Direct-To-Consumer 101: Make Money With a Small Fanbase ft. Curtiss King

A hundred diehards will literally change the trajectory of everything you're doing. People get 76 strings on a song and start complaining. You go into a busy Chipotle capacity of 76. These streaming platforms don't treat you as a business partner. I can listen to Curtiss King for the next 40 days. The majority of that money is not going to Curtiss King. It's going to Taylor Swift, it's going to Drake, it's going to whoever has a larger slice of the pie. You don't really have a lot of control over your quote-unquote business. So what direct to consumer says is I will now create an experience through my music and talk directly to my audience. What are some of the tools to execute a successful direct-to-consumer strategy? I use people keep saying, oh, AI is a tool, but a lot of people are not using it as a tool because they're a tool themselves. I call it impromptual dysfunction. Oh man. A lot of creatives feel guilty for accepting money. You're not evil for asking for money. In my belief, it is the future of where business in general is going. So when do you think someone should start?

Now. Creative people are typically not natural-born sellers. And as music makers, it's very possible that you've gotten a little uncomfortable when it comes time to sell your music and make a profit. Curtiss King, aka Captain DIY himself, is back on the podcast for the second time, but this time we focused exclusively on direct to consumer selling, sometimes known as DTC. In this episode, you're gonna learn why a hundred diehard fans might be more valuable than the classic thousand true fans. Why now is the time to get started, not waiting until you're bigger. How to retrain your brain on certain concepts like content, which is really just your messaging, branding, which is just your reputation, and your music in general. It's not just a product, it's medicine for people out there, and it has worth. And you deserve something for that.

He also gives us the exact tools and systems he recommends and even uses himself so that you can get started doing this today. We also had an extremely unhinged conversation on AI, available exclusively on our Patreon. If you know Curtis, he's on the front lines of that battle. So he had some choice work. If any of this sounds like it applies to you, this episode could legitimately be the one that changes the trajectory of your entire music career. So grab a notepad, hit the like button, leave us a comment, subscribe to the channel if you want to see more like this, and let's get started. This is the second episode where we've had repeat guests, Henry. We have Curtiss King back on the One More Time podcast. I'm so excited Let's turn these sound effects up, man, For Curtis, hold up. Let's go, man. And the LaRussell repeat wasn't even a full episode. So this is like the real first full repeat guest. And who better to have, back Than Curtiss King. I can't think of anybody else. I mean neither. Yeah, so I know you and I, you know, kind of chatted about what we wanted to talk about, because there's a million different directions that this conversation could go. But this one we decided that we wanted to really primarily focus on something that's become a very, you know, common topic of discussion amongst the music industry in general, but specifically on the indie side of the house.

I think direct to fan has been this like buzzword, buzz phrase. Direct to consumer. Direct to consumer, direct to fan, whatever you want to call it. What do you like to call it? I say DTC. Sounds like wrestling. I like that. What about D2C? That's uh don't do it for me. Visually, visually it looks beautiful, but D2C sounds like You better get put in a chokehold. Yeah. Kind of does. So, you know, for those that maybe haven't heard the the uh the idea of DTC, what what would you say direct to consumer is, and then maybe like, what isn't it? Sure, sure. So direct to consumer is uh it is a technique that is used not just by artists, by independent artists, but I in my belief, it is the future of where business in general is going. I'll give you an example outside of music first, so that the people who don't know will immediately get it. For those of you that are wondering why there's no longer an E3.

Well, at one point in time, E3 had a game conference that brought together anybody you could think of Nintendo, Microsoft, anybody that came in, they brought them all in the same environment. Well, Nintendo said, why are we coming to this environment to reach our people when we have our people and access to them, and we could actually do that directly within our own conference, our own version of an E3, and that's what they did. They pulled out of there and they weren't the only ones that did it. That was a sign of the times to come. So a company like that is looking and saying we need to be directly involved with our audience. Another example of this is Amazon. Amazon is obviously known for selling any product you can think of, including things like uh batteries. But instead of just selling you energizer batteries, you have Amazon Basics and Amazon's own brand. Well, Amazon even went a further step and said, Why are we doing Amazon original movies and why don't we own our own movie theaters? So what they did was they bought old AMC theaters, and that became now their direct-to-consumer process of putting their movies out, their originals.

They bought these old AMC theaters that were failing, and now they can just screen their own movies, sell their own Jeff Bezos popcorn if they want to. But now think of us as artists instead of using these third-party um DSPs like Spotify, excuse me, Opify as a likely. Oh man. Instead of using these companies where we don't really have equity, we don't really have control over you know you don't have control. You're not able to look at us an Opify and say, I want my music to just be free. You don't even have that option. But the fact that the payouts are 0.003 and that works on a sliding scale, especially with the the entrance of AI-based music uh in that pie system, you don't really have a lot of control over your quote unquote business. So what direct to consumer says is I will now create an experience through my music, through my content that will talk directly to the audience that I already have, either via email, which is something you don't get from Spotify as well, and I will cultivate this relationship that allows me to talk directly to my audience. And uh for some of them, like the LaRussell model, when I sat down with him and he explained it to me, they'll pay whatever they want.

So I released a song two weeks ago. If you were judging by streams, you'd think that song didn't do too well until you started to see that people were paying $20 for this individual MP3 because of what that song meant to them, and they had a very important decision to make that wasn't passive like streaming, which was what does this song mean to me? So direct to consumer for me is an entirely different way of looking at uh the exchange of music from you as an artist to your fan. So I I have a couple of questions, right? So, first off, when I just hear you describe it, I automatically think every artist should be doing this. Right? But they're but they're not. So, why do you think some artists are reluctant to go direct to consumer and try to sell their art? You want to get to the real ugly part of this? Please, definitely. If you ask most artists, they're gonna say, well, you need a fan base to do this? When the reality of it is, if I think of this as a mom and pop business, doesn't everybody need a fan base?

You start with no customers. You make a piece of piece of restaurant with your grandma's favorite recipe, and all you got is word of mouth. And people pass by it because they don't know what they know what Domino's is, they don't know what yours is. And then one customer steps in and you give them an experience of a lifetime that they can't stop talking about, can't stop sharing on Instagram stories, can't stop sharing anywhere they go, and they get all kind of ratings from you, their friends and family, and then you become their hangout spot. Then other people start coming around, and then that word of mouth may turn into extra income you put into ads. That is the same journey that we have as independent artists. So I think some artists make the excuse of, you know, well, this streaming is the top of the funnel, and that's where you bring in your audience. My pushback to that has always been these platforms, these streaming platforms don't treat you as a business partner, they treat the artists and musicians as customers. If they treated you like a business partner, why would they not give you access to the emails you need to contact your audience offline? Why does Spotify call them listeners and not fans?

Well, maybe because the majority of them are boss, but you didn't hear that from me. Um I have a feeling I'm gonna hit this gunshot button a lot this episode. Hey, and I know I beat up on Opify, but they beat up on us. Yes, but I'll say this. I think also a deeper psychological issue that is going on with a lot of creatives is that they feel guilty for for accepting money or selling their art. In their mind, it is a direct uh uh slap in the face to why they do music. They don't do music for money. We don't do music for money. I conclude myself, I'm an artist as well. We don't do it for money, we do it because it is an extension of our emotions and how we feel, and we want to express ourselves and share that with the world. However, if it's what you love, just like you may love your kids. I hope you love your kids. Just like you love your kids. Uh uh a sign of your love is your ability to provide for your kids. What are you willing to do to provide for your kids? I look at music in the same way.

