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Culminating Experience
Thesis
Outcome Paper
Calen Mims
15 June 2019
CULMINATING EXPERIENCE OUTCOME PAPER
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Independent Record Label
Operational Project
My experience as product manager for Disrupción
Records
Summary
Disrupción Records is an independent record label supported by Berklee
College of Music, comprised by a core team of seven individuals from five different
countries, and working with 28 artists from around the globe for international
exposure with distribution through the Orchard under Sony Music. Currently housing
a catalogue of artists spread across three imprints: EVLVE, Common Chord, and
Disrupción; the label continues to expand with new signings and new releases.
Formed in 2013, this is the first year the label has worked with artists outside the
Berklee College of Music program, participated in the Berklee College of Music
Valencia Campus “Musaico” live music festival, and added a synchronisation
department, Fusión.
Objectives
Disrupción Records has one main objective: to find and release unique talent
that can “disrupt” the music scene. In order to achieve this goal, though, the team
must unite under a common vision, delineate a plan and delegate roles, ensure this
plan is understood with clear objectives and individuals claiming ownership of their
duties with pride and integrity, and execute the mission while constantly re-assessing
and communicating any obstacles.
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My objective as product manager was to assist marketing and promotions in
setting up strategies and timelines for artist releases, ensure these deadlines were
being met, ensure the artists’ needs were being met as well, and most importantly,
getting the final “product” or package of the mastered tracks, metadata, and album
art released to the world. I was acting as liaison between the label, artist and
distributor. My other unofficial job titles included chief motivator, head strong-armer,
top demander of the items, and vice herder of the team (Nicole Casino, the label
manager, was the head in charge of that).
The product manager job is a fascinating and important aspect of the industry
that is often neglected and overlooked, yet one of the most significant. If the
metadata is not submitted accurately, then the appropriate parties do not get paid,
and as a result the process is not sustainable (mainly for the artist). In order for the
art to continue, the product manager must do their job meticulously and with great
respect and ensure utmost accuracy. I spent numerous man-hours dealing with
every issue thinkable and overcoming every obstacle imaginable, such as ordering
an immediate take-down on the day of a single release for our Venezuelan artist due
to a military coup being staged the same day causing political turmoil and unrest in
the region (not ideal release conditions), or resolving metadata that was submitted
incorrectly by the artist, as well as actually chasing down the artists to ensure correct
information was acquired. It is a full-time job and hard work with not much
recognition, but ultimately worth it in the end. One must take pride in a job well done
and being part of a bigger cause: the success of the artist and the label.
Resources
Upon nomination of the team in October of 2018, the only initial resources
provided were the guidance of our faculty representative, Mr. Pete Dyson with his
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experience and sage-like wisdom; a facility to work in, the Berklee College of Music
Valencia campus with rooms that had to be reserved hourly; and the hopes and
dreams of the members involved. There was no turnover from the previous team,
there was no money, and there were no current artists on the roster. Disrupción
Records was merely an idea at that moment in time. The label was founded in 2013,
but other than the name, it was completely dead upon our team’s receipt. In fact,
even worse, we were operating in the negative: the already established “Disrupción
Records” email accounts, social media pages, and web sights (to mention only a few
examples) were inaccessible due to the absence of turnover. Nobody in the current
team had the passwords and in order to make any sort of progress, we were forced
to identify and track down the previous team and obtain the information as well as
the passwords. This was not an easy task and time consuming, not the ideal
launching point.
Embarking on this uphill battle, it would take pure and honest hard work as a
unit to start gaining traction, to resurrect Disrupción Records, building it from the
ground up. It was Nicole Casino as label manager, Alexjandra Edwards and Nicole
Otero on marketing and promotions, Eleonora Muraglia and Camila Anino on Artist
and Repertoire, and myself as Product Manager. We were up to challenge, staring
in the face of adversity.
Tasks
Once the glow of being handpicked to work on the label subsided and the
hype of being selected as one of the chosen few calmed, a mountain of tasks
loomed over the team to an almost overwhelming extent. Comparable to an excited
canine chasing its tail, we were a crew with boundless energy and no real unified
direction other than the goal to change the world through music. We were eager as
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to what we were getting into but simultaneously also not quite sure exactly what we
were getting into. What was our identity? What kind of artists do we want to sign?
What type of music did we want to release? What was everyone’s roles? What
exactly is a “product manager”? Our team came from such a widespread area and
backgrounds and histories and upbringings. Everyone had somewhat of an idea of
what they as an individual wanted, but where we were headed as a team was a
completely different idea altogether. But just like every daring journey, we began
with a first step: our’s being determining the label’s identity.
Traditionally, the advantage of an independent label is their fierce identity
complimented by a very niche market. Indie labels are the maestros of cultural
knowledge in their specific field and usually the premier in identifying up and coming
talent as well as future trends. The indies are on the streets, at the venues,
experiencing the live performances, feeling the pulse of scene, soaking up the
energy firsthand. They are the revolution. Our label, on the contrary, was a hybridlabel of sorts.
To set the scene, Berklee College of Music was founded in 1945, post-World
War II in the Schillinger House in Boston by Lawrence Berk as the first jazz music
conservatory in the United States1. Since then, Berklee College of Music has
evolved from solely jazz to contemporary music, incorporating a plethora of different
styles and genres. From it’s inception in 2013, Disrupción Records worked solely
with Berklee College of Music artists, an impressively talented and diverse lot, these
musicians possessed world-class technical abilities in instruments spanning all
corners of globe from the saxophone to the ude, the piano to the djembe, from
Sweden to South Korea, and Venezuela to India. As wonderful as this may initially
1
https://www.berklee.edu/about/brief-history
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appear, it was a double-edged sword, there were only two common factors for us as
a label to base our identity on: diversity and Berklee.
