Josh Simons: From Indie Music Roots to Tech CEO Building Creative Communities

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Carmen Lezeth (00:02):
Hey everyone, welcome to All About the Joy,
the private lounge.
We have Rick Costa in the house, cynthia Lopez in the house and
our guest, josh, and I'm goingto mess up your name, but I'm
going to try.
Josh Simons, right, Simons.

Josh Simons, CEO of Viny (00:17):
Simons very close.

Simons, okay, it's so nice to meet you.
I always like to tell peoplehow I know our guests, but I
actually don't know you.
Julia reached out to us becauseI guess she listened to our
podcast.

Josh Simons, CEO of Vinyl. (00:32):
Yeah , julie's my assistant and I
asked her about a year ago tostart listening to more and more
podcasts that might coverthings that we like to talk
about and that I might bevaluable in in some way, and I
think she's doing a great job.
But, yeah, that's how we liketo talk about and that I might
be valuable in in some way, andI think she's doing a great job.
But yeah, that's how we came tobe.

Well, we're so glad to have you on the show,
and I did as much research as Icould, and so didn't Rick and
Cynthia.
So we have a million questions,but the first one I want to
start with is you were amusician, or you're still a
musician, and I see guitars inthe background, so can you just
tell us a little bit about thatbefore we get into how you
became the CEO of vinyl?

(01:11):
And creating vamper.
Do you say vamper?

yeah , that's, it's, however.
It's however you want to say,but that that would be
considered correct in 190countries um yeah so I I, I, um,
yeah, I started in a.
Well, you know, actually I'll goback a step.
So I, I started managingfriends bands when I was in high
school and, um, I really lovedsome of the music they were

(01:38):
making but, um, where I wantedto take them probably a bit more
commercial, they wanted to beindie and cool, and that's why
they got the girls and I didn't.
And I, I, I wanted to makesomething a bit more, something
that you might hear on the radio.
So I, I ended up stoppingmanagement and actually just
making the music myself, andthat actually, I mean it wasn't

(02:03):
a conventional career path inthat it broke really quickly.
So it got on the radio and westarted playing festivals and
touring within the first sixmonths, which is unusual.
And then it kind of stopped andstarted a lot because I would
pursue other things liketechnology companies and just
other little ventures, and so itwent in these weird fits and

(02:24):
bursts, but it's taken me aroundthe world.
It brought me to America, itbecame a citizen of that great
country and it introduced me tomy wife and all these wonderful
things, and so that's, yeah, ina nutshell, that's kind of my
playing career.
But then that obviously thenled to other things that we'll
probably talk about today, suchas running a big technology

(02:46):
music group and things like that.

Right, Well, I'll just say, you know we don't
really do things conventionalhere, Although last time we had
someone on the show I read theirentire resume.
It was pretty crazy, but it wasalso cool.
I will say this for you Prettycrazy, but it was also cool.
Okay, I will say this for you.
You are the CEO of Vinyl Groupand the founder of Vampyr, a

(03:07):
platform that's been called theLinkedIn of Creatives, which I
found interesting, but it'sreally something more human than
that.
You're a former musician turnedtech entrepreneur.
Tell me if I'm wrong.

Josh Simons, CEO of Vin (03:20):
Someone sent you the right information
or you're a really goodresearcher.

Cynthia Lopez (03:28):
She's a really good researcher.

I'm a really good researcher.
But also she did send me yourbio and then all your links, but
I'm not done.
Baby, Hold on one second.

Josh Simons, CEO of Vinyl.g (03:38):
All right all right.

You've raised millions, you've acquired iconic
media brands um.
You've stayed throughout thatwhole thing, you've stayed
pretty focused on one thing andthis is gonna say, I think
you're gonna say, stayed humble.
I was like, yeah, okay, no Idon't think you're, I'm just
kidding.
Um, you've stayed focused onone thing, which is empowering
artists and then trying to buildcommunities, and that's what I

(04:04):
think.
Julia, your executive assistantshe's brilliant, by the way,
only in the way that she'sinteracted and she communicates,
and because I work with so manypeople who are executive
assistants and I fired them allthe time, but that's a side
thing, but I think that's whatshe saw.
She's my first.

Josh Simons, CEO of Vinyl.gr (04:22):
EA , but I think that's what she
saw.
That was probably.
She's my first EA.
Really, I've held off havingone for about 10 years because,
for various reasons, I also justbelieve you can do most of it
yourself.
But then I got so busy to apoint that I was like no, no,
it's actually becomingdetrimental not having one.

Let's give her props.
It takes a vote of one.
Yeah, let's props, props, yeah,but yeah, one.
Yeah, let's props, props, um,but yeah.
But I think that's what we dois we're trying to build
community around all differenttypes of subjects or whatever,
and I think that's theconnection.
So we're excited to have youhere thank you so much cynthia.
I think you had a question, yes, um what inspired you to to

(04:59):
build vampir?

what makes it different from other, like
social platforms?

yeah , thank, that's a good question.
I was, um, thinking back, Ithink, as in england and we
might so my band had had somelike success in australia and,
um, and then, like a lot ofaustralians, um, when you start
to break in a market that'squite small, like that, you go.
Can I do this in a biggercountry?
Because I could probably make abit more money and blah, blah,

(05:27):
blah, reach more people, and I'menglish like I was born there,
so it made sense to give it acrack there.
At least on paper it made sense.
And then what everyoneunderestimates when they move
for, you know, for an artisticendeavor often is you're
starting from square one in anygiven city, so you probably