I love music so much. I want to create an environment around it where I'm not making music just because I'm stressed out about money. I want to create a healthy environment where the best music I produce is because I'm from a place where I can think clearly, act patiently, and make the best art that I know from the best place. Uh, some great art has happened because of being stressed out, but this is where I'm at with it. And so I think a lot of artists are psychologically kicking themselves out of the game before they even try it because they don't want to have to sell their music. In this generation, there's been artists who can get away with being not social and still get on social media for whatever reason. And they can get streams because, you know, something the algorithm picked up. Maybe they did a piece of content that didn't show their face, and they've gotten away with it. But I do feel like this is discouraging for artists who are like, I'm afraid of people, but I want their money. And that's something that I think I try to do my best on my platform to close that gap.

You're not, you're not evil for asking for for money. Matter of fact, there's a book that I read that's talking about um how to build a fan base, I be believe by Pat Flynn. And he said, not only should you be selling what you're doing to a potential fan base, you should be offering VIP pricing as well. And that's where DTC comes in. They had an example, crazy example where there was a bus stop, and they placed a throne next to the bus stop. They roped the throne they roped this throne around, right? And they said this is premium seating for the bus. Nobody's paying for that. You'd be mistaken. Because to sit in that chair, and you're like, what does this get me? I don't know. but I'm in this throne and it feels good. It's better than sitting on that hard bench. And people paid the premium for a service that they didn't even know what they got a benefit in. So what I'm saying is for you creating music that is someone's medicine, how dare you cut yourself off from the opportunity for them to express that financially when you need it. Yeah, Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, I I think the idea of selling and the idea of asking for money, even if it I don't know, I think it's just a mindset thing.

I mean, you struggle with it, bro. I think artists by nature are not like salesy type of people. It is a very different kind of mindset, you know. So it is like a switch that needs to happen, I think. Yeah, because I mean we had these conversations, man. Like, I do like to draw parallels between what we're doing over here on like the just podcasts and media company content creators, whatever you want to call us, and then what artists have to go through. I mean, that's something that but I think what your mindset is is like let's make it as valuable as possible. So I think if you can flip the the narrative in your head by treating it medicine, like this we've all had songs that have changed our lives, like quite literally. Ones that we have, you know, listened to to get us through hard times, ones that have like been the soundtrack to our lives, whether it's happy times, sad times, stressful times, whatever it may be. Um, so I think if you can flip that narrative, it's really just like the self-talk almost, right? And like the you're creating this weird stigma yourself. It's not that weird, like it's an exchange of value, right? Where you're giving them something valuable and in return they're supporting you financially.

But it is tough. How about this inverse? For those of you that are feeling pressure and you have no business feeling pressure because you make disposable music, you ain't got nothing to worry about. It's perfect to you. Take out the right price point for you. 0.003 cents for that hot garbage that hot garbage. And like you said, that pie is that pie is shrinking fast. Yeah. So oh my God, you Suno-obsessed producers and artists that are going ballistic and you have not dedicated any time to the craft or thought about the emotional connection. I just heard Soundwave talking about the GNX album, and he said something that that hit me hard today. He said, he knows an album is done, like an album like a GNX is done when he sheds a tear. He knows like that is the moment of completion, is that he has unlocked something. And I'm sorry, I I'm not against AI, I'm not against these type of things, but I do feel like people are missing out on a really beautiful opportunity to go through the beautiful struggle, and they're underestimating that, and they're being told by tech bros that that's not even fun to even do it like that. And it's like, fam, when you go through that and you see the way that people will invest into you because of what you did for them.

And you see, I don't need to have a million fans to make a living at this. I just like when I went to go interview LaRussell, it made it so real for me when I realized them 4K cameras that showed a pergola, it looked like a stadium. When I went there, it was a home. I knew he knew this. I knew he knew this. And I'm not saying this is any kind of disrespect to him at all. I'm saying it was so real that the door opened up, his mom came out and said hi to everybody. I'm like, this is in his actual backyard. And it's not like a super special backyard, like, oh no, no, this is this is this is this is like a Batman type of backyard. No, this is a backyard. It made me look at myself and say, you've been making too many excuses. Get to work. LaRussell will do that. He will absolutely eliminate any reason for excuse. So I think I know what you're gonna say about this, but I think there's people out there that uh probably have opinions contrary to yours. But what role do you think streaming platforms like a Spotify uh should play in the overall strategy of an artist versus what role direct to consumers should play?

I can't speak it for every artist, because I think every artist is in a different situation. As I mentioned, there are some people who literally will tell you, I am here for a moment, not for a career. I make disposable music. I can't give them advice in terms of what to do. Uh I will say this though for the longest we have artists have uploaded blindly to these platforms that continue to play with us, specifically Spotify. Like I am not an employee of Spotify, but for whatever reason, I will not get paid for my first thousand streams that I don't get annually on an abstract project from five years ago. I can't get my money until after, and then it starts from that thousand stream. What about the other traffic I just generated? Okay, cool. When I see you move in that direction, when I see where you're investing the money into AI weapons, and I these are things that are just not aligned with when I see you running ice ads for recruitment and the you know what? I didn't even need all that, and that's just icing on the cake. I look at this and I say, okay, they gave us an opportunity to really run a business.

And I can't say that I'm an independent artist. And he said I have to give the utmost props to arsonists from the from the from the heat makers because he said the statement and I reacted angrily when I heard it. But he said, How can you call yourself independent if your music is on streaming platforms? When the streaming platforms at that point in time, I know that shifted, 70% of 70 cents of every dollar was going back to the major labels that were licensed music to them. You're in in turn kind of working indirectly without being signed with the label. How can you call yourself independent if you're dependent upon Spotify? You're dependent upon all these entities. Do you really even have a business? How can you say you have a business if you don't even have access to the emails of those listeners that you have? You brag about having a gajillion listeners. Do you have any kind of pipeline to them if you're not uploading to Spotify? So and now with social media, you know, you can't even count on your followers seeing your posts anymore. I mean, if you have emails, you got nothing. Yeah. The moment that I talked to customer service at Spotify, and they told me when I was going through my whole phase of getting my music off of streaming, they said, Yeah, you can take your music down, but you can't take your profile down.

That's weird. What do you mean I can't take my profile down. It's my likeness. Yeah. And that's when I learned that the terms of service will reveal everything that you need. I highly suggest you do the research. But in what role can streaming play? I'll tell you what it can play for me. If I put my music on your platform and you play with me by spinning 0.003, and like I said, that's on a sliding scale where I can listen to Curtiss King for the next 30, 40 days. The majority of that money is not going to Curtiss King. It's going to Taylor Swift, it's going to Drake, it's going to Kendrick Lamar, it's going to whoever has a larger slice of the pie. Damn it, it's going to Johan Rohr, who is a composer that has numerous accounts, and he happens to be in the same area as Spotify in Sweden. It's a guy who's a composer who collectively, all his work has more streams than ABBA, Elton John, and a bunch of other people. What? This is news to me. Yeah, peep that out. Peep that out. Uh Rick Beato did an interview with a with a gentleman who's always predicted, I forget the gentleman's name, but uh Ted something, I believe.

And he talks about this. Like while your album got removed, I saw there was a singer named Cara, I believe her name is, she said she invested a hundred thousand dollars into her album and put it on Spotify, and they removed it and said, Yeah, we think there's bots on it. Yep, they sure did. No, I'm a fan of Cara. Shit's right, is that Cara as in, like, Cyhi's friend Cara? Even that does, like, the YouTube videos and shit? I think they've collabed, yeah, that's her. That's right. I am Cara Music. Wow, they removed her music. Crazy story. A hundred thousand dollars, and then they don't provide sufficient evidence. No, you just say, hey, the sources, trust me, bro. Yeah, like that's not working. Cause that how was she supposed to make her money back? I mean, obviously, there's other avenues, but that's a big one if you're investing all that time accommodating a platform. So here's what I did, and maybe I talked to you guys about this last time. I came up with the term strip it. Yeah, So you're still on strip it. I have not well, I I slightly changed it out because I'm still testing.

