April 27, 2021 • 32 mins
In this episode, we chat with Stanford alum Jose Serrano who manages emerging artists like Emery Kelley and Sybyr and rising artist Heidi Rolph-Statt about the role of streaming platforms in artists' careers. We discuss imbalances in pay, streaming and gender.
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Episode Transcript
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Jay (00:06):
Welcome to the Drop the MIC podcast where we'll dive into
conversations with some of themusic industry's most
established professionals.
Like all of our episodes, whatyou will hear today has been
created and curated by Stanfordstudents who are breaking their
way into the music scene.
I'm Jay LeBouef and I leadStanford University's music
industry initiatives.
Whether you're aspiring tolaunch your career in the music
industry are already a musicindustry pro, or just curious to
(00:29):
learn more.
We've got you covered.
Ugur Dursun (00:36):
Hello, and welcome to Stanford University's music
industry podcast.
My name is Ugur and along withmy friends, Tilly and Gala, I
will be hosting this episode ofMusic Industry Conversations.
In this episode, we're going totackle how the streaming
business impacts the artists inthe music industry.
(00:59):
In today's lineup, we haveStanford alum Jose Serrano, who
is an artist manager based inLos Angeles, and Heidi
Rolph-Stott, who is a 19 yearold up and coming artist hailing
from United Kingdom.
Up first, you're going to hearmy friend Gala's interview with
(01:21):
Stanford alum Jose Serrano, whohas worked at Warner Music Group
and is currently a manager forartists like Emery Kelley and
Sybyr.
Gala Coello (01:35):
Tell me a little bit about your story.
You know, coming from Stanfordinto the music
Jose Serrano (01:40):
I started off as a musician, I guess like most
people in this industry.
Um, I like learned the flute asa kid.
And did that for about fiveyears.
And once I got into high school,I was like, Hey, I need to like
grow.
And I guess I taught myself howto play a guitar and started
there and then went into collegeand started deejaying, learned
(02:02):
that my passion for music issomething that I can monetize in
a way.
So started off deejaying, youknow, my dorm parties freshman
year to then doing opening upfor like DJ Khaled and then
playing some gigs, uh, you know,In the Bay area and then got to
like perform in the Philippineswhen I was there.
So I got to like play around andsee what the industry was kind
(02:23):
of liking.
You know, I noticed that this ismy passion.
You know, this is what I want todo down the line.
I decided to fully pursue thatmy.
Junior year by interning atWarner, it was a Stanford in
Warner program.
And, um, I did more of thebusiness end during that
program.
I was consulting and helpingthem.
And then afterwards I landed agig with Warner Warner records
(02:44):
and ended up working there for agood year as an a and R
coordinator, which I loved.
But.
Also noticed that, Hey, I don'twant to be sort of a cog in the
machine, not to say that that'sanything wrong with the
industry.
Um, but I do see theindependence side as something
more beautiful.
So I went into management, um,and that's what I've been doing
for the past year.
(03:05):
I work at a management firm,private management firm, and I
also manage my own artists.
How do you make the transition?
Yeah, it's actually quiteinteresting.
Because one of the reasons thatreally drew me toPoliSciwas
understanding the way the worldworks.
Right.
And how structures are set indifferent, in different
(03:25):
capacities, whether it's like apolitical structure of business
structure.
And one of the beautiful thingsabout PoliSci is that.
It's easily transferrable intomusic because music and its
industry as a whole is sort of astructure.
And if you want to think aboutit too, right?
Most things are political,right?
There's a lot of negotiatingthat goes on there ends up being
(03:46):
sort of a system that is built.
And so that's what I think Ireally got out of that degree
and kind of being able totransfer it into music was like,
okay, there are all of thesedifferent systems.
For different career paths orlike for the world to actually
move and work.
And so music has its own system.
And I just dive deep into thatwhile studying policy.
So I did all of like my musiclearnings completely, completely
(04:09):
solo, you know, the system ofmusic or the way that it works
there.
So many different pieces, right?
There is the live, the touringside of things.
There's the recorded music side,there's the actual publishing of
it.
So these have all been built.
And as a manager, you have tounderstand how or what it takes
for an artist to actually breakor make money.
(04:31):
You're not really taught that atall.
Like there isn't anythingonline.
That's basically like a book tosay to, Hey artists.
Well, there's one book calledall you need to know about the
music industry, which I think isa fantastic book, but there
isn't sort of somebody to guideand hold your hand.
Gala Coello (04:46):
No formula.
Like if you blow up on socialmedia or like on a streaming
platform from one day to thenext, you could get a contract
or something like that.
And it's just, there's
Jose Serrano (04:56):
no formula.
Yeah.
And because of that, you have tobe on your, a game in a way as
an artist or a manager, whoeveryou are independently, you have
to understand, like there isn'tjust one way of making money.
Like some people will thinklike, Hey, I need to get onto
Spotify.
Right.
And that's it.
That's only one piece of thepie.
Like there are mechanicalroyalties, there are publishing
(05:17):
royalties.
Then their list kind of goes onand you have to understand that
you need to have every piece tothe puzzle to actually make.
Money.
So if
Gala Coello (05:27):
it's it's, uh, a pie chart, what percentage would
you say is like streaming
Jose Serrano (05:32):
on Spotify?
Oh, so, okay.
Yeah.
Okay.
So there are two pie chartshere, right?
The first part pie chart beingtotal money made by an artist
which is recorded music and thelive piece.
The live element to it.
Then you could say thepublishing and sync element to
it.
Um, merchandise go goes on,right from like, you know, if
you break big and you're aBrittany Spears, you're going to
(05:53):
be on TV.
You're going to have branddeals.
All of those things, if we gointo just the music, say you're
an independent artists, youdon't perform live.
There's a pie chart.
Right.
And I don't have the specificnumbers, but like for every
dollar that is made by theartists.
A certain percentage iscollected by Spotify.
Then you have to sign up to BMI,a performing rights organization
(06:18):
in order to collect that pieceof the pie, then there are
others.
And even then say that companiessay you signed up to BMI to
collect your publishing side ofthe money.
That's only collecting in the US.
So then you have to also open upanother account and then pay
more paid to also say there's acompany called song trust, which
kind of collects throughout theworld.
(06:40):
So like little do artists knowthat just having a distributor
like distro kid doesn't reallymake you collect.
Or it doesn't help you.
It's not their job to collectall of this money for you.
And nobody's teaching you andtelling you that, Hey, you
actually need about fourservices, like a BMI, a distro
kid song exchange, and then sungtrusts, sung trust is that
(07:03):
company that collects, um,throughout the,
Gala Coello (07:06):
okay.
So of the percentage that anartist.
From their streams on Spotify.
Is there a gap between whatsmaller artists make and say an
artist like Taylor Swift, whodidn't want her stuff on Spotify
for a really long time?
