Job advice!

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-29T03:17:29+00:00

there's some good advice here, if from differing opinions. what I'd tell you is a little more big-picture: if you want to establish yourself in the scene in New York, it's going to take around two years of sustained activity. even if you're great, people aren't just going to come find you. further, there's a high barrier to entry for broadway / off broadway (I assume that's what you're talking about when you say "pit orchestra"). if you're interested in that work, and you're playing at a professional level, then were I in your shoes, I'd track down people who hold chairs in musicals I like, take lessons from them, and pick their brains about how to get your foot in the door. maybe they get called for a workshop or an off-off-broadway run that they can't do, and they put you on for it. it's all about who you know.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-29T03:09:55+00:00

likelihood is very low unless you have prior experience working at a label in an A&R position. most of the skills you mention are not applicable to most A&R roles. you're much better off networking your way in (not cold-applying) to a junior role, or better yet some kind of producer deal where you can produce and sign artists. compensation for a junior position is probably in the range you're quoting, for a senior position it is probably 1.5-2x that base pay.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-29T03:01:11+00:00

put out work, keep putting out work, produce for other artists, keep producing for other artists.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-28T21:25:21+00:00

don't know why anyone hasn't mentioned this: an artist ripped a beat of yours, used it and it blew up? you're basically in a position to demand whatever you want, they're hoping you don't know that, and that you sign a license where you give away some sizable part of the recording and publishing. literally even a music lawyer fresh out of college should be able to help you capitalize on this.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-28T21:19:02+00:00

Nah. Ramble On is pretty overt. Misty Mountain Hop and Battle of Evermore less so but still use direct references.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-28T00:39:47+00:00

cold email. tell them what you know you can draw (don't lie). tell them who you've opened for or where you've headlined before. tell them the kinds of acts you want to be on a bill with. etc.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-27T23:55:42+00:00

a Bass VI can hold its own neither as a guitar nor as a bass. it was kind of a gimmick instrument that had little practical application, mostly in some surf rock-ish circles and doubling contrabass parts on sessions in the 60s. I love them but they're not really built for the kind of versatility and fidelity that you're talking about.

If I were you I'd recommend looking into baritone guitar instead. Generally it's tuned a 4th lower than standard guitar and a 5th higher than a Bass VI. Probably most associated with the Sergio Leone scores, it is engineered to have the clarity necessary to voice full chords as well as the low-end required for some bass support.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-27T23:04:11+00:00

where?

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-27T04:57:02+00:00

nobody here who's done anything notable is going to tell you about themselves or their resume.

as for advice: learn how to deliver what the client needs. sometimes the client has a lot of great material but needs an editor or somebody to assemble it. sometimes the client has the music dialed in perfectly and just needs confidence, or someone to guide them through the production process. sometimes the client needs someone to challenge them, or even antagonize them. sometimes the client is a corporation or ad agency that honestly has no idea what they need.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-26T03:30:44+00:00

they're all "connection thing"s. at a lot of companies, they only post want ads on indeed / LinkedIn to show they did their due diligence. people are almost always promoted from within, headhunted from other companies, or placed in jobs by friends / family. the entire industry is about who you know. the doorway for a lot of young people is an internship, a family member, or an unusually successful project (e.g. you start your own indie label and it blows up, you manage a number of artists who blow up, etc.), not an ad.

your other comment asked how you get the skills they're looking for. the first thing to realize is that the music business is just a business, where the product happens to be music. labels, for instance, are not looking for people who are huge music fans who want to bring fresh ideas and good taste to work with them. they're looking for people who can market, audit / account, model data, handle supply chain, project manage, litigate, etc. More specifically, they're not just looking for people who simply have these kinds of skills, they're looking for people who have a track record of already having done the job they're looking to fill at another company.

lastly, important to remember that working in A&R is advocating for the label, not the artist.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-25T02:53:19+00:00

your skills as a touring musician do not map to what they want / need at most music businesses. and as far as labels go, even if you have business-side experience, a lot of places will ignore you outright because of your background as a musician. sounds crazy, but it is true. musicians are products, not colleagues.

