Top 3 Ways To Get Dropped From a Label

[00:01:48] Mm-hmm. and you feel kind of bad. Like I said, I say if it’s five outta six chan chance of getting dropped, which it was 20 years ago when I moved here, I said, imagine a gun and you’re playing Russian roulette, but you have [00:02:00] five bullets. There’s only one out of uh, six chances. You’re not gonna get dropped.

[00:02:05] You’re. Off yourself because that’s how it feels. It feels like death. You, we know people have been dropped and they, they get depressed for a long time. Some of them quit music Completely. Yeah. Went far before their time. This is, this has happened. Plenty of times in the past. Yeah. Cheating their selves.

[00:02:21] Yeah. And, and in a, in a sense, if you get dropped because the music is just not great or you just, it’s the wrong time. Maybe the music’s great, but you hit the wrong niche. And there’s all kinds of things that happen in the marketing program. It’s gotta be a perfect storm, which we’ve talked about in the past.

[00:02:38] Great artist. Yep. Songs great. Great songs. Great team. Which is really great team. Really the. Of all of those. Yep. Great production. Yep. Great branding. Loyal fan base. Loyal fan base. Yes, we’ve talked about that in the past. So good, uh, reminder, um, of those things. But [00:03:00] there are three ways that you can quickly sabotage yourself.

[00:03:04] So what’s that first one? First one? , which one did we think was the most important? Let’s see. I would say Johnny. Oh, the Johnny come lately? Yeah. The classic Johnny come lately. Johnny come lately. You know, it’s, it’s pretty easy to reach a certain level of success and feel like punctuality. Is that the word?

[00:03:25] Punctuality? Yeah. Is, is, uh, not necessarily a. how you operate. Um, it, that sort of thing happens all the time. Clearly, even with the classic character of the movie star or the mm-hmm. , you know, famous singer or whatever. But, um, there are people today that still think that that’s an acceptable way to operate, even at a higher level, and you can shoot yourself in the foot.

[00:03:50] Mm-hmm. being a, a, an established legacy act and have people not wanna work with you. That’s another situation that I’m like currently. [00:04:00] Somewhat business related to is, is hearing, um, of how, you know, uh, management would go into to meetings with either existing or, or, or clients that, you know, wish to be represented by this company and having an a certain negative error about them just because they wanted to bring in some sort of like heft and heat mm-hmm.

[00:04:22] and think that that’s the way people can still work with each other. And that’s just not acceptable anytime so. To have it represented at, at that le level gives you some sort of hope that, like, you know, working to be a punctual person and a respectable, honest person is still a worthwhile endeavor in today’s society.

[00:04:42] It really is. And it shows that y you know, you and I know people that, uh, we’ve seen before in the past that were, that had a lot of pride and arrogance about showing up like 15 minutes, half an hour late. F this, I’m never gonna be on time for people. Let them wait for me. I know who I [00:05:00] am. Do you? Because I’ll tell you who’s has more character than that person.

[00:05:06] More swagger than that person is a Navy sill and they have all these, I am this person, this is who I am. But they start out with you will be as your training and they start it with very first is you will be a person who was never late. And they hear that every, I’m a person who is never. So if you can start with that.

[00:05:25] I mean, imagine how Broke cities will go because no tickets. The reason they’re giving tickets is everybody’s speeding. I am causing cities to go broke right now. That’s fine. Make you money somewhere else. Stop spending money on worthless $5 million statues of naked people at the top of Music Row. That thing is like, you know, you know, people think it’s artist.

[00:05:51] But when do you see a statue? When do you see naked people dancing around a whatever tree or whatever, and [00:06:00] some little f like crazy festival, like cu a cult, you know? Mm-hmm. . So there’s our, our symbol, $5 million. You don’t need our tax money. Yeah, plus there’s just the overall like driving by it and you’re like, well, this is cool, I guess, but still awkward.

[00:06:13] It’s very awkward. And the little kids, they, mommy, why are so people naked? You know? It’s just weird. And there’s some of you think maybe you are 30, you’re too old, you don’t understand, or you’re not autistic. But my completely appropriate divergent point is to say that if you are on. Not time on time. If you were early, like you say, if you’re not 15 minutes early, you’re late.