Okay. What I what I did at one point in time is I stopped distributing to streaming and started to only distribute to social media. Okay. So I would only go to like Instagram where it's gonna get shared, and then people are gonna ask a question where do I get this song? Well, at the end it says CurtissKing.bandcamp.com or CurtissKing.com. So I'm advertising on my own music still. I give them the full song, but you're gonna get a Curtiss King tag in the beginning, and you're also gonna get a CurtissKing.com at the end. Well, Curtis, isn't that disruptive to the listening experience? Yeah, and so is Ice Recruitment Ads. So true. Yeah. Or the person saying, Are you tired of the ads? Yeah, you should be. And if you say you love this music and you would love to enjoy it ads free, come support me. Stop going on that thrift shop called Spotify and come to the Gucci store. Come to the Gucci store and come get the kind of quality. You get the waveform. You don't get this compressed version of the music that is trying to supply, trying to trying to satisfy their loose. Yeah, we're getting lossless waves only over here.

Like, come on, you're right. Because Bandcamp has an app, my website is gonna accommodate you. I'm always updating it to make sure that the load time is A1. And I know not every artist is is designed this way, but for the ones that care, the ones that put in that extra care, LaRussell was definitely one of those who put that care in. They they have earned your dollar. And I bet you they've overdelivered in value beyond what you initially came there for. I want to just add uh in the in the vein of adding in ads, we promised we'd do a better job of reminding you guys to please like and subscribe to this channel. We are bringing you guys premium elite level value and that hopefully is helping with your indie careers. And we never ask for subscribes, and uh the data shows that it is very beneficial to mention that early on in these videos. So there it is. Absolutely. Thank you, thank you, Henry, for that. Absolutely. Um, I guess like people don't believe that someone would. I mean, LaRussell, I think, sold 250 tickets to his backyard show at a thousand dollars apiece.

So, literally a quarter million dollars in revenue for one backyard show, limited experience. It was with like a choir, I don't know what he had all the bells and whistles. He's out of his mind. he's out of his mind. He probably spent quarter million as well in in like production costs, right? He probably made zero dollars. So everyone thinks he like rode off on a golden chariot. He was probably back to work the next morning. He went all out for sure. But so for the people that don't believe that you know, people pay 20 bucks for an MP3, like you know, suggested earlier in the episode. What why do you think someone is doing that? Because they could get most people's music. I know you're a weird one where you only have strip it at some places. Well, like, if, you know, for for a normal artist that has a streaming profile with the songs up on streaming, and then they also have you know a direct-to-consumer business. Like, why are people paying money? Like, I just like what what what what do you think is happening? And for the people that don't believe that people are paying money, I just want to like understand what you think is happening. Let me take a moment to interrupt this episode and tell you about our friends over at DistroKid.

DistroKid is easily the best DIY distributor on the marketplace. Let me tell you why. It's only $23 a year, that's less than two bucks a month for you to upload unlimited music to all of your favorite streaming platforms on the planet. It's so easy that it takes me like five minutes per upload, and that's when I'm multitasking dealing with my two-year-old son. Hands down, my favorite part about DistroKid is how easy it is to add credits to an upload. I don't know what distributor you're using, but with DistroKid, it's super easy. You can put the artist, the producer, the songwriter. I'm pretty sure you could put like the junior associate engineer of a song. And me, I I want to know who's on the record. And if you sign up using this link, you're gonna get 30% off an already insanely low price. And you can finally start adding your collaborators because they are checking. They will notice when their name's there and they will thank you for doing it. Let's get back to the episode. What do you think? Okay. So to explain it, I gotta say something that I know a lot of artists are not gonna want to hear because this is one of their least favorite words in this era, which is content. content. Content, content.

Some people will look at my success and say, Well, that has to be because of his YouTube. If you go to my YouTube videos, you'll see that I hardly ever plug my music. When I'm in that story mode, when I'm making these actual reactions, I am there first as a hip hop fan, second as a I guess a media voice of some kind. And then, of course, I'm giving my input as my experience. Let me give you another perspective, right? And I've never shared these numbers before. LaRussell is doing crazy numbers because he deserves to when he has the infrastructure that he's built independently. And I don't think we should look at everybody's independent business as the same. We don't walk down the street and say, I wonder if this mom and pop place is making as much as this mom and pop place. All you know is they got the fire ass chicken wings over here, and they got the fire ass pizza, and you enjoy it nonetheless. I think the audience need to get their business out of the artist's business financially. I think it's it's important for us to share the success so they know that there's more people around. But let me give you this perspective.

So I had an album release party that I did for a project last year called, was it the year before? It was last year. Probably last year, for a project called Extended Warranty, right? I'm not a household name, but I have an audience that understands the passion that is in my music. And because I never refuse to tell the stories of these albums or to tell my story, people are emotionally invested in what Curtiss King is talking about. The people who are tapped in. I'm not looking for a thousand true fans anymore. I'm looking for a hundred diehards. Right? A hundred diehards will literally change not just your current financial situations, it'll change the trajectory of your inspiration and motivation behind everything you're doing. You'll start to see, damn it, a hundred people is a lot of people to be responsible for. It's a lot of people to keep in touch with via email because everybody's not opening emails at the same time. You can't handle a hundred. You have no business thinking about a thousand.

And when you get perspective on it, dog, like people get 300, people get 76 views on a song or listen, streams on a song, and start complaining and huffing and puffing about how nobody supports them. You go into a busy Chipotle capacity is 76 and you're complaining that you can't get to your food quick enough. You're doing Chipotle numbers, my guy. Let's go. You know what I'm saying? Let's get a perspective, right? Okay, so so remember the pandemic when when everybody was acting a damn fool for toilet paper and water and how it was so hard to go down the aisles. Most capacity is around 400 to 500. Can you look at your views a little differently now? So I I'll give you perspective on this. I released that extended warranty project, and uh it did well financially. It was compared to the overhead, it did so well for me. And I said, I want to do a show from home. And I converted my other living room with my my wife's blessings. I had to like really like tell her, like, yo, baby, this is going.

And she's like, I believe you, I believe you. So I did this, converted it, and this is after me being inspired by seeing what the Russell did. And um sold $400 worth of tickets. I was able to pay two guest appearances from my guy, Eugene O'Neal and another artist named Triz, another independent juggernaut out here named Triz. I paid him out. We ate some pizza afterwards. They went home. You know what I did after that show? I logged off the internet, went to the fridge, drank a Gatorade, and went upstairs to go to sleep. I didn't have to worry about getting my car from the valet. I didn't have to worry about eating terrible food on the way home from the from the venue. This was an experience I had never seen in my life. I thought about in my life, and I said, I could get used to this because $400 is not a whole lot in my realm of things, but knowing the possibilities that was for the first or the second show we ever did, the first ever paid one, we went through Eventbrite to do this. Oh, it showed me that the sky is the limit.

