In many ways, it’s a great time to be an artist in the music industry. Or rather, it’s a great time to be an artist in the music industry with an audience. That said, it’s a shitty time to be an artist trying to build an audience online, and that’s most of us! Artists believe if they can get a foothold, ride the algorithms, “go viral,” it’s nuts and bolts from there. They try all sorts of things, take advice, often end up humiliating and debasing themselves trying to find that foothold. The difficult reality is that while it takes a whole new set of skills to market online, it also takes great music that people will want to share. But what if you already have great music that you believe people will want to share, but you don’t have an audience yet? That’s called artist development, and it’s a moving target. From a professional standpoint, the question is always framed as, “What’s the best way to reach an audience right now?”
If you’re a regular reader of my Substack, I’ve mentioned before that Rounder (Gary Paczosa and I) signed Sierra Ferrell back in 20181 from a YouTube video. The video is a street performance of In Dreams we found on a platform called Gems on VHS. Gems, established in 2011, is an update on Alan Lomax field recordings, capturing the roots/Americana underground in its native habitat. As of 2018, when we became obsessed with Sierra’s video, they had around 20,000 followers. Today they have more than ten times that. In a 2018 Rolling Stone article, Sierra said “It feels like [making videos for Gems] is the only way I’m going to get noticed.” In this case, it worked. It worked for her but also for Rounder.
You bet we paid a lot more attention to Gems on VHS after that. We scoured Gems and similar sessions for talent as we lobbied the producers of sessions to lend their platform to our artists. It’s a different calculus than something like NPR’s Tiny Desk (so iconic and popular that it was hilariously spoofed on last night’s Saturday Night Live), or radio sessions from popular “NonComm” radio sessions that live online and are promoted through social media. Those sorts of sessions are highly sought-after across various genres - publicists play the long-game to get developing acts on those sorts of sessions, often without success. it’s a different kind of gatekeeper culture. These roots/Americana-centric sessions, such as Gems, or Radio WV (largely responsible for breaking Oliver Anthony last year), Appalachia Untold, and Western AF are run by music fans with more in common with YouTubers or influencers than old-guard media professionals. Now that virtually anyone has access to high-quality media tools and resources, there isn’t much quality gap between these properties and trad media content. There’s often a clearly-defined aesthetic look and strategy presenting artists in a natural, appealing way, and a real commitment to high-quality audiovisual content that’s up to old media standards. They’re (at least for now) reasonably accessible and personally curated, but they’re also extremely effective - often more effective to reach certain audiences than old guard media such as radio and TV.
Western AF is based out of Laramie, Wyoming, founded and operated by friends Mike Vanata and Brian Harrington, who share an interest in filmmaking. It’s a celebration of rural Western culture, imagery and aesthetics, but the focus is music. Their mission is “capturing raw and powerful sessions with singer-songwriters and showing that a good song can dig deep into your heart and soul.”2 They launched the YouTube channel in 2019, and had their first viral hit that year with one of their first videos, a solo performance of Cowpoke by Colter Wall.
I’ve seen major successes recently from collaborations my clients have had with Western AF and other platforms. Notably, The Red Clay Strays launched the trajectory of their viral hit Wondering Why with one of Western AF’s long-form “Live AF” sessions that featured the song. Several Rounder artists, including Sierra, Bella White, and Caroline Spence, filmed WAF sessions during my tenure with the label. I’ve trained my Twitter and Reels algorithms to deliver this sort of stuff to me almost exclusively because it’s the best way to keep up - I see the short-form vertical clips from them all the time, and it’s always high quality music and audiovisual. It’s a wonderful development resource, and the source of some of the most visually and sonically compelling content on roots music you can find on the Web.
That was a long lead-in to get to the point: last weekend I had the pleasure of helping organize a Live AF session. In fact, I participated - actually performed as a sideman - in a cool mancave/shack/clubhouse in a rural area near Murfreesboro. See, these days when I find music I think is great, I don’t wait until they need a lawyer to help. When a development project is clearly good enough to be successful, helping out can be pretty straightforward. This is about Clayton Nile Young, a roots singer/writer/multi-instrumentalist from Jacksonville whose music I’m helping get in people’s ears. A friend turned me on to his self-produced, self-released album, and I fell hard for it. It’s a delight. I believed - continue to believe - that a lot of other people will soon love it too. I connected with Clayton, and he said he’d be OK with it if I send his music around to see what happens.
How does that start? Clayton is a working professional with a young family. He doesn’t have endless resources, but he works hard and takes care of his family. He neither has time to constantly post on social media nor money to hire someone to do it for him. Does that doom him to be a hobbyist with a limited reach? Not necessarily.