[00:06:38] You know? Uh, he was three minutes late. I was three minutes early today, . Well, you know, but we had set up time so he was actually early, you know, but if you’re three minutes early, I’m three minutes late. We’re perfectly on time. We averaged out. We’re we right? We were on the money, but, uh, um, and it’s a, it’s a, it’s a hard pursuit, especially creative people.

[00:06:57] Cuz if we’re in a creative moment and I was. [00:07:00] playing, uh, guitar with Chris Miller and he was teaching me how to do jam over tracks and I was like, my fingers are doing everything I’ve ever wanted them to do as he sees a great moment. And I just kept playing and I like, and he is like, dude, even eyes got big.

[00:07:15] He goes all the scales. Everything you’ve worked for right now is just happening. It was electric and I was hitting his. Tones and bending two notes at once. I can bend two notes at once and it felt really good. And so like I might be late, like I said, five more minutes. So those are those times where you push.

[00:07:31] But going into a label meeting, man, respect yourself. Not just them. Respect yourself. And when I say respect yourself, you have enough honor code in yourself. Like, nah, I’m. I’m not late. I’m never late. And it’s weird to say. People say shouldn’t be in the positive that I’m always on time and I’ll tell you why.

[00:07:49] The negative kind of works better if who, who, who is a more fiercesome opponent person says, I can beat you up. Or a person says, you can’t beat me. [00:08:00] Fair. The second guy, fair dare person. I can beat you up. You’re like, yeah, me. If you’re actually saying that, you’re probably. No, you posturing. Probably can’t posturing.

[00:08:12] But a person says, you can’t beat me now. That’s what you have to look at time. You look at time. You can’t beat me. Yeah. And, and, and the negative implies a positive, positive and negative don’t have to be enemies. They can actually work for you. So this book I’ve been reading is fantastic. I’m gonna get get it for you.

[00:08:29] The Dan Crenshaw books. You create your own middle ground. Yeah. Not to get all weird, but like, you know, it’s like your own version of yin and yang and. . Yeah. Your path gets carved somewhere in the middle, and yeah. Do people only talk positive all the time? I will always be on time. First of all, you can’t be on time, and I’m writing a book on this, by the way.

[00:08:49] You’ll see it’s coming out. You can’t catch time, you can’t be right on time. You have to have a plan to be early, and if you don’t have a plan to be early, you’ll almost always be. , [00:09:00] you’re gonna be either 30 seconds earlier or 30 seconds late anyway. So don’t be ostentatious. Don’t think you can predict traffic.

[00:09:07] Don’t think you can predict how everything comes, can go down. And another thing you can do, and I’m telling you, I have dogged out people and had nothing to do with him in the music industry because I went to lunch with a guy and he called me. It was a 45. I may have told you about it, dude, this producer, he was real, real cool producer.

[00:09:24] He was gonna do a track for me. I was getting ready to give him five grand for one song that he was on fire. But he did, his fire got put out. So his is a perfect example. And then we will move on to point number two. We were meeting at Fidos. He was 45 minutes late and he sends me this text, dude, I’m so sorry.

[00:09:41] I just woke up and I picked up the phone. I said, good thing I’m of a little consequence on this. I said, I’m, I have, I was gonna pay him cash. Sure. He said, cash would be cool. I said, yeah, I cash is king. I got cash here. I said, I’m gonna take this. , I’m gonna go buy a guitar. Remember that, that classical one that I had, that [00:10:00] cool gut string guitar that bought, yeah.

[00:10:01] Mm-hmm. . Um, I said, I’m gonna go buy a guitar with it instead, and then put the rest of money in my pocket and I’m not giving you a dime because you don’t respect my time. I said, you know how much I am an hour? Yeah. You’re gonna pay me for that hour that you stole of mine because you, you have an excuse to be late at some way.

[00:10:21] Have you ever missed a plane? No. Well, this is the plane you just missed. And, and he, yeah, I guess that’s a good way to put it. Oh, he told his friends, he said, I never felt like a bigger piece of crap. And I said, sleeping in isn’t an excuse. There is no excuse if you don’t miss planes. Have you ever missed a plane?