How was an independent label going to form an identity on these two
principles? To add to the complexity, the team unanimously agreed to try and sign
artists outside the Berklee network, which meant we were now down to only one
common factor: diversity. This was indeed a very large and difficult initial obstacle to
overcome from the start! We had to figure out a way to somehow group together
artists from around the globe, playing different genres and styles of music, some part
of the Berklee program and some not, and altogether being backed by an institution
formed as a jazz conservatory all the while being located in Valencia, Spain with
some fixed assets but virtually zero financial backing.
Next task, and very significant for my role, was to determine our distributor.
With a wide variety of options to choose from, the distributor chosen would also be a
direct correlation with the caliber and quality of label. It would be a major aspect in
defining who we actually were and the type of artists we wanted to work with. Did
we want to go full-indie and stick to a more of Do It Yourself (DIY) type company or
did we want to shoot for the stars and go with a bigger corporation, making us seem
more legitimate? Did we want more attention and care from the distributor with a
smaller reach or associate the label with a giant name and be just another
independent label in a sea of others? Did we want physical distribution or stay purely
digital? Did we want to target solely the United States even though we were in Spain
or did we want international exposure? With so many options to consider, one thing
remained certain, we were definitely going to need to use the Berklee network in
making this idea a reality.
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The previous team utilized CD Baby, a company that is a friend of Berklee,
and they received some free swag and physical distribution as a result. CD Baby is
a great company with a solid business model and just small enough in comparison to
other large distributors to give Disrupción the attention we would want, but as a
downside it is also accessible by anyone, so the it would not be a defining asset.
Although we would get some potential free product from CD Baby, the distributor
would not be a major selling point for the label to our potential artists.
Another possibility was the Orchard. The co-founder, Scott Cohen, is a friend
of the Berklee family and came to speak at a Global Entertainment and Music
Business seminar earlier in the year. His company had been picked up by Sony
Music in 2015 and merged with RED in 2017, still keeping the Orchard name and
making the company the biggest independent record label distributor in the industry2.
This would be a good fit for the team due to the company’s humble roots, its
impressive merger with RED and acquisition by Sony which could be used as a
selling point for potential artists, and again, having Scott as a friend of Berklee is a
major plus. Additionally, the founding team of Disrupción in 2013 used the Orchard
as a distributor before the company was acquired by Sony, so there is some history,
and to further promote the decision, there are some Berklee alumni currently working
at the company, so it should be much simpler getting the operation up and running
again.
Next item on the list of to-do’s was the five year anniversary of the label and
our intention in recognizing this moment of importance. Possible actions were a
compilation album with all of the artists signed by our the team this year or host an
https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8496258/orchard-scott-cohen-retirement, 2/4/2019
by Billboard Staff
2
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event, a showcase of sorts, including Disrupción artists. Major issue with both of
these ideas is that we in fact at the time did not have any artists to work with.
An additional task that was put out by the team is involvement in the Musiaco
music festival that was set to occur in May this year. This festival is a big deal for the
program’s live-concentration members and it would be a great way to bridge the gap
with the record practicum students and the live practicum students. The festival
brings in significant fanfare (generally in the thousands), and would be great
exposure for a Disrupción Records’ artist. In return, we as a label would provide
talent for the live event and assist in promoting the festival. It was a win-win situation
for both parties involved, and would be another first for Disrupción Records by taking
part in this new venture.
On to the next task: marketing and promotion plans. This is a very enjoyable
aspect of the job as product manager by working directly with the marketing and
promotion department, strategizing new releases, coming up with different promotion
ideas, and keeping an overarching view on all of the artists involved to push
maximum exposure, rhythm of advertisement, and frequency of releases. There is
much strategic thinking involved with the process and a requirement to see the
bigger picture while simultaneously making achievable plans. As the product
manager you are not required to come up with the actual marketing or the promotion,
but you are there to ensure it all fits and makes sense, that all of the wickets are
getting hit and all of boxes are getting checked.
Rolling out the schedule following the planning sessions and driving the
agenda to meet the set objectives, going live to attain prescribed goals, adhering to
timelines, and hitting the mark of desired outcome is a beautiful work of art in itself.
With so many moving parts and so many things that could go wrong, it is a constant
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movement, an enduring strain to keep forward progress. Fortunately, Disrupción
Records had an all-star marketing and promotion team and it was a pleasure to
alongside them.
The final task was to come up with a turnover plan for the upcoming
Disrupción Records team, so they did not have to start in the negative like we did,
costing precious time and resources for an already extremely tight timeline and
accelerated program. To paint a clearer picture of the current flaws that existed,
nominations for the newest team were not finalized until the end of October and the
previous team graduated in early July. This left a four month gap where absolutely
nothing was happening with the label, and by the time the whole password-fiasco
was resolved and access-issues were rectified we lost nearly an entire additional
month before the team was gaining any traction and relatively operational. There is
a great need to set the upcoming team up for success, and a new process to resolve
the time gap that is a major concern for the artists.
Risks
From the get go, there was virtually zero risk, especially financially, for the
Disrupción Records team. The major benefit of starting up or being a part of any
independent music label is that it takes little to zero capital, more importantly it takes
vision, careful planning, and an incredible ability to adapt. There’s almost a sixth
sense required in order to succeed, which cannot be bought, acquired, or learned
through an organized institution, but rather learned through experiencing it firsthand.
That being said, the only actual risks involved would be failing as a team and not
achieving the goals we set out for at the beginning. Not forming an identity, not
producing any product, not learning a new set of skills would constitute a failure.
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To be honest, the majority of the risks are with the artists due to the short
tenure of label team, quick churn from start to finish, and gap between teams. The
most important trait the label has with the artist is trust and this takes time and effort,
not something that can be turned over to the new team. And just like a company
being restructured, acquired, or merged, without an original member from the
company still involved, there’s a high likelihood of a shift in priorities, which could
help or hurt the artist.