Because what happens when I have music that starts to take off and then the audience grows, which it's already doing. Like, this is a special time. This this is the era of the DIYs. I was watching an interview with Nardwuar, and I'm coming to understand how much of a DIY voice he is in his media space. He's had opportunity to take deals, but it was just more lucrative and more uh autonomy that he had in his art to do it the way that he did. It's got to just feel better, too, when you hit these milestones, it's just gotta be like, yes, you know, like I did this, me and my team did this. I guess, like compare it to nobody either. I don't have to cut you off, but I didn't have to compare it to anybody, like, oh my god, I only made 400 for a show. I made 400 for my living room rapping songs. It's insane to make 40 doing that. It's amazing. If I would have made 40, I'd have been like, I had to leave the house for that. Yeah, seriously. No, but I... $492 per. Yeah, I I think what you said though, around like the why someone would pay money when they could hypothetically get majority of music on YouTube for free, SoundCloud, Spotify, whatever.

Um, I think it is the emotional connection. Like, that's what I really kind of go back to. And the way you phrased it as far as like this is someone's medicine potentially, like someone's gonna fucking pay for that just out of the like love of you saved my life, you healed me, you helped me get through this time, you helped me turn up when I wanted to party. Like, you know, whatever you helped them do, that's where I think people will like, I don't know, And with all the services... It's a human thing almost with all the tools that we have available now in 2026. It's very easy to just offer it just in case, right? Like, why would you not? How about this? You go to CVS. This happened to me actually. You go to CVS and you see Excedrin is on sale, but you don't need it. It's on sale right now. You're like, man, I probably should get this because I get some pretty bad migraines, but you know what? I got this amount. Nah, I'll wait on it. Check back on the day that you have a migraine, how much you're willing to pay for that Excedrin. Yes, it is literally the only medicine on the market that can get the edge off of that migraine.

I look at the music the same way. For somebody, you told a story, and this is why this doesn't apply to artists who make disposable music. You sat in that studio and told a story that was so vulnerable. It was so personal that somebody else said, I thought that I was the only one, and this song speaks to me. You also told stories beyond just sharing and promoting your music. Like content should not be a dirty word to artists. There's a book that I read called Seducing Strangers, and uh, it's made by a brilliant marketing mind. And the gentleman said, replace the word content with message and see if that produces new creativity. Replace the word uh branding with reputation and see if that doesn't produce different ideas in your head. As content, there used to be a time that if you and I could not get on two dope boys and all these different blogs, we weren't heard from a content standpoint unless we had an audience. You get to now be your own blog outlet.

It's not a blog, but it's you sharing your thoughts on your own space. You mean to tell me we live in a time of freedom where you can reach your audience anytime you want, and the best thing you can think of as somebody who takes kicks and snares and mumbles from nothing and turns it into songs is to post SoundCloud photos on your page. To post play buttons from your Apple player. I'm not buying it. I challenge when I do one on one-on-one consultations, I challenge artists to remember your greatness. You do the impossible every time you sit down and make a song. How dare you now run out of creative ideas when it's time to market your music? So when do you think someone should start? Now. Okay. Okay, so now no follower count. No, this is because you know what? You know who's not afraid to do that? That mom and pop business I talked about that said we got the best pieces that you ever heard of. Yeah.

They're not giving away. Yeah, they're not giving it away for free. They're still selling. And I don't want to hear from any artists that because I've had people push back on this and say, no, you need an audience. You need an audience. No, you need an audience. I need a connection. Because I'll tell you when I had a MySpace page, shout out to Michelle Lynn. I will never forget her name, never met her in person. Michelle Lynn bought my first cup before Curtiss King was anybody to anybody, right? When Tila Tequila was still trying to get more fans on there. When Tom was in my top. eight. Oh shit. Tila Tequila. When Dane Cook was busting. Oh my God. It's going crazy, right? I haven't heard Tila Tequila in two decades. I'm saying, but shout out to Michelle Lynn because that's when I knew it was real. I didn't have an audience, but I thought, you know what? I probably should sell merchandise just in case one day somebody does, because the reality of it is you think that you start your business when you have customers. No, you start your business before you do, and you have to adjust as customers come.

Because some people right now are saying, Man, yeah, I'm gonna wait till I have a customer base, then I'm gonna start selling. And that's one of the worst decisions you can make because you don't have the infrastructure nor the preparation to prepare when your website crashes. You've never been there before. Yeah. And I think a lot of artists are are like I had a buddy of mine that said, Oh, I'm not gonna get tattoos until I'm ready to get a full sleeve. He still don't got tattoos to this day. Oh man. And I think that's the same mentality that's going into folks who are artists are like, oh no, I'm gonna wait till I have a fan base to then sell to them. You don't know how to sell. Maybe you should learn that very early. And I'm not saying to sell garbage to people, but music is relative. I think that if you understand, and shout out to Indie Mama Jane Lee, I heard her say this, and I thought this was brilliant. There are some things that are just objective bars, right? Like we need music.

We're in the audio business. Can you imagine being a florist and you walk into a florist shop and all the roses are dead? But she's telling you, I promise in a year it's gonna get better. I promise in the back there's some crazy. That's how I feel when I do shows that have bad sound. How dare me come here and I try to sell audio for a living, sell quality for a living, and the worst version of it is live. The worst version of it. So I think there's some objective uh uh uh bars that must be re that must be met. Like you should be working on your craft. Matter of fact, you should be prepared to give some stuff for free to bring in people who otherwise would not even care what you got going on. But I think that if you think that you're prepared to sell a t shirt before your music, you might want to question what's going on with your music. Yeah, I think there's some like ego, you know, potential like uh holdups there. Cause I could just see like, you know, an artist that maybe has X 10,000s of monthly listeners, maybe does a hundred thousand streams, isn't making shit money from it, right?

But then, you know, has to shift their mindset to go to like, okay, selling five singles is a win. I could just see that being tough for people. I don't think they're ready for that. I think that's a financial. I think that right there would mess their ego up, As you said. That would mess their ego up if you if you realized all of that that you're being sold, because you're being sold to on Spotify. When Spotify puts that number at the top of your page, that's not just for your fans, that's for you to get sold to. Hey, I should really push and pump this a little bit more so I can get my subs. That don't benefit you the same way it benefits Spotify. So that is marketing to you because you are the customer. Like one thing that I've learned coming up, it if if if you don't understand the hustle, that means that you the lick. And I think a lot of artists are not recognizing that. And and I I could see what you're saying right now is that their ego of well, the general audience thinks I'm doing well because I have 40,000 listeners, but you're broke in real life. That's so crazy.

You mean to tell me you mean to tell me four people, which happened last week, four people buying your album for a hundred dollars wouldn't do something for you? That wouldn't shake something a little bit for you. I thousand true fans, I don't even think we need that. Most people don't even need that. I think a hundred, a hundred hungry hippos. I like that, man. He made he means no disrespect to you guys calling you hippos. But I'm a nineties kid, so that's why I said that. No, I played it. I played it. But that reference might go over some people. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no disrespect. I'm just saying, like what I'm saying when I say that, and I say this to my DIY because I love my DIYs because the way that they show up, I don't have to sell to them. I just have to be honest with them, transparent. And so what I did, for instance, I get I I I give you, I don't wanna hijack your question, but I had a song that came out called Live For Me, where there's a million rap songs that say I die for my family, I die for my son, my wife. I said, what songs are out there that said I would live for you?

That's fire. I would go take care of my body. I would go out and do the things necessary so that I can be here as a father. So I made that song. In the midst of it, it made me start thinking, what actually happened in my life that inspired that. This year, I ran into a depression physically, emotionally, and I could not understand how to get out of this cloud that was over my head. And it got so bad that my body felt frail. I didn't, I couldn't get out of bed. I would sleep for hours and hours and feel more tired every time I got up. Finally went to the doctor and I said, Yo, what's going on? They did blood tests. I'm expecting the worst. They tell me that I'm vitamin D deficient because of all the time I spent as a DIY in the house. We've just talking about this. Got that taken care of? Gentlemen, three months ago, I wouldn't recognize me in this conversation that I'm having with you right now. You're taking supplements? I'm I'm taking 5,000 IU, sometimes 6,000, because I'm I'm just excessive like that. Because he's built like that.

