Helping Creators Promote Their Music & Manage Careers

#HowWeListen Live: In Conversation Podcast

"If you really, really love an artist, reach out and buy their record, buy their T-shirt, send them money, and appreciate how much blood sweat and tears go into that song that you listen to every day."

Our guest on today’s episode is Andee Connors, Pandora’s Senior Manager of Catalog & Creator Services. Pandora is only accessible in the USA, but it has over 60 million subscribers. The streaming service has a great history of human-led curation. Andee’s background is steeped in the DIY music ethos. His band bought a van, toured pre-cell phone and circled the USA, with stops in Europe, many times even before a record deal was on the table. He is an anomaly, both old school and very much a part of the modern music ecosystem. He brings to this conversation a great many insights, perhaps the most important being, to make sure you know what success means to you and then go after it.

Andee discusses how a Black Metal drummer with DIY coursing through his veins ended up working with Pandora at a job that no one wanted. He also explains what makes Pandora different from other streaming services, one thing is AMP, which stands for Artist Marketing Platform. This discussion also goes in the direction of modern-day music discovery. Is it better today? How have things changed, and how can people take advantage of those changes? When should you send your music to Pandora to get playlisted? Pandora has 60 million subscribers!! What about Radio VS streaming services, what role do they each play today? Why is Bandcamp awesome, because streaming your favourite artists is really not enough to support an them if you really love the music and they make you happy, you need to buy merch too, so says Andee.

Show Notes:

#HowWeListen Live: In Conversation

Pandora

SiriusXM

00:10 - Byta.com

05:09 - Running Aquarius Records

07:15 - I also had a label: tUMULt Records

08:13 - What is Pandora AMP

09:52 - Listing to thousands of demos

11:35 - The early days at Pandora

13:10 - The effect of things going digital

15:50 - Touring & recording back in the day

17:20 - How Pandora got its start

22:00 - Pandora is only in the USA but you can still use it to find fans

23:00 - Mike Warner - Book: Work Hard Playlist Harder

25:00 - Send your art to those that inspired you

29:00 - Community was your only connection before the internet

32:00 - What are your expectations, your barometer of success?

38:00 - Being a musician in 2023 is a lot of work

40:00 - Houston Pandora has a problem with submissions

45:00 - Timelines to get your music to Pandora

48:00 - Metadata

50:00 - AMP (stands for Artist Marketing Platform)

52:30 - Radio VS streaming

57:40 - How to better support the artists you love

59:30 - Are there too many platforms?

102:00 - Byta.com

Music by Fin Productions and Oliver Lyu

Episode Credits:

Artwork by Jen Pmphrey

Hosted by Marc Brown

Series coordinated by Jamie Ford

Produced and edited by Colin MacKenzie

Music by Fin Productions and Oliver Lyu