And then like now she does.
Does she get a higher percentagethan say like an indie artist?
Jose Serrano (07:25):
Yeah.
So that's, that's aninteresting, yeah.
That's all right.
So two answers to that question.
First, let's start off with how,like, Spotify Apple and like
YouTube system works.
So they, so streaming will makeabout, say a hundred dollars,
say everyone's streamed.
And for the month, a hundreddollars was made that will then
be cut out based off of thepercentage that the, the label
(07:49):
at the top.
They're artists, the percentageof that pie that they've made.
So say Taylor Swift and all ofthe big artists are under one
label since everyone's streamingthem.
The most, that$100 is mostlygoing to go to that label.
And then they take the smallerpercentage and divvy that up
into the independent artists.
(08:10):
So right now, the way the gameworks is that there are three
major labels.
Sony universal and Warner.
And so for every stream that'smade by Drake or something, it's
going into this larger pie,every dollar that's made.
And then at the end of eachmonth, let's say they're taking
it and saying, okay, well, Sonyaccounted for about 40% of the
(08:30):
streams.
So 40% of the money goes to themand then they can go into beat
that up and then same goes.
For the other labels.
And then the independent artistshave their little cut in terms
of artists getting more moneyfor their streams.
That's more so a thing to dealwith labels.
So the artists and labels willcreate like deal structures when
(08:51):
you get signed.
So if you're a smaller artist,Um, and you get a$100,000
advance from a label.
Most likely they're taking about70 to 80% of your royalties for
a very say, five, six years, whoknows how long that deal is.
Right?
However, if you've become aTaylor Swift and you've made
more money for the label andyour contract has expired, you
(09:15):
can go ahead and renegotiatebecause they're going to still
want you on that label.
You're a moneymaker to them.
So then you can renegotiate andmake more.
For, um, the music that yourelease.
So your percentage thenincreases in terms of like
streaming laws.
I think they've grown prettystrong and are pretty not, I
don't think they're pretty fairto be honest, but they've done a
(09:37):
good job of, I mean, the musicindustry has done a good job now
of like really tackling thatproblem.
Um, I think once again, it's notfair, um, to this day, but
they've been able to maneuverand get the best, right?
Like the, before I don't knowwhat the number is for last
year, but the industry wasgrowing at a pretty strong rate.
(10:00):
It was like at a positive growthrate for five years straight
after, you know, the whole.
You know, CD or like bust thatoccurred.
And then the digital boom thatoccurred back in like 2005, like
the industry was losing a ton ofmoney, but then bounced back.
I think the new problem now isall of these new social media
platforms that come out and likesimilar to tikt-, or it's not
(10:21):
similar to tiktok itself.
They're like Twitch streaming.
That's where the new battle is.
How do we monetize that becausethey're using music and not
licensing yet, so
Gala Coello (10:30):
what do you think would need to happen for it to
be more
Jose Serrano (10:34):
balanced, a huge one.
Um, I mean the balancing reallycomes when it's, when you value
the art for what it really is.
You know, so I think I, weweren't really around for that
CD era, you know, to grow up andreally see sort of we did, but
we got the tail end of itbecause we grew up in this age
where we had Limewire.
(10:54):
Like I had friends when I was akid that, you know, they were
just downloading tons of albums.
And I think, I don't know if youcould say there was a balance
before.
I know a lot of them, a lot moremoney was being made because for
every album, in order to listento a song, you had to buy an
album.
I love this one song believe byCher, right?
If I'm going to want to listento that, I need to buy the album
and then play it in my CD.
(11:16):
So with streaming, it's become agame of subscription.
I'm only paying$10 a month and Ihave the whole world of music.
So there, there is a world whereobviously I liked my$10 a month,
but if you do think of theartists, their arts should be
valued for more, you know,they're putting time into this.
This is their job.
So it's not balanced the waythat I do see it becoming
(11:37):
balanced is honestly within thelabel system, in which they
should be paying their artists.
More for the music that theymake or giving better, uh,
royalty splits in that sense.
Ugur Dursun (11:54):
Thank you so much for the interview gala.
That was really insightful.
So I wanted to bring up an issuethat I think is a very much
relevant and also important forus to talk about in the music
industry, which is the gendergap in music consumption
preferences.
According to data from Spotify,based on the sample of 5 million
(12:16):
subscribers, male users listenedto 94% male artists, and they
only listened to 3% femaleartists.
While female listener habitswere a bit more diverse, still
women happened to favor men overwomen in their listening habits,
as they listened to 55% maleartists and only 30% female
(12:40):
artists.
What we're going to talk abouttoday is whether it is going to
be a psychological phenomenon ora result of streaming services
influencing their users.
So a researcher by the name ofBrett Miller at the Macquarie
University in Australia did astudy on undergrad students and
found that male musical artistsare four times more likely to be
(13:04):
listed as favorite artists thantheir female counterparts.
And in this research, they alsofound that the pro male bias is
significantly higher amongmales, but it is also still
present among females.
I find this very interesting.
Obviously this study is from2008 and that's important to
(13:25):
note, and it's from a universityin Australia as it can't be
really applied to everyone.
However, it is very interestingto see that the pro male bias
does not only apply to malelisteners of music.
in fact it actually influenceseven female listeners of music.
(13:45):
There are obviously severalthings that influence what we
listen to, one of them being,which songs are actually more
popular.
And according to the AnnenbergInclusion Initiative at the
University of SouthernCalifornia, out of the 600 most
popular songs from 2012 to 2017,only 22% were performed by
(14:06):
female artists.
And in that case, it becomesharder for female listeners, to
actually find music by femaleartists that they can listen to.
As well as male listeners whomight just ignore the 22% easily
and continue listening to theirfavorite male artists.
I have also come across severalarticles online that discuss and
(14:30):
associate listening to femaleartists with being in the LGBTQ
community.
This kind of association couldactually be really harmful and
hurt female musicians in thelong run.
I believe that association couldcreate a stigma around listening
to female musicians and causemale listeners who do not
(14:52):
identify with the LGBTQcommunity to actually shy away
from listening to femaleartists, even if they like them,
but the listeners and thegeneral public are not the only
ones to blame for the male biasin music listening habits.
In fact, the University ofSouthern California Annenberg
Inclusion Initiative actuallyfinds that during the first half
(15:13):
of the 2010s, more than 90% ofGrammy nominations actually went
to male artists or mixed groupsthat included male artists.
This kind of disparity from theRecording Academy actually
upholds the male biases in themusic industry in designating
who makes better music andrewards way more male artists
(15:37):
than female counterparts.
You may be asking yourself, howdoes this all relate to
streaming services?
Well Liz Pelly from the Baffleractually studied how Spotify
upholds these male biasesthrough their algorithms.
She was inspired after seeing in2017 that none of the top ten
(15:58):
Billboard charts at the end ofthe year actually included any
female artists.