He's built like that, y'all. I like that. Yeah. I take uh one of the K2, I take magnesium citrate, I take uh uh turmeric, and I also take uh fish oil. Damn. And that cocktail of vitamins plus like eating lighter before I get to work, my mind, because I'm telling you guys, like the depression was also because I would sit down and make all this time from YouTube to finally work on my music. I would batch content and I'm finally working on music. And I would sit here in this room for hours. And I couldn't come up with four bars after doing this for 20 years. Was kicking my ass. Like it was really messing with me mentally. And then there was other voice in the in your, you know, in your prefrontal cortex that's like, damn, six hours, and you only came up with four bars, you could have spent that being a dad downstairs with your son. What's up with that? Damn. I took that and I made that two pieces of content. I went back to when I finally got my energy back, I said, this video is not to sell anything.

It's just to remind you, go go get some blood work done because what you're going through may not be as deep as what you think it is, because I know mental health is a big conversation. Maybe you're just vitamin D deficient. And I had a gentleman this last week that said that video was the reason that I went and got my test and I found that I'm deficient as well. And so I see that and I say, that was originally in my mind, promo for Live For Me. Now that song lives on even more than the song that I made Live For Me. That's for evergreen, that's evergreen content. That guy's never gonna forget you. Never forget because you you're making lasting impacts. The connection, connection. The connection. Nipsey Hussle says something that I hold near and dear to me. He said, as he saw the popularity of iTunes emerging, he said, ah, I get it. It's up to us to create experiences human beings can't stream. That's the job I have right now is to create experiences that human beings cannot stream.

So what did he do? He'd had an album where if you bought it for $4,000, it was a ticket into an exclusive show, or it was an opportunity for you to kind of get like uh uh be in a studio session with him and listen to the victory lap before anybody, or not the victory lap the uh the the album, the mailbox money album, I believe he had uh during that time or marathon, which one was it? I forget which one it was, but the orange album, you got to sit in a studio with him and listen to future music coming up. So those are experiences people will forever remember. Rest in peace to him, even more so now because he's not here. That's our job. If you're not a people person, if you're not somebody who is about community, which is something that LaRussell knocks out the park every time, you gotta really ask yourself, what are you doing this music for? If it's for just yourself, why are you sharing it with the rest of the world and trying to in a really weird way control the behavior of other people? Yeah.

We don't build fan bases, yeah. We build something and people crowd around it because they relate to it. Yeah. That why is the most important, man? Agreed. I mean, we we spend countless hours trying to figure out our why sometimes. You just get caught on autopilot. Like, yeah, how long have I been doing this without thinking about what the hell I'm doing sometimes? Yeah, like I I just made a comment before we got on air about what I think my why is for this. And and I I just enjoy creating something. Like I like the challenge of like putting the pieces together, and it's like there's so many moving parts, and it's like you could do this thing or you could do that thing, but it's like, what do I think is like you know, the cool right, you know, like thing to do, or whatever. And putting that one out there and seeing how it does, and like, okay, maybe that didn't work because of this reason. Yeah. Tweaking it. It's just like this weird game. And then I enjoy like the debates that we have about like what you think we should do. Like, so I I also like the team sport of it. I don't know if I could be a true like Curtiss King DIYer, bro. Like, I like, and I know you have team members and supporting casts, you know, like design.

Well, not only I remember last episode. This guy does a lot. I mean, you might have like a guy on Fiverr at least, right? No. Nothing. Okay, well, you suck. You're the worst example, but I'm the worst example. Are you editing all your YouTube videos? Yes. That one. I thought you had an editor last time we talked. I had an editor, but he realized I'm a lunatic. Okay, well, yeah, you are. You are. So as much as we're having this guy on the podcast to listen to, don't listen to him in some ways. Because like just in that way. If anything, listen to me to figure out if you really want to do this. Actually, that's it. If you're really built for this shit, that's it right there. If I have a conversation with me and you realize my brain could quickly go from F stops to kicks and snares to, to, to, to, to bit rates on, on YouTube. Yeah. Like, Maybe I don't want to be that kind of Yeah. Oh man, yeah, because I personally I don't love like the being alone and doing all the things. Like, I truly do enjoy the like team sport aspect of it.

And I think a lot of people do in music because I think like a lot of people look at music, and I mean, I know you have do things outside of music that you're responsible for, but like, you know, I I mean you have producers sometimes that you work even with No. No. You do collaborate with a nobody. At least on music, at least on the music tip, you do collaborate still, like you know what I mean. So and and I know you could produce, but you could produce all your own shit. You're you're a producer too, so it's like you could hypothetically, but it that's like fun for me, man. So I don't know. Just all that to say, like, find your why because it makes it a whole hell of a lot easier to get up and go through those motions that sometimes can feel like autopilot. You do have to like do the things consistently. Like there's all these quotes I've been reading recently about consistency, and like it is boring as shit. Like the consistent things that you have to do uh like do and show up and do every fucking day, they do kind of suck. But nothing great is built without that hard work, true, and just like the monotony, because it's like there's a reason why you have to do them consistently, like Nike consistently has to manufacture and market shoes, like it's like, yes, they come out with the new cool shoe and like the new way to talk about it and the color schemes and all the fucking things, but it's like at the end of the day, they're constantly just you know what I mean, doing a similar thing on a real on a regular basis. So and I would add like checking in on your why too, because at least for me, that shit changes all the time, you know what I mean?

Like monthly, I would say is not even a bad idea. Like, is this still the direction I want to be headed? Am I happy with what I'm doing every day still? Is it does it all make sense? It's also important. So starting from a place of gratitude, I think for a lot of artists, in that this is the easiest it's ever gonna be. How do I know it's because 10 years ago it was easier than this, and 10 years ago before that it was easier than this. Now, with all these responsibilities, it seems overwhelming, but expect the worst in 10 more years because we'll have more things. AI will be a part of all of our process, whether we like it or not. Like, there's gonna be things that are gonna make it more complex. So this is the easiest it will ever be. One one thing that I have been very intentional about is is interchanging the word have to with get to. It's a good one. Huge. Because I heard you say that right now, and I'm not correcting, I'm just saying that this is something I'm going to do. No, I'm bad about it.

I'm bad about that, bro. But you know what though? I've when I get mad about it, that switch does it for me. And I said, I'm not the best example, but that switch does it to me where I'm like, damn, I have to take down his light, and I have to go downstairs and get ready for this interview. And I have to. I'm doing an interview for my living room and not having to leave. I get to do an interview for my living room and not leave. I'm talking to the president of TDE about the history of TDE and the styles. Behind the scenes of the rap battle with Kendrick Lamar and Drake. That was crazy. I get to. I can't believe you got to interview Punch. That was insane, bro. In the middle of the fucking, or like, you know, right on the like aftermath of all of that shit. Like that was insane, man. Go check out that video. But uh before you do that, watch the rest of this video. And also don't forget to like and subscribe. You're on one today, but I love it. We gotta remember that shit. Let's go, man.

