We recently connected with Jake Kitley and have shared our conversation below.

Jake, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. It’s easy to look at a business or industry as an outsider and assume it’s super profitable – but we’ve seen over and over again in our conversation with folks that most industries have factors that make profitability a challenge. What’s biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

It’s very difficult to make money in music. Most of your average fans will add your music to a Spotify playlist or listen on YouTube but until you get millions of streams it’s just not very lucrative for the artist. Gone are the days of physical album sales for most artists. While these things are great, if you want to support a musician there are several ways that I’m aware of (in order of cost) that appear to be more helpful which are:

1 Buy merch
2 Bandcamp.com
3 Patreon
4 Go to live show
5 Add songs to playlist (free)
6 Engage on social media (free)
7 Tell a friend (free)

As a musician there are two paths to take in this game which both have pros and cons. Stay independent and kind of do everything yourself. This route is more work but you have artistic freedom and get to keep all of the intellectual property. Option B is sign with a label. This route gives you better chances to be seen by the masses because you be immediately plugged in to the machine and all of its connections but you’ll lose your artistic freedom and a lot of the intellectual property rights. Having read through a “big time” contract myself I’ll stay independent for now.

Jake, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Hello, my name is Jake Kitley. I’m a multi instrumentalist, composer, music educator and steamer. My current passion project is my solo project, “Morel Compass”. The music I make for Morel Compass Can be anything from rock, funk, fusion, jazz, solo acoustic or solo bass. As an independent artist I’m given the freedom to put out whatever I’d like. Usually my compositions are influenced by my fans and followers.

A couple of pieces that I’m most happy with are, “I Can’t Deny”, “Cheese”, “Exalted” and “HGH Lake” all for different reasons. “I Can’t Deny” was the first song I was genuinely happy with my production and mix on. “Cheese” is a really goofy funk song inspired by my TikTok followers and a fan favorite. “Exalted” was my first attempt at making a funky gospel track. “HGH Lake” is a solo bass album again inspired by my fans.

All of those tracks mean something to me and they’re all very different. I feel blessed to be able to explore music instead of being trapped in a sound. It’s just so much fun.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I’m the kind of person that hates talking about myself but I’ve had to unlearn that in regards to promote my music. If you’re unwilling to promote yourself no one else is going to do it for you. Obviously there’s a line between too much and not enough but through trial and error you’ll find what you’re comfortable with. Now I find myself posting all the time about my music and the more I do it the less weird it becomes. If I can encourage anyone out there reading this please put your art out and tell people about it. Someone out there really needs you.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Building an organic audience online just takes time. There are “get followers quick” schemes but I tend to stay away from them. It seems like bot traffic and while it’s flattering it actually hurts you in the long run. My advice to anyone starting out is just start posting stuff. Do it fast like you’re ripping a band aid so you can’t talk yourself out of it. If you’re brand new the videos are likely going to be low quality. That is okay. Post them anyway. You will find certain types of videos do better than others. At that time shift gears into making those videos the absolute best that you can. Look into video editing tips and tricks often and remember the audio is more important than the video.

Side note – People are going to troll you. I’d tell you to ignore them but it’s hard. I’ve come to understand that people that troll either feel inferior or are just absolutely miserable on the inside. You can fix neither of those so just keep it moving when they rear their ugly Troll face.

Contact Info:

• Website: Mimorelcompass.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/morelcompassband/
• Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/MorelCompassStudios/
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCajXisj7rwWm7vRaHGSEl1A
• TikTok: @ Morel Compass Band

Image Credits
Chris Kent