Everything You Need to Know About Music Sync Licensing ft. xJ-Will

We your music's featured on a Super Bowl commercial. That's six figs for that one spot of 30 seconds. And it beats the heck out of streaming. So how do I even get started? The same song could get placed over and over and over again. Four figures is the minimum. What's like the most underrated type of sync? Mobile games like 40% of the market and people don't realize it. I'll probably get shot for saying this. Damn, that's that's game. You need to be a specialist. If you have on a sync track, normally add another zero to the price. Oh, interesting. You had very underpaid for it. Wait, is it the jingle? The nature of this episode is very simple. Sync placements. Do you want your music in TV shows, movies, video games, the freaking Super Bowl? Do you want to get paid four, five, maybe six figures up front, non-recoupable with back end? We're super excited about Sync because it's an option that's available to an artist of any size.

Sync is beautiful because you don't have to be a Drake Beyonce level artist to make some serious cash. On today's episode, we sat down with Sync expert Jay Will, who has a 2,000 plus deep sync catalog, including everyone from Taco Bell to NASA. He's since become an educator in the space, sharing the sauce with the public, and he brought all the sauce with him on today's episode. Let's get it started. Obviously, I was like, yo, XJ Will, and you were like, yo, bro, it's it's just Jay Will. The X is silent. Was that a joke? Were you joking? Were you? I'm so serious. So you it's not XJ Will. I don't mind. It's it's it's it's spelled xJ Will, but the X is silent just because of like branding purposes. So like, for instance, there I did I tell you the joke. So like what happened? I thought that was the joke. I'm a student. No, yeah, but I'm gonna being for real. Cause like one of my students, I remember way back in the day when I was still in college, I was teaching lessons. And um, I had a French student, and her last name was Camo, and there was an X at the end.

I was like, Where where do you where is it? She was like, it's silent. So you can just make up any silent letter, it's fine. And she's like, yeah. And so that was the day. I was like, you know what? I'm gonna brand my my name this way, just to tease her. And she she thought I was playing around, but I was serious because there's other Jay Wills in like media. And so I was like, Yeah, let's just put an X in front of it, and now it looks different. It actually kind of looks cool in my opinion. It does. No, it's kind of gamer-esque. Everyone, everyone who meets you for the first time has to call you XJ Will, right? Oh, yeah, they do. Okay, cool. Will, like some people think my name is Will. Okay, well, yeah, hilarious too. I think I actually said Will as well. It's like, do you like going by XJ Will or Will? And you're like, well, it's actually Josh. No, it says Joshua Williams in his bio if you read it for two seconds. You know, I usually like to pride myself on my research, but I guess I fell a little bit. short. Oh no, the you you just fell for the Okie doke. That's okay. Yeah, for sure. But no, so we got XJ Will on the podcast. Okay.

No, man. This one after all that. Yeah, after all that, he still says it. I'm like, I'm just gonna call you XJ Will. Um, no, man, this is a really important uh topic for our audience, right? I think we've we've damn near covered, I mean, I would cover a lot. I don't want to say we've covered it all besides this, but like we've covered a wide range of topics. Uh but sync licensing, I I was kind of talking with you before this, has always been kind of mentioned like in passing. Yeah, I heard that's good. Yeah, I heard we should do that. Heard you can make money from it. Like, you know, we've talked about it's a royalty stream, right? But we've never really like dove into the nuts and bolts of like the sync licensing world. So I'm really excited to get you on. I think our audience is gonna learn a lot. We're gonna learn a lot. Um, so just to set the stage, like, what's your best definition of sync, right? I just want to make sure everyone even because they might not even know what it is, right? So, like, how do we even just define what sync licensing is? So it's short for synchronize. Yeah, so essentially start there.

This is gonna be so much fun. So, like, um when it comes to sync licensing, like The best way I can describe it is that you, the licensee, is giving permission to a film production studio, um, um a director, uh a game developer. You're giving these people that make visual media permission to synchronize, like you said, uh your music behind motion picture. Now, motion picture can be anything, like we were saying video games, commercials, movies, um, instructional videos, um, all kinds of stuff, video podcasts. Yeah, so like there you you have to have a license for this stuff because it's intellectual property. So, like, as long as you're kind of thinking of it that way. The other way I like to describe it is kind of with a with a metaphor of if you if you're going out of town, let's say we're going, I'm going to Atlanta for like uh uh I don't know, a party, because there's always a party in Atlanta. Um what you do normally, you you have to have a car to get around, pretty much, right? Yes, so it's just like you're now you're the film director and you're renting a car. Just because you put money down on that car does not mean you own it, right?

You can't just keep it. So you have to give it back. And let's say you have to um you have to stay an extra day, maybe because of uh the hangover external from the party. The activities have led to maybe having the party last a little longer. Okay. What happens? Normally you have to call and be like, hey, I need to use this for another day. That's exactly how it works in sync too. Because you're agreeing to license it for an extended amount of time. And after that time uh period is up, it's like, yo, you gotta pay up again because either some maybe someone else wants to use it and it's in an under an exclusive deal, or like um it's just past the term, so we got to renegotiate. So that's what I really like about it is that the same song could get placed over and over and over again. Yeah, for sure. So I think everyone kind of thinks of movie and TV as like the two biggest, most popular forms of sync, but you listed off a few others. What's like the most underrated like type of sync or like the media that syncs music that we average you know Joes might not think of when we think of sync? I'll tell you, there's probably like two of them.

Yeah. The first one's mobile games, because people think video games, but like mobile games like 40% of the market, and people don't realize it. Mobile games and esports. Um, and then the other one is educational videos. Like, I and I'll tell you the story because like it was wild to me. One of my homies placed a piece of music in an educational, like orientation video for a college, but it was a college. So in Missouri, we have like a um, it's University of Missouri, and then they have them in different cities Kansas City, St. Louis, uh, Columbia, Mizzou, you know what I'm saying? So, like, what happened was because it was under that branch or umbrella, he's he licensed that, that song under the the orientation video, and they used it for each one of those um venues. And because it was being published, he got a royalty for it for each one. So he got paid like four or five times for the same song in the same video, but because it was being shown at different times, um, he was able to get that that 5x placement, which was like crazy. Damn.

Yeah, it kind of sucks for the college. Hey, man. Well, I mean, it's called college got money for that kind of stuff. You know, true. That's part of budget. So, what's your background that led to you wanting to really focus on sync licensing, right? Not only for your own production career, but also as like an educator, content creator in the space. Like what led you to this? Yeah, because kids don't, you know, grow up being like, I want to be a sync licensed. Write music and never know who no one knows who I am. Um actually I'll I'll try to make the story as short as possible. But like what had happened was What had happened was every good story. Every good story starts like that. And I wanted to be a rock star. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. So like every musician that that starts, like they get an instrument. I I started playing trumpet at like 11. And um that's actually kind of probably late for kids that want to get into music. And so like I went through theory, learned jazz studies and did all this kind of stuff, played in orchestra when I was in high school, and eventually I went to college for uh jazz studies, performance degree. But I didn't realize that like no one asked for that when they hire you for a gig or whatever.

