We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Stuart Singleton. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Stuart below.

Stuart, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Almost all entrepreneurs have had to decide whether to start now or later? There are always pros and cons for waiting and so we’d love to hear what you think about your decision in retrospect. If you could go back in time, would you have started your business sooner, later or at the exact time you started?

I’m a big believer in “everything happens for a reason”. Before I started Cake Records, I had several other businesses that I had run. While I wish I had more of a specific vision for what I wanted to do when I was younger, the experiences and lessons from running businesses from the day I turned 18 are the reason I am able to have more of a focus now. Without trying out a ton of different aspects of the music business, I never would have been able to find what I love to do. Some people get too focused on the destination that they forget to enjoy the journey.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Ever since I can remember, my parents told me if I could find a job I love to do, I would never have to work a day in my life. When I was around 15 years old, I forced myself to sit down and think about what possible field I could work in every day and still want to come back to more the next day. I wrote down everything I was interested in at the time and tried to decide which one I wanted to pursue.

After months of self-deliberation, I came to the realization that every day no matter what mood I was in or what time it was, music was always there for me. And I haven’t looked back since.

While recording people in my basement and interning at multiple studios around Nashville, I was able to start developing skills as a sound engineer. While I was interested in engineering, it wasn’t the only aspect of the music industry that fascinated me. I wanted to start a record label and learn about every part of the music industry. When I was a junior in high school, I started a record label called Mattress House Music. While still in high school, I was researching bands all over the country that I thought had good songs, but not great recordings.

I would reach out to these artists, book them in studios, and promote their music. Now that I had a roster of artists I was working with, I knew they needed to start playing shows. When one of the artists told me they couldn’t get a show because they didn’t have enough ‘likes’ on Facebook, I thought well, I can book a show for you. So I started organizing shows the summer after my junior year of high school. During this whole process, I decided to skip my senior year of high school and go straight to Belmont University.

Once I got to Belmont, everyone and their mother was starting a new band of some sort, and what do bands need? You guessed it, more shows. Because of that, I started booking shows as often as possible. Sometimes I would have as many as three shows on the same day. During that time, I worked with and met a lot of incredible artists, but after two years there, I got an opportunity to work for a small artist management company in town.

Through this opportunity, I was able to spend all my time working with artists and assisting in every aspect of promotional campaigns, including digital advertising and radio promotion. After working there for several months, I decided to take some time off to focus on what I really wanted to do in the music industry.

A year or so had gone by, and I got a message from Matt Royer over Instagram, and we started talking. Realizing we had a lot of similar interests, we decided to meet up. That’s where I met Will Newman and Bryce Thwaits and then reconnected with Nathan Fouts, who went to the same middle school and junior high as me.

Matt, Will, and Nathan had been working relentlessly to create a lot of new music over the past several years but didn’t have anyone specifically focused on the business side of things. After talking for a few weeks we decided that the best way for all of us to work together was to start a label, and Cake Records was born.

While still working at Cake Records, I also took a job for a music administration company called Exploration. During my time there, I learned a lot about royalties and every place to collect them from, why people aren’t getting paid for songs, and how to make sure artists are getting every cent.

Since starting Cake Records, we have released over 200 songs, with many more on the way. This year we have released songs with just_omalley, Jyou, Casein, jiabeats, Nathan Piland, and MyceliumBug, with more coming from Goody, Classic Williams, and Hew G. We also spend a lot of time writing for other artists and have the ability to make tracks in any style. One of our biggest strengths at the moment is playlisting. We have a database of thousands of playlist curators of all genres that we can tap into for every release and have recently had a lot of opportunities with Editorial playlists. On top of that, figuring out how to generate algorithmic growth for Spotify profiles helps our releases exponentially. We’re only getting started!

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

Word of mouth brings us the most clients, as well as a strong social media presence. When you do a great job at something, people always want to tell their friends.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

Recently, I read Soundtracks by Jon Acuff, and Atomic Habits by James Clear. Both of these books have a lot of great tips for life and business.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://allmylinks.com/cakerecords
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cakerecords/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thecakerecords
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/cakerecords
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/thecakerecords
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTc_RZOOtHGiUnx63YvpP_g

Image Credits
Stuart Singleton, Kyle Somers