Yes that's that's right.
No female artists in the top tensongs, top ten albums or top ten
artists of the year.
To find out how Spotifyalgorithms actually reinforce
the male biases that we talkedabout in people's music
(16:21):
listening preferences, Lizactually made a new Spotify
account and used it as a blankslate to listen to whatever
music Spotify recommended her.
And over time, Liz found thatmost of the music Spotify
recommended a new user ended upbeing music from predominantly
(16:45):
male artists.
She also analyzed Spotifyplaylists, the bigger ones,
especially that shape a lot ofpeople's music listening
preferences.
For instance, over the course ofone month, she found that
Spotify's most-followed playlistactually featured only 20% women
(17:05):
and more than 65% male artists.
She finds that more than 85% ofthe tracks included male
vocalist, while only 45% of thetracks included female
vocalists.
The contrast is even starkerwhen she looked at Spotify's
prized RapCaviar playlist, whichis the prime hip hop playlist
(17:29):
that influences a lot of hip hoplisteners' music preferences.
And after analyzing the playlistfor four consecutive weeks, Liz
Pelly found that Cardi B's"Bartier Cardi" featuring 21
Savage was the only song led bya woman to be included on the
playlist.
Beyond that, there were only acouple of more women on the
(17:49):
playlist that were featured onsongs by male artists, like
"Lemon" by N.E.R.D.
Featuring Rihanna and"All theStars" by Kendrick Lamar
featuring SZA.
In short, over the course ofthese four weeks, the biggest
rap playlist on Spotify did notinclude any songs that were
performed only by femaleartists.
(18:12):
When the most influentialplaylist in hip hop actually
leaves women behind, how can weexpect listeners to find those
women and uplift them.
Liz also recorded her discoverweekly playlist that Spotify
compiled for her, which is aplaylist that Spotify
personalizes based on yourlistening preferences, and
(18:35):
everyone actually gets one ofthese playlists each Monday.
After looking at the data, Lizfound that her Spotify discover
weekly playlist actuallyconsisted of 79% male artists
and only 12% female artists.
Now Liz Pelly's study is a veryanecdotal study, but it really
(18:59):
speaks to how Spotify actuallydoes not foster a diverse music
listening experience for theregular user.
Now, if you looked at mypersonal discover weekly
playlist, I'm pretty sure wewould find that most of the
artists on there are eitherwomen or queer artists, but that
(19:21):
is my own personal preference.
And that's something I have overtime built for myself.
And I think at the end of theday, we need to realize that
female artists should not berecommended on an opt-in basis.
Now I will be passing the mic tomy friend, Tilly, who will be
interviewing Heidi Ralph-Stott,a 19 year old up and coming
(19:44):
artist from London, UnitedKingdom, who released her debut
single"Better Off Now" on March19th on all major platforms.
Tilly Griffiths (19:58):
Tell me a little bit about yourself.
It's a very broad question, butif we can just start there.
Heidi Rolph-Stott (20:04):
I'm Heidi.
I'm 19.
And I started singing.
I started singing like all mylife, but I started taking my
music seriously around this timelast year.
And that's when I started doinggigs.
Obviously when gigs were sayingand performing, then I turned to
doing live streams andeverything, and I just kept
(20:25):
writing music and reallyenjoying it.
So I thought.
This year, I'm going to, I'mgoing to release something and
that's what I'm doing now.
Tilly Griffiths (20:34):
That's so exciting.
So if it was this time lastyear, how did you get started?
What were those first steps tobreak into this?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (20:44):
Well, I started off by singing some
covers and I went to my localrecording studio and got one
recorded and he was like, you'vegot really good voice.
You should think about writingyour own stuff.
I was like, nah, it's okay.
And then a few months later Iwas different writing every day.
And I think it's just becauseI'm a writer as well.
So I'm working on a novel andsome short stories and stuff
(21:05):
like that.
So I just.
I love writing.
So I was like, might as wellwrite some songs as well.
And it just sort of went fromthere.
Tilly Griffiths (21:12):
Wow you're obviously really creative.
So the pandemic has put a stopto a lot of what you've would
have been doing with gigs andeverything.
But have you been able to usethis time to work on ideas?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (21:26):
Oh, definitely.
I mean, it's actually given memore time to write more music
because the thing with gigs, aswell as how good they are, you
do find yourself singing thesame things.
So it gave me a chance to reallysit down and just concentrate on
creating some new work.
And for me, I've really enjoyeddoing that.
I mean, I'd love to be able toleave my house, but, you know,
(21:47):
while I am at home, it's givenme something productive to do
Tilly Griffiths (21:51):
I'm glad you've been able to make the most of a
very awful situation.
So you have your debut singlecoming out next month, March
19th.
So what's that process beenlike?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (22:03):
So I got on a artist development program with
something called Mass Recordsand they, they work all over the
UK, but my center is inBirmingham.
And when I started on thatprogram, they were like, we'll
help you release your debutsingle during the time on the
course.
So I was like, that's amazingbecause I didn't have a clue how
anything worked?
(22:23):
I didn't know.
How to even set off as an artistor anything like that.
And I showed them a song thatI'd written, which is the debut
single hope that off now.
And they were like, Oh, this isreally good.
He should release this one.
And then we just set up with amusic distribution service
through them and that's calledSpinnup and they send my music
(22:45):
to the stores and yeah, I alsoshot a music video for the song
as well.
And that was in between the twolock downs that we had.
So that'll be coming out onYouTube probably a couple of
days after the song.
So that's something exciting aswell.
Tilly Griffiths (23:01):
That's amazing.
So in terms of the music comingout, the topic of this episode
is streaming.
So it will be coming out on anumber of different platforms
where, you know, most peoplestream the music now.
So from your perspective, assomeone just starting out, has
that changed your approach atall?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (23:19):
I mean, if it wasn't for streaming, then.
Not much music would get sold atthe minute.
You know?
So it's, it's like a reallyimportant thing right now.
And for me, I'm really excitedto be an artist on a streaming
platform and not just listeningto other people's music, which
obviously inspired me to make myown, but it's going to be really
exciting to be on the other sideof it and to experience it that
(23:42):
way, because I think it's sohelpful right now that it can
just come straight to yourhouse.
And it's the only way thatmusicians can be creative right
now.
I think it's the only way that Ican think of that you can really
reach out and build a fan base,get to know people and share
your music.
And I think it's a really, it'sa really good thing that I'm
(24:03):
excited to be coming apart ofit.
Tilly Griffiths (24:06):
Absolutely.
I totally agree.
This.
Especially in this time, it'svery important that on the other
side of that, some people areconcerned that artists aren't
fairly compensated for theirwork when it goes onto streaming
platforms.
But do you have any thoughts onthat as someone just starting
out or is that not reallysomething that you've gotten
into yet?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (24:27):
To be honest, I haven't really thought about
it yet.