For example, Mayani Swave is one of the Disrupción Records most prized
artist, even to the extent that we managed to fly him out to play a stage at the
Musaico Music Festival. Swave is from the Dominican Republic, and the only
reason we were able to establish any sort of contact and rapport with this artist is
because we had an individual from Dominican Republic on the team this year. There
is a possibility of not having a representative from the Dominican Republic on the
team next year, and this would greatly affect relations with the artist, most likely in a
negative manner. It is very difficult, if not impossible to maintain the artist roster and
this is the biggest risk for the team.
Outcomes
Commencing with the initial task of identity, in keeping with the label’s main
objective of “disrupting the music scene” and amidst the team’s development best
surmised by Bruce Tuckman’s article “Forming, Storming, Norming, and
Performing”3, the team got creative in achieving a clear identity while also
incorporating diversity and Berklee’s longstanding history: imprints. Much like a
collective or group, such as Unspeakable, Secretly or Beggars, Disrupción Records
decided to create three imprints to fortify a strong overarching identity, but also
!3 Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63(6),
384-399. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/h0022100
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maintain the ability to sign a plethora of talents an artists. Thus, Common Chord and
EVLVE were born.
Common Chord would be Disrupción’s nod to the Berklee College of Music’s
roots when it was founded in 1945 as a jazz music conservatory. It would focus on
more instrumental items with a strong emphasis on jazz and classical. The A&R
department did not spend much time with this imprint, but we were able to sign an
Indian film scoring producer, Srikant Krishna, to license one of his film scores with
us.
EVLVE was created for the broader spectrum of up and coming artists, mainly
those enrolled in the program and seeking development and nurturing. Disrupción
Records’ first signing, Nathan Dies, an undergraduate student originally from Brazil,
was placed in this imprint. It was great to be able to work with these artists directly,
provide them feedback, nurture them, and watch them grow.
To complete the grouping, Disrupción Records still maintained the overarching
imprint adding the artists we felt were of the highest quality, best caliber, and most in
keeping with label’s vision. Mayani Swave, Autumn Jones, rosewood., Sara Neal
were all directed into this imprint. The A&R department spent most of their time
focusing on finding and working with these types of artists.
Another part of Disrupción Records worth mentioning is the newly added
Fusión synchronisation department. Headed by Mariano Hernandez Garcia and Rea
Shena, this is the first year the label has reached into the synch sector. Initially, and
once again, this was a difficult sell due to our lack of catalogue, but when the label
continued to add more substance, Mariano and Rea managed to secure a synch
deal. Very exciting stuff for the label and new progress made!
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Next task and the most directly applicable to my job responsibilities, the
distributor. The team decided to go with the Orchard as our distributor due to its
international reach comprised of local representatives in more than 40 global
markets, impressive work with artists such as T-Pain, City and Colour, Hippo
Campus (a personal favourite), and Jacob collier to name a few, and most of all the
acquisition by Sony Music. The Orchard’s label and artists received a total of 60
nominations at the 2019 Grammy Awards. If this is not a convincing reason to use
the Orchard as a distributor or a significant reason for potential artists to sign with
Disrupción Records, I’m not sure what else would be. Combined with the other
positive aspects, such as having Scott Cohen in our corner and Berklee alumni
currently working at the Orchard, it was a no-brainer to choose this route. Only one
issue stood in the way, how does one go about officially getting a distributor?
Luckily, through extensive research, talks with previous teams, and Friday
morning business seminars, I was able to establish contact with Sammy Pisano, a
Berklee alumni and current Orchard employee at the New York City international
office that was able to point me in the right direction:
Figure 1. Original email with Sammy Pisano, Manager,
Sales Analytics for the Orchard on 24 Jan 2019
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This was great news for Disrupción and a big win for the team. We now had
an official distributor and an impressive one at that. Our A&R team could start using
the Orchard as the official distributor of Disrupción Records as a selling point for the
potential artist signings, increasing our legitimacy and value, and in return the quality
of artists we could add to our roster. We could start moving product and adding to
our catalogue as soon as we received it, but now we just needed to get it, and even
more importantly learn the Orchard’s platform and procedural compliance in order to
successfully release the tracks to the world. This was much more complicated than
initially expected.
The Orchard has a beautifully designed platform with a sleek and user-friendly
interface, but there are some strange encounters with operating procedures that are
not mentioned in the Frequently Asked Question’s (FAQs) section and the user only
discovers them through trial and error. The first and most glaring missing item is
there is no real “How to use this platform” written document or introductory video.
There is a help section, but this is mainly only helpful if the user encounters an error,
not in preventing one. Logging into the Orchard the user is greeted with a main
page:
Figure 2. Home page workstation for Disrupción
Records utilizing the Orchard interface on 15 Jun 2019
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It is fantastic and easy to read visual, getting an immediate view of quarterly
revenues and catalogue history displayed by Product, project, format/type, and
release date as well as also incorporating a column of top tracks, but the main issues
occur when actually uploading the new product:
Figure 3. Product Overview page for Disrupción
Records artist RETROVYZOR utilizing the Orchard
interface on 15 Jun 2019
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First off, the Orchard website is only compatible with apple safari. This was a
long and confusing lesson learned that could have been prevented and save a lot of
time and effort if it was clearly identified from the start. I am unsure whether or not it
is compatible with PC browsers such as Internet Explorer or Firefox, but the website
does not work with Google Chrome.
Second item, processing time. The Orchard states that it usually takes four to
six weeks for a digital track to go live in stores and two business days to correct any
mistakes made. This is generally not the case. Experience has proven that it takes
an average of 15 days for digital tracks to go live with ten days being the quickest.
As far as corrections to already released items goes, I still have outstanding issues
that have not been resolved and I am waiting for the Orchard to fix.