And so like halfway through, or no, it was I was I was out of school, and so I was doing gigs at night and like being a kid and teaching during the daytime, and I was like, yo, I'm I'm 26 at this time, and like it's time to get off my parents' health insurance. And so like bills start packing up, and I'm just like, all right, how are we gonna do this? Cause like a hundred dollar gigs every weekend are not gonna really make a I'm not gonna be able to be comfortable. And so um I started and I I was managing and touring a band at that moment in time, and like um everyone, especially in the mid 20s, everybody's kind of pivoting. Either people's getting kids, getting married, and stuff. So I didn't know if we were gonna be able to still make or keep the band together. So that's when I actually got into production. Um so like from there, um I tried to sell beats to rappers and and all that kind of stuff. But I live in the Midwest. Like outside Tech Nine or D. Like, I'm not, I'm not gonna really be able to, there's not a lot of people investing in their marketing or just their craft as a musician or an artist anyway. You know what I'm saying?

Normally, if they were, they're they're leaving KC probably as soon as possible. Uh so because of that, um, I was like, yo, this is I'm not making what I want to make with learning how to do all this stuff with production. And I feel like my music's expensive, or at least it to me it sounds expensive at the time. And so my wife was just like, why don't you just like make music for like TV shows and commercials? And at first I was like, that's whack. Like, I don't want to do that. I'm trying to be an artiste. And like it was, it just made no sense to me. But I started thinking about like, yo, when musicians are done touring, like they're still making money. How is this possible? And it's the publishing game. So the best way to get publishing is from performance royalties when you're so on TV, when your music's featured on a Super Bowl commercial, that's six figs for that one spot of 30 seconds, and it beats the heck out of streaming. So um I did my first, I so I I took like 18 months to kind of figure out how to do it. And I got into a music library and I kept sending them stuff, and I don't know why they accepted me because I definitely didn't know what I was doing.

But eventually, after like song number 218, um, I got a placement. It was for a Taco Bell commercial for like five figures. Yeah. I was just like, oh, he's never he's never gonna forget the number 218. You know how clearly he specified how many songs he had to fucking make and send to this sync library. He's been getting Baja blast slushies ever since. He pulls up to Any Taco Bell and they're like, yo, Will. Everything on the menu, bro. Like they gave him the gold card. It's fire. Yeah, yeah. So TLDR, though, your wife told you to maybe try it. Yeah, it was totally her idea. Cause I was just like, man, I don't know what I'm doing. Like, this is terrible. And I we were like, and we were newly married too, bro. Like, there was no reason for her to be like, I don't know what he's doing. It's taken, it's been two and a half years. He still ain't figured it out. We we're gonna have to do something. We were living in a uh a very uh not, it wasn't we were living downtown. And so like rent was super cheap, and we were just I was I was in the trenches, bro, trying to figure out how to do it.

And um eventually it worked out. So hell yeah, man. She's the one. I love that. I love that story for so many reasons. So, all right, obviously you've kind of put in the work over the years, right? Like from that time when you decided to like give it a shot to try and figure out how to get your your music into TV, film, et cetera. You've obviously put in the work to now help like us and our community figure out like what it was the actual best way to go about this? Cause like I'm sure you had so many like lessons learned and trial and error. Trial and error out the ass, right? So, so if you if if I'm a musician, right, and I decide just like you did, you know, a number of years ago that I want to get my music synced in film, TV, et cetera. Like, what what is the first step? How do I even get started? Okay, so first thing you really definitely need to need to do is make sure you're tied to a PRO of some sort, because that's how you get your back end royalties. Okay. So that that that first figure with the Taco Bell ad, let's say, was $10,000. Um, that's up front.

That's not after it plays on television and then you rack up your back end royalties. You see what I'm saying? So um, it's very important to make sure that your music is registered. Normally, um, and we'll get to the other way you can do it, but like make sure that's done first. Second, you need to understand what where your music fits in the market. So, like a lot of people are like, oh yeah, my music can work for TV and film just because like it doesn't sound bad. But like A, it needs to be built for it. And B, I mean, do you really know where your music can fit on television? Because most producers, they're like, no, man, I'm grinding, like, they don't watch a lot of TV. And so it's really important to understand what the market actually wants at that given time. Like, so for instance, March Madness comes up, what kind of music is normally played? Marching band stuff, uh, you got a lot of uh sports or rock-based hip hop, like those kinds of things seasonally are are really important to pay attention to because if you don't know where your music's going to be placed, then how do you know what to make in the first place? You know what I'm saying?

So, like understanding what your niche is is really important. After that, so that's step one. Uh get registered with a PRO. Step two, understand where your music can actually fit. There's a couple websites that you can use to like figure that out. Like, there's one called TuneFind. And essentially what it does is like after an episode air of television airs, like for instance, the recruit just came back on Netflix. After the first episode, you can go on this website and it'll tell you everything that they used on uh on that uh on that episode. And it does it per episode for like a bunch of different TV shows, ads, and I think they're getting into like video games and stuff too, but like doing that research to kind of understand, okay, like this show uses the style that I make, whether that be like trap or some some really cool dark indie pop or something like that. So now you know where the episode the the TV shows or networks that are using your music. Now it's time to make an EP. Back when I first started, you needed to make like 12 songs. Now it's like, don't know if I got time to listen to 12 songs.

So like make four songs and I always tell people my students like if someone put a gun to you and was like I need you to make the coolest song ever like because a lot of people they're like oh yeah I can make all kinds of different stuff you need to be a specialist because that's what people like especially if you're a musician like of course yeah you can make as long as there's Western harmony normally like you can make a bunch of different genres but like what's the one you're really good at because that's the one they'll accept you for it's kind of like dating you don't want to show up with like holes in your shoes or anything crazy like that. You want to put your best foot forward so like make an EP of like four like bangers make sure they're built for sync meaning uh they have short intros uh stinger endings there's a couple other things that make sure that the arrangements built for like utility purposes um for like music editors and supervisors and stuff like that I'm curious on that note is it important that the music be out does it need to is there an advantage to that as long as you own the music that's more valuable. Okay. So like a lot of people they they normally are held up and they won't um they won't pitch because they're like either they want it to stay valuable because it's like you've never heard this before I'm I'm giving this to you or they go on the other side we're like oh man I don't have any new music because like I all my stuff's released already just as long as you own it it doesn't matter um sometimes you will find briefs where they're like we need something fresh but like as long as you have it then you have an opportunity to land it especially if it sounds great.