I probably will.
When it's my second or thirdsong and I know more about how
it works, but I do know a lot ofpeople have said who've released
stuff before, they're like youdon't get much money from it and
like, you know what?
It's okay.
It's okay for now.
We'll see how it goes.
Tilly Griffiths (24:43):
Definitely.
I think it you'll stage as well,this is about getting your name
out there, getting people,listening to your music.
So, the fact that it's onstreaming, does that change the
way you think about how you'regoing to market your music and
how you get people to hear aboutyou?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (24:58):
Yeah.
I mean, definitely because if itweren't for streaming before I
was releasing this song, I wasjust, you know, posting videos
on stuff like Facebook andYouTube and things like that.
So this is completely anotherlevel.
It's something that I can sharea full song with and be able to
have people listen to it andhopefully enjoy it.
(25:18):
So it's definitely going tochange the way I market it.
So it'll be a lot of trying torally people around and to get
the streams up.
But yeah, I'm looking forward toit.
Tilly Griffiths (25:31):
So I guess that's the next step really?
But, what are the next fewmonths gonna look like for you.
So the single comes out, what'snext?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (25:39):
I'm working on a couple of other songs.
I have, like, all theinstrumentation down and I just
can't get to the studio torecord my vocals.
So hopefully soon I'll be ableto go and get those songs down
and then it'll just be, keepreleasing and hopefully making
some more music videos andseeing what happens I guess.
Tilly Griffiths (25:59):
So going back a little bit, just kind of to you,
what does your creative processlook like?
Like how do you write thosesongs?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (26:07):
Wow.
Well, it's kind of differentevery time to be honest, but I
always start off with an ideathat I've been thinking of.
I can move on to little notebookand I just jot down ideas and
any inspiration that I getbecause I find to get
inspiration in like reallyrandom in places like on a train
or just in a cafe or something.
And I'm like, I need to jot thatdown.
(26:27):
So I start there, then I alwayswrite on my acoustic guitar.
So I always just try and findchord patterns that I like then
just play around with words andsee what sticks and then go from
there.
Yeah.
Tilly Griffiths (26:43):
Sure.
That makes a lot of sense to me.
Just getting back to thepandemic again, you said you
were just starting out beforethis happened.
So how have you been able tokeep connecting with your fans,
I guess, and the people thatwant to hear your music?
How's that been for you?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (26:58):
I've just found live streaming to be
actually really helpful forthat.
You know, like just before I wasdoing some gigs and I was on a
live streaming program where wewent and filmed it in person,
and then obviously everythingwent online.
But what I did find was I wasable to do gigs for people in
different areas.
Like I did a gig for someone inManchester called Matt Phredd's
(27:22):
and I did the Basement Door,which is a London-based music
center.
So maybe I wouldn't have beenable to do that if it was in
person.
So it was really helpful to getto do that online.
And that way, I suppose I got tomeet new people and, hopefully,
have people hear my music andenjoy it.
Tilly Griffiths (27:41):
What is your favorite aspect of being an
artist?
Is it that creative process orperforming, or what do you enjoy
the most?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (27:50):
I obviously love all of it, but my favorite
thing still is to go fromnothing to a song.
So definitely the songwritingprocess for me, because I just
think of, like, each song aslike a little story.
So it's like a story just with amelody, I guess, and music.
So for me getting to write thatto then have people hear it,
(28:13):
that's definitely my favoritepart.
So I'd say it's that, but thenobviously getting to perform
what I've made is also reallyfun.
And definitely since the gigshaven't been going ahead, it
will be so much fun when theydo, but recently it's definitely
been just writing and gettingthings down.
Tilly Griffiths (28:31):
And then that whole process of creating the
songs, how much of that is allyou, cause I know you're a
musician, like an all-rounderpretty much, so in terms of,
like, instrumentation, do you doall of that or do you work with
other people?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (28:45):
Yeah, I do it all.
I write it all and then I takewhat I've got my guitar and
vocals and any ideas that Ihave, I take it to the studio,
but then they like helped mebuild a for track, but I always
record all the, I record thepiano and the guitar all myself,
and then they helped me with thelast little bits and bobs.
Tilly Griffiths (29:05):
How long does all of that take?
Like you say, sometimes songscome you right away, but what is
the general timeline?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (29:12):
From writing the song to getting it finished?
I mean, it depends how manytimes I go per week, but I know
I've done one in three weeks,which was quite quick, then one
that took, like, two months.
So anything between that sort oftimeline, I'd say roughly from
first idea to final mix would beabout a month on average, maybe.
Tilly Griffiths (29:36):
That's quick.
You must have a lot in storeready to release.
Are there particular artistsright now that inspire you and
influence your sound?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (29:45):
Yeah.
So, so many.
Taylor Swift is like thebiggest, because she just keeps
dropping albums out of nowhere.
And I'm like, that's just, Idon't even know.
That's a whole nother level.
I'm like that songwriting isjust insane.
And so she's definitely my maininspiration, but I love Lana Del
Rey and London Grammar and anysinger-songwriter, to be honest,
(30:07):
I love musicians who write theirown music.
Tilly Griffiths (30:10):
I'm also just thinking now about how there are
so many different ways thatartists can get their music out
there.
Like the recent example ofOlivia Rodrigo with Driver's
License and how that was aTikTok sensation.
Have you thought about that andhow you could be creative with
these different platforms to getyour music out there?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (30:28):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm willing to tryanything I guess.
And definitely there were somany different ways and there
are so many people, like yousay, doing so well with these
streaming platforms right now.
And, maybe if it weren't forthat, then we wouldn't have even
heard of that song, which isactually crazy.
So yeah, it's really, it'sreally good.
Tilly Griffiths (30:49):
Okay.
Well, I think this is my lastquestion but I want to know,
where do you see yourself in sayfive years' time?
I was going to say a year, buteverything is so crazy right
now, we're going to go with fiveyears.
What is the big goal?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (31:04):
Wow.
Okay.
Um, I definitely say to justkeep creating as much as I can.
And obviously, because I dowriting as well as music and I
also act, it's just to try andwork hard at everything I'm
doing and hopefully earn moneydoing what I enjoy and get to
earn a living, being what I wantto be.
(31:26):
So hopefully in five years,that's what I'll be.
But we shall see, we shall see.
Tilly Griffiths (31:31):
And just to finish off, remind me where we
can listen to your music andwhen we can do that.
Heidi Rolph-Stott (31:37):
Okay.
So my debut single is'Better OffNow' and it comes out on 19th of
March on Spotify, Apple, Deezer.
Just all major music streamingplatforms that you can find.
Yeah.
So be sure to check out.
Ugur Dursun (31:55):
Thank you, Tilly, for that interview.
And that will be a wrap for thisepisode of Drop the MIC: Music
Industry Conversations.