Third item, formatting. Many artists are very concerned with the pure
aesthetics of the visual text displayed for track, even outside the actual song. For
example some artists or label managers prefer “featured” over “feat.” over “ft.” This
is not an option for the client.
Fourth item, artist profile association. Another issue encountered was
ensuring the artist was correctly connected to their already existing Spotify/Apple/
Deezer account or that a new one is created. For example, Alex Rapp, a MPTI
graduate program student released a track on the Women in Music album, and she
does not have an artist profile on all the main streaming services. The Orchard took
the liberty of accidentally associating her with a much different Alex Rapp, a
hardcore German rapper with songs such as “Hande hoch” or “Kopf Zu”. There is no
official section for already existing artists using the Orchard for the first time to enter
in their artist profile link, nor is there an area to indicate if the artist has an artist
profile at all.
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Fourth item, universal link. This has been a request from the Disrupción team
from the very start and there still has not been any movement on the distributor side.
There is a section for each individual direct service provider (DSP) link such as a
Spotify link, an Apple link, a Deezer link, etc. but a single universal link grouping all
the DSPs together for the artist and label to use. This would be greatly helpful due
to the growing number of different streaming platforms and consumers using
different platforms as a result.
Fifth item, using DSP features such as back playing video. Spotify especially
is loaded with numerous features that would make a Disrupción artist’s page stand
out more (such as back playing videos instead of album art), yet we as the
distributors client are unable to use the features. Again, there has been no response
as to the resolution of this issue. This is not a game-changer but a nice feature for
the client to have available.
Sixth item, painstakingly meticulous attention to detail is required with regards
to the artist metadata. Another fun lesson learned is the crucial match-up of the file
name (.wav) to the actual track name the artist desires. If this is not identical, the
track will get rejected (usually after waiting for two weeks as it is processing), and
one must wait another two weeks after the changes have been made and
resubmitted.
Ultimately, the six aforementioned items are the main technical issues in
regards to the outcomes using the Orchard as a the distributor for Disrupción
Records. The most significant problem encountered would have to be the response
time and working with client services. It is great that the Orchard is huge and under
Sony Music and received 60 grammy noms this year. It is fantastic when it come to
making Disrupción Records more legitimate and respectable, but ultimately being a
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part of this giant business means just that. Disrupción is but a mere small piece, a
cog in this massive machine, a minnow in an ocean of fish and when it comes down
to it, and the already overtasked sales analytics manager has to choose between TPain or Mayani Swave, the manager is going to choose T-Pain as a higher priority.
This can be frustrating for all parties involved especially when issues arrive and the
response time is achingly slow, but these are the consequences associated with
working in the big leagues and with a distributor used by thousands of independent
labels. All in all, I successfully managed the product of 28 global artists, with new
products and upcoming releases on the way.
Continuing along to the proceeding task identified, the Five year anniversary
of the label. After getting team together for one of our weekly synch events, we
decided by unanimous decision to host an official event to celebrate the anniversary
and help promote the upcoming Musaico Music Festival. Alexjandra Edwards in
Promotions did a fantastic job of organising the event and it went off without a hitch.
A truly wonderful event, good times were had by all.
Next task, promotion and marketing plans with Nicole Otero of marketing.
Heavily social media driven, Nicole and I would be in constant communication of
planned release dates, major upcoming events, and promotions. She would ensure
the social media world was fully aware of any and all music coming from Disrupción
Records.
Finally, the last major task was to prepare an all-encompassing turnover plan
for the upcoming team. Nicole Casino, as the Label Manager, took this task under
her wing and compiled a list for each department, including all passwords for social
medias, web pages, emails, etc. as well as the contract for distribution through the
Orchard, if desired by the oncoming team. The only final item to work out is to brief
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the new GEMB academic fellow to ensure they can hold down the label until the new
team arrives.
To cap off the report, I would like to share the data gathered from the Orchard
as my tenure as Product Manager to give a more visual representation of the work
accomplished. The label has garnered nearly 30,000 streams in total and is most
popular with Dominican females aged 18-24:
Figure 4. Total Streams and Top Audience for
Disrupicón Records artists from the past 12 months as of
12 Jun 2019.
Figure 5. Streams by Geography for Disrupicón
Records artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun
2019.
Figure 6. Gender and Age Listeners for Disrupicón
Records artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun
2019.
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Figure 7. Top Countries and Top Regions for
Disrupicón Records artists for the past 30 days as
of 12 Jun 2019.
Figure 8. Types of listeners for Disrupicón Records
artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun 2019.
Figure 9. Gender and age of listeners for
Disrupicón Records artists for the past 30 days as
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Figure 10. Total Audio Streams and YouTube Audio
and Video Streams for Disrupicón Records artists for
the past from nomination date of 24 Oct 2018 to 12
Jun 2019 as of 12 Jun 2019.
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Figure 11. Data Sources used by the Orchard as of 12
Jun 2019.
Figure 12. Most recent distribution contract signed by
Berklee College of Music and Orchard Enterprises on
17 Jun 2015 as of 12 Jun 2019.
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Conclusion
Ultimately, the experience as Product Manager for Disrupción Records proved
to be a resounding success; very fruitful in knowledge gained, and significant
development as an indvidual through real-life experience and demonstration of ability
to manage a long-term project. There remains no better way of learning than by
doing. In combination with the fostering environment of Berklee College of Music
Valencia Campus with the guidance of Professor Pete Dyson, this was a very unique
experience that has increased my abilities as a professional and in return the music
industry as a whole. My only major concern is the the artists involved, all of which
were informed of the temporary nature of the Disrupción Records team, but some of
which did not fully comprehend. I still foresee having minor turnover issues with the
oncoming team, but with the new procedures implemented, the label will be in a
much better place.
