The Industry Connection

Music News

• 📰 Quick Hits:

  • TikTok’s first ever live concert was watched by 33.5M unique viewers.

  • Latin Music listeners on Spotify grew 986% in the last 10 years.

  • Lorde teases new music.

  • Billie Eilish’s album is 85% finished according to Finneas.

  • Universal Music Group (UMG)’s market cap hits $50B.

• Artist-to-Fan platform Medallion raises $13.7M

  • Its investors include your typical funds, as well as Black Squirrel Partners (founded by members of Metallica), Guy Lawrence of Disclosure), Jungle, Mt. Joy and Bill Silva.

• The merch company used by Mitski, Father John Misty & Carly Rae Jepsen has abruptly shut down and laid off its staff.

  • This is part of a macro issue in the economy right now: increased prices and a slow down of merch and apparel sales. Certainly something to keep an eye on in ‘24, as merch sales are a primary revenue driver for most Artists.

Interview with Jay Moss, SVP, agent at Wasserman Music

New York-based, Jay Moss, is one of the biggest Electronic agents in the game. He got his start interning at Sony Music Entertainment, moved over to management roles at B23 Management, and Team8, before a 5-year stint at Flowerbooking in Chicago.

The move that hyper-charged his career was joining Windish Agency in 2014 (acquired by the Paradigm Talent Agency in 2015), and he has steadily carved out his impressive roster since.

That list includes ODESZA, Louis the Child, TroyBoi, Jai Wolf, Surf Mesa, Elderbrook, Big Wild, it’s murph, Ben Böhmer, EVAN GIIA, Crooked Colours, Dr. Fresch, Emancipator, Lane 8, Maribou State, Phantoms, Sebastian Paul, Two Feet & more.

Our conversation is below:

AvA: How did you first get started in the music industry?

Moss: In highschool I was in a program where you interned for the entire second half of your senior year. I ended up at Sony Music Columbia Records in Manhattan, interning for the VP of Marketing. It was an amazing experience, but I learned very quickly that I wanted to be on the live side of music. I had absolutely no idea where I wanted to end up, but just had that innate feeling that I wanted to be in live music. 

Every summer during college at Northwestern I would go on Craigslist to find internships, and just interview for everything under the sun. I ended up at a B23 management, who at the time were managing Tokyo Police Club, Passion Pit and a few other Artists. I worked for Brandon Schmidt, and his assistant at the time was Rich Cohen, who now is now at RoyalT Management.

When I went back to Chicago, I got an internship at Flowerbooking, and came back again for another semester. I ended up getting hired as an assistant there, and grew to a junior agent, coordinator, and then to an agent and started building my own roster. 

AvA: What was your experience like early on as an Agent?

Moss: I think it’s incredibly difficult early on, especially at a small agency. I was trying to build out a roster of music that was made up of artists I really liked, but at that time that music was very different from the entire rest of the agency's roster. I was also competing against AM Only and Windish, and was signing at best 1 out of every 10, maybe 1 out of every 20 artists that I really pursued. It was tough, but I was determined. I was there for 5 or 6 years and saw my Artists starting to really grow. I wanted to grow with them and had a big opportunity to go to the Windish Agency. It was a very difficult decision, but ultimately one that I made and didn’t look back. 

AvA: Walk us through your approach when signing new talent early on in your career. 

Moss: Early on in my career, I had to try and identify as much talent as early on as possible, because I knew that nothing was going to be handed to me and I was up against very stiff competition. So I really just tried to find stuff that I loved, and I just chased it. And I chased it hard. I remember going down to SXSW where I would see 20 or 25 artists a day. 

It was also during the golden era of the early stages of left leaning indie dance music. I just tried to go after it and I got 1, and then 1 led to 2, and then 2 leads to 4, and I started building this little niche that kept taking me to the next thing. Ultimately that led to ODESZA, which opened a lot of doors. 

AvA: Has your approach changed?

Moss: It's changed significantly. I used to be staying up till all odd hours of the night scouring Hype Machine and blogs and trying to find Artists, and now I just don't have the same bandwidth. I have tried to build a team here at Wasserman with Steph (Aristakesian) and Logan (Handelsman), and a bunch of others that are doing that. I have tried to empower the younger agents and help them build rosters of their own.