(05:48):
don't have a network around youof folks in that space.
You certainly wouldn't haveaccess to, say, managers or
publishers or producers orpromoters I don't know why they
all start with P, but these arepeople that can sort of get your
career, I guess, into that nextlevel.
And I think you underestimateor take for granted that the
first sort of, let's say, theyears between the ages of I

(06:10):
don't know 15 and 20, eventhough you're still a kid and
you're probably living at home,you're still building your
network during that time, and sothat's kind of it's almost free
time that you get.
And then when you're an adultand you're paying rent and
you've got to earn a living andall that stuff, you don't get
that free time a second time.
So it's a long way of sayingwent to another country,
couldn't or didn't have the timeto build the career a second

(06:32):
time over.
And I and I sat back andreflected on it and thought,
well, technology's done a greatjob of making it easy to build a
fan base.
You know, anyone can start aninstagram account, youtube
channel, you can put your musicout there through cd baby, and
you can.
There's all sorts of ways youcan sort of build your, your
audience.
But there's no tool in themusic industry to connect

(06:54):
professionals one-to-one.
And that was the sort of lightbulb.
That was like, well, surelysomeone, if they haven't built
it, should be thinking about itor starting to build it.
And so then I just kind of goton with it and that was the
start of vamper.
And it wasn't like a calculatedthing or aha, we're gonna go
and conquer the world.
Anything like that was justlike this might be a useful idea

(07:15):
.

And then we just started building can you tell
people why it's called vamper?

yeah , so the vamp in music is to
like jam around a set of ideas,usually like a chord progression
or um, like a rhythm, over andover again in a bit of a loop,
until everyone sort of starts toget into it and you start
creating something really out ofnothing, and so that's to vamp.
And then it was 2015 andeverything had an r at the end
of it, so it was tinder andtumblr and um, and, and so we

(07:42):
just were very uncreative inthat respect.

I was trying to figure it out and like I'm glad
I was, like I'm just gonna giveup on that for a moment yeah, no
, it's it's pretty yeah, what.

Rick Costa (07:54):
How old were you when you kind of thought like
music is going to be thetrajectory of my life?

Josh Simons, CEO of Vi (07:59):
probably about the age of four, because
my parents both were in themusic industry and my
grandparents in quite seniorroles and my father passed away
when I was two.
So a lot of very raw memoriesfrom not quite two but certainly

(08:20):
the ages of three or four.
Quite visceral memories ofbasically me and my twin brother
living in England with a singlemum who had to move her kids
back to Australia because herEnglish partner had just passed
away.
It was such obviously aformative time but in and
amongst all that was this familythat was just immersed in the

(08:41):
music industry and we coped as aunit, the three of us, by
listening to old records and mumintroduced us to like Diana
Ross and the Supremes and likeTubular Bells, which is like an
instrumental album, and there'sjust all these old sort of
classics Toto, led Zeppelin, Icould go on for hours.

Toto is a big deal in Europe, right.

Yeah , yeah, yeah, we deal here with
like two singles or something.

Yeah, the two big singles, yeah, Africa Wow
that's a name I haven't heard ina while.
Go ahead, I'm sorry.

But no, so that was just around.
And so then you know, again wewere this kind of protective
unit of three that we're justtrying to get through a really
rough time for any family andand you know, we were such young
kids and so I suppose my momwas trying to do things to give
us hope and and, um, not and Idon't mean it wasn't negative,

(09:35):
by the way it was a reallyactually kind of amazing time.
As kids we had no idea that itwas an unusual upbringing, um,
but she just surrounded thehousehold with music and stories
from the industry, and pianosand and acoustic, you know,
guitars and things were justaround the house and so it just
it felt like it was a given.
It was never, it wasn't, Iwasn't forced into it, but at

(09:57):
the same time it was like neverreally a choice.
It was like you're gonna besomehow, you're gonna be
involved.
How did you?

switch from not doing being a musician.
I mean, I think that would behard and I only know it because
I was a dancer and then Icouldn't do it anymore, Like
there was no choice, so I had togo to college.
You know what I mean.
How were you able to reconcilethose two things, leaving that
field and going into basicallythe business end of it?

Josh Simons, CEO of Vinyl.gro (10:24):
I really think they're the same
muscle.
I think they're the same muscle.
See, the main thing I think Ithrived at when I was a playing
musician more actively issongwriting, and songwriting to
me is problem solving.
It's like I've got this thingthat sounds catchy, but is it a
verse or is it a chorus, or isit a pre-chorus or is it?

(10:44):
How are we going to end thesong?
Are we going to fade it out?
Are we going to end with a bang?
There's all these sort of microdecisions In any given song.
There might be a thousandlittle decisions that you're
making along the way, maybe more.
And running a business isidentical.
You know, this staff member isnot behaving particularly well,
or they did this thing and maybewe should have a chat to them.
But if we do that, that mightdisincentivize them, and so
we've got to do this thing overthere and maybe we can give them

(11:06):
a bit of leeway.
But we're going to launch thisinitiative and maybe take off
some responsibility.
So anyway, I'm still making uphypotheticals there, but the
point is it's all problemsolving, and I think that's the
part of the brain, that sort ofpart of my French gets turned on
a little bit when it's working.

You get really passionate, like did you guys
just notice him.

That's what it's like every day, and I
think that's what attracted meto music making and then,
ultimately, I found that samesatisfaction running a business.
So you know, same, same butdifferent type thing.

So tell us how then you got vinyl, how vinyl
come into fruition, I guess it'sa good question.

So I started vamper in america and
we launched that in like 2015and then something happened in
about 2021, um, if I'm sure weall remember, sort of halfway
through the whole covid thing,tech companies plummeted like
the valuation of private techcompanies plummeted.

Oh right, it was like COVID yeah.