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Thesis
Outcome Paper
Calen Mims
15 June 2019
CULMINATING EXPERIENCE OUTCOME PAPER
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Independent Record Label
Operational Project
My experience as product manager for Disrupción
Records
Summary
Disrupción Records is an independent record label supported by Berklee
College of Music, comprised by a core team of seven individuals from five different
countries, and working with 28 artists from around the globe for international
exposure with distribution through the Orchard under Sony Music. Currently housing
a catalogue of artists spread across three imprints: EVLVE, Common Chord, and
Disrupción; the label continues to expand with new signings and new releases.
Formed in 2013, this is the first year the label has worked with artists outside the
Berklee College of Music program, participated in the Berklee College of Music
Valencia Campus “Musaico” live music festival, and added a synchronisation
department, Fusión.
Objectives
Disrupción Records has one main objective: to find and release unique talent
that can “disrupt” the music scene. In order to achieve this goal, though, the team
must unite under a common vision, delineate a plan and delegate roles, ensure this
plan is understood with clear objectives and individuals claiming ownership of their
duties with pride and integrity, and execute the mission while constantly re-assessing
and communicating any obstacles.
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My objective as product manager was to assist marketing and promotions in
setting up strategies and timelines for artist releases, ensure these deadlines were
being met, ensure the artists’ needs were being met as well, and most importantly,
getting the final “product” or package of the mastered tracks, metadata, and album
art released to the world. I was acting as liaison between the label, artist and
distributor. My other unofficial job titles included chief motivator, head strong-armer,
top demander of the items, and vice herder of the team (Nicole Casino, the label
manager, was the head in charge of that).
The product manager job is a fascinating and important aspect of the industry
that is often neglected and overlooked, yet one of the most significant. If the
metadata is not submitted accurately, then the appropriate parties do not get paid,
and as a result the process is not sustainable (mainly for the artist). In order for the
art to continue, the product manager must do their job meticulously and with great
respect and ensure utmost accuracy. I spent numerous man-hours dealing with
every issue thinkable and overcoming every obstacle imaginable, such as ordering
an immediate take-down on the day of a single release for our Venezuelan artist due
to a military coup being staged the same day causing political turmoil and unrest in
the region (not ideal release conditions), or resolving metadata that was submitted
incorrectly by the artist, as well as actually chasing down the artists to ensure correct
information was acquired. It is a full-time job and hard work with not much
recognition, but ultimately worth it in the end. One must take pride in a job well done
and being part of a bigger cause: the success of the artist and the label.
Resources
Upon nomination of the team in October of 2018, the only initial resources
provided were the guidance of our faculty representative, Mr. Pete Dyson with his
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experience and sage-like wisdom; a facility to work in, the Berklee College of Music
Valencia campus with rooms that had to be reserved hourly; and the hopes and
dreams of the members involved. There was no turnover from the previous team,
there was no money, and there were no current artists on the roster. Disrupción
Records was merely an idea at that moment in time. The label was founded in 2013,
but other than the name, it was completely dead upon our team’s receipt. In fact,
even worse, we were operating in the negative: the already established “Disrupción
Records” email accounts, social media pages, and web sights (to mention only a few
examples) were inaccessible due to the absence of turnover. Nobody in the current
team had the passwords and in order to make any sort of progress, we were forced
to identify and track down the previous team and obtain the information as well as
the passwords. This was not an easy task and time consuming, not the ideal
launching point.
Embarking on this uphill battle, it would take pure and honest hard work as a
unit to start gaining traction, to resurrect Disrupción Records, building it from the
ground up. It was Nicole Casino as label manager, Alexjandra Edwards and Nicole
Otero on marketing and promotions, Eleonora Muraglia and Camila Anino on Artist
and Repertoire, and myself as Product Manager. We were up to challenge, staring
in the face of adversity.
Tasks
Once the glow of being handpicked to work on the label subsided and the
hype of being selected as one of the chosen few calmed, a mountain of tasks
loomed over the team to an almost overwhelming extent. Comparable to an excited
canine chasing its tail, we were a crew with boundless energy and no real unified
direction other than the goal to change the world through music. We were eager as
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to what we were getting into but simultaneously also not quite sure exactly what we
were getting into. What was our identity? What kind of artists do we want to sign?
What type of music did we want to release? What was everyone’s roles? What
exactly is a “product manager”? Our team came from such a widespread area and
backgrounds and histories and upbringings. Everyone had somewhat of an idea of
what they as an individual wanted, but where we were headed as a team was a
completely different idea altogether. But just like every daring journey, we began
with a first step: our’s being determining the label’s identity.
Traditionally, the advantage of an independent label is their fierce identity
complimented by a very niche market. Indie labels are the maestros of cultural
knowledge in their specific field and usually the premier in identifying up and coming
talent as well as future trends. The indies are on the streets, at the venues,
experiencing the live performances, feeling the pulse of scene, soaking up the
energy firsthand. They are the revolution. Our label, on the contrary, was a hybridlabel of sorts.
To set the scene, Berklee College of Music was founded in 1945, post-World
War II in the Schillinger House in Boston by Lawrence Berk as the first jazz music
conservatory in the United States1. Since then, Berklee College of Music has
evolved from solely jazz to contemporary music, incorporating a plethora of different
styles and genres. From it’s inception in 2013, Disrupción Records worked solely
with Berklee College of Music artists, an impressively talented and diverse lot, these
musicians possessed world-class technical abilities in instruments spanning all
corners of globe from the saxophone to the ude, the piano to the djembe, from
Sweden to South Korea, and Venezuela to India. As wonderful as this may initially
1
https://www.berklee.edu/about/brief-history
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appear, it was a double-edged sword, there were only two common factors for us as
a label to base our identity on: diversity and Berklee.
