We caught up with the brilliant and insightful The BLK LT$ a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
The BLK , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?
As a full time creative, its a blessing that I am able to support myself while being able to work on my craft. After years of studying, practice and trail an error working on my own music, I am now able to lend my talents to others thru songwriting, production, vocal. production and engineering. Everyday I work with someone else it pushes me to grow and expand which in turn helps me to get better when approaching my music. Although sometimes it can be exhausting while working long hours and sometimes missing time with family or being able to work on my own craft its a continued flame to help me get better expand my network and encourage others in my field to do the same, by stepping out of the box and becoming more. self sufficient.
The BLK , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I started off in this industry, very young, hungry, and wanting to learn. I would constantly ask questions and purchase items that I would need in order to be able to do my craft on my own time. Now over a decade plus later I am able to utilize what I have learned from many other producers and songwriters, with other upcoming artist, producers, and engineers who are now in the position I once stood in. Sometimes we stand in our own way by not taking the time to learn, so most of the time when I am working with Artist, I like to give them advice and tips on ways they can become self-sufficient like learning DAW programs, studying the music business, studying other musicians, their techniques, their blueprints, and ways they can apply those things to their music. I am very proud that I am able to teach my clients and even my fans about different ways they can be an artist by experiment with the knowledge they gain as they continue to learn in this industry. Nowadays, it can be very expensive trying to be an artist, no matter what that may be, but if you can take the time to learn how to do some of the baseline things that are required to get the job done, it makes it easier to afford other things that you may not have the skills for i.e. marketing, visuals, video production things like that.
What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?
As a musician, I feel like streaming has really hurt the financial stability for Artist. We are not paid as much as we used to be paid when people were buying physical copies or were only able to download and purchase the songs online. In order to create a thriving ecosystem for artist I feel, it’s very important that fans really show support to artist by sharing the music, purchasing singles and albums when they come out not just having monthly subscriptions. Go out to shows see them live! Purchase merch all of these things. It’s become very difficult especially for independent artist to even create the music sometimes because of the unfair pay for Songwriter‘s and producers due to streaming, so I feel like the best thing people can do is support them in ways outside of the streaming world, I think they will also be pleasantly surprised by the other types of assets that are being offered beyond the music playing online
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
One lesson I had to unlearn in the past was being available to everyone for everything. I feel like as a multi faceted artist a lot of the times I just wanted to be in rooms and just wanted to work with people because I was either a fan or loved the things that they had created that I forgot to value my own creativity, and what I brought to the table. Realizing that I wanted to do this as a full-time job and wanted to make music for myself I knew that I had to make sure that I was being compensated. Sometimes up-and-coming song writers and producers are not paid because they want you to gain “experience”, which is totally understandable, but after being in this industry for a long time and becoming a necessity in a lot of big rooms I realized that I was no longer doing this “for experience” I was actually just being used and that is something I had to unlearn. I had to make sure that like everybody in the room I was just as valuable and needed to be paid the same way as everyone else if you don’t put your foot down, especially in the music industry, you will get taken advantage of. I do believe that there are circumstances where money doesn’t compare to the experience, but that is to be judged at your own discretion. Having a family I know TIME is worth more than some paying jobs so I choose wisely, I am no longer afraid to ask for what I am owed and I am not afraid to say “Thanks, but no thanks”
Contact Info:
- Instagram: theblklts
- Facebook: theblklts
- Twitter: andreenamusic
- Youtube: www.youtube.com/andreenamusic
Image Credits
Zoe Shinn, 88everything