[00:10:41] Just actually I have. Um, and I, it was the only time it ever happened. It’s weird circumstances. Thought I was gonna be early. Guess I didn’t plan enough for enough circumstances and just No, no, that’s what it was. It was like, I believe it was American Airlines. Cause I think they’re one of the only [00:11:00] airlines that’s like, if you’re not 15 minutes early.

[00:11:03] Yeah. They’ll shut the door. They shut the door. The plane’s still there at the gate. Nobody’s leaving for 15 minutes at least. I’ve had that happen and I, I’ve showed up because like a, a, um, um, security line was, You can never predict in a, you know, I’ve didn’t find out a BNA for at least a decade at this point, if not more, and had never seen anything like it.

[00:11:23] Tons of people were missing their flights in line next to me. So it wasn’t just like, just a me type situation. Um, but yeah, got to the gate at that 15 minute mark and they shut the door. . Wow. Yeah. I could not believe it. I’ve had that happen. It was flying 19 flights too. Well, was it, was it just like trying to get home or was it like, were you trying to meet a client or, or?

[00:11:44] I was actually supposed to be going to Bocelli’s house. Oh gosh. So, yeah, you get it. It was a work scenario for me too, and I was like, you literally made me miss a flight. Mine was because I was going to Chicago Airport, which is the worst, you know, I definitely on my [00:12:00] plane, did everything I got there. We sat in the tarmac for an hour, like you can’t find a place to unload us.

[00:12:09] What’s going on? Get this together, and I understand contingencies. And see that, those exceptions by the way, United. Ooh, I. You United. Yeah. They’re worst of my favorites. They’re worst and American second to worst. Um, sorry if you were for them too bad. Uh, gimme some free coupons and we’ll talk . I’ll, I will we change?

[00:12:28] Sure. Yeah. Some flat coupons. I’ll take ’em even if y’all are late all the time. But I, I, I did, I missed my opportunity to meet him. Dang. That was really, really kind of horrible. And uh, yeah, so they put me on a later. And um, and by the way, the pilot had been late. Wow. He said, oh, the pilot got caught up.

[00:12:48] Well, you’re, they’re supposed to be like an hour and a half early or something like that. So think of this, when you go into a meeting, the stakes are always high because the stakes are your character and you show [00:13:00] up early. People love you. And I, again, I haven’t mastered this, I’ve gotten much better at it because I was that creative type who like tries to cram.

[00:13:09] Too many things at once and thinks of the best case scenario instead of the worst case scenario. But if people will forgive your tardiness, your lateness, um, if that is your exception, but they won’t, if it’s your norm, sure. If that’s who you are. I mean, I fired one of the best coaches I’ve ever had, and sorry if you’re watching.

[00:13:31] We won’t say your name. I love you, bro. Um, oh, just, or, or not a bro, somebody else, maybe or a sister. Yeah. I don’t know. Yeah, two dads. Yeah. Who, whoever. Um, uh, and I, but I fired one, one of the best coaches I ever had because he was chronically late. I said, man, you can’t do this. Sure that one reason. So an example, best one, one killer producer, killer coach.

[00:13:57] Yep. Can’t work for me anymore, man. You can’t, can’t have [00:14:00] you like disrespecting everybody else’s time. And they both learned and now we have to, so number two, to have a good work ethic. Um, do you definitely start with being on time? That’s for sure. Yeah. But. Lack of work ethic. I think also is putting in more time, is doing more.

[00:14:21] We’ve, you’ve, I’m sure you’ve, did you see the Michael Jordan special? Did y’all see that? I keep hearing so much about it. Having a dude, I barely make it past putting the kids to sleep right now. , I know that’s and like. If I didn’t eat dinner, I like hurry up and put something in my mouth and then it’s time, it’s time for them.

[00:14:36] Boom. Go to, uh, but, but it’s on the list, it’s fantastic. And you know, he started this like morning club of all the starters on the team and they said, and they’d get there with his personal trainer in his house. He’d set up his gym and his house for them to work. Personal training to, to take the game up to that high level.

[00:14:53] And, uh, and it’s a lot of training was to prevent injuries because Michael had an injury, I think first [00:15:00] or second season, and, um, missed a good chunk of season. And he is like, wow, it’s, and the trainers says, because your body’s weak. Now, I think there’s a lot of parallels here in the music industry too, if you’re, if you ain’t, if you ain’t strong enough for this, um, if you ain’t trained, if you don’t, if your voice ain’t ready, if your chops ain’t ready.