Because yeah because these music supervisors aren't really concerned with the song being popping like it just needs to accentuate the scene. If the budget allows for it, sometimes music supervisors or directors will ask the supervisor to find something that's like fresh. Okay. And that's normally what they say fresh. Um, but when it comes to the scene, yeah, as long as it's and I always like to tell people this as long as your music is helping tell a story or sell a product, it can be used in sync. Like, period. So, like, it doesn't genre doesn't really matter as often. It's more about like, how does this make you feel when I'm seeing uh whether it be a watch ad or um a Nike commercial, like what is it, what does it make you feel? Because if it helps them to sell that product, obviously that music's gonna be more important. Like Sonic Brand is a huge thing. Like, if you hear the Taco Bell ding, like you know exactly you don't even have to watch the commercial to know what it is, right? You know what I'm saying? Yo, that's not quite it. I feel like he just so casually I feel like he's so casually like breezed

over the like few things that maybe make your music built for sync. Now, once again, you mentioned that if a director or a music supervisor is looking for something fresh, then they might be looking for a more, you know, just current popular song, right? Yeah, but outside of that exception, it sounds like there might be a little bit more of a general rule of thumb when it comes to how the music should actually be like structured. What you know, what are the the elements of a sync ready song when it comes to the music? So you said short intro, you know, what I mean, like just yeah, just kind of give us the the fundamentals. I'll give you some games. So, like short intros, stinger endings, that's like they sound cheesy, but they're definitive. Like most people like fade out of their music sometimes, a lot of especially in pop. Um, but if you give a distinct ending that's good for music music for TV and film, because if they're changing the scene, like let's say um you're watching a teenage drama and like this kid's I don't know, like euphoria style, like someone's ODing on drugs or something, it's super dramatic. You have this long string line or something like that, and you go to a party afterwards, like, but there's a fade out of that music still.

Like it feels weird, right? So like scenes change very quickly. So there's you have to make sure that the music ends on a dime. So that's really important to do. Um, on top of that, I'm trying to think about it. They can also just fade out the song themselves. Like anyone can let them do it. Yeah, exactly. Like if they want to do it. It sounds cheesy, but like at the same time, like it don't matter. Yeah. So the other thing that I've noticed. So after I got that first placement, I was trying to reverse engineer like why did they pick the song and how can I make more of them? Right. And so, like, over the past few years, um, I've realized that there's like four things. And we already talked about one, which is arrangement. Like, you have to make sure that stuff is moving quickly. Every four to eight bars, there's something changing in your arrangement, whether that be like adding a synth, taking one away, taking away the hi-hat, leaving the bass and drums just for uh uh a section or two, like giving variety instead, so like here's here's the game. I think every four bars, I think eight bars of the same is too much in 2025.

Yeah, yeah, if it was short attention spans. Yeah, and like with a commercial, like 15 seconds, that's eight bars by itself, right? Right? So, like you gotta do it. That's like an eternity for these fucking Gen Zers, bro. That's my old, That's my old head talking. I'm right there with you, bro. Yeah, but like with arrangement, like you have to make sure that stuff is continuously changing. Uh so because if you if you pitch a song that only has like a verse and a chorus, that's two different moments, right? But if I pitch a song, I'm gonna have a I'm gonna have a different intro. Uh both verses are gonna sound different. That's three different options for them to use, right? Two choruses are gonna sound different. I'm gonna add a bridge and I'm also gonna add a stinger ending. That's eight or nine different options in one song. So when I send send an EP out, it's four times nine instead of like four songs. Or like maybe maybe 35 different options. You know what I'm saying? We just gotta clip. So like wow.

Yeah, clip that. Cause like that's that's essentially because they're and I'll tell you one thing, man. Like, and this goes back to what we were talking about. Like, it doesn't matter how old the music is. Uh, an artist and a friend of mine, uh, her name's Prima. We just got a dove commercial for like a couple thousand dollars, and it was from something we made like three years ago that we just we genuinely forgot about, and like it this always like makes me kind of mad because it's older music, and like if you if you're continuously making music, I get upset because I'm like, Y'all, yeah, y'all chose that. Like, we had all this other cool stuff that we're making now, and this is what you like, what what's going on here? So it just gives you more perspective about like how subjective music is, and even if someone else might not like it, someone else will. And that's that's a common theme of listeners too. Like, if nobody no artists don't understand what their best song is gonna be, and it's hard for them to lean into that, but I think you're so close to the music and you have your own personal opinions that you don't end up, you know, reacting appropriately. I mean, yeah, these these people that are picking the music for these commercials and for these movies and and TV shows, they are just listeners.

Yeah, at the end of the day, they are just people that like, yeah, this is their job, and they're fucking good at it typically, especially the ones that are like working on you know the biggest productions that exist, but like at the end of the day, you might ask two highly qualified music supervisors like which song would you pick for this scene? And they might have two different opinions, yeah. Right. I mean, it's just it's so subjective um damn that's that's game I think it's a numbers game at that point right it's just putting up shots so is so that that was the thing then that that's why I always tell people like it took me 200 songs to get one yeah so now I have a catalog of like over 2000 and I have different and we'll get to the next step or we'll have to make some type of visual or something for this one that's why you have to have a lot of different things out there so like it's all being pitched at the same time. You know what I'm saying? That's how you can start getting recurring revenue coming in. So let's talk about just like the process for a song landing in the lap of a music supervisor right so how does you know Jay Will God I just want to say XJ Will do it. XJ Will let's say like he's our guest I'll call you whatever the fuck I want to call you we just start calling our guests by whatever name we choose.

So Sam uh talk to us Sam Yeah I I don't like Jay Will either Sam sounds right um okay Sam so you know what what are the different ways that a song can be um on the radar of a music supervisor okay so to me there's like three different opportunities. I hate to interrupt this episode but guys I got one thing on the mind right now and it's data. I can't stop thinking about it. All the artists in 2024 are winning because of data. They know who their fans are they have access to their fans do you Spotify's not telling you who your fans are Apple Music ain't telling you who your fans are but our friends over at DistroKid created a feature called hyperfollow. Every single release, you can set up a pre-save campaign with a HyperFollow and get access to every single fan's email address. Now you can let them know when you have a show coming up, when you're dropping exclusive merch, when you're going live. And without the data, you're just bound by the algorithms of TikTok, Instagram, YouTube. No more relying on those platforms.

We're going straight to our fans. DistroKid is the best DIY distributor. You can upload unlimited music for a ridiculously low rate. And you're gonna have access to features like hyperfollow. OMTdistro.com, You're gonna get 30% off when you sign up for DistroKid, and you can start collecting your fans' data today. Henry, let's get back into it. Um I'm gonna go from least important or most unlikely to the most likely. Okay. So the most unlikely is that you actually know the music supervisor, and they just so happen to have a project that they're working on that they need your music for, and you don't have any melodic loops or anything like that in it, or uncleared samples so that you can use it. Okay. That's the first way. That's like very nil of a chance to do that unless you're really tight with them and like actually have music that works for it. Yeah, like, oh, I went to high school with Henry. I got his I think this is his email still. It's his college email, but I don't know.

