Co-Creation in the Music Industry

>> We're going to
tell you some stories
about co-creation in
the music industry.
No. We're going to tell you
three stories specifically.
We're going to tell
you about one song,
one album, and some artificial
intelligence technology.
And we're going to tell
you how that one song,
that album, and that technology,
actually grew to yield
five number one singles,
four Grammy's, and
some technology
that is actually used by over a
million musicians
around the world.
And, of course, that
wouldn't be possible
without us all having
a very strong network.
So I truly love and
my guests here truly love
the music industry because
the work that we do in
co-creating actually yields
something really powerful.
For us, it yields taking
some ideas and turning them
into a really tangible art form.
Through that process,
we help musicians,
and we help bands,
and artists, realized
their full potential.
And, my favorite piece is we
support an entire ecosystem.
You see, when we have a track or
an artist or an album
that is really exploding,
that supports
the whole ecosystem.
Everybody from
the content creation side,
production, distribution
and consumption,
so you have, songwriters,
producers, audio engineers,
musicians performers,
record labels,
everybody on the artist
and management
side and ultimately when
the artists are successful,
that then yields social and
philanthropic implications
that we can all benefit from.
So I look forward to diving in.
By way of a quick introduction,
my name is Jay LeBoeuf,
I am the executive director of
a nonprofit called
the Real Industry,
and the folks in
the Real Industry is to help
University students understand
how the real world works.
So how we actually create
products in industry,
or how the music industry
actually works and some roles
that they can do there.
I'm also a lecturer
at Stanford University
and I am hoping you
can give a very warm
welcome to my three guests.
Please welcome Joe London,
Peter Gray, and Greg Mertz.
So Joe is going to start us
off by telling us the story
of the song Star Of The Show.
>> I guess I'll start by just
talking about networking.
I like to think of networking
almost like a puzzle,
where you have
like when you start
a project or you start something
you kind of have
the four corners,
and then, you fill in
the stuff that's kind of easy
and eventually you have
all these like holes.
And it's you really have to
utilize what's around
those to like really fill
them in and kind of get
to the point where
you're trying to go
and so I thought this song is
actually a good
representation of that.
I had been sent
a video of a demo of a song
for the artist Thomas Rhett.
And the video was
a fan film the video of him
at a show playing the song,
months in advance.
It was the only recording
they actually had of
the song and they had sent
me the video and said,
"Hey, we really want
the song produced.
This is the only
recording we have.
Good luck." So I pulled up
open the video and kind of
did what I thought was
the direction that I thought
the song should be going.
And being from Los Angeles
and being more of
a pop producer,
I've kind of taken
the song sonically to
a kind of a pop, country song.
Thomas, being a country artist,
eventually they heard
the initial version
of song and they loved it and
they thought it
could be a single.
But we had some holes in
the thing where it could
the song fit for country radio
or was it a little too pop.
So, eventually bringing in
a bunch of different people,
a good friend of
mine, Julian Bunetta
was an incredible
producer-songwriter.
Basically showing
him the song be like,
"Hey, what do you
think about this?
Do you have any
ideas?" And he loved it
and he has a bunch
of great ideas.
So Julian came in and
then we brought in
an amazing steel guitar player,
named Skip Edwards.
From there, added a bunch of
sliding guitars
that made it really
really cool and really
more in the country land.
From there, we
brought it to one of
Thomas's kind of
main producer collaborators
and nationalist,
a legendary producer, Dann Huff,
and just basically kept like
finding those pieces of
the puzzle and getting closer
and closer to fight like finding
kind of the end goal that
we want to feel the song,
and in basically,
finding all those pieces
we got to the song.
Song came out, and ended up
being a successful
song. So, yeah.
>> Here we look at the-
>> Yes, I think we have
the initial video of the demo
that they sent to me,
which was kind of terrifying
for me. [inaudible]
[MUSIC]
>> Yes, I think you
can kind of see from
the initial start
of just that real
basic acoustic to go through
the processes of
utilizing the network,
that I had in the networks
that my co-producers
had in the song.
We were able to like really take
it to the next level
of production,
where it feels a little bit
pop and innovative
but also feels kind of country
at the same time I think.
I think we got to a cool spot.
>> Fantastic. Nice work.
That was a fantastic example of
co-creation within
songwriting and production.
>> Thank you. Yeah.
>> So I'd like to,
I told you I'm going
to give you one song,
an album and some technology.
So let's talk about
an album. Peter, welcome.