So there was this big crash and
then there was this huge reboundand everything was like to the
moon to the moon and GameStopand crypto and all that.
And then what happened, likeimmediately after that, is this
kind of steady, almostrecession-like in the private
markets behavior, where we werea company that had and I'm not
going to bore people with thisbut we'd raised money at about a

(12:32):
$20 million pre-money valuationand that means it's bloody high
for the amount of business thatwe were doing.
And then what we were findingis we'd come to the end of the
runway, which means we sort ofrun out of money to spend to
develop the products and bringin more customers, which is the
life cycle of a startup, right?
You raise money, you spend it.

(12:54):
Grow the business, raise moremoney.

Is this for vinyl ?

This is for Vampa.

Vampa okay.

And so then this sort of thing
happened to the world where thevaluations plummeted and our
valuation went down to about $ 5million and our board that's
like quite a big haircut, it'slike a 75% discount.
So our board was like you know,you've done a good job, you've
worked really hard, but it's,you know, I think, year seven or
eight into the project andmaybe it's time you found a
buyer and you know we don'treally want to do a down, what's

(13:23):
called a down round, where wewould have had to raise money at
a lower valuation and givenaway more of the business.
So I started looking for a buyerand I found a company in
australia called jackster.
That was like imdb for themusic industry, um, and they had
their own unique challenges andit was a tough time for
everyone, that post-covid period.

(13:43):
So someone you know smarterthan me said maybe, if you can
find a way to bring thosecompanies together, um, they
might have a fighting chance tosort of not only survive but
thrive.
And that's exactly what we did.
So, long story short, I sold mybusiness to a company called
jackster.
I then took over jacksterwithin a few weeks and we

(14:06):
rebranded it as Vinyl Group,which was a big portfolio sort
of play, and now we've bought awhole bunch of other music
businesses.

Wow See, I should have called you first, because
now that all makes such sense tome, you know what I mean.
Tell us what the focus is nowwith vinyl.

I think broadly and lazily you
can probably break the businessinto two parts.
There's vinyl media, which is,um, a publisher that owns titles
like rolling stone, australia,variety, australia.
Um, we have an ad network inthere too that represents the
australian web traffic for siteslike deadline, uh, hollywood
reporter, right, rotten tomatoescoming.

(14:46):
Hollywood Reporter, rottenTomatoes Coming Soon.
That's a pretty big business.
And then on top of that we owna bunch of music publications
that are more native to againAustralia.
So that's very much anAustralian media business, but
it's the product of I think Ibought about four or five
different companies to assemblethat as to what it is today, and

(15:06):
that's the media thing that wecall vinyl media.
And then there's our technologybusinesses on the other side of
vinyl group, and thatencompasses thamper, obviously
we've talked about rightjackster.
Um, we've got a business calledserenade, which is like nfc
merchandise.
So you know, if you go to aconcert and you buy, I don't
have anything handy, I've got alittle percussion thing here,
just.
But like, let's say, you boughta frog at a concert and you buy

(15:28):
, I don't have anything handy,I've got a little percussion
thing here, but like, let's say,you bought a frog at a concert
and it's a piece of merchandisefrom your favorite band.
Nfcs is like a chip that wouldbe embedded somewhere in this
and when you touch it with yourphone it activates a digital
experience.
So it's like a merchandisecompany that's trying to blur
the lines between physical anddigital, and that's really cool.
That's an English business thatI bought in, I think, september

(15:51):
, and so you know we're workingwith some really major
international artists that Ican't talk about to bring those
products.

You know that's all we want.
Now, Like what is this, what isthis?
You can't do that.
We're going to delete that part.
That's not fair.

It's fine.
You know what is this?
You can't do that.
We're going to delete that part.
That's not fair.
It's fine, we're a publiccompany, so we can never talk
about things that haven'thappened yet, right?

No, no, I know, I know For you, it's
international, but it probablymeans people from here in the
United States.

Yeah , sure.

And I see that you've worked with Lady Gaga.
I was just checking out.

I you've worked with lady gaga,
you know, I was just checkingout.

I've not worked with gaga, oh well.
Why is lady gaga on yourinstagram or whatever?
What was?

that I don't know.
She might have been in one ofour magazines or something oh,
yeah, I don't well, it was nicetalking to you.
We were really I wish I couldsay that I've personally worked
with mama monster.

That'd be very cool god, you know what I didn't
realize.
This was going to be morebusiness oriented, because I
just learned so much anything no, no, it was so, that was just I
.
I feel like I just learned somuch about business in general
and I like to pretend I know somuch about business and I just
felt so educated well, I, I dotoo.

I my life's been, um, nothing if
not strange for the last coupleof years.
Well, this is all comingtogether and I'm obviously
driving it, but there's a degreeof being a passenger in the
journey as well and watching ithappen.
It's like this is all.
Yeah, I mean, my mom doesn'tbelieve.
When I go go home some Fridayevenings and have dinner with my

(17:29):
folks or whatever my mum andher new partner I will sometimes
tell them what I'm up to andshe just thinks I'm lying half
the time until it becomes a newsstory.
Really, like last year, I think, when we got to December 23,
2023, so call that 18 months agowe had this cold play tour

(17:51):
coming up which was like 11dates or something.
We had this and that was.
It was a whole year away, so wehad to keep that quiet for an
entire year.
And then, on top of that, wejust bought rolling stone
australia and that was a bigdeal here and, yeah, they just
thought I was lying about it all.

(18:13):
It wasn't until it started isit?

is it kind of like imposter syndrome?

Josh Simons, CEO of Vi (18:18):
probably .
Yeah, I think everyone has that.