Can you still make music? Like I messaged him on Facebook. He just so happened. I need this track for the intro to Game of Thrones. Got anything? Oh, yeah, I've got the perfect song for that. I just happened to have made something yesterday. Again, Never happened? Yeah, okay. So that's the most unlikely. Most unlikely, but it still does happen. Sure. For weird odd reasons. Um, but like the the second way is through um, let's say a music supervisor, because they don't know anyone, normally, and this is actually this is probably the most likely. Um, the so what happens is like let's say Nike needs uh music for their next commercial. And so what they do is they they don't actually pick the music themselves, they hire an ad firm to like figure out how to do the film production, all that kind of stuff. They might need to be at permits if they're doing something outside. Um, and so after the the film has been shot, it goes back up to Nike, they approve it, and then they go hire a music supervisor to go, hey, this is the vibe we're looking for. Um, can you find it?

And so if you don't know them from high school, what happens is they go to either a sync agent or a music library. Okay, and um, this is the music that we give them, give our music to, basically. These are the people that we give our music to, and basically they vet to make sure that A, it's built for sync, and B, it's of highest quality. So like now I don't have to worry about like pitching my stuff to music supervisors. All I have to do is stay in my bedroom and make as much music as possible. You see what I'm saying? So they're they're basically pitching it for me on my behalf. And if the music supervisor likes it, they they throw it on the picture, and if it works, great. They send it to Nike, they like it. Congratulations, you got a placement. As long as again, you own a hundred percent of the um master and the the publishing. Does that make sense? Will these agents work with anyone or they just work with you because you're Sam. Um, they work with anybody as long as you have good music, like it really doesn't matter. Okay. Um, normally what happens? They take a cut, obviously.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Yeah. Um, they normally the the cut, and I'll be honest, like the cut sometimes can be anywhere between 20 to 40 percent of the upfront fees only. Um if they're they ain't cheap, bro. It's not, but like half of zero is zero, bro. He brought it back. You gotta go hunt, he brought it back. You gotta go hunt and get this stuff yourself. You're not you're gonna be I'm gonna have like four more song or four times more songs than you to get placed because like I don't have to worry about it. No, I mean you literally can be just making the next the next song, like while they're going and doing the work, you can just be working on the next one. Yep. On to the next one, yeah, exactly. So um essentially what I like to try to do is that method because now I'm making relationships with these kinds of people, and when so this is the real cheat code. So when they get the song placed, um because normally the reason why the music supervisors go into these agents is because when they went to the labels, like let's say they wanted to have Cardi B on the commercial, like she's gonna charge you at least a couple hundred thou if the if their budget doesn't have it for that, maybe it's not a Super Bowl ad, then they're gonna have to find something that sounds like a Cardi B. And that's where they come to us because we can make that kind of stuff for a lot cheaper.

See what I'm saying? Yeah. Um, so again, uh when you go to to the music supervisors, I mean to the sync agents where our music uh is in their catalog, they'll pick it out, and if they like it, then place it. Okay, how can our audience uh find sync agents to work with? Um sync agents are normally it's it's they're terri uh I'll probably get shot for saying this, but they're terrible at SEO on their website sometimes. And so like it takes a lot of time to try to find them on Google. Um, so there's a there's also a difference between a sync agent and a library, and I want to just make make the difference real quick. A sync library to a uh sync agency is like a Walmart versus like a boutique Givenchy store. And what I mean by that is like a library will have a larger catalog of more options, like because if you go to Walmart, if you need a shirt or if you need like gardening oil or whatever, like it's there, you know what I'm saying? Versus like if you go to like Givenchy, like you you you might not have a backpack.

Maybe they only have shoes, purses, and I don't know, a t-shirt. Like that's just what they got, but it's really high quality, and it's that's if you go there, that's what you're gonna get. And so, like, that's the difference between the two. Normally, a sync agency works with a lot more artists than just people that make instrumental music, like myself. So, normally what I'll try to do is I'll partner with uh an artist, make an artist duo, and then apply for those kinds of things. Because normally, if you have vocals on a uh a sync track, it will add normally add another zero to the price because they're paying for the lyric now. Because helping tell a story. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Watch TV shows like Love is Blind, and like they're literally repeating what they're thinking, kind of like that's that's where they get the is there an advantage to maybe writing like generic like lyrics that someone might say on Love is Blind. That's a good question. So generic is the wrong word I would use. Okay, I would use universal because if you think of every hit known to man, right? Like they're all simple repetitive lyrics.

I always use Beyonce because like she's really good at it, right? Like a five-year-old could sing that song, and an 85-year-old can too. And because it's so relatable, that's why it spreads like wildfire when it gets on radio and whatever, right? So, like the another pro tip, and we talked about this yesterday. We had a uh sync agent come into our private community. Um, she was like, if your music can actually be understood by people that don't understand English, that's another win. Because like now, you get those universal or not universal, those global fees when they like this commercial was really great. Let's run it in Tokyo or or I don't know, uh Korea or whatever, and like people can still like understand and relate to it because it's like it's a vibe. Yeah, okay. So yeah, so you touched on obviously the the unlikely scenario that our next door neighbor is a music supervisor who needs a song. You talked about obviously submitting our music to both you know seek a sync agents as well as music libraries that house catalogs of music. Is there another way that music supervisors get their hands on tracks or are those kind of like the oh yeah the other way?

Yeah. Okay, so there was three ways. I remember it now. Yep, I'm bringing us back. I'm bringing us back. Go ahead. What? Yeah, yeah. The streets be watching. They spot they find it on Spotify, or like you actually like make content, and so it got some type of push there. I've seen artists get um get pulled for projects like that just because of them running into each other on an algorithm. So that's the other way to do it. I find those to be the least likely, but it's also a way to do it just by chance. And actually, that was one of the ways that so one of my goals for this upcoming year is to try to find some way to get any of my music involved in Sony's Into the Spider-Verse um franchise. So whether that be a trailer promo for I don't know, a t shirt or something, like I want some of my music in it because I think the franchise is great. And so like one of the things I did was I I did like a diary series on um on Instagram, and I was just like day 34 of like trying to get my music in the Spider-Verse. And like one of the because like I was saying, the streets be watching, one of the people that actually got music into I think the first film on the trailer side of stuff, they reached out and was like, hey, you this actually could work.

Like they signed me to a deal because that was the um they just found it on the algorithm. You see what I'm saying? So, like, it does happen. I wouldn't say it happens very often, but like I would try to branch out and do as much as you can because it's gonna multiply the opportunities for your music. And artists should just be making content for their music anyway. So it's just kind of another bonus thing that can happen if you're yeah, we are. But what's so great about Sync, and which is why I am excited to like have this conversation today, is that you don't necessarily have to even be popping an artist artist. You you literally can be someone who does enjoy making music. And like, yes, this is a business side of it, but like you don't have to be this forward-facing brand, right? Like every song that comes up on a TV show, like unless it is one of those like fresh tracks that the you know supervisor wanted everyone to know. Uh we don't know who the fuck the artist is that made it, or like the producer is that made it. Uh I mean shit.