[00:15:18] Um, you ain’t strong enough. You ain’t good enough yet. Uh, goes back to that 10,000 hours we talked about. Yeah. I think one of our first episodes, you guys remember that? Yeah. If you haven’t, go back and watch it worthwhile. Listen, it’s 5:00 AM club. They’re getting up their, and they’re, they’re, they’re, they’re meeting and you don’t actually have to go.

[00:15:39] But they said Michael would razz you mercilessly, um, when they get to team practice or if it were a game. He would sit there and say, where were you? Weak, weak. You’re weak. You’re weak. I can’t even have, imagine him looking at me. You’re weak. He’d be like, our buddy Brad, if he looks at you, [00:16:00] I thought, you should come to jujitsu.

[00:16:01] You’re weak. You’d be like, Yes, I am. I will be returning to the couch now. Thank you. Its yes, and I’m going to go cry on my pillow . Um, so, uh, your work ethic is being early and staying late and being an in, uh, exercising. Massive intensity. You know, my son, Caleb, I’m not sure if you know this, but he’s in quarterback training right now and it’s awesome.

[00:16:26] See, now last we spoke, he was, he was doing really well with basketball. Yes. And now it’s football season and they’re doing, he’s done training all summer and he’s put on some weight. Okay. Six back. And he’s like, he’s been eating a lot of Elvis sandwiches. Yeah. Yeah. Is it the pb? Uh, just, it was just peanut butter and banana, right?

[00:16:44] Is that what he used to eat? Yeah. I think that were the only two ingredients. I don’t know. He was eating like steak and eggs and steak and burgers and steak and eggs and more steak. And uh, he’s just, , you know, he’s put on about 10 pounds, you know. Geez. Almost, almost. One 30. And he’s 14, [00:17:00] you said? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:00] That 10 pounds, that’s a lot. I, well, I graduated high school weighing 1 35 and he’s gonna be one 30. Same. I think we’ve talked about this in the past. Same, oddly weighed the same course. You had more muscle, because I’m taller, so stretched out. Little scrawny guy, you know. Well, we couldn’t wait to weigh one 50.

[00:17:15] And, um, and the, so the quarterback coach, he says, we’re gonna put another 10 pounds on him before school. Whoa. So he’ll be weighing one 40. So if you add the Elvis sandwich to mistaken eggs, you should be, you should be able to get there. No problem. Sandwiches. But it’s some, sometimes he has three days because not only is he playing for the middle school team, but he’s now the new quarterback in his first season cuz he’s doing private quarterback training.

[00:17:41] That’s where he was this morning. and then, uh, Scott Felder, whos up? Scott Scott’s a bad, bad man. He back up, uh, I think under Tony Romeo, one of those guys had to Dallas and uh, had a great man. If you’re just a backup quarterback, you don’t even know how hard it’s just to get drafted. If you’re any kind of nfl, [00:18:00] you’re a bad dude.

[00:18:01] And this dude. Unbelievable. And he’s, and he played for Nashville Cats too, and did some stuff. And now he’s here and training and all of his quarterbacks have great success. But, uh, Caleb left and he was like learning these, okay. Hip, hip, hip, hip, hip, hip, hip. And he just sat there running these little side ladders or run, re step drop palm.

[00:18:22] So the first practice, the guy’s looking at him saying, man, you, you’re a worker, aren’t you? And he goes, I’m gonna be the hardest worker you have ever had on this. and the guy said, you’ll love this. And he said, well, um, we can have you as quarterback on middle school, but um, we, uh, we need a couple more receivers on the varsity team.

[00:18:42] You interested? Geez, 14, he’s playing varsity. If this isn’t the base of a proud father, I don’t know what. That looks like it’s probably like, look at this face. This is a proud father. I, yes. I boast about my kids. You got it. You got beautiful kids too. [00:19:00] Beautiful wife, family. Gotta bo you gotta be proud. But it’s when, when, when a person can exemplify that because they outwork everybody, somebody beat him.