I think everyone has it, yeah but, it's kind of
cool to hear someone who is, whois as successful as you are, to
admit it, because most peoplewould never yeah, well, most
people you called it being onthe passenger right, like like
you're just watching it happenas, as opposed to being the
person who's driving it.
So it's kind of the same thingas yeah, I think it's the same

(18:41):
thing.

Yeah , but hopefully.
Hopefully, though, like whenyou're busy, you're not spending
too much time looking backwards, and I certainly don't.
It's more about trying to bepresent sometimes and
appreciating what's going on inreal time.

Right.

Go ahead.
Cynthia, you spoke about havinga twin brother.
Is he also in music and is hepart of the business too?

No , he's a lawyer and he's a
really quite high-powered one.
I try to convince him to bepart of the business, but he's
so far resisted.
He's smart law somewhere inengland, yeah, yeah because
someday you might need him Iknow, I know I'm trying to get
it.

I'm trying to get a good rate yeah, I, I, I heard
the twin thing too.

So when you said, I was like
because I didn't see any of thatin your bio or anything, yeah,
yeah, no, we don't know he'smuch skinnier and just a smaller
frame I'm I'm the bulkier oneof the two.
He looks like my dad.

(19:49):
I look like my mom.

Okay, cool, okay, I have a question.
So what does the music industryget wrong about community?
Because you seem to be centeredon trying to get artists and
musicians specificallycommunity-based.
So I'm trying to figure outwhat do they get wrong or what
are they not doing right thatyou're filling that void for?

Yeah , I think historically there's a
lot of gatekeepers in the musicindustry and there's good and
bad reason for that.
Well, gatekeeping in general isnot a great thing, but there's
understandable reasons.
And then there's just peoplebeing assholes, but the main
reason is it's a very hardindustry, like any creative

(20:31):
business, to crack into and thenonce you, once you achieve a
certain level of success, youkind of want to protect your
position.
Um, now, there's big exceptions, that.
So one thing I noticed,particularly when I lived in
america, is, um, when someonemakes it like an ariana grande
or um or Kanye West or thinkingof people that were sort of
working in studios that I wasaround, they have their whole

(20:53):
crew with them and that crew isusually there from when they're
in high school or in theirreally early years.
And I love that, because that'sthe positive side of the music
industry, where we talk aboutlike a rising tide lifts all
boats.
And that's what I really try topromote in everything I do,
which is reminding folks that,in order to be successful, you
don't need to try and find outhow you can get in touch with

(21:13):
Jay-Z or how you can get intouch with some music executive.
You actually just need toreally invest in your friends
and the people around you,because if everyone's helping
the people around each otherlike, it only takes one of you
to make it for everyone toreally ride that wave, and so
that's what I'm big on promoting.

But you know, I also lived in LA, so I've seen I
was just going to say how couldyou even believe that when,
nine times out of ten, those arethe people that end up?

No , that's not true, though,
because when I've been becauseliving like the truly successful
ones I can think of I'm notgoing to name names, but there's
a few not very nice people thathave kind of effed up, you know
, as in gotten successful bygoing, we call it vertical
networking versus horizontalnetworking, but I would say, far

(22:03):
more often than not, the reallyfamous people, like I said, are
surrounded by people that camewith them, and that's a great
example and that's what restoredmy humanity in the industry,
because they'll always be thegate.
So they might themselves begatekeepers and not allow
someone to come up, or mightshut a door on someone and not
give them an opportunity.
Whether that person's owed oneor not is kind of up for debate,

(22:25):
but I do see, typically peoplebring folks with them, and so,
again, I think that should giveeveryone hope that it's possible
to make it.

Sue, I know what you're saying and I like your
viewpoint better, so I don'twant to be negative, but I'm
going to be Go for it, but in myexperience.
What I've noticed is that moneychanges things.

Yeah , but I think money is that
money changes things.
Yeah, but I think moneycorrupts in any industry.
Yes, I think it's separate tothat fame piece that comes with
being in creative industries.
I've seen people that aren'twell-known but who have come
into or maybe they've gottenreally high in their careers
suddenly have a lot more wealththan they used to, and I've seen
it corrupt them in a reallyugly way.
Okay, fair, suddenly have a lotmore wealth than they used to,

(23:09):
and I've seen it corrupt them ina really ugly way, and so I
think the fame part is separate,maybe related.
I've also seen, um, what aharsh spotlight can do to a
person and really make them goinwards as well, and, um, that
certainly has its owninteresting, weird side effects.
But I think when what I try todo when I talk about this topic
is push all of that other stuffto the side and just talk about

(23:31):
practical ways for people toearn a living in the industry
that they love being in, andthat's that's how I'm able to
just stay quite optimistic andand focusing quite tightly,
narrowly how do we do that?
I think I've said it, I thinkit's, I think no, like I said, I
think it's about um doublingdown on the people that are

(23:54):
already around you and askingquestions and and being an
interested person I foundgenerally serve most people
pretty well we joke all the timeabout when one of us hits the
lotto, we're gonna take care ofthe rest of us.

I say it, but I'm lying.

I'm lying every time I'm sitting
here in my office looking at myneighbor's house and him and I
have a pact where, if one of uswins the lottery, we're going to
buy a couple of the otherhouses and build a big, nice
compound for us all to enjoy.

We come visit.
I think we should do a podcastin person with you.
Cynthia doesn't want to comebecause she's afraid of the
spiders.

That , uh, that's only up, that's
only up north, which is likequeensland's the name of the
state, it's like it's like ourversion of florida, um, and
that's where you get all thecrazy stuff.
But people think that that'sall of australia.
That's just one, one part.
But okay so, but people thinkthat that's all of Australia,
that's just one part.

