There are a lot of areas in the music business that can crossover into different sections. A lot of times though you will see a lot of people/business’s who will find a niche and stick with that. For a manager this is definitely not the case.

Managers will be dealing with EVERY aspect of an artists career and it’s your job to be able to take care of your artist’s business in every area. Therefore it only makes sense that you need to be up to date all areas of the music business: labels, record deals, social media sites, marketing, touring, music videos, publishing, merchandise etc. etc. etc.

Honestly, as many different areas you can think of is how many you need to be educated in. It’s no news that times are changing and changing very rapidly. What may be the norm today maybe old news tomorrow so you need to be constantly educating yourself on what are the successful strategies used by…… well…… the successful people. And even they don’t have every answer and are still learning.

Books are certainly a good place to start. I’ve never met anyone who was dumber because they read TOO many books. Go to amazon.com and make yourself a list of required reading on these areas and make sure you do more reading on the topics that you don’t know a lot about. There are only so many hours in the day, so there’s no point in wasting them on reading things you already know. The point is to be educating yourself. If you just get one good idea out of a book, no matter how many pages, then the book was worth it.

However books can be out of date with the on going trends in the music business so make sure to tap into to other sources on the internet. Get a list of blogs together that you are going to read on a regular basis. Keep an eye out on any news story that has to do with artist management or any of the other areas you are trying to educate yourself on.

Remember, the more areas in which you can guide your artists to the most successful results the more successful you yourself will be.

It wasn’t but three weeks ago that the world heard the news that the King of Pop had left us. As many of us scurried to get our thoughts out on the social networks I decided to take step back and wait. I knew I would end up taking advantage of my blog to share some of my thoughts but I felt the need to really take some time to get some perspective on the whole situation.

MJ was the artist of my generation and it wasn’t until now that I look back and truly see what an impact he had on my life and musical career and up bringing. There are so many points where I can recall MJ popping into my life here and there and sometimes more so than others.

“Thriller” was released at the end of 1982 just a year and a half after I was born but MJ’s effect to hold quickly. By the time I was two I started to sing songs that we’re on the radio at home and when my mom drove me around. I had two favorites, “What’s Love Got To Do With It” by Tina Turner and “Billie Jean” by you know who. For Christmas that year I got a transformers boombox (it was Soundwave, the transformer whose chest was a cassette player that played other mini transformers disguised as tapes) and the first album that I got was……… you guessed it, Thriller. Let me just say that I wore that tape out to the max. To this day I can still remember taking that boombox with me where ever I went. I must have listened to human nature going to bed 1000 times, or at least it seemed that way. It wasn’t until MJ passed that I actually realized that “Thriller” was the first album I ever owned.

I became obsessed with the Thriller music video but the intro, where MJ turns into the werewolf, really scared the hell out of me. One night my family had rented the “Making of Thriller” vhs tape with all the behind the scenes highlights and everything. We stayed up late watching it and my Dad kept peaking out the window, telling me he was looking out for werewolves, just to scare me even more.

Many times after that MJ’s influence would pop up in my life but one of the instances I will always remember came during the spring in 1999. I started getting into drama senior year at my high school and was lucky enough to land the lead roll in the last play of my high school career. The play was Woody Allen’s “Don’t Drink the Water.” It was originally set in the 60’s but the director thought it would be fun to change the setting to the 80’s and add as many references to the time period as possible, and the 80’s were of course MJ’s defining decade. There was a scene where one of the characters got drunk and began to hallucinate. We thought this would be a good place to inject a dance sequence, re-creating the “Beat-It” dance, knife fight and all.

MJ wasn’t just the type of artist who just influenced music. He influenced life, because he himself was just so much larger than life. I have been a fan of Michael Jackson’s music since I can remember but I never got to see him live in concert and I never will. Instead I’ll just have to picture what it would be like watching MJ doing the moonwalk on stage, every time his music comes up on my playlists. R.I.P. Mike, it was fun while it lasted. Thanks for my very first album.

I’m a firm believer in paying attention to the past. Keeping an eye out on what has come before you can help you move forward to the future. It has been a long road to get Vindico where it’s at now. Did that road specifically start one year ago, five years ago, ten years ago? Who knows? I can give you a little background info, and a very brief summary of my music career, to see how I’ve placed things together to get to this point though.

I started playing bass when I was 13. I had been slowly building a record collection up to that point and had become increasingly more interested in music on a daily basis. I played in bands in high school, saw lots of shows, and even took a few music classes. When it was time for me to choose a career path I decided to major in music in college. 