Pretty much all I did was send the album link to a my friends who book a couple sessions, Appalachia Untold (which has already filmed a session and released a song), and Western AF, which agreed to capture a four-song live session that just happened last Saturday, Easter weekend. I just found out about Clayton in early January, we booked Western AF in February, and the session was done in March. It’ll post over the summer - that is incredibly quick and efficient for our business. Will the session be the thing that establishes Clayton as a major player in the roots music space? Who knows. But it can’t hurt, and we’ll find out soon. But my time investment, the total financial investment, is very light in music marketing terms.
One of the coolest things about the session is that Clayton had never heard his songs realized by a full band. He recorded the album mostly by himself, layering and multi-tracking. The record sounds like a band, but it’s studio trickery. An old trick, one I’ve used many times before (including on my most recent album). But the recording isn’t a live performance; it’s a simulation. It was my goal to bring the tracks to life with players who could not only play the parts - some of which aren’t easy - but just as importantly to capture the vibe. And to make it fun. It had to be fun.
I volunteered to play acoustic guitar, but because acoustic is the backbone I decided to recruit a pro to hold the anchor, so I would have that pressure. I called my friend Jonathan Tebring, a Nashville session player married to a fiend of mine who played in the live lineup for Rascal Flatts. That’s a little deceptive, though. Jonathan’s good enough to back the stars of Music Row, but he has good, diverse taste. He’s easy to be around, that is important!3 I ended up playing some guitar and piano, but Jonathan did the heavy lifting and made it a much easier, more fun day for me.
Clayton loves the band Futurebirds, a great Athens, GA rock band and former client of mine. I’m friends with their former drummer, Payton Bradford. Payton’s also a lawyer and a family man, so he generally appreciates a chance to play with good musicians. And he’s easy to be around. Clayton brought a seasoned bluegrass musician named Adam Sushi from Jacksonville to play upright bass (also easy to be around), so that left one seat to fill, “utility person.” In addition to guitar and rhythm tracks, the songs have lots of cool piano and banjo parts.
I called around and got some recommendations for ace session players. I knew the band would be great, and above all I wanted to have a great vibe. I called the best vibe musician I know who happens to be a virtuoso on several instruments, the great Aaron Lee Tasjan.4 I sent him the music and asked if he could cover the piano and banjo. Aaron said, “Well, I don’t really play the banjo.” I said, “Well, neither can Clayton, and he played on the record!” He agreed, and we had our band. This is notable, because Aaron is a successful artist in his own right. He doesn’t need to do this. I know he agreed in part because I asked. But he’s also the kind of musician who will do something because it will be fun. That’s why he’s perfect. (And no, I don’t mean he played purely for fun - he’s a professional…I’m saying fun is part of the equation).
Working with the Western AF team was incredible. Brian and Mike filmed, with their colleague Will Ross capably handling the audio engineering challenges on a tight schedule. These guys are each professional to the core. They told us the session would take from 1:00 til 4:00. I arrived a few minutes after 1, we wrapped at exactly 4:00. I’ve learned to expect these things will take hours longer than anyone expects. The crew remained respectful, relaxed, friendly, and appreciative throughout. They made it easy. They contributed to the vibe where so often film and audio crews detract from or even destroy the vibe. It was, start to finish, a great experience.
The set felt great, sounded great and largely faithful to the record. Clayton performed brilliantly, nailing each take, even switching instruments (having guitarists freed him up to play fiddle, but one song called for his preferred 12-string). The venue was just a couple miles from the place where Clayton grew up - his wife, infant daughter, and parents sat and listened, all seemingly deeply pleased and excited by the sounds. I hope we’ll all remember this years from now as the start of something that will grow in ways none of us can imagine. But for sure we’re gonna remember it as a really fun day making music and making new friends. Were it for those things alone, I’d still feel deeply grateful and feel it’s worth it. But that isn’t the goal. The goal is to get people to love the music like I love the music. Right now, for this project, this is the best way to do it.
Maybe it was early 2019, and I’m not gonna fact check.
From the Western AF website.
Musicians, especially young ones, this is a critical point. Great musicians get hired. Everyone on this session is great. Good musicians get hired too, but only if they have a great reputation for being cool and easy. On a tour, musicianship is super important. But the other 22 hours a day call on a different skill set. That’s less true for the studio, but it’s relevant. Develop great interpersonal skills, understand boundaries and personal space. I swear, it’s the more important skill set if you play well enough.
Aaron is in the process of releasing his new album Stellar Evolution on April 12. It’s great and you should check it out. Or better yet, buy it.