Recently, I mean, let's just go with breaking bad. Let's just go breaking bad. Let's just go breaking bad. Breaking bad? Okay, yeah. Like, do you know the composer? No. No idea. No, no, no. Oh, exactly. You know what I'm saying? Or that like I always use the the uh guitar sort of like or um the office, the the piano theme. Like, everyone knows that theme, but like, do you actually know who wrote it? No, no, but that guy's loaded. Does it matter? He's he's he's he's living on a boat somewhere, bro. Yes. like it's been syndicated so many different times. Like, that's that's honestly one of the the biggest placements that you could possibly get is if you get a theme song and that that show just keeps running. You know what I'm saying? That's the dream, bro. Is it, is it is it always a a thing where you kind of get a percentage of back end based on the performance of the show? Perfect segue. Let's let's talk about the financials of Sync. Like how are these contracts and agreements structured? That's a great.

I was actually wanting to make sure we got there. I'll loop you there. Yeah, exactly. Because that's that's what our our audience definitely wants to know. Like, how do we get to the fucking bag? And you know, what are the different ways that these deals are structured? So normally what I've one of the one of my good friends that's in the business, uh, I asked a lot of questions when I first got in. Also, um, another way to just segue back to loop back, the other way you can find libraries outside of Google or like their social medias is LinkedIn. Um, there's a lot of great information on LinkedIn. You just type in like music libraries or a sync agents, and all of the people that work there are there, and then you can go to the links and do a bunch of deep research. But to circle back to what we were talking about as far as fan financials, someone that uh gave me a lot of help explained to me that four figures is the minimum and should stay there. That's industry standard. If they're using your music for three seconds, 30 seconds, two minutes, like you need to get at least a thousand dollars for it because you're licensing your intellectual property, and intellectual property is expensive. And um, so essentially, like we were mentioning before, there's two payments that normally happen.

There's the upfront fees and then the back end royalties. Uh, if your music is not being broadcast, then you're normally not going to get those back end royalties. So normally the upfront fees are normally a lot bigger. Uh, something else that you have to kind of think about as far as with what determines the price is there, and there's a lot of different factors. There's like where's it going to be, what media platform, is it worldwide? Is it only in a locale, like maybe a county, or is it only in a specific number of states? Um, there's there's other things like budget that they actually have to pay for that specific ad TV show or whatever, um, and things of that nature. So all those things get calculated, and then they give it to the supervisor, and now they have basically a budget where they have to go out and shop and see what music they either have in their catalog or who has in uh library or um agency does that make sense yeah so so the upfront fee is that like recoupable like a fucking record label advance or is that just like a okay that's just that's yours. That's yours.

and normally like we've mentioned before it's split between your uh your agent or library and you sure but still it's better than like recouping 20% on the dollar you know what I mean? you own the you still own the music at the end of the day which is my favorite part about the whole process because let's say my term or my deal with that library or agency is over with um I can take my music out. Maybe they can give me as many placements as I'd like um so I could take my music out after like two year term and then give it to another agency that maybe is popping with my music at the end is that because a lot of these agreements with libraries are exclusive you typically have to do have to go with one at a time? They're moving more towards exclusive so we're exclusive versus there's three different types of deals with libraries and agencies. There's exclusive which means that only they can pitch it. Non-exclusive means that like I can give it to this library I can give it to this agency I can give it to like a multiple different ones and I'll have them like try to get it synced. Normally because it's a non-exclusive deal the payouts are a little bit lower okay um because it's not you can't you you can get it if I can't find it here like I'm gonna go to another store and find it somewhere else right whereas if it's exclusive like you can only find it here which raised the price um and then there's buyout deals which basically mean I'm purchasing this music for ownership.

And normally what I recommend if people like those deals aren't necessarily terrible, but I normally recommend that if they're going to if you're going to do a buyout deal, like I had a buyout deal one time for a Ford commercial, and it was for it I I say the most try to make sure you get as much money as you can for that because that music's not yours anymore. So normally I recommend like five figs at least or something like that. Because you can't monetize anymore. Hey, buy this shit, my guy. It's all yours, buddy. I'll make another one. I'm like that's a that's a big tip too, bro. Like, you cannot be married to your music because like that, I and I suffered from that for, for a really cool project that uh me and a buddy put out just because you thought something was the one. stuff that I've ever made. Yeah, like it's gotta go in a Super Bowl or but. And, like that was the wrong way to think about it. Cause like it's it it stayed in my it stayed in my uh my hard drive collecting dust for a year. Just because I was like, no, I don't want to give it to this person because like I don't know if they have the right contacts or not. Like, just put it out, make more.

It's huge. Damn. I think that goes for just artists putting out music in general, too. It's like I'm gonna hold this one until the single, it's like, well, the audio, your your fans like this one more, so maybe that's your single. Like, I don't know. Yeah, it's it's it's crazy because like a lot of I think a lot of artists they they they're in their own heads when it comes to the music. Because I mean, it takes a lot of like intellectual like work to get this stuff out, and you want to make it perfect and all that kind of stuff, and that's totally fine, but like I guarantee you your tenth track is going to sound better than your first. Because we don't get worse by making more music. It's virtually impossible. So obviously, I know you have a community of students, right? Um, I'm curious. I feel like it well, is your personal favorite success story of yours, uh, the Taco Bell, like just the first one, or do you have something that you're like super proud of that's happened since personally? My my favorite placement is going to be either my first or my next one. Just because like I love the the grind and the journey of like making more music, and if it doesn't work here, I know it's gonna work somewhere else down the line.

You know what I'm saying? So like after the also after the first one, like the excitement is not like the same, just because the the buildup of how much time it took to finally get there, and then afterwards, like okay, I I understand the formula. But there was a really cool, so and again, like sync takes time. This is not a get rich quick thing at all. Because um, there was a and this is one of my favorite stories. One of our uh the homies in our community, uh, he really wanted to get his music on 2K, and just because he makes music that sounds like it should be on 2K, very high energy hip hop, um, always a vibe and uh sports like energy heavy. And so what he did, he did did his research or whatever, found a library that actually got music on that video game before. So it's like, okay, it's highly likely that if I send my music here, and I know it's built for 2K because I've done my research, I've listened to their soundtracks or whatever, I know this fits, right? I send it over to them.

Um it's gonna, it's more than likely gonna get a placement. And so they accepted his music and then sent him the deal. And he was like, This deal kind of looks funny versus like what you've shown us in the past, because the one of the clauses was for perpetuity. And so when per if there if a library ever asks for either perpetuity or writer share on your music, normally I tell people run away because like they did not help you make the music. So why are they getting the cut of it? That's not fair. And then perpetuity is just like if you don't make a placement, like I should take that music back and give it to somebody that will. So I I don't like that at all. So I normally tell people to run. Um, but anyways, what happened was it was a weird contract or whatever, and we were just like, This this kind of messed up, but like one of the people that we had come into, so we have like soup music supervisors that like have done stuff with Marvel, um, sync agents, library owners. We have them come into our community to listen to our stuff so that we know straight from the horse's mouth that this works or not.