>> Thank you.
>> And before we watch
that beautiful video again.
Actually, I was
hoping you tell us
a little bit about
The Heist kind of set,
set the scene for
why this is the album
that we're talking about.
>> We'll do and following
on what Joe said,
"It's important to
know that this is
the creative epicenter
how it really starts."
Right? And it is.
It's a team sport as
much as you want it
to just be an artist
or the people who
are really around
the nucleus once it
leaves your hands, right?
And the team of producers and
the people that
you put around it,
then it requires an army of
people around the world to
really be able to
deliver an artist and
their music to the top
of the charts globally.
In that case, the reason we're
talking about Macklemore,
which is a great source
of pride for me being
a part of a big major label
Warner Brothers Records.
There was this artist
Macklemore,
Ben Haggerty, who had been
on the scene for
a number of years,
he had been very successful as
an independent artist
selling out
tours here in the United States
and around the world.
And it gotten to
a point in his career
where he recognized
that something
was missing about being able to
get kind of paint
the world so to speak,
and really finish
his breakthrough
and it was getting
a song on the radio.
And getting a song on the radio
was traditionally something that
major labels have a bit of
a media stranglehold on.
Others can try to
do it occasionally,
they sneak through and
it's exciting when they do,
but certainly, much more of
an exception to the rule.
And wanting to maintain
his independence
and not appear to be
saddled up with the man
and working with
a record company which
we certainly understood.
We took a very discrete
approach to saying,
"Hey, why don't
you let us help?"
You don't need our help
putting your music on Spotify,
or on Apple Music or iTunes.
You have your own
independent publicist,
you don't need any help making
videos you do
a great job of that,
you don't need us to take
pictures for you but,
you do need a song on the radio
we know how to do
it and we can help.
So we made a very quiet,
very low key deal
and we maintained
our discretion and
we always promised to
stay in the shadows
which we have.
And the result of that kind of
co-creation and
collaboration that we have,
went on to a number of
big hit singles and
as Jay mentioned,
seven Grammy nominations
and four wins,
and now an album
that's sold north of
five million copies with
tens of millions of singles,
and hundreds of millions
if not billions of
streams at this point,
and really put Ben
and Ryan on the map
as a massive
breakthrough artist.
It was his vision of
knowing what he wanted.
Our understanding of recognizing
an ability to do it in
a fairly different way,
typically labels would make
a lot of noise about
a big breakthrough.
We wanted the world to know
that they had accomplished it.
And in the case of this,
we simply kept her mouth shut.
And as a result,
now we're going into
his third album that will
be out in a couple of weeks,
and we've had a great and
collaborative experience
with a world class artist.
That makes sense?
>> I think, it's
a really fantastic example
of how the capital
and the goodwill,
and the networks that Warner
Brothers Records has built.
It is something that
an artist can come
in and use it to
amplify their work.
Take it to millions
and millions people.
>> Yeah, and someone
mentioned I think in
the last piece too,
I know is a gentleman
who's headed to Detroit.
It's one thing to want
to protect your networks,
it's one thing to
want to protect
in on their relationships.
It's so much better when you
let them rest. You
know what I mean?
And you really share
it with people,
if you're fearful about someone
having a better relationship
with your partner than you are,
then you probably
have some work to do.
If you can maintain
a fearlessness about it,
the opportunities for
explosive growth
particularly in music,
how great would it be
if instead of saying,
"Well, I don't want to
talk to Max Martin."
You called Max Martin and said,
"Hey, we're going to
do this together."
And the next thing,
you were making
more records with him or
each other and there's
just a big explosive opportunity
that people tend to not
want to participate in.
>> Fantastic. Well thank
you Peter. It's really good.
>> My pleasure. Thank you.
>> So, I'll call
it like it is the music
industry is not always
known for being in
the forefront of technology.
In fact, we often resist it.
But our next story,
we're going to talk about Greg,
and how you have actually
led the charge to
discover new technologies and
embrace them within
the industry.
>> Yes, absolutely. Hi everyone.
Thank you Jay for inviting
me into the Microsoft team,
and this is quite a
special subject matter,
really as I look at it,
to connect Burning Man
to the powerhouse of
Shenzhen back to us.
Macklemore is quite an
interesting sort of series of
unrelated topics
that come together
in the context of networking,
and it's near and dear to me
although I'm sort of
learning more about
how I've adapted
in this universe,
in a way that is relevant
for the subject matter.