I still absolutely love finding a needle in the haystack and developing artists though. It's probably one of the things that I enjoy the most. 

AvA: Any exciting recent signings? 

Moss: it’s murph, out of USC. Logan and I are working on it, and he just seems to be off to the races. He was in the music business program at USC, and his final exam was a song that ended up going viral.

Part of the virality of it was him playing it in his class as his final presentation. He's got a great social presence; he's a real smart, charismatic guy. I think he's got the chops to be pretty, pretty special.

AvA: ODESZA has seemingly played every market at the biggest levels. What is next for the duo? 

Moss: They've been incredible at listening to my ideas, their manager Adam Foley’s and really their whole team. Now that they've reached this critical mass, it’s a bit of a role reversal. We ask them “what do you guys want to do?” “What's next in your career?” “What haven't you accomplished that you want to accomplish?” 

It's not always just about selling more and more tickets, or getting bigger and bigger. I think once you reach a certain point, it's okay to say “we are really comfortable with where we are at,” and determine what you really want to do next in your career, and we will help them achieve those goals.

AvA: What were the learnings from their side project Bronson? 

Moss: Maybe don’t put out an album during a global pandemic! Especially a really dark and emotional album. The album and the project is incredible, but it came during a really dark time. We had a whole tour and massive rollout planned, but that all fell by the wayside with COVID. It’s still in their back pocket, and hopefully one day they're able to launch it with the vision they really had for it.

AvA: How important are festival plays to the careers of emerging artists?

Moss: Festivals are incredibly important, but I think that the key is to do them when the timing is right. If you're a really young, developing Artist playing a noon slot at a festival when no one knows who you are, it’s probably a waste of time to play that festival. But if you're bubbling and you're hot, then playing that noon slot can be a massive springboard. Timing is everything. 

AvA: What is one piece of advice you have for someone just starting out in the Music business? 

Moss: This is a job that a lot of people want and very few will succeed in. It's just the reality of the business. It's an unbelievably hard business, and oftentimes isn't a fair business. You need to want it more than everyone else, and work harder than everyone else, and have no ego. You have to know that the road is long and hard. but at the end of the road there are some pretty incredible things that wait there. It ain't easy, and it doesn't get easier, the longer you do it. The bigger and further along in your career you get, it will get harder in different ways. I think you need to know that going in and be prepared for it, because if you're not, it’ll chew you up and spit you out real quick. 

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Top Music Jobs and Internships

💼 = Job | 🎒 = Internship

💼 Administrative Assistant - Wener Mgmt - Vancouver - Apply Here

💼 Day to Day Manager - Involved Management - LA - Apply Here

💼 Senior Talent Buyer - Another Planet Entertainment - Berkeley, CA - Apply Here

💼 Marketing Assistant - JV Entertainment - LA - Apply Here

💼 Executive Assistant to CEO - AVEX USA - LA - Apply Here

💼 Content Creator - Warner Music U - NYC - Apply Here

💼 Marketing & Events Rep - Warner Music U - NYC Apply Here

💼 Day to Day Manager/Assistant to CEO - Hills Artists - LA - Apply Here (Applications close EOD today)

💼 Music Operations Manager (Creator Tools) - TikTok - LA - Apply Here

🎒 Spring 2024 Internships (14 different Internships) - BMG x Music Forward - NYC/Nashville/LA - Apply Here

🎒 Summer Intern - Bowery Presents - New York - Apply Here

🎒 Global Partnerships Spring Intern - AEG Presents - LA - Apply Here

🎒 Music Marketing Internship - STILETTO Entertainment - Culver City (LA) - Apply Here

🎒 Marketing Spring Intern - The Midland Theatre - Kansas City, MO - Apply Here

🎒 Business & Legal Affairs Summer Internship - Universal Music Group - NYC - Apply Here

🎒 Music Group PR & Promo Intern - Insomniac Events - Calabasas, CA (LA) - Apply Here

Mood for the rest of the year:

👋 Thanks for reading this week’s newsletter and see you next year!

This newsletter is written by Warner Bailey (connect with me here). Edited by Malik Figaro. 

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