Okay, so now we know we're staying away from the
north Right right, but do you?

have the big spiders where you are too.

Yeah , Australia has the big
Occasionally, but I think, sinceI moved back here in 2022, I
think I've seen one.

That's enough for me, yeah.

Rick Costa (25:12):
Somebody just sent me a postcard from what's this
called blue mountain australia.

Oh yeah, that's between melbourne
and sydney, so I live inmelbourne but our office is in
sydney and we I fly back andforth it fairly frequently.
It's about an hour flight, um,and we fly over those.

They're beautiful how do you?
How do you balance I'm gonnaget us back a little bit how do
you balance innovation,technology with authenticity?
Like you're very grounded, um,not that I would expect you not
to be but how do you deal withkind of just having all this
tech and all this innovation andstaying kind of normal?

(25:49):
You're speaking on my level, Iget you.
How do you do that?

I don't know.
I've never liked things, eventhough I own a social media
platform.
I've never really much used orcared for social media, um,
which I do think is can be acorrupting force if it's
monetized the wrong way and istaking advantage of vulnerable

(26:14):
people and their state of mind.
So I've stayed away from socialmedia.

But we don't want to promote that.
We want people to go check outvinylcom.

Yeah no, I have a weird I do.
I have a bizarre relationshipwith self-promotion.
I mean, I say that as someoneappearing on this podcast, but
I'm pushing, I'm also pushingmyself right, like this is also
like I want to be out therespeaking more because I know
that I've got something to add,but I just think there's um,
there's probably digital.
I've heard the term digitalhealth before.

(26:45):
It's a bit wanky, um, but Ithink being mindful of spending
too much time with technology issomething that everyone should
probably, at the very least,consider Just the nature of what
I do.
There's a lot of thinking thatgoes into pretty much everything
.
As I was saying before, there'sa lot of decisions every day,

(27:06):
countless, maybe hundreds ofdecisions that impact the
business or some other person'slife in some way, and so there's
a lot of thinking time andthinking.
I find that during thinkingtime, you're actually away from
devices a lot.
You know I've got an incrediblelike you can't really see it,
but I've got gadgets all aroundme, and I've got gadgets all
around the house, but I findthat I very rarely touch

(27:27):
anything.
Yeah, much more time is spent.

For the audio.
But for the audio, I wantpeople to know that you should
go check out vinylcom andvampirme.
But, um, okay, if, if youweren't doing this, what would
you be doing?

I don't know, probably playing
bad piano in a cover band.
I don't know, I don't know, Idon't know he's been doing it
since he was four.
Yeah, it's kind of.
I mean, I suppose when I was inmy 20s I worked as a toilet
cleaner and a gardener for aboutaltogether, about four or five

(28:11):
years, somewhere around that,and that was how I afforded.
That's how I afforded to makemy first album.
That's how I was able to payfor rent in my first apartment.
So I'd probably just go backand cut grass again.
To be honest, the happiest I'veever been was there was one

(28:32):
year where I took one year offcreating.
It wasn't planned that way, itjust happened that way.
I was a bit burnt out, like waytoo young to be burned out, but
I was burned out and I I wantedto just not be creative for a
year and just make a bit ofmoney and have some fun and
drink beer on the weekends andjust chill out.

And I've got to say it's still probably looking
back with rose-colored glasses,but my favorite memories are
from that year I think thatmakes sense, though I think all
of us can go back, because itwas simply you didn't have all
this responsibility, you didn'thave all these people that you
my biggest responsibility waswas making sure I was clean

(29:14):
before turning up to a party sothat the pretty girl might kiss
me up to a party so that thepretty girl might kiss me
exactly yeah same thing honestly, I think that's what.

That's.

What's keeping you humble is that you started
small and you worked your wayand you knew, you know about
hard labor yeah, 100 yeah Ithink it's important to have
what I call real jobs, like realhard jobs that are are more
about manual labor and notglamorous, before you start then
acquiring companies and sellingthem and buying them and doing

(29:48):
all the stuff you're doing.

Yeah , because that is the natural
progression.

I've heard yeah, no, it's not, but it should be,
it should be required thateveryone who's like a teenager
or a young 20-year-old shouldhave to do like hard labor I
don't mean like prison work butit teaches you something, it
gives you some character.

It gives you discipline.
I think it teaches you how tostart and finish a job.
One of the reasons, I think, alot of people who say they want
to own a business and want to dobig things, one of the things I
observe, at least sort of froma unique perspective, is
people's inability to get thingsfinished.
And so a lot of people are verygood at I mean, almost

(30:33):
everyone's good at startingideas, but I think the key to
success is often completing, andsometimes completing doesn't
mean the vision that you hadwhen you got started.
It just means having a finishedproduct and something to give
to the world.
Typically speaking, when youput something out there into the
universe whether it's effort ora product or a combination of

(30:54):
the two things you will getsomething back.
And again it might not be whatyou think you want, but it will
get something back.
And again it might not be whatyou think you want, but it'll be
something, and that something,that concept, that idea.
I've built my whole life aroundthat one idea.

God, I'm so jealous of you.
I also think that a lot ofreason why people go into
wanting to become entrepreneursor getting into business is
because they think they're goingto make a lot of money.

Rick Costa (31:19):
Yeah.

It's really if you're passionate about
something, you will continue todo it and you will find your way
doing it.

There's another thing in that which I
really hold on to, which is, ifyour version of success is just
I want to be able to do thething I love and earn enough
from that to be able to pay thebills um, I think, then,
everything above that is just anadded bonus yes and, and that
gives you a real freedom.
So I I have that as well andthat's from, that's from doing

(31:52):
those years of labor, because Iwas just like I don't know.
I can't remember what I was onback there, maybe $800 a week,
not a huge amount of money,right and I remember thinking if
I can earn that same amountfrom doing something I love.