Because if if not, then like I'm normally they don't give us feedback if they don't like our music. They just no thanks. This is not what we're looking for right now. So, like, this helps everybody level up. And one of the guys that uh we interviewed actually works or not works, but he works for that library, like he gives them music all the time. And so we just got on a Zoom call together and was just like, hey, remember us? He was like, Yeah, what's up? And so we were just talk talking about the contract, and he's like, Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The reason they do that is this, that, and the other. And it made sense to us. So it was like, oh, okay. So, like, do we do we send them this music and not be married to it, or do we hold on to it? Because this this uh this deal looks weird. And so eventually the artist was like, you know what? Just I'll make more. Like, just take this and we'll see what happens. A year goes by and he finds his music in 2K, and he not not just one placement, but two um in the same game at different times. So we got paid twice for doing that, which I think is just super cool, and it'll probably get when it circles back around again just because I know the production quality and the lyrics are really great, it's probably gonna happen again. So, like sometimes it's it's better to do that kind of stuff.

But the the interesting thing was it took him like two years to do it. So, like he grinded and made a lot of music, and that just one opportunities made his first placement, which was that's very rare to like, okay, I want to get my music into this, and it actually happens. Normally it's just somewhere else. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, so like I thought that was really cool. Hey, sorry to butt in, but you're an independent artist, right? You have great music that you want the world to hear, right? You know that organic social media posting is the best free way to get exposure and market your music, right? Most artists understand this, but they get paralyzed because they don't know what types of videos to make. What do I post? Luckily for you, the One More Time podcast has gathered a list of 100 viral content ideas specifically for musicians that we're giving to you for absolutely free. We've seen these formats crush time and time again. They really work. Take these ideas, insert your personality, your music, and watch the views start rolling in. All you gotta do is go to 100 viralcontent ideas.com and you can have the entire collection in your inbox in minutes. So sorry for the interruption. Please forgive me. Let's get right back into it.

So, what are some of the biggest mistakes that people who are trying to break into sync make? The biggest I'll I'll give you three of them. Okay. Biggest mistake, first one is giving up because most people they tried sync and don't see any results within 90 days, and they normally just quit because they're like, oh, this isn't worth working for me. What is like what's like the maximum that like how you know if someone's been doing it for this long, maybe give up. If you've been doing it for two years, I would say you need to seek help. Just because like honestly, it's either it's either the music, you have terrible communication skills, or like you don't follow instructions, which is the second thing. Like someone, if a supervisor asks you, hey, I need a track that's 30 seconds long, it needs to be hip hop, and I need it to have this instrument in it, and you don't follow all three of those directions, like they're not gonna pick it. And they'll probably be like, this person obviously doesn't understand English. Like, I'm not gonna ever ask them to anything ever again.

Like, isn't that is that quick, bro? Like, and you'd be surprised how many people are just like they want to be artistic or whatever, and they ignore the instructions. Um, and so like those kinds of things are like terrible to do. The last thing is, and I guarantee you, and I've asked this question to um to our special guests that come into the community, what's the biggest pet peeve of of of you as a music supervisor or a sync agent or library? And it's always sending MP3 attachments. Like their servers don't have enough space for it at all. And so like as soon as if they even if they even look like there's an attachment on here, whether it be a picture or whatever, they straight to the trash. Tell them to listen to it. Yeah. And so what I do and I think this is like the best thing to do is I'll use a streaming link from uh a company called ReelCrafter because what they do essentially is it's kind of like a press kit or an EPK for uh musicians but it's kind of built more towards sync specifically if you're a composer or like a video game composer because like now it shows you it gives you data on like what they're listening to as far as like what piece of the track is like the most clicked like it's it's almost like SoundCloud. Almost SoundCloud-esque yeah it's it's it's pertaining to you and with sync so like you upload videos and have your music behind it and uh all your information's there and it's just like a one-stop thing so that they can kind of check out okay this music not only sounds good but looks cool because it's branded the right way you know what I'm saying and so like that makes you look super professional and like I have like this guy's obviously something like that.

He's producing music for sync. So I'm gonna take him maybe a little bit more. for brands. Seriously. Yeah yeah so so what other information goes into right like the submission because obviously it's the music file right for them. I mean well in this case it's not an MP3 but it's like the music but aren't there like other, yeah, exactly. What other kind of like metadata type of information should people be including? Yeah, metadata is like super important because if you give a music uh supervisor or a library your song, if they can't remember the name and they can't remember your name, how are they going to find it? And that's what metadata is for. So tempo, instruments, genre, um, related sounding artists, you could put in oh, that those that's like lower on the tier. That's second tier. First tier, you need to make sure you put your information, your PRO, and then if if it's one stop, which is like a golden word. I made some content on it uh the other day. But like essentially, if your music is one stop, that means that you won't, that the supervisor only has to come and contact one person to get permission to use it.

Because let's say you have a band, and oh, this actually happened, low-key. So I was in Los Angeles at a at a um at a sync event, and this the this guy was telling me they had a band, and everybody because that's how you do it, especially in like Nashville, like everybody owns uh equal percentage of a song if they recorded it, right? And so what happened, they uh they had an opportunity for a sync license and it was like for $20,000 or something like that. And the supervisor had to call each one of them because they owned a portion of it and they didn't say it was one stop. Meaning they can all they all all they had to do was come to the singer and be like, can we use this? And they say yeah. So because they didn't say one stop, essentially what happened was they had to call each person of the band, and the bass player's phone was like off, or he was in some I don't know, he was unreachable. And so because it was a last minute thing, because most especially in television, like they do stuff like I need it to yesterday. And so what happened is they lost the placement. And probably it was on a really popular TV show too.

So like it would have boosted their streams. It could a lot of artists like Lizzo and Aloe Blacc Black, there's a lot of artists that like got their start because they were put in front of an audience of millions of people, got paid for it, and then everybody's like, Oh, this is dope, Shazam, right? And then all of a sudden now they're getting more opportunities and stuff because they they just douse their song with lighter fluid. It's always the bass player. It's always the fucking bass player, bro. So like you have in the in your metadata, you have to make sure that you have like say that it's one stop and then make sure it's written in an agreement as far as your split sheets are concerned. That looks more attractive. to the supervisors, yeah. One stop because it's less worry for them because all they gotta do is contact one person instead of five. Yeah, and the advantage of that is that most indie artists can do that. When you when it c comes to the labels, normally there's like 18 people on one song, right? As far as songwriters and stuff are concerned.

And so like it becomes a big hassle to try to clear a song, um, especially if it's super popular and like there's a lot of people on it. Like Kanye is known for like putting everybody if the janitor was in the room, he's getting a cut, right? So like that it becomes really hard to sync that kind of stuff. No, I mean, and that's why I thought, you know, uh most of our community is indie artists and producers, etc. Like not signed, not signed to a label, not signed to a publisher. So I feel like that's why I thought sync was so important, bro, because it was like you can just do this shit on your own without having to go get approvals and you know, have someone else route it through legal and this, that like no, you can fucking decide on your own. Um that's huge, man. That's huge. What's the most um like bizarre placement that you or someone in your in your community has gotten? Just like the weird, it's like the weirdest, like I don't know, you mentioned like the educational video for the college. That one seemed kind of like, you know, all you know, offer one, but it's probably like it's probably too crazy. Let's go.

