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Hello everyone! Welcome back to How to Break an Artist. Or should we say How to Make an Artist!

For this series, we are shaking things up a bit. Alfie is putting everything we’ve talked about so far into practice and has decided to bring you all along for the journey as he reenters the world as an artist. Each month, we are documenting every stage of the process with help and advice from experts along the way.

In this episode, we start in January 2025. Alfie is writing songs and hopes to get them made into demos to start thinking about releasing them. We will hear his songs go from rough ideas to fully formed tracks, with a masterclass in songwriting and home recording from Liz Horsman.

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We’ve missed you! Welcome back to our New Year’s Eve special, The A-Z of the Year 2024. In this special New Year’s bonus episode, the lads go through some of their favorite and biggest music news of the year from A to Z. Consider it the hootenanny of podcasts!

Let us know what we’ve missed and what’s on your list!

We hope you have a wonderful New Year and look forward to seeing you with a new series in 2025!

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Hello all, Alfie here, This week for the series finale we are joined by the one and only Gabrielle Aplin. Not only is she an incredible Artist, Songwriter and role model; she is the unsung hero of this podcast, bringing us stories and topics to talk about, reviewing the episodes and writing each week’s blurb…which this week is my responsibility. 

In my opinion, Gabrielle is a natural broadcaster, She effortlessly hosts this episode and brings in the topic of ’Superfans’. 

She talks about her experiences as a fan and as an Artist and shares great stories and anecdotes. We all examine different fan behaviours and the music industry's new found obsession with the ‘Superfan’. 

From Stan culture and fan conspiracies to golden circle tickets and gig etiquette; We also talk about Chappell Roan, Taylor Swift and much much more.

Thanks so much to Gabrielle for hosting this and thank you to all of you who support us and listen to the podcast. We really hope you enjoy the series finale. 

If you’d like to keep listening over the break we will be continuing to produce bonus episodes over on Patreon.

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Welcome back! In this episode we’re talking about the live music industry and who better to tell us all we need to know than a booking agent!

This week we are joined by Joanna Ashmore. Joanna has worked in all areas of live music and we couldn’t think of anyone better to join us for this episode. Joanna shares her experience and some cool anecdotes from her time working in grassroots venues, to supporting Blur in her band and booking shows for some of our favourite artists.

She also gives great advice for new artists trying to get their foot in the door like how to approach promotors and the way to conduct yourself in these live settings. Joanna and the lads also talk about the importance of grassroots venues for artists and the wider community and so much more in this weeks episode all about live music.

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This week the lads are delighted to be joined by sync expert, Tom Stingemore. In his own words he is “a long time major label, major publishing sync person. Pushing on eighteen years of doing sync for the world’s greatest artists and songwriters - in my own biased opinion.” We have to say we agree!

Tom has worked on some of the most iconic syncs during his time at Universal Records, BMG and Hypnosis such as the famous John Lewis Christmas ads and the iconic iPod adverts. However times are changing and brands are no longer making one or two big adverts a year, they’re making hundreds of pieces of branded content. Is traditional sync licensing able to keep up with the increasing demand? Or will brands and advertising companies start to opt for royalty free music? Tom tells us all about the inspiration behind his new company ALLOY sync distro. and what he’s doing to streamline the licensing process for commercial music in the social media age. 

@tomstinge @alloysyncdistro

https://www.alloysyncdistro.com/

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Welcome back! This week we're diving deep into an AI rabbit hole.

AI has proven to be both a blessing and a curse for many industries, but how is it affecting the music industry? You may remember the Beatles using AI for their recent single "Now and Then" to isolate John Lennon’s voice, or maybe you’re a fan of the new AI artist, Anna Indiana. However, AI-generated music first appeared back in 2016, and the lads take us back to the beginning to tell us all about it.

In this episode, Alfie and Fionnán chat about the legalities and ethics of AI, the alleged illegally trained AI machines by Udio and Suno, and YouTube’s plans to offer payments to artists willing to train their AI technology. It doesn’t just stop at music, though, as they also discuss the effects of AI on the gaming and film industries. All that and more chats in this episode!

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It’s summertime and for many musicians and music fans that means one thing… festivals!

We’re sure many of you have been to or are going to one this summer, or maybe you’re even playing at one! So in this episode we’re going to try and cover everything you need to know. 

Alfie shares his festival memories and tells us about the festivals he’s played with Hudson Taylor. How did they end up playing so many great stages at festivals? Is it just luck or are booking agents integral to being booked?

Fionnán accepts a hypothetical slot at a made up festival next week, and together the lads go over how they could make it work comparing it to Hudson Taylor’s budgets from 2022 festival season.

The lads also go over some of the issues faced by fans trying to attend festivals, obviously they talk Glastonbury! They also check in on some independent music festivals in the UK to see if they are experiencing the same success.

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Welcome back! We’ve been covering a lot of doom and gloom recently so we want to lighten things up a little this week with a catch up. 

Fionnán's got some big news. He’s changed his artist name to Fionnán Barrett, which is his own name (obviously!). He’s been thinking about it a lot and reveals to us why he’s done it and why it’s important to define who and what you are as an artist.

The lads catch up and reflect on the first time sharing a line-up together at the Never Fade sessions in London and finally tell us about the first time they wrote together.

We also hear exciting news from one of our listeners who shares exciting news about signing a US sync deal and loads of other stuff because as we know, Alfie loves to talk!

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