That's like the jackpot oh man, yeah, yeah, we
want to do this and make $800 aweek.

Rick Costa (32:13):
That's right.

We want to do that.
That's why we all work 40, 50hours a week and we still do
this.
Show you, that's why we allwork 40, 50 hours a week and we
still do this show.
That is the goal.
You want to be passionate aboutit and you get something back
from it.

That's right, yeah.

What brings you joy in your work.
Now I mean, I think I kind ofcan say it for you, but go ahead
.
I want to hear it from you.
I think it might be moreinteresting.
Well, you know what's so weird?
I think that you embody joy.
I wasn't expecting this.
Look, I'm going to be honestwith you.
Julia is great.
Is that her name, julia, right?

Josh Simons, CEO of Vinyl (32:45):
Julie , julie, julie, julie, julie.

Renton, I'm so sorry.
My neighbor upstairs is Julia.

Shout out to Julia upstairs.

And then my goddaughter's name is Juliana,
so I'm having a little bit of aconfusion here.
Okay, she's great, but I neverhave had someone on the show
that I have not interacted with.
So I think you noticed Ireached out to you on linkedin
and then I was like you knowwhat?
I'm gonna leave him alonethough, because I don't think he
wants to be bothered, so I'mjust gonna go with the flow.
So I was expecting somebodyreally kind of snooty no, I, I

(33:20):
don't like you know.

what might have happened is, I have
this thing and I've told Juliethis.
I want to meet people, but onething that I've learned from
being on some other podcasts nowis folks often want to do this
sort of pre-interview get toknow you first and I've never
found that to be helpful becauseit actually it removes magic

(33:42):
moments like.

I think we're having now Wait, wait wait
Before you go on before you goon.
Okay.
So, rick and Cynthia, I'm aboutto reprimand you in front of
our guests because do youremember that other person?
And you guys were like, oh,maybe they do, you should let
them do a pre-interview.
I'm like I'm not doing nopre-interviews, remember?
Okay, okay, go ahead, josh wellI?

I sometimes when I get a sense,
either through being cc'd on anemail or I get sent something
whatever.
I get a sense sometimes whenmaybe someone wants to do a
pre-interview and I have to.
It's so hard because I don't.
It's actually me trying to bethe opposite of snobby by going
no and like putting settingboundaries.
I'll tell julie like I'm notdoing that, like I'll turn up
but it's actually for the, it'sfor the benefit of their show,

(34:24):
right, and?
And so we have theseinteresting debates about that
because, again, it's trying toactually come from a really good
place but it can sound probablynot so nice.

No, no, usually we have the person.
So this is we're small boutique, we're I mean, we're awesome
and we are definitelyinternational now, so it's so.
It's not just you.
I don't know why so many peoplefrom all over the world keep
coming on the show.
It's amazing.
So we're excited and we'regetting bigger.
But usually the person whowants to be on the show is the

(34:54):
person who emails me, right?
So it was really interestingand I was like, okay, you know,
we're just gonna go with theflow with this man and so, yeah,
no, I love it, but you justseem like a regular guy, like
I'm coming to Australia to visityou, spiders or not, I don't
care.

You're welcome.
There's a.
There's a spare couch somewherein the house, A spare couch.

I thought you said a spare cat, I'm like okay,
not friends.

I'm not a cat person either.
Okay, we're best friends again.

Rick Costa (35:26):
Cool, this actually brings to my remembrance.
Somebody wanted to interview mefor their local TV show thing
and he wanted to meet up first.
So he went to a diner and he'sasked me all kinds of questions
beforehand.
Then when we got to the thing,it seemed really stiff because
it was like and flat it was like.
Now I feel like I wish I didn'ttalk to him ahead of time.

(35:47):
That's right Because it justlooked stale and yeah, I agree.

I'll tell you exactly where I
learned that lesson.
I was doing a TED Talk in 2015,and the producer said the night
before and this was probablyone of the biggest things, if
not the biggest thing, I'd doneup until that point the producer
the night before said do arun-through for all of this here
, just for time.

(36:13):
And I was like it's good.
I was like I've timed it, it'sgood.
And then she said no, no, wejust need to do it for time,
don't worry, we're not going togive you notes.
So we did it and they gave me alist of notes.
Oh no, and I went and eventhough I ended up going, I'm
going to ignore most of them.
It was still played in my mindand then, when I delivered the

(36:33):
speech, it was can I swear?

you only did.
But yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, itwas shit.

It was incredibly shit, and I've
ended up having it taken offlineand all that.
There's still, I think, onesmall part of it on YouTube, but
the point is is like I learneda big lesson from that, which is
like no back yourself.
You know you got an interestingstory.
You're a decent communicator,at least as far as I can tell

(37:02):
story.
Um, you're a decentcommunicator, at least as far as
I can tell.

and um, you don't want to blow that by sort of
doing, yeah, exactly what we'vebeen discussing so that's funny
because usually in, in in thefuture, if you were ever to do,
nobody would ever ask you to dothat probably you mean like now
because of your now you are, andalso even if they did, then
you'd be like, yeah, I'm notdoing that that's right, whereas
I was.
I was 10 years younger and, yeah, polite yeah I'm not sure the

(37:28):
same way too, like I've hadpeople just work wise, ask me
you know what?
Can we just go over what you'regoing to say in the
presentation?
I'm like okay, no, like yeah,you already.
You hired me because you wantedme to do this.

So I hope you don't.