Like a tampon company reached out, or what? I was thinking, like a really explicit I made a very explicit um he let's just say he made a uh really well known track for very explicit content and um was trying to figure out because it was technically it technically is a sync placement, but because like he didn't know what he was doing, he got he got very underpaid for it. And so because of that, like it's just like I can I can show you to a lawyer, but like this is terrible. You know what I mean? So is it the jingle? Yeah. Seriously. I actually I actually he emailed me and was just like just because like by this time I was already doing a lot of education stuff, and he's just like, bro, like how do we how do you they I didn't get a lot of money for this track? Like somebody needs to fix this. Dang. Wait, wait, wait, wait.

There's a lot of rigmarole behind it. It's actually the jingle, yeah. The like boom. Uh that I yeah, so like essentially he's like, sure. I don't know, I've never heard it, but right, yeah. Um wow, wait, wow. That's insane. Damn, that's insane. He didn't, he didn't know he should have had this episode to refer to. Literally, literally, but it wasn't made yet. So, so what's the future of sync, do you think, right? Like with all this new AI and technology going at a crazy pace, like, where do you see you know, sync going in the future? I see with when it comes to AI, there's a lot of companies that like are shying away from it because no one owns the copyright to it outside of those companies. So, like, because you can't technically, according to Library of Congress at this moment in time, you cannot copyright something that was made completely by um a generative program. Like that's not going to be like a thing. You know what I'm saying?

Like you can't just use completely AI generated stuff to sync on your own. But also a lot of supervisors are old school. Like they rather have like new pop in music. And a lot of the times um when it comes to AI generated stuff you have to feed it information. And we make indie creators make new stuff that doesn't fit the mold all the time and it becomes popular right like speed sped up versions like who who would have saw that coming right so really yeah exactly. So like because of that it's always going to be a step up behind. So like I I genuinely think that indie creators are just going to continue to run the market when it comes to sync licensing just because it's so easy for us to create stuff. On top of that I strongly think and I was just looking at some some stuff from Luminate Luminate and uh splice they always at the beginning of the year they put out like what's most popular. Yeah. And so when it comes to genres I normally like check out that kind of stuff and find out what's trending and Afrobeat stuff um I'm a piano still like world music's still really popular country music pop music and um orchestral music is still like top five genres normally that most people and soul music because it's used like all the time and people relate to it. Those are the the biggest genres that normally work with sync and they're continuously like steamrolling everything else.

So like when it comes to the future of sync outside of that I would definitely think of new media platforms. Like at first, like maybe two, three years ago, we thought that the metaverse was going to take off, right? And so, like, that's video content the whole time you're like putting on the goggles. So, like, that's a revenue stream. Yeah, there's obviously gonna be music playing. Yeah, you're not just gonna be, yeah. This is people just walking around it's not gonna be silent while you're just walking around, right? Yeah, that's a placement. Yeah, so like more uh I'd be looking on the like on the horizon for like more media platforms, like esports, like I was mentioning before, that's always picking up Steam. Um, and let me think the other one was just a yeah, virtual reality and interactive stuff like that. So you mentioned um, you know, kind of like metaverse and stuff, like it what's micro sync? I feel like I've heard micro sync. Does that yeah? So micro sync is essentially for podcasters like yourself or YouTubers that might not have a whole film production studio budget for for larger known songs and things of that nature. So, like you have companies like Artlist, uh Epidemic Music, and uh there's a couple other ones, like Pond5, uh, that will basically act as music libraries at a cheaper rate.

And normally it's that's how I first got started, and I was like, this is not enough. Like, I'm making I'm spending hours on tracks and getting $35 a track for uh license usage, and sometimes it's just not enough. And so, like, it's good to get started to kind of understand how the market works. Um, but unless you have like a deal with um certain libraries where they pay you more, like for instance, I know there's a company called That Pitch, where like they have they basically have buyout deals for a lot of your music, and they they've they've grown over the years. Now they they're offering like non-exclusive deals and stuff like that, but it goes to YouTubers, and sometimes other film production studios will pick it up. They'll pay a little bit less on the front end, like anywhere between like 200 to 750 dollars, but on the back end royalties, like I still get royalties from when I first got started with Sync and like the TV shows will use the same music over and over again because it's just like we they don't care. They just re- they're putting it out on syndication.

And like those back end royalty checks will go anywhere between a couple cents to like I've the largest I've ever seen is like $8,000. And it's just like passive income based off of something I did years ago. So and so if you think about doing that over and over. So microsync, essentially, if you want to be really successful at it, you have to make a lot of music. So if if it adds up. So if TikTokers are using my song, is that sync? Yep. And how do you get paid from that? I feel like that's like the I feel like no one knows how that actually happens. It depends. So like if your music is going through a distributor like TikTok, uh they have their own like sound on or something right like that, right? That's that's a way to do it. Um, but if you then there's there's also music libraries that uh give a section of their music a uh not away, but they give it to TikTok to put in their own personal commercial music library to use. And when companies use that, because businesses like if you're making user-generated content, normally because it's on that social media platform, the rate is a lot lower. But if you're a business, like you're paying for it essentially through TikTok.

And so what happens is TikTok pays a it's called a blanket license, and basically they pay a lump sum to a library to use whatever music they want out of this pot that they give them, and then whatever they use, they split it across everybody that's got music in that pot. Okay. So then that's the 30 seconds to a minute that you would see if you click a sound on on TikTok. That's the section that they've been allocated. Yep. Okay. And record labels have those kinds of deals with um with um social media platforms all the time. Cool. Well, I didn't know that. Sam, XJ Will, Jay Will. Josh, we we've entered a final segment of the podcast. Yeah, man. God, so much fucking game, bro. I know. I really hope that a lot of people will go out there and start like pursuing this for real. No, like I know you always try and get our community to like rewatch our episodes just on some like try and get our views up type. Shit. No, it's, it's take the value. I know they're not getting all the value. No, but like this one, like you have to watch back.

Like, even I was like, wait, what did he say again? Like 10 minutes in, you know what I mean? Oh, this one is a notepad heavy episode. Gets our notepads out. For sure. But now we start the fun section. This is the rapid fire rampage. Okay. I'm gonna break it into three sections. I'll explain them as we go along. First part is just some simple short answers. Let's get into it. Starting with, give us your best, just like short elevator pitch on why you think artists should be taking sync placements seriously. Making music for brands not fans is probably the smartest thing to do because A, fans don't pay as much for music because it's devalued, and that's just because I'm an old man. But like also, the the fact that like the fans will come later. Like if your music's exposed to a bunch of people and you're actually getting paid for it, why wouldn't you do it? It's the best way to actually get paid for your art. I'm convinced. So I'm I'm making I'm making a sync hit tonight. Right?