Thank you for tuning in and comeback next week for an all new
episode of Drop the MIC,Stanford University's music
industry podcast.
Welcome to the Drop the MIC podcast where we'll dive into
conversations with some of themusic industry's most
established professionals.
Like all of our episodes, whatyou will hear today has been
created and curated by Stanfordstudents who are breaking their
way into the music scene.
I'm Jay LeBouef and I leadStanford University's music
industry initiatives.
Whether you're aspiring tolaunch your career in the music
industry are already a musicindustry pro, or just curious to
(00:29):
learn more.
We've got you covered.
Ugur Dursun (00:36):
Hello, and welcome to Stanford University's music
industry podcast.
My name is Ugur and along withmy friends, Tilly and Gala, I
will be hosting this episode ofMusic Industry Conversations.
In this episode, we're going totackle how the streaming
business impacts the artists inthe music industry.
(00:59):
In today's lineup, we haveStanford alum Jose Serrano, who
is an artist manager based inLos Angeles, and Heidi
Rolph-Stott, who is a 19 yearold up and coming artist hailing
from United Kingdom.
Up first, you're going to hearmy friend Gala's interview with
(01:21):
Stanford alum Jose Serrano, whohas worked at Warner Music Group
and is currently a manager forartists like Emery Kelley and
Sybyr.
Gala Coello (01:35):
Tell me a little bit about your story.
You know, coming from Stanfordinto the music
Jose Serrano (01:40):
I started off as a musician, I guess like most
people in this industry.
Um, I like learned the flute asa kid.
And did that for about fiveyears.
And once I got into high school,I was like, Hey, I need to like
grow.
And I guess I taught myself howto play a guitar and started
there and then went into collegeand started deejaying, learned
(02:02):
that my passion for music issomething that I can monetize in
a way.
So started off deejaying, youknow, my dorm parties freshman
year to then doing opening upfor like DJ Khaled and then
playing some gigs, uh, you know,In the Bay area and then got to
like perform in the Philippineswhen I was there.
So I got to like play around andsee what the industry was kind
(02:23):
of liking.
You know, I noticed that this ismy passion.
You know, this is what I want todo down the line.
I decided to fully pursue thatmy.
Junior year by interning atWarner, it was a Stanford in
Warner program.
And, um, I did more of thebusiness end during that
program.
I was consulting and helpingthem.
And then afterwards I landed agig with Warner Warner records
(02:44):
and ended up working there for agood year as an a and R
coordinator, which I loved.
But.
Also noticed that, Hey, I don'twant to be sort of a cog in the
machine, not to say that that'sanything wrong with the
industry.
Um, but I do see theindependence side as something
more beautiful.
So I went into management, um,and that's what I've been doing
for the past year.
(03:05):
I work at a management firm,private management firm, and I
also manage my own artists.
How do you make the transition?
Yeah, it's actually quiteinteresting.
Because one of the reasons thatreally drew me toPoliSciwas
understanding the way the worldworks.
Right.
And how structures are set indifferent, in different
(03:25):
capacities, whether it's like apolitical structure of business
structure.
And one of the beautiful thingsabout PoliSci is that.
It's easily transferrable intomusic because music and its
industry as a whole is sort of astructure.
And if you want to think aboutit too, right?
Most things are political,right?
There's a lot of negotiatingthat goes on there ends up being
(03:46):
sort of a system that is built.
And so that's what I think Ireally got out of that degree
and kind of being able totransfer it into music was like,
okay, there are all of thesedifferent systems.
For different career paths orlike for the world to actually
move and work.
And so music has its own system.
And I just dive deep into thatwhile studying policy.
So I did all of like my musiclearnings completely, completely
(04:09):
solo, you know, the system ofmusic or the way that it works
there.
So many different pieces, right?
There is the live, the touringside of things.
There's the recorded music side,there's the actual publishing of
it.
So these have all been built.
And as a manager, you have tounderstand how or what it takes
for an artist to actually breakor make money.
(04:31):
You're not really taught that atall.
Like there isn't anythingonline.
That's basically like a book tosay to, Hey artists.
Well, there's one book calledall you need to know about the
music industry, which I think isa fantastic book, but there
isn't sort of somebody to guideand hold your hand.
Gala Coello (04:46):
No formula.
Like if you blow up on socialmedia or like on a streaming
platform from one day to thenext, you could get a contract
or something like that.
And it's just, there's
Jose Serrano (04:56):
no formula.
Yeah.
And because of that, you have tobe on your, a game in a way as
an artist or a manager, whoeveryou are independently, you have
to understand, like there isn'tjust one way of making money.
Like some people will thinklike, Hey, I need to get onto
Spotify.
Right.
And that's it.
That's only one piece of thepie.
Like there are mechanicalroyalties, there are publishing
(05:17):
royalties.
Then their list kind of goes onand you have to understand that
you need to have every piece tothe puzzle to actually make.
Money.
So if
Gala Coello (05:27):
it's it's, uh, a pie chart, what percentage would
you say is like streaming
Jose Serrano (05:32):
on Spotify?
Oh, so, okay.
Yeah.
Okay.
So there are two pie chartshere, right?
The first part pie chart beingtotal money made by an artist
which is recorded music and thelive piece.
The live element to it.
Then you could say thepublishing and sync element to
it.
Um, merchandise go goes on,right from like, you know, if
you break big and you're aBrittany Spears, you're going to
(05:53):
be on TV.
You're going to have branddeals.
All of those things, if we gointo just the music, say you're
an independent artists, youdon't perform live.
There's a pie chart.
Right.
And I don't have the specificnumbers, but like for every
dollar that is made by theartists.
A certain percentage iscollected by Spotify.
Then you have to sign up to BMI,a performing rights organization
(06:18):
in order to collect that pieceof the pie, then there are
others.
And even then say that companiessay you signed up to BMI to
collect your publishing side ofthe money.
That's only collecting in the US.
So then you have to also open upanother account and then pay
more paid to also say there's acompany called song trust, which
kind of collects throughout theworld.
(06:40):
So like little do artists knowthat just having a distributor
like distro kid doesn't reallymake you collect.
Or it doesn't help you.
It's not their job to collectall of this money for you.
And nobody's teaching you andtelling you that, Hey, you
actually need about fourservices, like a BMI, a distro
kid song exchange, and then sungtrusts, sung trust is that
(07:03):
company that collects, um,throughout the,
Gala Coello (07:06):
okay.
So of the percentage that anartist.
From their streams on Spotify.
Is there a gap between whatsmaller artists make and say an
artist like Taylor Swift, whodidn't want her stuff on Spotify
for a really long time?
And then like now she does.
Does she get a higher percentagethan say like an indie artist?
Jose Serrano (07:25):
Yeah.
So that's, that's aninteresting, yeah.
That's all right.
So two answers to that question.