There's a reverse of that as well,
which is and this is more familylife.
I find, after a big work thingor like we've been in the news
for something or there's beensome announcement, then I spend
time with like more distant it'snot like my immediate family,
but more like, you know, cousinsand such and they'll go.
What happened then?
And can you rehash that?

(38:04):
And it's like no, absolutelynot.
I live it Like I'm not going tospend my spare time and
weekends and leisure timerevisiting what I do in my
professional hours, like that'sjust not, that's not exciting to
me, that's, it's painful.
Anyway, we're just now.
We're just now.

(38:24):
We're just having a grouptherapy.
Love in.
Who's complaining aboutannoying family things?

exactly where do you see your career going?
Or you know what?
Not even your career, because Ithink you're.
It's not a career for you.
This is like your life, that'sright but what do you see
happening in the years to come?
Like is it is final, going toget bigger?
Are you going to do otherthings outside of it?
What are your kind of lifegoals?

(38:54):
Yes, awesome answer yes, I lovethat.
Yeah, um, okay, no, I think yes.
Awesome answer yes, I love that.

Yeah , okay, no, I think vinyl gets
bigger and I do other things andhopefully get a little bit of
balance back too.
I have been defined by mycareer for my whole life and I
think maybe there's a worldwhere that eases up a little bit
, because I can now can now, tobe honest.
So, maybe take a bit more timefor myself.

Yeah, is there something that you love to do?
Kind of like, what would youlike to do?
Like, have you ever beenskydiving?
Like tell us.

No , and I wouldn't Cause it, just
scares the.

I went skydiving.
Are you kidding me?

Come it just scares the kids out of
me.
I went skydiving.
Are you kidding me?
Come on, I'm scared of thatfeeling of the drop, I think.

But then other people told me you don't feel it
.
No, can I tell you the worstpart of skydiving.
But I would do it again.

And if I come to.

Australia, you're going.

Rick Costa (39:53):
We're doing it.
Okay, here's the thing.

The worst part is going up in the plane because
they're not going to bring youback down.
You have to jump.

Rick Costa (40:02):
Yeah.

So, and then the worst, worst part is watching
everyone before you go.

Yeah .

You know, but I had the whole thing filmed and
every time I'm I watch it, I'mlike, yes, I got to do it again
because I have kind of forgottengoing up in the plane, which
was scary.

When you watch it back, do you?
Do you look panicked at all, orno, you guys have seen it right
.

I'll send you the clip.
I'm having a blast because I'mtalking to the camera guy.
Well, I think I'm talking tothe camera guy, so I, so it's
tandem, of course.
Um, but we had the camera guynathan, and I was like talking
to him and I'm laughing.
I love.

It was pure joy yeah, okay, maybe
look, I'll tell you what I amdoing in in about two or three
weeks, and I'm I've been waitingfor months for this is I'm
buying a jet ski, and I'vebecause I'm moving.
I'm moving to a house that's onlike an inlet, um and and so we

(41:01):
my wife and I actually weren'tplanning on moving at all this
year, but we found this placeand it's.
We've kind of always dreamed ofhaving a place on the water,
and when we found it happened tobe in our price range, we were
just like, oh my god, this istoo good to be true.
So we we bought that about fourmonths ago and we finally move
in in a couple of weeks and thefirst thing we're going to do is
get some water toys.
So I'm looking forward to thoseJet skiing.

That would scare me.
That would scare me.

Well , the only times I've ever done
it have been trips down toMexico.
In fact, I love doing it inMexico so much that one trip we
went down just to go jet skiing,and so if I can make that part
of what I have in my everydaylife, then I think that's
probably a net positive.

Oh, that would be cool.

Yeah , I can see going out after a
tough day at the office and justblowing off some steam out in
the bay on the jet ski.
I think that to me sounds likeheaven, so I'll let you know in
a year if it's worked or not.

Oh no, that's going to be cool, Rick.
What were you going to say?

Rick Costa (42:00):
Yeah, I have friends that absolutely love love doing
it.
It's like they just feel thefreedom and it's a joy and it's
a thrill and it's just they loveit, Absolutely love it.
You're not an ocean person.

I live a block from the ocean.
I live in Santa Monica, you'vebeen to los angeles yeah, I live
right here, but I respect theocean.
I will not go into the ocean,especially here in santa monica,
but just in general yeah, yeah,yeah yeah, fair enough.

Rick Costa (42:29):
I do want to ask about the emperor though.
Oh yes, how it compares to likea linkedin, like sure now you
go to chat gpt, explain like I'ma six-year-old.
What does this mean?

yeah , yeah yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

But it's only for musicians, but I thought it was
also for creatives.

It's for creatives.
It is because it started off asa place for drummers to find
guitarists, singers to findproducers, like really
fundamental roles in the musicworld.
And then what happened is likepeople would hit us up and go,
well, I make artwork for music,can I join?
And we're like, yeah, we'llcreate a category for you.
And then someone would go andgo I'm a videographer, I like to

(43:04):
film bands and go on tour withthem.
Okay, well, I'm a choreographer.
And it kept going and going.
And then now we've got, I think,like 27,000 different role
types in there, so it to sort oflinkedin.

(43:27):
So, in terms of like, if youlook at the global workforce and
and the number of people whowork in creative adjacent sort
of fields or creative fields andadjacent creative fields,
you're talking about 10 of theworkforce thereabouts.
Um linkedin, only four percentof their user base identify as
working in creative fields.
So what that says is that it'snot an efficient place for
creative people to network,which I think anyone who's used
it would probably agree it'sgotten better over the years,

(43:49):
but it's.
You know, if I want to go andsee someone's portfolio and find
other people who are fans ofKendrick Lamar, who also, like
you know, who also have thesefollowing skills and have, you
know, worked in these spaces,specifically in music or in film
.
You just can't do that on LinkTo Like.
The example we always give islike if you wanted to find

(44:10):
someone who listened to both LedZeppelin and Kendrick Lamar and
lived in Tampa and played drumsfor five years and was in their
early thirties and I'm tryingto think of all the filters we
have and listens to blues, right, if you want to do all those
different pieces like you can'tdo that on any platform in the
world, but you can do it onVampa and that's.
That's like we built that, andit doesn't matter what city in

(44:32):
the world you're in If you go inand customize it like that you,
you will get results.