How was an independent label going to form an identity on these two
principles? To add to the complexity, the team unanimously agreed to try and sign
artists outside the Berklee network, which meant we were now down to only one
common factor: diversity. This was indeed a very large and difficult initial obstacle to
overcome from the start! We had to figure out a way to somehow group together
artists from around the globe, playing different genres and styles of music, some part
of the Berklee program and some not, and altogether being backed by an institution
formed as a jazz conservatory all the while being located in Valencia, Spain with
some fixed assets but virtually zero financial backing.
Next task, and very significant for my role, was to determine our distributor.
With a wide variety of options to choose from, the distributor chosen would also be a
direct correlation with the caliber and quality of label. It would be a major aspect in
defining who we actually were and the type of artists we wanted to work with. Did
we want to go full-indie and stick to a more of Do It Yourself (DIY) type company or
did we want to shoot for the stars and go with a bigger corporation, making us seem
more legitimate? Did we want more attention and care from the distributor with a
smaller reach or associate the label with a giant name and be just another
independent label in a sea of others? Did we want physical distribution or stay purely
digital? Did we want to target solely the United States even though we were in Spain
or did we want international exposure? With so many options to consider, one thing
remained certain, we were definitely going to need to use the Berklee network in
making this idea a reality.
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The previous team utilized CD Baby, a company that is a friend of Berklee,
and they received some free swag and physical distribution as a result. CD Baby is
a great company with a solid business model and just small enough in comparison to
other large distributors to give Disrupción the attention we would want, but as a
downside it is also accessible by anyone, so the it would not be a defining asset.
Although we would get some potential free product from CD Baby, the distributor
would not be a major selling point for the label to our potential artists.
Another possibility was the Orchard. The co-founder, Scott Cohen, is a friend
of the Berklee family and came to speak at a Global Entertainment and Music
Business seminar earlier in the year. His company had been picked up by Sony
Music in 2015 and merged with RED in 2017, still keeping the Orchard name and
making the company the biggest independent record label distributor in the industry2.
This would be a good fit for the team due to the company’s humble roots, its
impressive merger with RED and acquisition by Sony which could be used as a
selling point for potential artists, and again, having Scott as a friend of Berklee is a
major plus. Additionally, the founding team of Disrupción in 2013 used the Orchard
as a distributor before the company was acquired by Sony, so there is some history,
and to further promote the decision, there are some Berklee alumni currently working
at the company, so it should be much simpler getting the operation up and running
again.
Next item on the list of to-do’s was the five year anniversary of the label and
our intention in recognizing this moment of importance. Possible actions were a
compilation album with all of the artists signed by our the team this year or host an
https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8496258/orchard-scott-cohen-retirement, 2/4/2019
by Billboard Staff
2
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event, a showcase of sorts, including Disrupción artists. Major issue with both of
these ideas is that we in fact at the time did not have any artists to work with.
An additional task that was put out by the team is involvement in the Musiaco
music festival that was set to occur in May this year. This festival is a big deal for the
program’s live-concentration members and it would be a great way to bridge the gap
with the record practicum students and the live practicum students. The festival
brings in significant fanfare (generally in the thousands), and would be great
exposure for a Disrupción Records’ artist. In return, we as a label would provide
talent for the live event and assist in promoting the festival. It was a win-win situation
for both parties involved, and would be another first for Disrupción Records by taking
part in this new venture.
On to the next task: marketing and promotion plans. This is a very enjoyable
aspect of the job as product manager by working directly with the marketing and
promotion department, strategizing new releases, coming up with different promotion
ideas, and keeping an overarching view on all of the artists involved to push
maximum exposure, rhythm of advertisement, and frequency of releases. There is
much strategic thinking involved with the process and a requirement to see the
bigger picture while simultaneously making achievable plans. As the product
manager you are not required to come up with the actual marketing or the promotion,
but you are there to ensure it all fits and makes sense, that all of the wickets are
getting hit and all of boxes are getting checked.
Rolling out the schedule following the planning sessions and driving the
agenda to meet the set objectives, going live to attain prescribed goals, adhering to
timelines, and hitting the mark of desired outcome is a beautiful work of art in itself.
With so many moving parts and so many things that could go wrong, it is a constant
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movement, an enduring strain to keep forward progress. Fortunately, Disrupción
Records had an all-star marketing and promotion team and it was a pleasure to
alongside them.
The final task was to come up with a turnover plan for the upcoming
Disrupción Records team, so they did not have to start in the negative like we did,
costing precious time and resources for an already extremely tight timeline and
accelerated program. To paint a clearer picture of the current flaws that existed,
nominations for the newest team were not finalized until the end of October and the
previous team graduated in early July. This left a four month gap where absolutely
nothing was happening with the label, and by the time the whole password-fiasco
was resolved and access-issues were rectified we lost nearly an entire additional
month before the team was gaining any traction and relatively operational. There is
a great need to set the upcoming team up for success, and a new process to resolve
the time gap that is a major concern for the artists.
Risks
From the get go, there was virtually zero risk, especially financially, for the
Disrupción Records team. The major benefit of starting up or being a part of any
independent music label is that it takes little to zero capital, more importantly it takes
vision, careful planning, and an incredible ability to adapt. There’s almost a sixth
sense required in order to succeed, which cannot be bought, acquired, or learned
through an organized institution, but rather learned through experiencing it firsthand.
That being said, the only actual risks involved would be failing as a team and not
achieving the goals we set out for at the beginning. Not forming an identity, not
producing any product, not learning a new set of skills would constitute a failure.
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To be honest, the majority of the risks are with the artists due to the short
tenure of label team, quick churn from start to finish, and gap between teams. The
most important trait the label has with the artist is trust and this takes time and effort,
not something that can be turned over to the new team. And just like a company
being restructured, acquired, or merged, without an original member from the
company still involved, there’s a high likelihood of a shift in priorities, which could
help or hurt the artist.