First, let's start off with how,like, Spotify Apple and like
YouTube system works.
So they, so streaming will makeabout, say a hundred dollars,
say everyone's streamed.
And for the month, a hundreddollars was made that will then
be cut out based off of thepercentage that the, the label
(07:49):
at the top.
They're artists, the percentageof that pie that they've made.
So say Taylor Swift and all ofthe big artists are under one
label since everyone's streamingthem.
The most, that$100 is mostlygoing to go to that label.
And then they take the smallerpercentage and divvy that up
into the independent artists.
(08:10):
So right now, the way the gameworks is that there are three
major labels.
Sony universal and Warner.
And so for every stream that'smade by Drake or something, it's
going into this larger pie,every dollar that's made.
And then at the end of eachmonth, let's say they're taking
it and saying, okay, well, Sonyaccounted for about 40% of the
(08:30):
streams.
So 40% of the money goes to themand then they can go into beat
that up and then same goes.
For the other labels.
And then the independent artistshave their little cut in terms
of artists getting more moneyfor their streams.
That's more so a thing to dealwith labels.
So the artists and labels willcreate like deal structures when
(08:51):
you get signed.
So if you're a smaller artist,Um, and you get a$100,000
advance from a label.
Most likely they're taking about70 to 80% of your royalties for
a very say, five, six years, whoknows how long that deal is.
Right?
However, if you've become aTaylor Swift and you've made
more money for the label andyour contract has expired, you
(09:15):
can go ahead and renegotiatebecause they're going to still
want you on that label.
You're a moneymaker to them.
So then you can renegotiate andmake more.
For, um, the music that yourelease.
So your percentage thenincreases in terms of like
streaming laws.
I think they've grown prettystrong and are pretty not, I
don't think they're pretty fairto be honest, but they've done a
(09:37):
good job of, I mean, the musicindustry has done a good job now
of like really tackling thatproblem.
Um, I think once again, it's notfair, um, to this day, but
they've been able to maneuverand get the best, right?
Like the, before I don't knowwhat the number is for last
year, but the industry wasgrowing at a pretty strong rate.
(10:00):
It was like at a positive growthrate for five years straight
after, you know, the whole.
You know, CD or like bust thatoccurred.
And then the digital boom thatoccurred back in like 2005, like
the industry was losing a ton ofmoney, but then bounced back.
I think the new problem now isall of these new social media
platforms that come out and likesimilar to tikt-, or it's not
(10:21):
similar to tiktok itself.
They're like Twitch streaming.
That's where the new battle is.
How do we monetize that becausethey're using music and not
licensing yet, so
Gala Coello (10:30):
what do you think would need to happen for it to
be more
Jose Serrano (10:34):
balanced, a huge one.
Um, I mean the balancing reallycomes when it's, when you value
the art for what it really is.
You know, so I think I, weweren't really around for that
CD era, you know, to grow up andreally see sort of we did, but
we got the tail end of itbecause we grew up in this age
where we had Limewire.
(10:54):
Like I had friends when I was akid that, you know, they were
just downloading tons of albums.
And I think, I don't know if youcould say there was a balance
before.
I know a lot of them, a lot moremoney was being made because for
every album, in order to listento a song, you had to buy an
album.
I love this one song believe byCher, right?
If I'm going to want to listento that, I need to buy the album
and then play it in my CD.
(11:16):
So with streaming, it's become agame of subscription.
I'm only paying$10 a month and Ihave the whole world of music.
So there, there is a world whereobviously I liked my$10 a month,
but if you do think of theartists, their arts should be
valued for more, you know,they're putting time into this.
This is their job.
So it's not balanced the waythat I do see it becoming
(11:37):
balanced is honestly within thelabel system, in which they
should be paying their artists.
More for the music that theymake or giving better, uh,
royalty splits in that sense.
Ugur Dursun (11:54):
Thank you so much for the interview gala.
That was really insightful.
So I wanted to bring up an issuethat I think is a very much
relevant and also important forus to talk about in the music
industry, which is the gendergap in music consumption
preferences.
According to data from Spotify,based on the sample of 5 million
(12:16):
subscribers, male users listenedto 94% male artists, and they
only listened to 3% femaleartists.
While female listener habitswere a bit more diverse, still
women happened to favor men overwomen in their listening habits,
as they listened to 55% maleartists and only 30% female
(12:40):
artists.
What we're going to talk abouttoday is whether it is going to
be a psychological phenomenon ora result of streaming services
influencing their users.
So a researcher by the name ofBrett Miller at the Macquarie
University in Australia did astudy on undergrad students and
found that male musical artistsare four times more likely to be
(13:04):
listed as favorite artists thantheir female counterparts.
And in this research, they alsofound that the pro male bias is
significantly higher amongmales, but it is also still
present among females.
I find this very interesting.
Obviously this study is from2008 and that's important to
(13:25):
note, and it's from a universityin Australia as it can't be
really applied to everyone.
However, it is very interestingto see that the pro male bias
does not only apply to malelisteners of music.
in fact it actually influenceseven female listeners of music.
(13:45):
There are obviously severalthings that influence what we
listen to, one of them being,which songs are actually more
popular.
And according to the AnnenbergInclusion Initiative at the
University of SouthernCalifornia, out of the 600 most
popular songs from 2012 to 2017,only 22% were performed by
(14:06):
female artists.
And in that case, it becomesharder for female listeners, to
actually find music by femaleartists that they can listen to.
As well as male listeners whomight just ignore the 22% easily
and continue listening to theirfavorite male artists.
I have also come across severalarticles online that discuss and
(14:30):
associate listening to femaleartists with being in the LGBTQ
community.
This kind of association couldactually be really harmful and
hurt female musicians in thelong run.
I believe that association couldcreate a stigma around listening
to female musicians and causemale listeners who do not
(14:52):
identify with the LGBTQcommunity to actually shy away
from listening to femaleartists, even if they like them,
but the listeners and thegeneral public are not the only
ones to blame for the male biasin music listening habits.
In fact, the University ofSouthern California Annenberg
Inclusion Initiative actuallyfinds that during the first half
(15:13):
of the 2010s, more than 90% ofGrammy nominations actually went
to male artists or mixed groupsthat included male artists.
This kind of disparity from theRecording Academy actually
upholds the male biases in themusic industry in designating
who makes better music andrewards way more male artists
(15:37):
than female counterparts.
You may be asking yourself, howdoes this all relate to
streaming services?
Well Liz Pelly from the Baffleractually studied how Spotify
upholds these male biasesthrough their algorithms.
She was inspired after seeing in2017 that none of the top ten
(15:58):
Billboard charts at the end ofthe year actually included any
female artists.
Yes that's that's right.
No female artists in the top tensongs, top ten albums or top ten
artists of the year.
