented and different, here’s a few artists breaking out that you can learn from.

Zach Bryan

• You Tube: 748K subs

• IG: 2 million

• TikTok: 2.1 million

How Did Zach Bryan get noticed?

Zach Bryan was 24 years old and in the Navy when he took a video of him outside his barracks in 95 degree heat singing “Heading South.” He wasn’t trying to be famous, he was just making music. It was an instant hit and now has 22 million views on YouTube.

But leading up to that moment was eight years trying to figure out how to construct songs and year after year of writing. Since he got noticed he’s played at the Grand Ole Oprey, toured across countries and built a dedicated following.

This is a pretty standard way to get noticed in todays world. Work on your craft for years. Get amazing. Put stuff out there. Repeat.

Connor Price

• YouTube: 2.19 million subs

• IG: 2 million

• TikTok: 5 million

I just found out about Connor Price from the business podcast my first million (biz pods are my thing!). His wife, Breanna and him are next level creative and driven. They build these amazing skits that lead into the songs. Connor was an actor and has an incredible knack of creating an interesting hook to keep you watching. It’s classic TikTok strategy where something is changing every few seconds to keep you hooked. When they brought those vids over to YouTube shorts they generated 800,000 subscribers. My favorite example!

The interesting part I find is during the podcast Shaan really pushes them to build on the skit format. It’s new, different and catchy. I completely agree. And here’s why. The carrot flute song. That’s what I searched for. Not “Spinning” by Connor Price, the actual song title. Then the first video I landed on was the actual music video. And it’s good. But I stopped halfway through. Then I found the carrot skit with the song. Played it, sent it to a friend and played it again. That’s magic.

Breanna mentioned that Spotify is their primary income source (60 million streams a month x $4k = $240k per month), then five figures for YouTube, brand deals can get into the six figures, sync deals for TV, video games, etc. publishing revenue, merch and finally touring where they break even right now as he headlines for others. 

Connor and Breanna are building their business by getting exposure to new people through TikTok and YT shorts, turning those into streams on Spotify and YouTube and building out their fan base. But I have to say, I think Shaan is right and they should push the skits/music. They’re brilliant and different.

Ren

• YouTube: 1.02 million subs

• IG: 314k

• TikTok: 713k

Be warned, if you start watching Ren videos you’ll lose nights going down rabbit holes. I would pinpoint Ren’s breakout to his song “Hi Ren.” It’s brilliant, different and can’t even really be played on the radio as it doesn’t fit the format. It’s too long and has a spoken word section at the end.

Ren did something interesting though. He let others use his entire video in their videos. In a world full of creators trying to get noticed they need something to talk about. And here was something noteworthy that people could use. So a cottage industry arose of creators reacting to Hi Ren. 25 minute videos analyzing the song, how good it was, surprised faces all streaming from different accounts. Example. Another example. Another.

The deeper you go down the rabbit hole the more you see the work and craft. Ren started with a band years ago singing on the streets. His variety is truly amazing. You can just tell he’s an artist.

My bet is Zach Bryan will become a household name. Connor Price will pivot into TV, think Flight of the Conchords or a Netflix show like Breanna mentioned on the pod. And Ren? I have no idea, but he’s going somewhere.

One last thing.

Most of us aren’t going to be famous musicians. But we can learn from great entertainers.

• Do you use video?

• Are you changing it up every 4-5 seconds on the shorts?

• What’s your initial hook?

• Are you telling stories?

• How much did you focus on the sound in your last ad? And most importantly

• Are you different?

Bonus

You likely have never heard of Oliver Anthony. I just heard of him 30 minutes ago after I sent out the newsletter (subscribe below!). But here’s some magic. Country music that cuts straight to your soul. He just got noticed. Going to be exciting to see what happens.