For example, Mayani Swave is one of the Disrupción Records most prized
artist, even to the extent that we managed to fly him out to play a stage at the
Musaico Music Festival. Swave is from the Dominican Republic, and the only
reason we were able to establish any sort of contact and rapport with this artist is
because we had an individual from Dominican Republic on the team this year. There
is a possibility of not having a representative from the Dominican Republic on the
team next year, and this would greatly affect relations with the artist, most likely in a
negative manner. It is very difficult, if not impossible to maintain the artist roster and
this is the biggest risk for the team.
Outcomes
Commencing with the initial task of identity, in keeping with the label’s main
objective of “disrupting the music scene” and amidst the team’s development best
surmised by Bruce Tuckman’s article “Forming, Storming, Norming, and
Performing”3, the team got creative in achieving a clear identity while also
incorporating diversity and Berklee’s longstanding history: imprints. Much like a
collective or group, such as Unspeakable, Secretly or Beggars, Disrupción Records
decided to create three imprints to fortify a strong overarching identity, but also
!3 Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63(6),
384-399. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/h0022100
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maintain the ability to sign a plethora of talents an artists. Thus, Common Chord and
EVLVE were born.
Common Chord would be Disrupción’s nod to the Berklee College of Music’s
roots when it was founded in 1945 as a jazz music conservatory. It would focus on
more instrumental items with a strong emphasis on jazz and classical. The A&R
department did not spend much time with this imprint, but we were able to sign an
Indian film scoring producer, Srikant Krishna, to license one of his film scores with
us.
EVLVE was created for the broader spectrum of up and coming artists, mainly
those enrolled in the program and seeking development and nurturing. Disrupción
Records’ first signing, Nathan Dies, an undergraduate student originally from Brazil,
was placed in this imprint. It was great to be able to work with these artists directly,
provide them feedback, nurture them, and watch them grow.
To complete the grouping, Disrupción Records still maintained the overarching
imprint adding the artists we felt were of the highest quality, best caliber, and most in
keeping with label’s vision. Mayani Swave, Autumn Jones, rosewood., Sara Neal
were all directed into this imprint. The A&R department spent most of their time
focusing on finding and working with these types of artists.
Another part of Disrupción Records worth mentioning is the newly added
Fusión synchronisation department. Headed by Mariano Hernandez Garcia and Rea
Shena, this is the first year the label has reached into the synch sector. Initially, and
once again, this was a difficult sell due to our lack of catalogue, but when the label
continued to add more substance, Mariano and Rea managed to secure a synch
deal. Very exciting stuff for the label and new progress made!
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Next task and the most directly applicable to my job responsibilities, the
distributor. The team decided to go with the Orchard as our distributor due to its
international reach comprised of local representatives in more than 40 global
markets, impressive work with artists such as T-Pain, City and Colour, Hippo
Campus (a personal favourite), and Jacob collier to name a few, and most of all the
acquisition by Sony Music. The Orchard’s label and artists received a total of 60
nominations at the 2019 Grammy Awards. If this is not a convincing reason to use
the Orchard as a distributor or a significant reason for potential artists to sign with
Disrupción Records, I’m not sure what else would be. Combined with the other
positive aspects, such as having Scott Cohen in our corner and Berklee alumni
currently working at the Orchard, it was a no-brainer to choose this route. Only one
issue stood in the way, how does one go about officially getting a distributor?
Luckily, through extensive research, talks with previous teams, and Friday
morning business seminars, I was able to establish contact with Sammy Pisano, a
Berklee alumni and current Orchard employee at the New York City international
office that was able to point me in the right direction:
Figure 1. Original email with Sammy Pisano, Manager,
Sales Analytics for the Orchard on 24 Jan 2019
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This was great news for Disrupción and a big win for the team. We now had
an official distributor and an impressive one at that. Our A&R team could start using
the Orchard as the official distributor of Disrupción Records as a selling point for the
potential artist signings, increasing our legitimacy and value, and in return the quality
of artists we could add to our roster. We could start moving product and adding to
our catalogue as soon as we received it, but now we just needed to get it, and even
more importantly learn the Orchard’s platform and procedural compliance in order to
successfully release the tracks to the world. This was much more complicated than
initially expected.
The Orchard has a beautifully designed platform with a sleek and user-friendly
interface, but there are some strange encounters with operating procedures that are
not mentioned in the Frequently Asked Question’s (FAQs) section and the user only
discovers them through trial and error. The first and most glaring missing item is
there is no real “How to use this platform” written document or introductory video.
There is a help section, but this is mainly only helpful if the user encounters an error,
not in preventing one. Logging into the Orchard the user is greeted with a main
page:
Figure 2. Home page workstation for Disrupción
Records utilizing the Orchard interface on 15 Jun 2019
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It is fantastic and easy to read visual, getting an immediate view of quarterly
revenues and catalogue history displayed by Product, project, format/type, and
release date as well as also incorporating a column of top tracks, but the main issues
occur when actually uploading the new product:
Figure 3. Product Overview page for Disrupción
Records artist RETROVYZOR utilizing the Orchard
interface on 15 Jun 2019
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First off, the Orchard website is only compatible with apple safari. This was a
long and confusing lesson learned that could have been prevented and save a lot of
time and effort if it was clearly identified from the start. I am unsure whether or not it
is compatible with PC browsers such as Internet Explorer or Firefox, but the website
does not work with Google Chrome.
Second item, processing time. The Orchard states that it usually takes four to
six weeks for a digital track to go live in stores and two business days to correct any
mistakes made. This is generally not the case. Experience has proven that it takes
an average of 15 days for digital tracks to go live with ten days being the quickest.
As far as corrections to already released items goes, I still have outstanding issues
that have not been resolved and I am waiting for the Orchard to fix.