[00:19:12] Cuz he usually beats all the kids in suicides. Everybody on the team, in every team, he’s been somebody beat. and if you, and if you’re not first, you’re gonna have to run all eight. And he goes, yeah, good. I got to run all eight. That was fantastic. All eight suicides, hard suicides in 93 to grab the weather.

[00:19:28] And he goes, honey, what he, he looked at coach and he said, yeah. He goes, I’ll just make sure next time I’m the fastest. And he goes, but I’m gonna still run all eight. And that’s the thing, where is your work ethic So insatiable. I mean, look what a 14 year old can do, let alone. Yeah, a grown adult can do.

[00:19:46] Exactly. In an industry like this, I mean, yeah, it’s cutthroat and yet it’s, there’s so much competition. It’s un, it’s unbelievable and it can certainly be a huge weight on your shoulders if you let it. Yeah. What’s the longest all that to say? [00:20:00] What’s the longest time you’ve ever practiced? Just like just one knife.

[00:20:02] Well, you know, nowadays it’s a little bit less. Quantity and more about qualities, smart practice. So I can do a lot more with 15, 20 minutes than I could do with two hours when I was a teenager, which was about what I would do every single day. Mm. That’s why I was able to, you know, every month I’m a hundred percent better than the next, and then next kind of like what, you know, Caleb’s going through right now.

[00:20:30] Yeah. It’s just, you’ve, you fixate on something because you, you connect with it and you wanna say something with it. Mm-hmm. . And that it sparks that fire that hopefully leads a true artist to the right doorstep in this town because there’s a lot of the other stuff going on right now that mm-hmm. you and I really don’t appreciate.

[00:20:53] But except for now. Except for now. And we’ve got a feeling that’s gonna change [00:21:00] well. Soon we’ll be talking about that a little bit more as things unfold. It’s a nice little place to take us into our third point on addiction addictions, definitely someone we’re talking about. So recap, uh, those three things are, um, you know, those three, there, there’s three addictions too, isn’t there?

[00:21:24] Yeah. I guess if you wanted to make the sub subcategories and kind of, you think it’s just all alcohol, Well, no, I mean, sub substance abuse is obviously the first thing that comes to mind for most people. But, um, you know, getting, getting caught up in relationships you shouldn’t be in is, mm-hmm. just as devastating in my opinion, is having a gambling addiction.

[00:21:47] Yeah. You know, or having a, having an, uh, alcohol dependency or something like that. Potentially to be a, a nuclear bomb to your career? Either way? Oh yeah. We’ve seen people [00:22:00] and you know, we’ve seen people who said, okay, I’m gonna talk about a sensitive subject. If you have a problem with this, like a lot of people have, um, you probably just need to.

[00:22:11] Talk to somebody, get some work done. Some just stick to the Instagram folks. Yes. See what he’s, see where he is going with that. But even Instagram, I know somebody said, I used to go to some bad websites and see things I shouldn’t be doing. And if you think, Hey man, back off that I, I have no problem looking at that.

[00:22:26] It’s not a victimless crime. We have now seen what. The, the anti, I’m gonna say it, porn, anti-porn. People have been telling us that it’s a, an industry of human trafficking. And now we know, and now human traffickers have been arrested at a favors pitch. Thank God every one of them need to go. And so certainly it’s not a victimless crime.

[00:22:49] And some people that are less, may seem less victim is just people who are scantily clad on, uh, YouTube, uh, not YouTube, but on, um, I. [00:23:00] and somebody’s like, well, I’m not this beautiful person. They wanna put themselves out there, but do you notice how not one person just satisfies you? That means if you’re with a girl, she, she’s gonna be thinking you, uh, you’re, you’re never gonna be happy just looking at me.

[00:23:19] I said, well, not only just looking at you, but look, just looking at this girl, cuz they have to have numbers. That’s the thing, a person can satisfy a need in a sense of the community and the relationship you have with just one great person and suddenly everything disappears and that’s a fantastic thing.

[00:23:35] But when you have that substance, which is a sub, it’s a type of substance abuse, you know, you know, it fries out the dopamine receptors. It’s actually makes. Mentally ill mentally sick. It makes your body physically, you’ll physically crave that. And I know people who say, yeah, man, uh, come in for a lesson.