Can anyone join?
Yeah, yeah, so like, like Ilike to write poetry.
So like say, for instance, if Iwanted to join, and is there a
category where, like people canwrite their poetry if somebody
may want to use it as in a songor something like that?

yeah , so there's, I think, the most
relevant category, so that wouldbe like lyricists.
Um, I think there's, I thinkthe most relevant categories for
that would be like lyricists.
I think there's like lyriccomposers, separate to lyricists
as well, and then you can docustom categories and type
whatever you want.
So, probably, although I don'tknow how active people would be
looking for poets, if I'm honest, I've not heard of that use
case before.
But the thing I think I likeabout Vampyr is that anyone

(45:18):
creative can go on there, createa profile, have a look around
and if it's not for them, theycan leave, and if it is for them
, they can stay.
It's like anything in life,right, no one's forcing you to
join, no one's forcing you tostay or anything in between, and
I love that.
That's why it is designed.
There's other platforms outthere that try and do what we do
and they've got, once again,gatekeepers, like they're, um,

(45:39):
you know they have to look atyour, the work that you've done
first or decide if you'requality enough to be on there,
and we're just like, let thealgorithm sort it out.
Like, obviously we built thealgorithm, but we you don't want
, you know, really, really verycareful here, but from from an
objective standpoint.
You don't want people that aresort of such low quality that it
degrades the overall experienceof other people.

(46:00):
But at the same time, who arewe to judge what's low quality?
And so the way you sort of getaround that is certain algorithm
tricks that will see thathopefully you're connecting
people at similar levels ofskill and similar levels of
experience and similar sounds,and some of it, you know, get
easier with ai and we're sort ofstarting to look into that too.
But right now it's moremathematical matching based on

(46:23):
certain attributes.
It's all a bit nerdy, but we doour best to try and match
appropriate people with someonethat they might get value out of
.

How do you know so much about social media but
you don't use social media Likeyou know a lot about the
algorithm.

Yeah , I mean I do use them.
I just I'm not active on them.
I'm not, I'm not, I'm notbuilding yeah, I'm not building
a fan base on any platform.
I think some things I'm on have10, I think, like LinkedIn, I
might have, you know, 10,000followers or something I don't

(46:57):
spend.
I don't spend a lot of time on.

Can I just say like you, just that's so funny.
Like people don't just have 10000 followers on linkedin,
that's not but I've got, I'vegot plenty of friends that have,
but I've got plenty of friendsthat like have over 100 000 or
whatever

well , I was going to say no, I've
got like plenty of friends thathave thousands of instagram
followers.
I've got like a hundred and Idon't really use it.
That's why I don't have many,right.
So what my point is?
I think like when you use aplatform actively, you can build
an audience.
I just I haven't personallybuilt an audience, but I've
built brands.
So my companies have pages thathave hundreds of like.

(47:32):
My Vamper has hundreds ofthousands of likes my all.
Between my media companies thatI own, we've got millions of
likes and followers.
So I know how social mediaworks.
It doesn't mean I personallyyou don't use it.

Rick Costa (47:47):
Yeah, that's right.
You don't personally use.
That's not for you.

Yeah Well, you know it isn't of the time.
I mean.
I think that also makes sense.
You're not spending your timescrolling and whatever.

I'm jealous of the folks that can,
because it is folks can.
Folks can run the job.
Yeah, okay, we're struggling.

We're no, no, because I know, because,
opposite, we're using yourservices because we're trying to
be creative on it.
Yeah right, I mean that's kindof the difference.
And we're trying to do whatyou're doing.
That you've been doing sinceyou were a kid and you found
your way through it, and butyou're doing something you love.
When I asked you the questionwhat you would do if you weren't

(48:28):
doing this, you didn't reallyhave an answer, which kind of
means you're doing what you'resupposed to be doing, whereas I
think most people, myselfincluded, are always pursuing
doing what we love and making aliving at it.

Rick Costa (48:42):
So that's why we're using your services, you know,
yeah, yeah so, um.

So before we sign off, do you guys have any other
questions?
Because I just want to makesure that we promote vinylcom
vamperme, which I did not knowthat.
So it's dot m e um, and willyou come back and be on the show
, josh?

100% .

Okay, because we're coming to your house.
We're not going to wait for youto move.
We're not stupid.

We'll do it live from the jet ski.

You can be on the beach.
Me and Cynthia will be on thebeach.
I don't know where Rick will be, but Okay.
On the beach.
I don't know what rick will be,but okay, on the beach watching
you and your wife on the jetski amazing and your cat.
No, I know you don't log offyet, but um, so everyone
remember we are always on onfriday nights, um at 6 pm.
Pacific 9 pm eastern.

(49:35):
On sundays, 12 o'clock, pacific3 pm eastern josh, it was so
great to have you on the show.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
We really appreciate it.
It was really fun.

Thank you Carmen, thank you Cynthia,
thank you Rick.

Yeah, and remember everyone.
At the end of the day, itreally is all about the joy.
Bye everyone, Bye.
Thanks for stopping by.
All About the Joy.
Be better and stay beautifulfolks.
Have a sweet day.

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