To find out how Spotifyalgorithms actually reinforce
the male biases that we talkedabout in people's music
(16:21):
listening preferences, Lizactually made a new Spotify
account and used it as a blankslate to listen to whatever
music Spotify recommended her.
And over time, Liz found thatmost of the music Spotify
recommended a new user ended upbeing music from predominantly
(16:45):
male artists.
She also analyzed Spotifyplaylists, the bigger ones,
especially that shape a lot ofpeople's music listening
preferences.
For instance, over the course ofone month, she found that
Spotify's most-followed playlistactually featured only 20% women
(17:05):
and more than 65% male artists.
She finds that more than 85% ofthe tracks included male
vocalist, while only 45% of thetracks included female
vocalists.
The contrast is even starkerwhen she looked at Spotify's
prized RapCaviar playlist, whichis the prime hip hop playlist
(17:29):
that influences a lot of hip hoplisteners' music preferences.
And after analyzing the playlistfor four consecutive weeks, Liz
Pelly found that Cardi B's"Bartier Cardi" featuring 21
Savage was the only song led bya woman to be included on the
playlist.
Beyond that, there were only acouple of more women on the
(17:49):
playlist that were featured onsongs by male artists, like
"Lemon" by N.E.R.D.
Featuring Rihanna and"All theStars" by Kendrick Lamar
featuring SZA.
In short, over the course ofthese four weeks, the biggest
rap playlist on Spotify did notinclude any songs that were
performed only by femaleartists.
(18:12):
When the most influentialplaylist in hip hop actually
leaves women behind, how can weexpect listeners to find those
women and uplift them.
Liz also recorded her discoverweekly playlist that Spotify
compiled for her, which is aplaylist that Spotify
personalizes based on yourlistening preferences, and
(18:35):
everyone actually gets one ofthese playlists each Monday.
After looking at the data, Lizfound that her Spotify discover
weekly playlist actuallyconsisted of 79% male artists
and only 12% female artists.
Now Liz Pelly's study is a veryanecdotal study, but it really
(18:59):
speaks to how Spotify actuallydoes not foster a diverse music
listening experience for theregular user.
Now, if you looked at mypersonal discover weekly
playlist, I'm pretty sure wewould find that most of the
artists on there are eitherwomen or queer artists, but that
(19:21):
is my own personal preference.
And that's something I have overtime built for myself.
And I think at the end of theday, we need to realize that
female artists should not berecommended on an opt-in basis.
Now I will be passing the mic tomy friend, Tilly, who will be
interviewing Heidi Ralph-Stott,a 19 year old up and coming
(19:44):
artist from London, UnitedKingdom, who released her debut
single"Better Off Now" on March19th on all major platforms.
Tilly Griffiths (19:58):
Tell me a little bit about yourself.
It's a very broad question, butif we can just start there.
Heidi Rolph-Stott (20:04):
I'm Heidi.
I'm 19.
And I started singing.
I started singing like all mylife, but I started taking my
music seriously around this timelast year.
And that's when I started doinggigs.
Obviously when gigs were sayingand performing, then I turned to
doing live streams andeverything, and I just kept
(20:25):
writing music and reallyenjoying it.
So I thought.
This year, I'm going to, I'mgoing to release something and
that's what I'm doing now.
Tilly Griffiths (20:34):
That's so exciting.
So if it was this time lastyear, how did you get started?
What were those first steps tobreak into this?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (20:44):
Well, I started off by singing some
covers and I went to my localrecording studio and got one
recorded and he was like, you'vegot really good voice.
You should think about writingyour own stuff.
I was like, nah, it's okay.
And then a few months later Iwas different writing every day.
And I think it's just becauseI'm a writer as well.
So I'm working on a novel andsome short stories and stuff
(21:05):
like that.
So I just.
I love writing.
So I was like, might as wellwrite some songs as well.
And it just sort of went fromthere.
Tilly Griffiths (21:12):
Wow you're obviously really creative.
So the pandemic has put a stopto a lot of what you've would
have been doing with gigs andeverything.
But have you been able to usethis time to work on ideas?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (21:26):
Oh, definitely.
I mean, it's actually given memore time to write more music
because the thing with gigs, aswell as how good they are, you
do find yourself singing thesame things.
So it gave me a chance to reallysit down and just concentrate on
creating some new work.
And for me, I've really enjoyeddoing that.
I mean, I'd love to be able toleave my house, but, you know,
(21:47):
while I am at home, it's givenme something productive to do
Tilly Griffiths (21:51):
I'm glad you've been able to make the most of a
very awful situation.
So you have your debut singlecoming out next month, March
19th.
So what's that process beenlike?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (22:03):
So I got on a artist development program with
something called Mass Recordsand they, they work all over the
UK, but my center is inBirmingham.
And when I started on thatprogram, they were like, we'll
help you release your debutsingle during the time on the
course.
So I was like, that's amazingbecause I didn't have a clue how
anything worked?
(22:23):
I didn't know.
How to even set off as an artistor anything like that.
And I showed them a song thatI'd written, which is the debut
single hope that off now.
And they were like, Oh, this isreally good.
He should release this one.
And then we just set up with amusic distribution service
through them and that's calledSpinnup and they send my music
(22:45):
to the stores and yeah, I alsoshot a music video for the song
as well.
And that was in between the twolock downs that we had.
So that'll be coming out onYouTube probably a couple of
days after the song.
So that's something exciting aswell.
Tilly Griffiths (23:01):
That's amazing.
So in terms of the music comingout, the topic of this episode
is streaming.
So it will be coming out on anumber of different platforms
where, you know, most peoplestream the music now.
So from your perspective, assomeone just starting out, has
that changed your approach atall?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (23:19):
I mean, if it wasn't for streaming, then.
Not much music would get sold atthe minute.
You know?
So it's, it's like a reallyimportant thing right now.
And for me, I'm really excitedto be an artist on a streaming
platform and not just listeningto other people's music, which
obviously inspired me to make myown, but it's going to be really
exciting to be on the other sideof it and to experience it that
(23:42):
way, because I think it's sohelpful right now that it can
just come straight to yourhouse.
And it's the only way thatmusicians can be creative right
now.
I think it's the only way that Ican think of that you can really
reach out and build a fan base,get to know people and share
your music.
And I think it's a really, it'sa really good thing that I'm
(24:03):
excited to be coming apart ofit.
Tilly Griffiths (24:06):
Absolutely.
I totally agree.
This.
Especially in this time, it'svery important that on the other
side of that, some people areconcerned that artists aren't
fairly compensated for theirwork when it goes onto streaming
platforms.
But do you have any thoughts onthat as someone just starting
out or is that not reallysomething that you've gotten
into yet?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (24:27):
To be honest, I haven't really thought about
it yet.
I probably will.
When it's my second or thirdsong and I know more about how
it works, but I do know a lot ofpeople have said who've released
stuff before, they're like youdon't get much money from it and
like, you know what?