Sorry. Come on. You guys understand. Like, we have to say it helps the channel. Please like and subscribe. I mean, and also Curtiss has been cooking this entire episode. So if you don't like this one, we have nothing to offer you. Just go away forever if you're not learning anything here. Don't forget, I'm I also came here bearing gifts for those of you that are on the Patreon side of things. I don't know if I'm supposed to say anything about that yet, but it's a nice foreshadowing. It's a nice foreshadowing. Head on over to the Patreon, subscribe to the One More Time uh Patreon right now. There's a little freebie courtesy of Curtiss King. Curty, courtesy of Curtiss King. That was quite a sentence. That was kind of hard to say for a second. Understandable. But no, so I don't want to uh wrap this at all with um, you know, without talking about this part. So, what are some of the like uh tools uh and systems that someone should have in place to execute a successful uh direct-to-consumer strategy? Because I think there's a lot of things out there that maybe some people have heard of. You mentioned Bandcamp earlier. I want to get your take on just what are some of the things that you use for your own, you know, direct-to-consumer uh model, and maybe if you don't use them, but things that you've heard about that you think uh the you know the people should check out. Right, right.

I want to pull up this website while I'm even talking about this right now. Um, because I want to make sure that I get this website right. And they have been so dope about making sure that I get uh great service at like the my vinyl prices have been ridiculous because of them. And then like I said, I'm not sponsored by them. I've never had contact like that with them. But um the name of the company is Kunaki. Have you heard of Kunaki? No, I don't think so. K-U-N-A-K-I. Uh, in terms of getting a bang for your buck and being able to get a fast turnaround on CDs, being able to buy, like, because sometimes I'll run out a particular album and I need I just need five more, right? Five so I can autograph them and send them out from home. Uh, they'll do those and they sell them to you pretty much wholesale. And you can design your album cover and then upload it straight to there. You can upload waves, so it goes straight. You can put the metadata on there and it goes straight to it. Uh, they even have like different styles of vinyls. I have some of these that are sitting in here, but Kunaki is huge in terms of my physical copies and getting it to where it's low overhead, but I'm still able to get stuff here physically sent so I can send it out and sign it and all that.

Kunaki, mutt major. My website, before we even talk about Bandcamp, Bandcamp can get shut down tomorrow. CurtisKing.com is everything for me. Right? Because if I have a hub, it doesn't matter what's happening in the algorithm. My fans know how to find me. And that hub is going to be a connection to my email list, which uh the emails that I use is Flowdesk. It's not a popular one, but Flowdesk is like, you can tell it was made with content creators in mind and artists in mind. And it has been my communication devices where they got these really dope layouts. We talked about it last time on here. And we've become fans since then, right? Yeah, man. Flodesk is so it's so simple. So it made it so easy and the whole idea of like they I'm not sure if it's still even is the thing at the you know at at this given time but like they didn't cap you as far as like contacts and whatnot like MailChimp gouges you for every contact you add, it's like it's another thousand dollars, and if you're not prepared to learn a thousand features, you know, and become this email tech guru, I think that if it's just a part of your strategy and you need to do it like it's a great solution. Yeah so it's way less daunting because we've done both. We've had MailChimp and then we switched over to Flodesk and MailChimp is extremely terrifying and like overwhelming

if you want to get into it it's great. You know disrespect to get into it. If you have a business to get into it you have no choice like you need those other tools and features but like for a lot of us we have businesses but they're really positioned as small businesses. Yeah I think those are made for you know more corporate type of environments or people who are trying to go in that direction but it's not it's not always as friendly to us especially financially like you're eating money like crazy I MailChimp to the grave with you. Yeah it's it'll take your mortgage I mean it's insane. What else you know how many times I had a great month and I was like all right we paid rent we let's getting a little tight. And MailChimp was like, Can I hold $500? Yeah, your email list gets bigger and you get punished. You gotta pay double now.

Like, how dare you penalize me for growing? Flodesk, if you didn't know, it's 38 bucks no matter how large your list gets. And uh they got a lot of the same the the bare essentials, right? So if you're getting started in that, and if people are asking, like, does anybody still open up emails? Yes, yes, they do. Because what's a good open rate for you? What's like good? What do you consider good? For me? Yeah. If I'm cooking 35, 40%. That's massive. That's good. Kicking ass. I am kicking ass. 35, 40. Because the thing is, I put so much emphasis on what that subject title's gonna be. And you know, you know what you because it used to be average about 15 to 20, and then you know, it would go down from there. This is my next tool. And I know this is gonna be surprising to hear because you see, you hear about certain ChatGPT. As a thinking partner, Henry just got way too excited. I'm hype.

Um I'm so sorry if I am. I hope I'm not poisoning any waters in different places. I really hope that that's like I really got to do more research about it, but damn it, the the the assistance it gives someone who does like so many different tasks. I'll sit there and have a have a conversation with um the tool because I'm looking for patterns that I myself, with all these things floating in my brain, I can't see some of the patterns that are obvious at times. It's almost like when you look, you say, you know, when you look at the uh the mirror on your card, it says objects may uh seem closer than what they are. I feel like that's proximity-wise what happens with my business is that I can't see the obvious things. So I've done things even like tell me what all my album titles have in common, and I'll feed it like 10 album covers. It already has this information. I'm not giving anything no. And it'll say, hmm, based upon these titles, you tend to use this many syllables. Based upon these patterns, you tend to uh use a lot of nostalgic themes based upon that. And I sat there and thought, and I said, okay, this is when it becomes artificial becomes assisted intelligence and not artificial intelligence.

People keep saying, oh, AI is a tool, AI is a tool. But a lot of people are not using it as a tool because they're a tool themselves. A lot of them let me talk about it. Let me talk about it. You say AI is a tool, but you're the tool actually. Hey, for a whole for a whole deep dive on AI with Curtiss King, because he is unfiltered as fuck. Come on over to the Patreon. Subscribe right now because we will we will get all into AI here shortly. One last thing about that though. One last one less. Okay, give him one little more. A little smidget. Yeah, it's a little smidget. So we'll strip it. Beanie Siegel said, my voice was affected because he was unfortunately shot and his vocal cords were permanently damaged. He's using it as a tool to get his old voice back. Yep. I may I'm loving that. A1. DOC got in a car accident. He's using it as a tool. For those of you that are able-bodied and able to use your voice, but you're too lazy to put your 10,000 hours in. AI is your new Viagra.

For your music. It is your new enhancement. I call it, I call it impromptual dysfunction. I know. Impromptual dysfunction. That's enough. We're gonna get into that video in the Patreon because that shit's crazy. Answer your question about I'm sorry, what was the original about that? Well, we were on tools. You were on tools. And you were on ChatGPT. Oh my gosh. so we got, yeah, so we got um website, obviously. We got you know, Kunaki for like physical CDs, vinyls, uh, et cetera. We got um Flodesk for email marketing, you know, whatever you might uh you know want to use there, and we got ChatGPT. Anything else that you think people should include in their like starter kit? Okay, Bandcamp. Yeah, I I know there's some really sketchy politics about their new ownership, but Bandcamp has an app, even has an app as well. Um, those are the ones uh also uh mixed by Ali engineers has a new platform. Yeah. shout out to Ali.

I would love to get him on the podcast if you have any connections there, bro. Because he's doing I could I could make I could I can see because I mean he's he's doing some really really dope stuff. Well, and as an engineer, like I'm obsessed with the guy. Yeah, but it's okay. Well, exactly. But like engineers is totally not even it's not even engineer specific anymore. Like the shit he's grown. Yeah, the shit he's launching now, it's like all encompassing, it's really cool. So I'm excited to see. They got a new direct to consumer part of engineering. I know, yeah. I saw that's that's awesome. All right, cool. So that's that's a good that's a good start. That's a good list for sure. Yeah, um, all right. How speaking. of Canva. Oh, my god, I'm sorry. I use Canva every day of my life. Yeah, canva. Yes. I know I hate Canva. I mean, I love Canva, but I I hate. I'm so glad I don't have to I use Canva. Yeah. We pay for Canva. I don't ever use it. I'm in Canva. Sorry, man. For $12, brother, I you know how many graphic designers I want to fight? I just want to line them up in a row.

