WORDS TALLULAH SYRON - SPECIAL THANKS LUCID PUBLICITY
Ever wondered how someone got to where they are? Dreamed of working in a creative industry but no idea quite how to get there? F Word's brand-new series ‘Behind The Scenes’ delves in to the lives of creative professionals, and first up is Global Director of Streaming and Commercial Partnerships at LVRN, Tom Jones.
With a wealth of knowledge in the music industry Tom has spoken at both SXSW and the BBC as a panel expert. Developing his experience and relationships across artist management and music PR Tom has worked with Universal Music Group in London working across all labels under the UMG umbrella (Republic, Def Jam, Polydor, Interscope, Virgin, Island, Decca, Capitol). Tom’s insight and understanding of what drives and expands an artist’s most organic reach and shaping the musical influence of some of the industry’s most celebrated artists is one that places him at the very centre of the music industry conversation.
Tallulah Syron: Hi Tom, thanks so much for chatting with us. You have such a wealth of experience within the music industry from journalism and PR to DSP relations and commercial partnerships! What are you currently working on and how would you describe your current job title?
Tom Jones: Hey! of course, great to connect with you guys too. Safe to say I tried the whole menu! Currently working across the entire LVRN roster, which is in such an incredibly exciting space right now. We’ve heavily expanded the roster now working across Amapiano (TxC) & country (Tanner Adell) as well as the R&B, pop, rap space. Working with a team of experienced leaders that I’ve looked up to for many years prior to joining the company was a dream come true and that experience mixed with our young hungry executives at the company creates for a tonne of inspiration and creativity flowing trough the team on a daily basis. With my current role Director of Streaming Strategy and Commercial Partnerships I work across DSP relations, pitching our projects/singles to the editorial teams, advising on strategy based on the latest streaming performance, roll out strategy, marketing and more.
TS: What does an average day look like for you?
TJ: Each day is completely different. Always start the day running through the roster performance across each partner, checking performance, relaying & prepping for our wider team calls. Always check the latest industry news & goings on to keep on top of the latest commercial opportunities and possible new revenue streams. Sometimes I’ll be meeting with DSP teams, attending playbacks for artists in person. Afternoon’s I’m across our artist strategy for company/artist meetings and advising on market growth, performance and rollout strategy.
TS: You’ve worked with so many amazing artists including Summer Walker, 6LACK, SPINALL, Alex Vaughn, Äyanna, Baby Tate, TxC and SadBoi. Is there one campaign that has particularly stood out for you?
TJ: The SadBoi BARE CHAT EP release in May felt like a real moment. It felt like SadBoi really introducing herself as a new contender and the new princess of Toronto, stamping her mark in such an authentic and true to self way. Seeing her rise off the back of that campaign across music, fashion and culture feels like we’re witnessing that bubbling of a new superstar. A real testament to authenticity.
TS: Who would be the dream artist to work with?
TJ: I have huge list of icons I’d love to work with in some way shape or form in my career. These days with a marketing mind and someone who is fascinated with fan building and indie artist ecosystems, a dream artist would be Mike. The ecosystem he’s built independently across streaming, merch, Patreon and live shows is damn near incredible to have watched the built over the last 5 years as both a fan, consumer and observer.
Pivoting sonically from his previous sound, seeing the early wider scale appetite globally for country music/genre merging (with Rap/R&B), consistently releasing tracks and bodies of work to feed the fanbase, tapping into the exclusive content game and wide ranging merch on offer to fans (Steve’s) as he calls them. My admiration for any independent artists like Mike creating a their own world in which they can form a hugely lucrative career with many revenue streams will always be so important to me both as a business strategist, a fan and a music lover.
TS: What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learnt in your career?
TJ: You can plan and plan and plan but the work really starts when the record comes out, that’s not the finish line, it’s simply the start gun. That’s the time when you begin to see how fans are reacting to the music, how fans are consuming and get deep into the analytics/data. It’s time to get to work.
TS: Tell us the best piece of career advice you’ve received?
TJ: It’s okay to be wrong. I think a lot of the time coming into the industry and moving into higher positions of influence a lot of people mentally close off and forget to keep an open mind to continuously learning and being open to a different way of thinking to their own when really the key to a successful career is to never stop being curious. Allow yourself to be perpetually inquisitive and never lose that inner child curiosity. We have to question everything to really get to the root of why we really do this.
TS: One bit of advice you give to someone just starting out in the music industry?
TJ: Never work for free. Everyone’s time is valuable even when you’re starting out and every ones time comes with a price tag for the work they put in. Gone are the days of free work for experience gain. As the industry changes and the other generations at these firms are looking to the young generation for their input, insight and ideas that now makes someone starting out in music more of an asset than ever.
TS: What’s next for you? And what are your goals for the future?
TJ: Relocation to LA before the years up, that’s the next adventure. Once I’ve planted my feet I’ll be hitting the ground running.
TS: The music industry has changed so much within your career, what do you envision for the next 5 years?
TJ: I think with the huge shift of focus on short form visuals/content that we’ve seen over the last 5 years we’ll continue as we as consumers continue to need that quick bitesize short form content, you see it with both music and podcasting. Part of me feels like as the industry pours and pours into feeding the short form algorithm there will be a space and time for high quality, long form content to make a comeback. I think we see it currently with a growing love for ‘the album’ coming back, I personally see a lot of discourse about people wanting higher quality interviews that delve deeply into an artists album making process and not just the gossip/surface level style content.
I think we’ll also see a heavy adoption of AI to help the globalisation of music consumption specifically in relation to AI generated lyric translations that’ll allow albums to be delivered/sung/rapped seamlessly in multiple languages. We’ve seen this happen with podcasting briefly and YouTubers taking this one on already, of course music is a different beast but I believe parts of the industry will utilise this to reach further fan bases. But that's a whole other conversation when it comes to lyrics losing meaning/sentiment sometimes via translation.
TS: Final question, this is something we ask everyone. What is your favourite "F" word and why?
TJ: Fruition. I love the graft, the grind and working to create something incredible, be that breaking an artist, hitting certain targets, a big creative goal but you really can’t beat the feeling of everything coming to fruition and seeing the full circle moment of your hard work.
