What is an Artist Manager?

YMCMB's Drake and Manager Cortez Bryant.

Every artist knows that they need a manager, but most don’t know to the extent that a manager is needed or the services a manager offers. A manager becomes the artist’s best friend, which is why a lot of the times it ends up being a parent or the smartest friend. But a manager has to have experience, connections to gatekeepers, and a proactive attitude. There are also certain responsibilities that self-proclaimed managers don’t know about and their young artists don’t know to have them handle.

The number one thing artists should know about their relationship with their manager is that the artist is the employer and the manager is the employee. Putting your future in the hands of your employee is both a gift and a curse. With this knowledge you know that the final decision is yours. The problem is you have to trust the decisions of your manager because they’re supposed to be the expert in getting your career from point A to point B. This is why it’s important to have a manager with experience.

SHOFLO: The Future Of TV

I’ve discovered a great and innovative creation for live broadcast events. The self-proclaimed new standard in industry cue sheets is called SHOFLO. It truly is an amazing way to keep business flowing even when the key personnel are spread across the world. It has so many features to ensure full connectivity between everyone you need that it will make your head spin. It is full compatible across almost any of today’s standard platforms, it is web based, and it lets you keep everything you need for your event in the cloud.

Protect Your Brand

As a manager one of the most important things to do for your talent is to protect their image. Making sure your talents content is properly placed in places that reflect positively on their brand is a key part of this. Protecting their content is the only way to have any control over placement. A TV show is no different. Sometimes clips of TV shows are used in music and other forms of media. There are ways to

The Tyesha Talks Show (L) Host: Tyesha Spells,
Marcellus, Yung Juve, and Adj B

protect the media, and there are fair ways for others to use the media.

When someone uses your content without permission there is a four-part test to determine if the user infringed. First and foremost you must own the copyrights or trademark. Secondly, the purpose of the use of the materials has to be either Educational, for reference in commentary like the news, or as a parody. Third they will see how much was used and how recognizable is the portion that was used.

Never Take A Loss, Get It In Writing

Drake has Future removed from his tour.

Mary J. Blige got $145,000 deposit for a show she didn’t do and is going to keep the money, Future wants $1.5 million for a tour he’s no longer a part of, and Kim & Kanye can sue the paparazzi for pictures.

Mind On Your Money

Snow On The Bluff (Promo)

Humans are understood to be creatures of habit. I’ve grown up seeing the same people doing the same things all of my life. It has been rare for me to even meet a successful person. My mentality on fame and success used to be, that’s a fantasy world. I once thought that in order to chase those big dreams you'd have to be crazy. So few people make it to that level of success, what are the odds of me being one of them? But now I ask myself, isn’t this the mindset that keeps the gap so big?