I just want to fight them for the next seven days because of how many of them use templates from websites that were just like Canva. And I look and I say, Oh my god, that's my artwork that I paid $400 for. You find out, yeah, you see the template later, and you're like, that looks like exactly like my shit. Same font, same positioning. All they did was take my money and interchange my name. I can do that. Yeah. So, you know, speaking of our Patreon, head over to the Patreon. But like, should artists have, you know, paid communities, do you think? Is that part of your you know, direct to consumer model? All hands on deck. Okay. I know I'm gonna be one of the rare people who say this and and it's gonna feel very lonely, especially when you're trying to limit your subscriptions. And I understand wanting to do what makes sense, but stop learning on stop waiting until the perfect situation to then learn how to do the thing. I think that if you learn how to build a website now with no website visitors, that's the best time to make mistakes.

And then when people come, you'll learn like, oh, my website is not accommodating. You know, I was telling a buddy of mine today, I was like, he showed me his website that he's selling his sound packs and things on, and I said, he said, how do you think of it? I said, first of all, turn the background to white because the page is gonna load faster. And most of the most multi-million, multi-billion dollar companies that sell digital products are on white backgrounds, Best Buy, Apple, um, whatever you can think of. They're all on white backgrounds. Didn't know that. Yeah, it's interesting. There's a psychology to it. So like these things that are so easy, because I know we're artsy, and we want to make sure the background is. But I want my black background Curtis dark mode. I want dark mode. I really do. I know, I really do want dark I'm so glad you just said it so that when I say it later, he'll be like, Oh, yeah, fuck Curtis. Damn it, Curtis. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, every everywhere you buy from, they come on Amazon. That's true. Last time we saw a black background on Amazon. Well, I don't know if we're gonna have millions of people coming to, you know, our site, but we will. Well, eventually.

They said that if they said if there's if their website so much as misses two or three seconds, they lose like ten million dollars. Yeah, that's insane. That's just a little different, but so you think people should have Patreons or like, you know, paid Discords, etc. And same philosophy, like start now. Like there's not some threshold for like trying to how how dare us as artists think that we know what's best for people that want to invest into us. Yeah. That's a good one, right there. Yeah, that's great. Somebody says, hey, I know you're just getting started, but you just working on this new thing inspired me to finally take a chance on my new thing, and I would love to compensate you for that inspiration. Yeah. Oh no, I can't take that, man. Music's not ready yet. Give it about seven months. You're gonna remember me. I promise. Yeah. Then I'll come back for that seven dollars. No, anything all hands on deck. Move through it with as much confidence as you can that you're building for tomorrow.

It's not gonna all come just because you build it. But when you start building it and you make it available, you'll be surprised how many people say, five bucks? I'll pay more for a service like Netflix, and I don't even like it half the stuff that's on there. Yeah, you were just shitting on all Netflix content. Literally, like yesterday, I'm pretty sure. They're pumping it out, man. Damn man. Well, this has been inspiring. Uh Curtis, we're gonna wrap up this portion of the episode with the I don't think Curtis is very familiar with this segment. It is yet again his second rapid fire rampage. Let's see if he can level up. I think he did really good last time. I'm sure he did. I'm gonna rewatch it after this, but we will see. I got some fresh portions. They are it's the same format. We're gonna just start with some short answer questions, some this or that, and some word associations. Let's jump right in. If an artist watching this wants to get started with DTC today, they are wholly inspired by this interview. What are the first three moves you'd recommend they make right now? Bandcamp.

Flodesk. Take it off take it off Opify. Okay, website. Yeah, no good. Okay. Yeah. Let's not worry about that. There's so many steps. Even as I say website, I started to think like that's gonna be a bit of a process, but I think that that's gonna be the most important part of the process is that you have got your subscription. I use Wix. So let's just say Wix. We've yeah, yeah, we've usually done it. We've done it. And you know what Wix has also that I think people don't talk about is that they have um one of the only storefront stuff? Storefront, but also pay what you want is uh uh uh something that they already make. A default feature. Oh, cool. Yeah. They don't have to even add it as a on Shopify sometimes, yeah. I love that. So is it safe to say you're a fan of the pay what you want model? I I actually have that as a question. Okay. I definitely am because boy, oh boy, when when when I I've never sold an album in my entire career for a hundred dollars. I've been doing this for 20 years until I made one available in 2023 at the end of December.

And the first person that did it said, I'm not even here for the music. I just thank you for everything that you've been doing on the content space. Wow. Simply because I made it available, and then after that, it happened for the first time. Then it happened Ten more times after that. Bro, do podcasters do pay what you want ever? Would we be the first? We could be the first pay what you want podcast. Interesting. I need you to put some respect on one more time podcast. Let's start Indie. Thank you. I don't think we treat it like that enough. Indie media is a thing. Somebody gotta somebody got a bang for y'all. Indie media is a thing. I'm glad that Curtis is banging. Shut up? What the fact that you guys can just interview whoever you want, however you want, how long you want, say whatever you want to say in the process. You are independent as in the things we all have in common are that we want our autonomy. We want our freedom to do what we want to do and not be held down by somebody saying, I don't think you should do that.

I think you should interview more premier signed artists. The fact that you have people knocking down your doors, that's indie. That's DIY. Damn. Man. Yeah, it's funny how we get this advice for independent artists, but how much of it applies to us and our situation. It's the only reason we do this podcast. Now, at this point, It's amazing. It's just for help with our own career. My mind, I'm like, just like we gotta fucking launch that website, man. I know, like, I can't believe it took us this long to get the Patreon up. Literally, we were those guys like, we need to have 40,000 followers before we do a Patreon. Yeah, no. It's like completely flipped. You know, I did the same thing? God, So lame, though. So lame. Moving on. Uh, this is a fun one. Curtis, describe the deal that a major label would have to offer you right now in order to get you signed today. Um, deal with me. I'm not going anywhere. That's the deal. There is there is no I I there is nothing about that. The more that I've done stories, which is why if it interests any artists to do reaction videos, you should do them just from a researcher standpoint.

I used to be like anti the industry because of my own experiences. And then I started to dive into just how treacherous it is. And now I can present in my mind like 16 videos where I'm like, why would anybody in their right mind? That's a big part. Anybody in their right mind want to get into this bit into bed with them. And we see how this thing plays out. So for me, more power to their business model and their and their their Zania Monet's and their AI girlfriends and boyfriends. And hey, I hope you guys have a long marriage. But for me, nah, I truly, I truly, truly, as crazy as I sound, I love that this all falls on me. And I'm expanding my team this next year, but it's gotta be people who understand. Like if you don't love this, you'll quickly hate it. Yeah.

Damn, there it is. Powerful. This one's gonna get kind of deep here. Um, Curtis, what is your most controversial food opinion? I think that tacos with ketchup on them has a bad name for it. Well, yeah. That sounds horrible. It sounds disgusting. First of all, first of all, you guys have been really respecting them up until now. Is that some LA shit? Like, what is that? No, I can't. Don't you say that? People are clicking off the video right now. I need you to bring it back. Let them let them. I will never stop. I will never stop. It's specifically, yeah, I'm a menace. It specifically has to be, it's not, I don't do not the carnage side. Put the sauce on that. I'm talking about like like like ground beef, ground, like like the ground. Like a cheeseburger taco type shit. I don't like like, yeah, I'm like, okay. And even like, you know, maybe even some chicken tacos. I'll put a little ketchup on those. Damn. That's my controversial. Hey, there's nothing more. If you ask my audience, they already know they like this fool likes ketchup on his tacos, and they judge me for it.

