happy 2026 - 2 things i'm doing "differently" this year as an artist

hi all

just got off an hour long meeting with my management team and we had a good discussion on where we're at , where we aren't, and how we're going to get there.

this inspired me to have a chat with you :) some observations and discussion were had and the takeaways...

1. CONSISTENCY

i have over 20 unreleased tunes on deck, some polished and finished, some 75% of the way there, some only 25% finished but have super solid ideas that will be somewhat easy to finish with a nights work.

we made a list of labels we'd target, sketched out release dates for the next 3 months, scheduled in when i'd need the artwork and masters turned in by, and that's that.

i plan on releasing nearly every 3-4 weeks until the end of the year, and have the music done to do so.

what's this mean to you? set goals on labels far out in advance, self release inbetween label releases if you can score some, and then build a content schedule around the releases.

in the meantime, if you're unsure, tease releases on socials and see what gets engagement. if you haven't built an audience on platforms yet, focus on tiktok and use related hashtags to get a lil organic traction.

since my release schedule is pretty far out, now I can base content around each release and have a strong steady output on both ends without too much stress.

1. SOCIAL MEDIA OR MUSIC FIRST?

social media isn't as life changing as it was a year or two ago. that's not to say it's not possible to have a life changing moment on there, but notice less artists are breaking on socials and the translation has gone down.

the MIDIA study comes to mind:

https://www.billboard.com/pro/tiktok-music-discovery-youtube-streaming-midia-study/

they basically monitored 10000 social media users to find how they discovered music organically. the results are crazy.

• no single platform dominates music discovery, but Youtube reaches the most people at 52%, streaming at 40%, tiktok at 37 (the lowest of all discovery.)

• almost half of consumers did not stream music they heard on social media

• 16-24 year olds are less likely to take steps after discovery, from saving a track to checking the artist out deeper. only 19% of young listeners who discovered a new artist on social media went on to listen to more of their music

• on Tiktok users are more likely to follow an artist than to listen firther. of 20% of consumers who followed an artist after discovery, ONLY 26% explored of that small percentage explored more of their music.

it is an insane read to be honest and shows the industry is placing too much value on short form content IMO.

that said - you can't ignore socials - but don't overvalue them or devalue your work because it's not formatted to win on social media...i doubt the mona lisa would go viral lol.

what am I doing differently?

choosing to release more music in the time i'd be focusing on short form content, and letting the content come secondary to making the highest quality art I can. in the past i've struggled to balance both and it's affected my musical output - that will not happen now.

on another note, my manager shared one of his other clients had a 4 million video view song across socials. it translated to 100k streams in a month, which is good - but far from life changing for them.

hope this helps and inspires you on your journey

cheers