It's okay.
It's okay for now.
We'll see how it goes.
Tilly Griffiths (24:43):
Definitely.
I think it you'll stage as well,this is about getting your name
out there, getting people,listening to your music.
So, the fact that it's onstreaming, does that change the
way you think about how you'regoing to market your music and
how you get people to hear aboutyou?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (24:58):
Yeah.
I mean, definitely because if itweren't for streaming before I
was releasing this song, I wasjust, you know, posting videos
on stuff like Facebook andYouTube and things like that.
So this is completely anotherlevel.
It's something that I can sharea full song with and be able to
have people listen to it andhopefully enjoy it.
(25:18):
So it's definitely going tochange the way I market it.
So it'll be a lot of trying torally people around and to get
the streams up.
But yeah, I'm looking forward toit.
Tilly Griffiths (25:31):
So I guess that's the next step really?
But, what are the next fewmonths gonna look like for you.
So the single comes out, what'snext?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (25:39):
I'm working on a couple of other songs.
I have, like, all theinstrumentation down and I just
can't get to the studio torecord my vocals.
So hopefully soon I'll be ableto go and get those songs down
and then it'll just be, keepreleasing and hopefully making
some more music videos andseeing what happens I guess.
Tilly Griffiths (25:59):
So going back a little bit, just kind of to you,
what does your creative processlook like?
Like how do you write thosesongs?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (26:07):
Wow.
Well, it's kind of differentevery time to be honest, but I
always start off with an ideathat I've been thinking of.
I can move on to little notebookand I just jot down ideas and
any inspiration that I getbecause I find to get
inspiration in like reallyrandom in places like on a train
or just in a cafe or something.
And I'm like, I need to jot thatdown.
(26:27):
So I start there, then I alwayswrite on my acoustic guitar.
So I always just try and findchord patterns that I like then
just play around with words andsee what sticks and then go from
there.
Yeah.
Tilly Griffiths (26:43):
Sure.
That makes a lot of sense to me.
Just getting back to thepandemic again, you said you
were just starting out beforethis happened.
So how have you been able tokeep connecting with your fans,
I guess, and the people thatwant to hear your music?
How's that been for you?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (26:58):
I've just found live streaming to be
actually really helpful forthat.
You know, like just before I wasdoing some gigs and I was on a
live streaming program where wewent and filmed it in person,
and then obviously everythingwent online.
But what I did find was I wasable to do gigs for people in
different areas.
Like I did a gig for someone inManchester called Matt Phredd's
(27:22):
and I did the Basement Door,which is a London-based music
center.
So maybe I wouldn't have beenable to do that if it was in
person.
So it was really helpful to getto do that online.
And that way, I suppose I got tomeet new people and, hopefully,
have people hear my music andenjoy it.
Tilly Griffiths (27:41):
What is your favorite aspect of being an
artist?
Is it that creative process orperforming, or what do you enjoy
the most?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (27:50):
I obviously love all of it, but my favorite
thing still is to go fromnothing to a song.
So definitely the songwritingprocess for me, because I just
think of, like, each song aslike a little story.
So it's like a story just with amelody, I guess, and music.
So for me getting to write thatto then have people hear it,
(28:13):
that's definitely my favoritepart.
So I'd say it's that, but thenobviously getting to perform
what I've made is also reallyfun.
And definitely since the gigshaven't been going ahead, it
will be so much fun when theydo, but recently it's definitely
been just writing and gettingthings down.
Tilly Griffiths (28:31):
And then that whole process of creating the
songs, how much of that is allyou, cause I know you're a
musician, like an all-rounderpretty much, so in terms of,
like, instrumentation, do you doall of that or do you work with
other people?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (28:45):
Yeah, I do it all.
I write it all and then I takewhat I've got my guitar and
vocals and any ideas that Ihave, I take it to the studio,
but then they like helped mebuild a for track, but I always
record all the, I record thepiano and the guitar all myself,
and then they helped me with thelast little bits and bobs.
Tilly Griffiths (29:05):
How long does all of that take?
Like you say, sometimes songscome you right away, but what is
the general timeline?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (29:12):
From writing the song to getting it finished?
I mean, it depends how manytimes I go per week, but I know
I've done one in three weeks,which was quite quick, then one
that took, like, two months.
So anything between that sort oftimeline, I'd say roughly from
first idea to final mix would beabout a month on average, maybe.
Tilly Griffiths (29:36):
That's quick.
You must have a lot in storeready to release.
Are there particular artistsright now that inspire you and
influence your sound?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (29:45):
Yeah.
So, so many.
Taylor Swift is like thebiggest, because she just keeps
dropping albums out of nowhere.
And I'm like, that's just, Idon't even know.
That's a whole nother level.
I'm like that songwriting isjust insane.
And so she's definitely my maininspiration, but I love Lana Del
Rey and London Grammar and anysinger-songwriter, to be honest,
(30:07):
I love musicians who write theirown music.
Tilly Griffiths (30:10):
I'm also just thinking now about how there are
so many different ways thatartists can get their music out
there.
Like the recent example ofOlivia Rodrigo with Driver's
License and how that was aTikTok sensation.
Have you thought about that andhow you could be creative with
these different platforms to getyour music out there?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (30:28):
Yeah.
I mean, I'm willing to tryanything I guess.
And definitely there were somany different ways and there
are so many people, like yousay, doing so well with these
streaming platforms right now.
And, maybe if it weren't forthat, then we wouldn't have even
heard of that song, which isactually crazy.
So yeah, it's really, it'sreally good.
Tilly Griffiths (30:49):
Okay.
Well, I think this is my lastquestion but I want to know,
where do you see yourself in sayfive years' time?
I was going to say a year, buteverything is so crazy right
now, we're going to go with fiveyears.
What is the big goal?
Heidi Rolph-Stott (31:04):
Wow.
Okay.
Um, I definitely say to justkeep creating as much as I can.
And obviously, because I dowriting as well as music and I
also act, it's just to try andwork hard at everything I'm
doing and hopefully earn moneydoing what I enjoy and get to
earn a living, being what I wantto be.
(31:26):
So hopefully in five years,that's what I'll be.
But we shall see, we shall see.
Tilly Griffiths (31:31):
And just to finish off, remind me where we
can listen to your music andwhen we can do that.
Heidi Rolph-Stott (31:37):
Okay.
So my debut single is'Better OffNow' and it comes out on 19th of
March on Spotify, Apple, Deezer.
Just all major music streamingplatforms that you can find.
Yeah.
So be sure to check out.
Ugur Dursun (31:55):
Thank you, Tilly, for that interview.
And that will be a wrap for thisepisode of Drop the MIC: Music
Industry Conversations.
Thank you for tuning in and comeback next week for an all new
episode of Drop the MIC,Stanford University's music
industry podcast.
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