I'm judging you for it. Let's move on quickly. All right. Quickly. Curtis, look in your crystal ball and give us your best guess on the relationship between AI and music five years from now. Uh, I think this current bubble that they're excuse me, this current push that they have right now to get artists to quickly accept it, music listeners to quickly accept it. I think that they will see that bubble pop. I think it will be successful at some point, but I think at the speed that they're pushing it, no way in hell because people are not having it. I think this is a time period where the tech bros are showing how out of touch they are with human beings, listening to Mikey, whatever the guy's name is from Suno say, making music's not even fun. Sir, this is a live recording, and we can see that was insane for sure. Like that blew my mind.

And then he doubled down when an interviewer tried to give him a lob, like, well, you don't really mean that. Like, you're like, you know, he said, no, it's just not enjoyable at all. Okay, all right there. You might be a cyborg from 2052. We're not there yet. In terms of us, I think that this is a time period where with all the division, I think with with the direction of the economy, the arts are the most important that they've ever been, right? We're we're literally fighting with the authenticity of the things we see. We don't know if that's a real thing. People are getting uh scam calls from people that sound like their their family or their mother uh getting kidnapped. Like we need human experiences. We need live shows more than we've ever needed them. We also, after coming through the TikTok era of quote unquote talent, where really wasn't any talent, we want to see people do things like play the drums on our MPC, play the drums live, sing live. I think we fiend for that.

And I think that they're overestimating how much we don't care about nuance today in this generation. Will it be something different in the future? I'm sure. But right now, that bubble's gonna pop. And a lot of these companies that are getting all this funding are gonna owe those investors a whole lot of money. I just think they're going around it so reckless. You know, I I I don't like the fact that they use a lot of minority faces to be the front end, taking all the the the arrows for this stuff. I just it just it it to me, it looks like something that is temporary. So my my prediction is that the labels are gonna fall in love with it because they've been working human beings like machines, and now they're gonna have machines and they're gonna realize oh, that's why we didn't do this before. So my prediction that my crystal ball, and I could be so off, is that this bubble will pop and uh ram prices for computers will go back down to a reasonable level, and not 400% where they're at right now. Hopefully.

Yeah, I do agree. The the just AI and virtual reality and the glasses are coming. Uh, do you think like human experiences are gonna have like a renaissance, you know, that counterculture? Everything always balances out in the end. And if you thought that rant on AI was good here in the Rapid Fire rampage, head on over to the Patreon because just wait. Because holy shit, this guy clearly has an opinion on AI music. Right. Anyways. Only a couple more of the short answers here. You must delete three apps from existence. Facebook. Three apps? I don't know. I'm gonna look at my phone real quick. Well, hopefully you don't have them on your phone. I can do I can do without some of these. Facebook. I'm saying from existence, you don't even have to have it on your phone. Oh no, Facebook. Damn, Facebook catching strays. Uh Instacart.

Ooh. I don't need Instacart no more. RIP. And if it has to be a social media, Twitter. Get it out of here. Give me IG and YouTube. I'll be good. I don't even do you guys even watch cable anymore? No, no, of course not. Not in years. No. I thought about it last night. I was like, I went to my room to go fold. I went to room to go fold up clothes. And I said, I wonder who uploaded a new video on YouTube. Excuse me? Who are you? That's cable now. Last one of the short answer. Typically, my last question of the short answer is always, what's your favorite curse word? We already asked Curtis that. So I'm going with what is your favorite clean curse word substitute? Lint liquor. Yes. Okay. Great commercial. That's a classic. I like I like what you tried to do there, but he did it. What do you mean? try No, he did great. I mean, the question, you know. Oh, well, yeah, thanks. All right.

Fair enough. I mean, oh okay. Moving on. This is the this or that. Curtis, you already know how it works. Let's get it going. Starting with email list or SMS list. Email list. One time drops or monthly memberships. Monthly memberships. $100 from 100 fans or $1 from 10,000 fans. $1 from 10,000 fans. More good products or less great products? More good. Oh, wait, wait, wait. What's the question again? More good products or less great products. Like have fewer great. It's kind of confusing the way you're. Yeah, yeah, that kind of got me a little bit. Like, because I definitely want there to be as much greatness as possible. So at the expense of quantity. Yes. How about make great great again? I'll take that. I'll take that.

Yeah. This is shittily worded question, so we'll take whatever answer we can get. Comment down below if my question made sense to you when you when I said it. Yes. I want to know. Let's get the general public's consensus. Anyway, um, AI or AI. Allen Iverson. Fair enough. Stay tuned for the Patreon portion. Allen Iverson never poisoned waters in Memphis. It's all I've known. Crossing people up in Memphis, but he never poisoned the waters in Memphis. You know that? He never helped you with your multitasking either. Anyway, we won't get into that right now. Yeah, let's let's let's Patreon Henry. He's helping it. Um touring or content? Content. Unknown but respected. Or internationally famous, but most people think you're kind of annoying. Unknown but holy shit. I did not expect you to hit that last one. Yeah, that was great. Unknown but respected.

I like it. Um, this one I'm actually curious with with what everything you do. Your Wi-Fi only works for uploading, or your Wi-Fi only works for downloading. Upload and I already have enough on these flash drives and hard drives. I thought he was gonna go there. And last one, quit music or lose an eye. Excuse me? Quit music or lose an eye. You said Quit music or lose an eye. Quit music or lose an eye. That's an eye for an eye. I lose an eye. Hey, I think you look good with an eye patch, personally. He does give me eye patch energy, bro. Eye patch is crazy. You don't see how I seem like a pirate. You're not gonna go with the fake, the weird fake eye, are you? You gotta go with patch. Curtis with a glass eye. I'm a little scared. I'm a little afraid of the fake eye because I feel like I would be the type of person to say something thought provoking, and they would just kind of flip themselves. I'm one of those people I feel like. I feel like that's a guy that's a humor with me.

Oh Lord. Definitely patch. Last section is the word association. Last section is the word association. You know how it works. If you don't know how it works out there, you're about to find out. Starting with music, passion, AI music, soulless, lyricism, mastery. Superfan. Family. Cringe. Necessary. I love that. Actually. YouTube. One word. TV. Maybe like maybe, you know, you could be new TV. There you go. We'll take that. Beat theft. Bastards. Waffle House. Rumble. Yeah. Six seven. Shut up, son.

No, bro. Yeah. Is your kid on that? Yeah. Oh my god. I'm gonna quickly tell him. You know how how I messed it up? I just said 789. He said. Gotta shut him up there. I'm so grateful that my kids are too young to be doing that shit. Yeah, you missed the cutoff. Oh my god. They don't know about it. Thanks. Goodness. Shock G. Two words. Digital underground. We're living in it. Guilty pleasure. YouTube Urban Explorers. Should we should we? No. Okay. Don't unpack that. We don't have time. Emoji. Ranch Hammer DIY. Direct to consumers. Let's go. This has been Curtiss King on the One More Time Podcast. If you want exclusive bonus footage, this episode's all about direct to consumer. Support the One More Time Podcast.

Subscribe to the Patreon. We're heeding the advice. We're talking all things AI. This guy's clearly already shown you he is out of pocket when it comes to this conversation. Yes. Appreciate you coming on, man. We're gonna head over to the Patreon. Thanks, man. Thanks, man.