We were lucky to catch up with David Lowe recently and have shared our conversation below.
David , appreciate you joining us today. The first dollar you earn is always exciting – it’s like the start of a new chapter and so we’d love to hear about the first time you sold or generated revenue from your creative work?
I had just joined a platform for freelancers to see if I could find any clients on there. Very quickly, a cryptocurrency startup contacted me and said they wanted me to make a 1 minute song for them that sounded like an ODESZA song. I had only been producing for a few months but accepted the job offer. They were really happy with my work and paid me $1000! I thought I was going to be a millionaire in my first year as a freelance music producer. But guess what? That gig was a one off on the platform and I realized that reputation wins you clients not just hustling on someone else’s website. My first dollar earned (well first one thousand dollars!) but more importantly, a crucial lesson learned.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I was lucky enough to be born into a musical household (my Dad was a great pianist so I always heard his music in the house when I was a kid growing up). I then got into a few bands when I was in my teens & learned guitar. When I saw how many people played guitar, I started learning the bass & drums so I could get in bands more easily. Then I started playing Latin percussion in order to play alongside DJs in clubs. When I moved to Austin, Texas I was the lead singer, songwriter & guitarist for a band there. After being in bands, I was tired of being out of control so wanted to be able to create the entire songs & perform myself. So I taught myself how to program electronic music then taught myself how to DJ.
I currently have 2 main artist projects (LUCKYKAT & Katnap) and have produced around 100 songs and 5 albums across them both. I also created 2 new genres: High Contrast and Nu-Lofi.
I help my clients by creating beats using inanimate objects to tell a story using sound. For example, for a recent client, I recorded sounds in my kitchen & then edited these to form a 30 second song. This is fun because in a regular day, I always hear beats when I hear random sounds (cars, people, animals, trees etc). In theory, you can create a sound or beat from anything.
This work has attracted offers from bigger brands & I have just been contacted by someone to potentially work on a TV commercial & movie.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
I started electronic music production 4 years ago during the pandemic & because I got COVID really bad & nearly died. I learned Ableton for 16 hours a day while I was recovering. This helped get good at my craft faster than most producers. The lack of being able to make enough money from music to be sustainable early on was the biggest challenge but I will never give up. The world needs to hear my music. We rise
We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?
I focus on 2 main social media channels:
TikTok (https://www.tiktok.com/@luckykatmeowsic )
YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@LUCKYKATmeowsic )
For TikTok, I focused on short form content like when I live streamed a 2.5 hour DJ set then cut up the mashups into 1 minute clips. This helped me grow my following to 6500 followers.
For YouTube, I posted those short clips on YouTube Shorts which doubled my following in 1 month! I now have 600 subscribers. I also post my full songs which are longer form content to attract the fans who want to spend longer on my channel.
I think the key is to share your gift with your followers & fans and stay true to yourself.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://officialluckykat.com/
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/luckykatmeowsic
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/luckykatmeowsic/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/katnap
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/katnapmusic
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LUCKYKATmeowsic
- Other: Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/artist/263Sj9JhEp3usrQTJgfe5l
Image Credits
Photo credit: David Lowe / Katnap Music