In business, you have to take care of yourself last. You must pay employees, taxes, and your accountant before you pay yourself. When building a business or “brand” you must put work in and demonstrate your value to get paid. In my younger days, I had two chances to build with “nobody” emcees that I thought had something. I failed to put in the work and failed to find any value in myself. Let me tell you about the time, I ALMOST produced for Drake and Kendrick Lamar.
As a producer, you regularly network with people in the industry and hook up artists you like and see potential in, usually with free beats. This could lead to one record, none, an entire project. You never know. Catching the right artist at the right time can propel their career and yours. The best way to achieve this is, is to build your catalog constantly. You’ll end up putting in a lot of work that doesn’t pay. Selling music is like selling any other service. You have to build your value, demonstrate that value, then get paid when your value is on demand.
You have to build your value, demonstrate that value, then get paid when your value is on demand.
In 2008, I found Drake on MySpace and purchased a hard copy of his ‘Comeback Season’ mixtape. I was a fan. I contacted him via MySpace and he gave me his email. We sent some beats back and forth. He told me his verses cost $3000 at that time. Mind you, he was rapping on MySpace! He wasn’t shit then! I thought this guy was tripping and stopped communicating with him. He knew his worth, and the rest is history.
Earlier that same year, my guy Illest Illuminati was on tour with Tech Nine. He hit me up one day and told me about this artist Jay Rock that Tech had just signed, and brought on tour. He asked me to send some beats his way…the email address was “kdottde@____.com” — mind you at this point, NO ONE knew what TDE (Top Dawg Entertainment) was let alone who K Dot (Kendrick Lamar) was. Nothing came from this exchange, but I didn’t fully commit to the opportunity.
Years later, I was watching an interview with TDE, Jay Rock and Q mentioned that Kendrick chose the track order for their projects. They also mentioned that he has a huge hand in picking out beats for the team. I immediately remember that email address from years and years prior and realized I had sent Kendrick Lamar beats when he was a nobody
I didn’t follow up with Drake and Kendrick Lamar back in the day because neither situation immediately benefited me. I didn’t think I was one song away from my life changing, but you never know I guess. At the very least, a collaboration with either artist looks pretty on a resume and makes for a good story.
In retrospect, I’ve learned a lot about business from NOT producing for Drake and Kendrick Lamar. Business is about ‘eating shit’ at times and working for free. Building value and learning to leverage that value until you reach your destination. At first, your initial value is free work, then cheap work, and eventually, if you play your cards right, you’ll be in demand. While you’re building, you should always be paid your worth, but working for free will always be beneficial. Finding that balance is the hardest part.