[00:23:55] He goes, uh, sorry. I’m like half an hour late today. And I said, why you, why you so [00:24:00] late, man? He said, uh, here’s this lesson. I was just on the computer. It’s like, 5:00 AM What time did you get on? About 10. He goes, yeah, I gotta go get. And, and it can be that way because it doesn’t satisfy relationships, satisfy they feel voids.

[00:24:19] Relationship with your friends, relationship with God, relationship with your family, relationship with your spouse, love of your life, relationships with your work people. Those are satisfying. , but this just plug in that void with all of this junk, just smut. It is. Smut it be call me a per, I don’t care. You want, leave some comments, whatever.

[00:24:39] Send me some message. It’s smut and you know it is. It’s when you utilize another person for your gratification rather than having the guts to be able to meet that person, have a relationship with them, be willing to live for them and maybe even die for them because that person is worth, they have value to.

[00:24:56] You know the second one person says, man, that girl I would [00:25:00] like turn over the earth for her a million times over just to be with her. Okay, well, let’s say you guys start dating. She says, I’m in love with you and I. She says she’s in love with you. A car hits her and then she’s paralyzed from here down.

[00:25:15] You wanna take care of her. See, loved Trump’s. So if you got that, that addiction is a very serious one in this industry because this is a narcissistic industry. Mm-hmm. . So that’s, that’s just a real thing. We were joking around about going, we were talking about this uncomfortable elephant in the room.

[00:25:35] Well, it’s like the, the elephant feels the room. This is, it is a very real addiction. We talk about, everybody knows about chemical addictions and get help with that, but those are another void feeling. . Yeah. And there’s some great facilities around here. If anybody out there is struggling with that, you know, feel free to reach out on site.

[00:25:54] And what’s the other one? There’s a couple really good ones out here. What’s the, um, uh, the river, um [00:26:00] oh one or Cumberland. Mm-hmm. Institute. Mm-hmm. . Yeah. Cumberland River. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and you gotta be careful cuz you know, I knew a girl, brother went there and he did gold coal for two or three years and then all he did is, um, one line of something and, uh, somebody put fentanyl in it.

[00:26:16] Oh. and so he’s dead at 20. And she is still not over it. I see. Her post happened to a childhood friend of mine a couple years ago as well. Yeah. So, so, you know, you need to be careful. Watch that. And then the last one was, um, gaming. Now, not just gambling, but gaming people. I’ve no one people, this dude came to Jisu with me a long time ago.

[00:26:38] Friend of Scott Gyps and you know mm-hmm. Gypsy’s. A tough dude too. Bass player, friend of ours. But he had a friend. Who was coming all the time and got so good. And after I’d be been going there for two years and beating all these guys and were thinking Brett’s tough now. I’ve just been going more, that’s all.

[00:26:56] And consistency. Ex. Yeah, consistency. I just know more moves than you. But this guy [00:27:00] went and he was a savan. He would just figure things out and um, one time at the very end he was like, let’s roll. And he took me down. I was All right, cool. I’ll get out of this and I start pulling out it, and he reverses this weird arm bar thing that we were learning that I totally forgot, and Nels tapped and he goes, did I really beat you?

[00:27:18] He said, yeah. And then he tells people, I said, I just, I’m so excited, I’m so obsessed with this. I’m, I feel like I’m gifted at it. You know what he did? He said one day he said, Scott said, you coming. He goes, man, I’m just, I’m, I’m gonna play World War. Sit there, just like gaming literally. And he says, this guy was, he would give up sleep to play this game.

[00:27:40] He were like, I don’t need sleep. I need to play this game. They’ve bragged for who could play the longest. Those what those games are, are extremely addictive. I literally won’t play them for that very fact. Hmm. My son has a limited time that he can play those games, like with his friends. And when that time is like, Hey, what time is it?[00:28:00] 

[00:28:00] I got four minutes left. He said, you want to use those last? Nope. Unplug. And a lot of times he says, nah, I don’t. Some wanna go online and play some game with him, uh, with his friends. He says, nah. He goes, I’m too motivated for that. So that’s awesome, man. Three things that’ll kill you, kill your career. You gotta put your career first before any of that.

[00:28:22] Be self-disciplined. Make your decision right now what you want to do and don’t get. I like it. Let’s put a bow on it. See you guys next time.