What Young Musicians Can Learn from Jamey Johnson

11 years ago Liv Carter 4

Shortly before the 2013 GRAMMY Awards, Rolling Stone magazine caught up with some of the nominees. A very patient journalist, Dan Hyman, went to interview Country Album of the Year nominee Jamey Johnson in Chicago. The conversation was almost painful to read and it holds a valuable lesson that I think upcoming artists must take on board. It starts with why they were in Chicago. Johnson was nowhere near the GRAMMY Awards ceremony in Los Angeles because, as he said in the interview: “I just don’t see the value in it.”

Really? He did go on to admit that “[awards] are really nice for the people that are on my team that work hard,” but kept insisting that to him they hold no value and they are not why he makes music. No one was suggesting they were. If you are nominated for a GRAMMY Award, you show up. ‘It’s nice for other people but I’m just too cool to care about any of that,’ is not good enough. Attending the ceremony in no way means that you are suddenly making music for the awards, only a very defensive person would think so. It is out of respect for your peers who voted for you, and out of respect for those people on your team that you should be there. But I guess Johnson is more interested in protecting his anti-establishment-rebel creds. No one starts making music for the sole purpose of receiving a GRAMMY nomination, but if the industry in which you chose to make your career bestows you that honor, you show your appreciation by showing it the proper respect.

But this is really only a small issue compared to what else is in the interview.

His responses are often dripping with arrogance. Consider: “I write because it makes God happy that I write. I sing because it makes God happy that I sing.” Is that so? And how do you know that? Self-professed humility before God, immediately followed by such pompous statements, drives me crazy and Hyman was more charitable then I would have been by leaving that alone.

Yet, it is still not the part of the interview that bothered me the most.

Asked if he was writing new material, he replied: “I wish I could tell you that I am writing. I’m not. […] I feel pretty used by the music industry, in that my contracts are written in such a way that I don’t get paid.” The record deal that is structured in such a way that the artist does not get paid does not exist. Clearly, there are parts of this story that aren’t being told. (But wait, who cares if you’re not getting paid, you only write because it makes God happy. Right?)

But it gets better, and here is where the real lesson lies.

The music business is a business same as any other. It sometimes gets a little more complex because it involves selling art, something inherently subjective, but there are basic truths which still hold true. The most basic of all is: read your contracts before you sign them. If you fail to do this, most, if not all, of what happens next will be on you. After claiming his record label used him and is mistreating him, Johnson offers as a defense that “as a musician I never studied music law. I can’t even read the contracts I’ve signed. But I’m fairly sure they don’t say what I thought they said.” (Given that Mercury allowed him to release a double-disc CD, which is just not done in country, makes me think they actually tried to give him as much freedom as possible and that they treated him pretty well. Go find me one other label that would have taken that risk.)

Look, very few artists easily understand the business side of the business, and fewer still enjoy it. But it is part of it nonetheless. You ignore it at your own peril. If you are serious about a career that involves a major label deal, you have got to make time for this. It will not be fun, it will not be glamorous, and it will not be why you started making music. But it is reality. An important point: if you are not willing to do this, that is absolutely fine, and no one should hold that against you. But then you must accept that a major label deal is not for you.

A quality that frustrates me most in some very talented people here is the hipster ‘I don’t give a shit’-attitude toward business. 90% of the time, if you wonder why this or that artist didn’t find mainstream success, that is the reason. They got in their own way. The refusal to face reality leads to the intellectual crime of willful ignorance. As per Johnson: “In Nashville they think because you signed this contract that you owe them the remainder of the terms of the contract.” Yeah, that’s not just in Nashville, that’s actually sort of a Planet Earth thing. Maybe things are done differently on Gallifrey or other planets, but here, if you make a contractual promise you will be held to it. Claiming that being asked to do what you already agreed to do amounts to mistreatment, means that there is a whole lot of privilege that you have not examined.

If you want to be part of a system with complex rules, accepting them is part of your price of admission. That is how the world works, in every sector of business. Imagine wanting to play major league baseball, not bothering learning the rules, but then complaining that you can’t run straight to second base; and better yet, then refusing to play out your contract until you are allowed to do so. It is a sign of a narcissistic, over-inflated sense of your own importance to feel that existing rules, which you were given every chance to be aware of, do not apply to you.

The music business is a tough business. Music Row is a shark tank. If you want to wade in, there is one essential thing you can use as body armor: education. Learn all you can about the business, from text books, autobiographies, and talking to people who have been there and done it. Learn the basics of contract law and find people you can trust to explain the more complex issues to you. If you are not willing to do this, for whatever reason, forget major record deals and release your music independently. Or, if after learning all this stuff you think those rules will just not work for you, also forget major record deals and release your music independently. Do it right and you can have a very rewarding career on your own terms. If you decide to go the record label route, you must be prepared for all that entails.

To paraphrase a simple truth: with major label deals comes major responsibility.

 

Liv Carter

Liv Carter

Liv is a career coach for creatives, and the people who work with them.
She holds several certificates from Berklee College of Music, and a certificate in Positive Psychology from UC Berkeley.
Her main influences are coffee, cats, and Alexander Hamilton.
Liv Carter

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