In 2003 I graduated with a “jazz studies with an emphasis in music technology” degree from Webster University in my hometown of Saint Louis. Shortly thereafter I got a part-time job teaching Jazz Band at a local high school not to far from my house. I found myself learning more by actually having to “teach’ something whether then just trying to “learn” it.

During this period I got to experience, on a small level, what went into to having someone put their musical career in my own hands, for me to help them achieve the next level in their playing. Some of my guidance came through actual music lessons while many others came through giving advice in directing students in which direction to take their careers. I had some really amazing students during this time.

I had always wanted to start a record label, or some type of music business, and was waiting for the right time to do so. Pretty soon I realized I was stalling and if I didn’t make a move soon I would wait forever. I then began to lay the groundwork for what would be Vindico.

 I’ll lay out my first steps in starting Vindico in part 2, stay tuned.

Vindco, as fate would have it, was not started in L.A. It does not have offices in N.Y. As a matter of fact, Vindico has only one office and that’s in my basement, and my basement is in St. Louis. If I had to wait till I could afford to move to one of those cities to start a company, then I would probably never be in the music business.

It would be nice to be able to have lunch with a record exec or set up a meeting at an A&R’s office but the truth is………it’s not necessary. The Internet has provided us with enough opportunity to network with millions of other people without ever seeing them. Some of my strongest relationships are with people I have never seen, and that’s okay for now. There will come a time, where I can do lunch meetings or office meetings but until then I can still get an enormous amount of work done.

In this day and age most everyone is connected to the Internet by more than just email. Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and Youtube are just some of the many examples of the social networks that people are plugged into. When you are starting your own company, it is more than likely, that there are people out there who know more about your claimed “area of expertise” than you do. Don’t be afraid to scour these networks for those people who are already connected in the business and create relationships with them. Make it a point to find other people who do what you do and see what types of relationships are important to them. There will be many who reject you and many who will never respond but if you keep your nose to the grindstone, you will begin to grow your contact list onto names of people you can do business with.

One week I had emailed 300+ entertainment attorneys only to hear back from 10-15 of them. So remember, networking is not a five-minute chore that you cross off your list early in the morning. It’s something you need to be doing at any chance you get. Think about the types of connections you need in order for your business to succeed and focus on building those relationships. No business can thrive if they don’t network and develop relationships.

Vindico is excited to welcome CKDK to it’s roster of artists. Check back to see updates on the group and what Vindico has in store for them!!!

Welcome to Vindico Music Group. This is our first post for our blog. Simply put, we are an artist management and development company. We started with no magic secrets, no short cuts, no miracle contacts and no money. What we did start with was a tireless and diligent work ethic and efficient networking skills. From here on out we will be blogging not only our own opinions on the music business, but also all our downfalls and successes. We will try to be as open and honest as possible about all the moves we make to help our company create a dent in the music industry. I’ve been a musician for 14 years and a teacher for almost 10 years and I can honestly say that you learn way more as a teacher then as a student. By no means do we have the answers to all the questions about how to be successful in this business. We are learning everyday just like everyone else. But if we can teach others what we find works and what doesn’t work, hopefully we can open up relationships with many new people and share ideas on how to achieve our ultimate goals. The key to the ENITRE music industry is relationships. I don’t care how good your music/talent is, if you do not have the right relationships in place then you will not succeed. No one will ever be able to tell me of a person who achieved ultimate success and did it alone. It’s just not how this business, or truly any business for that matter, is set up.

It is now May 2009. I have been working for many years, waiting for the right time to start this journey. Jan. 18th 2009 was the day Vindico officially started, although there had been a lot of planning to get to that point. Since then, we have grown a sizable contact list and have had many big doors opened up to us. Don’t worry. We will talk about how we’ve grown our contact list and how we’ve put ourselves in the position to make bigger moves than when we had started out.

Our roster currently only has one official artist and we are actively engaged with a second. We are looking to add several more artists to our roster at this moment and would love to hear any material from ANY genre of music that artists have to offer. I will save all the details on our artists and our staff for later blogs. There will definitely be time for everybody to learn about our clients and personnel.  

Vindico has grown to a massive army of…five people, including myself. We will all be blogging on here to provide everyone an insight into how we operate, personally and professionally. We look forward to meeting many new people and developing many new relationships as we travel down this road. Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the ride.

Ben Kniffen

Vindico Music Group