[Michael Blue Williams Becoming a Manager]
To become a manager, there’s a number of different ways. Some people start by being interns at a management company or an entertainment company. Some people may meet an artist and the artist will bond with them and they’ll like, “I really believe in you and I want to try and get you a deal.” So sometimes that’s how the relationship forms. Sometimes it’s an artist, they might be the most intelligent friend that an artist knows. So the artist will approach them like, “Yeo, you’ve always been good with business,” or, “You’re good with stuff that I’m not good at,” and that’s how it will start.
If you’re just somebody at home and you’re like, “Hey, I want to be in the music industry and I want to be a manager,” first think I would tell you is to get educated about the music industry. Because as a manager, you’re responsible for the business side of it. So pick up some books, read, educate yourself so that you can educate your artist when he comes to you with questions. Go to seminars. If you’re trying to find talent, you can go to showcases. You can go to open mic nights. You can search the web and see people’s websites. Just search until you find an artist that maybe excites you and then approach them. Find out if they have a manager. Tell them, “I really believe in you and I want to get out there and shop a deal for you.” So there’s a number of different ways to slide in as a manager.
A manager’s main qualities are being intelligent, people skills, communication skills. A good manager, to me, needs to be able to sometimes see around the curve of what’s coming. Managers need to be able to translate lingo. They need to take it from artist speak, as I like to say, to label speak, so the label understands it. And then from label speak to artist speak. So they need to be able to do that. They need to have planning skills, time management. A good manager needs to be able to do budgets and be able to really coordinate logistics of where you are it’s gonna be, how they’re gonna get their timing, things of that nature. And communication is very big because you have to communicate with a lot of people. And as a manager, you’re not just representing yourself. You’re representing your client. So you have to be able to sound intelligent and get your ideas across and be articulate.
A manager’s job is to deal with all of the political issues and power struggles that come up, whether it’s within the group, or whether it’s within the label, or within the label, communicating with the artist. When it’s within the group, it’s the manager’s job to keep everyone on the same page, which is the band and what’s best for the band. Sometimes with a label, you get into political issues where you may lose a president that signed or an ANR has signed the artist, and now you have a new president or a new person who may not be sure about the group. And the manager has to get that new president or new ANR excited about his band and keep the focus on them and keep them as the focal point. So a manager has to navigate the politics and power, egos, of the record label and within his own band.
An artist represent himself as a manager sort of like that thing they say about lawyers, you’re your own worst lawyer. It’s the exact same thing. There’s no separation. I usually tell people to try not to hire either the family or themselves as their own managers. It’s just usually those things don’t work out.