Moving on. Trump has just appointed you to a brand new position of music industry Czar. What is your first order of business? My first order of business is to try to find a way to make sure that AI music doesn't take away other people's jobs. Because making music is actually fun. Uh contrary to belief that's come out in the last couple weeks, yeah. We need some regulation. Yeah, Sam. Gotta have it. Gotta have it. Moving on. What emoji best represents you and why? Ooh. What's the one I always use? The um Uncle Sam? The smoke, the steam? Oh, yeah, with the note coming out the nostrils. Yeah, Cause it's like. Cause it's like. It's, It's a grind emoji to me, and I that's that's that's what I'm all about. Love that. What is actually you kind of covered this? Let's just go into this one. You must choose a song to play anytime you walk into a room. What song are we going with?

Ooh. Danger by Blackway. Ooh. What's up, Danger? Cause, cause he's dangerous. I thought he was going danger by mystical. Okay. Maybe as a backup. That's much better, bro. Maybe as a backup. That's my that now that I I'll I'm gonna answer that question with danger by mystical. Who's gonna ask you that question. I mean, if I ever get on the one more time podcast, bro. Okay, fair. Um, last one of the short answer. What is your favorite curse word? Ooh, I don't swear. Can you say like the letter that it might start with if you had one? I don't just move on, Henry. He's like, no, do it. God. Such a bad influence, brother. Kind of that like you can track me too. Like if you listen back, like I know. no, we believe it. I knew that before I asked this. I was like, he's probably gonna say he doesn't even do it. Yeah. We've had a couple like you on here, Sam. A couple of you. We've had a couple of couple of you's on the pod. For sure.

Anyway, Henry really gets disappointed during this episode. It's like I guess I can tell you're left like wanting more. Anyway, moving on to the second part. This is the this or that. I'm gonna give you two choices. You just pick one of them. Okay. Starting with drums or melodies. Melody. Drums are flats. Melody. Or wait, flats. We moved to chicken wings without you noticing. There we go. Okay. He was thinking flat notes, bro. He's a trumpet player. Sharps or flats. Yeah, exactly. Flats. Oh, okay. Discover new artists or binge your favorites. Ooh, discover new. Nickelodeon or Cartoon Network. Cartoon Network. Gotta go with Cartoon Network. Wrong answer. Anyway. TV sync or movie sync? Movie sync. Kitchen sink or bathroom sink. Kitchen. AI generated insights or human creativity.

Ooh. I'm gonna go with AI generated insights. You know what? Says the guy who doesn't want AI to take over. I want to use it as a tool. Welcome AI mostly. I want to use it as a tool. I think that I mean it speeds up productivity so much. Like, for instance, and I meant to mention this earlier. Like go ahead. When when you're um like for instance, I had a uh a brief for like a BC Boys track, and I'm like, I want my when I record vocals to sound exactly like it, so I just type into AI like how do I record so it like it like what did they use? It gives me exactly what it what what gear and everything because of how I train it. And so like now I have a track that has vocals that sound like BC. Tells you like what preamp, what compressor, what how to EQ, and can ask it, Ask it, all that kind of stuff. And it just levels up your production. Wow. What company is that? What company is that? just the ChatGPT. That ChatGPT can spit that back? Oh fuck. man. Bro, like me and a lawyer actually like wrote a whole book of like prompts, like where you could just ask it this kind of stuff and it just it spits it back out.

And you can also tell it what gear you have. And it's like I've had like presets made from AI just based off of like, hey, I have the analog lab series. Uh, which one would work best for this kind of style song? You just gotta ask the right truck questions. We gotta, if I ever come back, we gotta do something on that. Cause like that's just prompts, just prompts prompt engineering is the new job. For sure. No, no, we honestly should. I think we uh I shared something to our story recently that some other uh platform shared. I think it was you do at uh 24-7 artist. Um shout out to them. They posted something about like seven ChatGPT prompts that every independent uh artist should be using, and they were awesome, right? Like, and so I think we definitely need like an episode on just prompts that musicians can be using. Um just real quick, I know this is rapid, but it's not anymore. But I I know we didn't touch on this. How do I even get to the point where I'm getting briefs? Oh, you have to be signed to a um uh super or not a supervisor, a label, or not a label, I'm sorry, a sync rep.

So a library or an agent. Okay, If you're not sign with one of them. Yeah, they they're they're the ones that get the instructions. Okay, Sure. unless you again have a supervisor that lives next door. Okay, well, yeah, and we already crossed that one. I also went to high school, yeah. Right, right. Okay, cool. I just wanted to because I always heard the term brief, and like that's basically this the description of what someone's looking for. Those go to the supervisor. Let's go to those either the library or the from the supervisors and they give them to the library owners and then they give them to us. Okay, cool, yeah. All right, sure, So just like just a few more of the this or that. starting with strawberries or blueberries. Ooh, blueberries. TikTok or YouTube? YouTube, and finally become a full-time rapper or leave the music industry forever. Ooh. I'd leave. I didn't think he was going that way. He was like, ooh. I'm out. That was so that was such funny. That was like the best comedic time that you could have asked for. Oh. Ollie, no problem. Touring.

Don't get me wrong. I've toured the world. Like it's so much fun, but just like it's bad on the knees. I don't have to. It's bad on the knees. Being famous is just terrible for like work-life balance, in my opinion. I can't go to the grocery store. Hot take. Hot take. That's funny. Moving on to the last section. This is the word association. I'm just gonna give you one word. Just give me the first word back that you think of. Yeah, this is how we get into your subconscious, you know what I mean? Oh gosh. It's gonna get real. I'll leave. That's so good. Starting with music, art. Spicy. Expensive. Marketing. Necessary. Slushy. Summer? Money. Uh security. Viral. Overrated. Violin. Suzuki.

Toilet. Bad music. Shitty ass music. Put it all in the toilet. Put your violin in the toilet. ChatGPT. Uh tool of future. Coyote. Jackal. Cryptocurrency. Wait, I almost swore it. Not necessary. Podcast. Um relationships. Lil. Baby. Why are you so laughing so hard? Bro, have you seen that? Have you seen that clip of um gosh, who is it? Um T-Pain. He's like, oh, we need no more lows. Like, stop being low. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's the first thing I thought of. I just said T-Pain. Sync. Um licensing. What were you going for? Uh I mean, there was a pouring out of you. Sync Alliance. Um could have been like sync could have been like comfort or like income. Like, there's a lot of ways he could have gone. What did you want him to do? I wanted to see where he went. I didn't have one. Sync equals freedom in my mind. Freedom is what I wanted. That's what I wanted. That's what it is. Man, appreciate you for real, uh Sam XJ Will, J Josh. Sam. A.K.A. A.K.A. Yeah. Yeah. If y'all didn't learn something about sync, then like please rewind because this shit was chock full, man. That's it. Yeah, appreciate you coming on. Until next time, Henry, what are we doing? Getting out of here. Peace, y'all. Bye bye.