Network, the kind of things I've
been hearing about today
are so central to my life.
I'm very active in a lot of
civic contexts
politically and use
very powerful networks to
drive opportunity there when
it comes to political
activity and activism.
I do it in the international
global conservation movement,
where I'm very active
in networks that drive
conservation in
Africa and elsewhere.
I bring it heavily into
my field of career,
vocational field which is
the music industry
where I built a deep,
strong, and tight network.
That cohesive network
that we talk about through
many years of productive work
on behalf of artists,
through the creative cycle into
release and global impact.
But then, being
a part of an industry
that was being
disrupted so heavily,
and working with artists along
that period of disruption,
is feeling like we would
benefit by reaching outside
of our cohesive networks
which by the way,
we're working beautifully
for many years so we
didn't have to adapt
in the same way.
But I started to see
an opportunity to bring
some leadership to this area,
working in conjunction with
a very enlightened leader
within the Warner Music Group,
Cameron Strang,
who was focused as
well on how we can expand
innovation and our networks.
That led me to actually
have the privilege and
opportunity to go build out
new networks for example,
starting with
Stanford University,
where I built a program
with Warner and we did
a massive online open course,
where we brought many,
many famous artists to the table
reached thousands
of people globally
and performed creative tasks
that the outcome of that.
And then, I took
that network within Stanford,
and as we were pursuing more
on the technology front,
how could we get in
front of technology,
where could we participate
earlier in the value chain.
I sought out Jay in
his adjunct role at Stanford,
and he was teaching a course
on music information retrieval.
Which I thought was
important category for
development of the music industry.
Through that, was able
to reach networks that
brought us to this company
called Landor,
at a time when it
had three employees.
And this was changing the face
to machine learning of
the music production cycle
through mastering.
What I did was,
I was able to sell that concept
to the Warner leadership.
We invested in that company
and then serving
as a bridge myself
through my consultancy.
I was able to work
deeply with Landor,
to drive business development
strategies globally.
And I have watched
that company go from
three employees to 90 employees.
It has millions of
dollars in revenue.
It is present in
190 countries and it is
translated across 15 languages.
There is a very robust
and strong community
of a million and a half users.
And, it's really shaking up in
very exciting ways
disrupting frankly.
So, we're in on the disruption
early in the value chain,
we're not waiting for
it to happen to us.
It's creating tremendous
economies of scale and
it's freaking cool, right?
That you can do this
with your mobile phone.
I mean the ecosystem
is mind-blowing.
So I love being part of
a music industry that is jumping
into that as opposed
to waiting for
it to hit us. You
know what I mean?
And by the way, it's not
always an easy transition.
We have professionals
who are afraid of this,
but then they start to
see that it can co-exist.
And frankly, they can
adapt their skill sets
to manage in this
changing environment,
bring a little of
that Shenzhen mindset
to what we're doing.
So, that's the Landor's
story which I'm,
one of several I'm
participating in,
where I found early tech,
brought some investment,
brought some
strategic leadership,
and now we're seeing
dramatic expansion globally.
Landor is one powerful example
that unites Jay and I,
and it's been a privilege
working with these guys and
I continue to work
deeply with them.
We've brought them across
the music business.
It's not that Warner
is controlling
that network and maintaining
it as a closed environment.
We invest but we've driven
adoption through
Universal Music Group,
Disney, ASCAP across
the music landscape.
So I think it's
quite a compelling story of
that type of broadening
of networks and how
that can be powerful.
>> Fantastic. Thank you
Greg, that was great. So, I
hope I delivered as promised.
Again, to really
bring it all together.
We all depend on
the cohesive networks that
we have. They are very tight.
We make very intimate
artful, personal,
emotional decisions together
and we count on each other,
but we all have to
keep opening it up.
So whether it's Joe,
if you want to write
for a new genre you
haven't written before,
you need to reach
out to a new network.
Build, trust, credibility,
demonstrate some goodwill,
and then be welcomed in.
Whether it's Macklemore saying,
I need extra distribution,
I need extra help,
opening up reaching out
and then Peter being
so generous with
your contacts and creation's
connections that helps out.
And Greg same thing you've kind
of masterfully reached out,
opened up huge parts of
the music industry worlds to
mean fellow tech
industry folks but,
then now the tech
industry is able to
benefit from all the
great music connections.
So, I want to thank you all
for giving so much
and being here today,
and also again, a huge
thanks to Microsoft
for supporting us and
creating this great event.
>> Thanks for having us.