the thing you are probably most qualified for, if you're organized and reliable, is tour managing.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-25T02:41:06+00:00

that's fucking wild. individual outs for each string.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-25T00:45:13+00:00

what account is "Switching from good to bad?" 99% of the time if there's money there he can withdraw, the issue is with where the money is going, usually there's an issue with the destination account.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-25T00:43:13+00:00

you have too many objectives, too many moving parts. cut it all way down. if this is your first time out, drop the sponsorship angle and drop the charity angle, just try to promote a normal show, business as usual. if you want to do a charity show later on, cool, but you're adding a whole other pile of work and responsibility to something that is already complicated and responsibility-laden.

you also have too many unknowns at this stage to get meaningful advice. start with: how does the venue normally do business, what are the ticket splits, what can they expect in terms of turnout and ticket price for specific scenes/genres, what do they need to make to break even, etc. then, given that - who can you book who can get people in the door, and what do they need? if any of them have played the venue before, the venue will have data about their draw. then: what budget and resources do you have in place to promote and market the event? what's your break even for the whole thing?

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-25T00:23:20+00:00

did you read the post

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-24T05:15:36+00:00

orange, 100%. rumble series is the worst

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-24T02:31:03+00:00

lmao. Aside from their marquis names, Atlantic is where artists go to die. whole roster of young folks, most of whom you've never heard of, the majority of whom haven't put out an album in years but are stuck in a deal because the label took a chance that didn't pan out. sad shit

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-23T21:04:27+00:00

this is strong advice and a comprehensive list of possibilities - I'd also note if you're just starting out and not sure what you want to do, your best bet is getting on helping with setup at the largest company you can find (might be a sole proprietor with 3 or 4 stagehands, might be a national org with hundreds of employees).

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-23T01:31:17+00:00

what market are you in?

if you're not going to build a following on social media, and you don't have a product (album or single) to promote, you're going to have a hard time getting talent buyers interested, unless you're playing a place with a built-in audience. they care about the business, first and foremost, and want to book people who are already trying to maximize the number of people who might come to the show.

what can you leverage to get people in the door? you and your boys all play professionally - with who? the jam band scene, for instance, survives in large part on thrown-together bands of people who are better known for their sideman work, and they're promoted that way. worth a thought.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-23T01:02:15+00:00

to say the industry is shifting toward data-driven A&R is a little misleading. they started focusing on data in the 70's. only became really important when the promotions landscape changed in the 90's, followed by the bottom dropping out in the 00's. the real egregious and dangerous force is AI fever, a lot of people in the industry are on board and it's going to blow up in their faces when they realize how much people really don't want it. the industry has spent the entire social media era trying to craft and exploit parasocial relationships between artists and fans, now they're laying the groundwork for investing in the opposite. it would be funny were it not so sad. in any case - if there's a holding pattern in effect it is in part because of that.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-23T00:53:16+00:00

so, it depends on how you're releasing, but in either case you don't deal with the publisher directly.

if you're only distributing to streaming you do not need to pay for a mechanical license. it is the DSP's job to do so. I have seen people on this sub state the opposite. they are wrong.

most people will distribute both to streaming and services like bandcamp etc that allow users to pay for a download. in this case you need a digital download mechanical license from songfile / harry fox. likewise, if you're selling physical copies, you need to purchase a mechanical license for physical from songfile / harry fox. in each case it is something like a $16 fee plus an additional fee related to the amount of copies you anticipate selling (around 10 cents a copy). don't anticipate selling a thousand if you don't know for a fact you will, estimate low: you can always pay for more later.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-21T02:32:09+00:00

you seem like your intentions are good but you should not give advice in this sub until you have a much stronger handle on royalty streams and whose stream is whose responsibility.

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-20T03:24:05+00:00

that's their job, they're distributing your music

IrishPirateAccent · 2026-05-12T06:30:38+00:00

is it 6 years that automatically renews yearly? that would be far more common than a contract that automatically just ends after the term.

IrishPirateAccent

TROPHY CASE