Third item, formatting. Many artists are very concerned with the pure
aesthetics of the visual text displayed for track, even outside the actual song. For
example some artists or label managers prefer “featured” over “feat.” over “ft.” This
is not an option for the client.
Fourth item, artist profile association. Another issue encountered was
ensuring the artist was correctly connected to their already existing Spotify/Apple/
Deezer account or that a new one is created. For example, Alex Rapp, a MPTI
graduate program student released a track on the Women in Music album, and she
does not have an artist profile on all the main streaming services. The Orchard took
the liberty of accidentally associating her with a much different Alex Rapp, a
hardcore German rapper with songs such as “Hande hoch” or “Kopf Zu”. There is no
official section for already existing artists using the Orchard for the first time to enter
in their artist profile link, nor is there an area to indicate if the artist has an artist
profile at all.
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Fourth item, universal link. This has been a request from the Disrupción team
from the very start and there still has not been any movement on the distributor side.
There is a section for each individual direct service provider (DSP) link such as a
Spotify link, an Apple link, a Deezer link, etc. but a single universal link grouping all
the DSPs together for the artist and label to use. This would be greatly helpful due
to the growing number of different streaming platforms and consumers using
different platforms as a result.
Fifth item, using DSP features such as back playing video. Spotify especially
is loaded with numerous features that would make a Disrupción artist’s page stand
out more (such as back playing videos instead of album art), yet we as the
distributors client are unable to use the features. Again, there has been no response
as to the resolution of this issue. This is not a game-changer but a nice feature for
the client to have available.
Sixth item, painstakingly meticulous attention to detail is required with regards
to the artist metadata. Another fun lesson learned is the crucial match-up of the file
name (.wav) to the actual track name the artist desires. If this is not identical, the
track will get rejected (usually after waiting for two weeks as it is processing), and
one must wait another two weeks after the changes have been made and
resubmitted.
Ultimately, the six aforementioned items are the main technical issues in
regards to the outcomes using the Orchard as a the distributor for Disrupción
Records. The most significant problem encountered would have to be the response
time and working with client services. It is great that the Orchard is huge and under
Sony Music and received 60 grammy noms this year. It is fantastic when it come to
making Disrupción Records more legitimate and respectable, but ultimately being a
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part of this giant business means just that. Disrupción is but a mere small piece, a
cog in this massive machine, a minnow in an ocean of fish and when it comes down
to it, and the already overtasked sales analytics manager has to choose between TPain or Mayani Swave, the manager is going to choose T-Pain as a higher priority.
This can be frustrating for all parties involved especially when issues arrive and the
response time is achingly slow, but these are the consequences associated with
working in the big leagues and with a distributor used by thousands of independent
labels. All in all, I successfully managed the product of 28 global artists, with new
products and upcoming releases on the way.
Continuing along to the proceeding task identified, the Five year anniversary
of the label. After getting team together for one of our weekly synch events, we
decided by unanimous decision to host an official event to celebrate the anniversary
and help promote the upcoming Musaico Music Festival. Alexjandra Edwards in
Promotions did a fantastic job of organising the event and it went off without a hitch.
A truly wonderful event, good times were had by all.
Next task, promotion and marketing plans with Nicole Otero of marketing.
Heavily social media driven, Nicole and I would be in constant communication of
planned release dates, major upcoming events, and promotions. She would ensure
the social media world was fully aware of any and all music coming from Disrupción
Records.
Finally, the last major task was to prepare an all-encompassing turnover plan
for the upcoming team. Nicole Casino, as the Label Manager, took this task under
her wing and compiled a list for each department, including all passwords for social
medias, web pages, emails, etc. as well as the contract for distribution through the
Orchard, if desired by the oncoming team. The only final item to work out is to brief
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the new GEMB academic fellow to ensure they can hold down the label until the new
team arrives.
To cap off the report, I would like to share the data gathered from the Orchard
as my tenure as Product Manager to give a more visual representation of the work
accomplished. The label has garnered nearly 30,000 streams in total and is most
popular with Dominican females aged 18-24:
Figure 4. Total Streams and Top Audience for
Disrupicón Records artists from the past 12 months as of
12 Jun 2019.
Figure 5. Streams by Geography for Disrupicón
Records artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun
2019.
Figure 6. Gender and Age Listeners for Disrupicón
Records artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun
2019.
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Figure 7. Top Countries and Top Regions for
Disrupicón Records artists for the past 30 days as
of 12 Jun 2019.
Figure 8. Types of listeners for Disrupicón Records
artists for the past 30 days as of 12 Jun 2019.
Figure 9. Gender and age of listeners for
Disrupicón Records artists for the past 30 days as
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Figure 10. Total Audio Streams and YouTube Audio
and Video Streams for Disrupicón Records artists for
the past from nomination date of 24 Oct 2018 to 12
Jun 2019 as of 12 Jun 2019.
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Figure 11. Data Sources used by the Orchard as of 12
Jun 2019.
Figure 12. Most recent distribution contract signed by
Berklee College of Music and Orchard Enterprises on
17 Jun 2015 as of 12 Jun 2019.
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Conclusion
Ultimately, the experience as Product Manager for Disrupción Records proved
to be a resounding success; very fruitful in knowledge gained, and significant
development as an indvidual through real-life experience and demonstration of ability
to manage a long-term project. There remains no better way of learning than by
doing. In combination with the fostering environment of Berklee College of Music
Valencia Campus with the guidance of Professor Pete Dyson, this was a very unique
experience that has increased my abilities as a professional and in return the music
industry as a whole. My only major concern is the the artists involved, all of which
were informed of the temporary nature of the Disrupción Records team, but some of
which did not fully comprehend. I still foresee having minor turnover issues with the
oncoming team, but with the new procedures implemented, the label will be in a
much better place.
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Media of
