Dave Cronen on Artist & Label Management

Artist and Label Manager Dave Cronen provides perspective artist and label management. From Virgin to Rough Trade, Play It Again Sam (PIAS) and Grand Royal Records, then Trust Management to guide the careers of hundreds of revered artists that have influenced popular culture - The Beastie Boys to Johnny Marr, Ash, We Are Scientists, Dexys, and Baxter Dury. Working with artists who received Ivor Novello Awards, Oscar nominations, and NME Godlike Genius Awards. Mentoring the next generation of artists, producers, and entrepreneurs at the Academy of Contemporary Music.

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Transcript

Roy Sharples: 0:05

Hello, I'm Roy Sharples, and welcome to the unknown origins podcast series, the purpose of which is to deliver inspirational conversations with creative industry experts on entrepreneurship, pop culture, art, music, film and fashion, which will be published on all relevant podcast platforms on on the unknown origins website and amplified through social media. Today's topic is artists and label management. When I have the pleasure of chatting with the charming Dave Cronin from virgin turf trade, pious and grand royal records, then trust management by gaining the careers of hundreds of revered artists that have influenced popular culture. From the Beastie Boys to Johnny Marr ash, we are scientists dexys, and boxes of jewelry to name but a few working with artists who received Ivor Novello Awards, Oscar nominations and enemy godlike genius awards, mentoring the next generation of artists, producers and entrepreneurs at the Academy of contemporary music. Hello and welcome Dave, what a journey.

Dave Cronen: 1:18

I don't know what to say off the intro Hello, hello, and take it from

Roy Sharples: 1:23

what inspired and attracted you into the music industry in the first place. And then subsequently artists and label management.

Dave Cronen: 1:33

I think because when I was growing up, I obviously wanted to be a footballer and sort of realized in my early teenage years that I wasn't good enough for that. And I sort of considered a lot of other things. But as I got nearer to the end of my school days, music was the only sort of consistent thing from listeners young kids to pop music and then I would say that my music outlook changed. I was too young for punk. So like to tone scar was my my punk. So around 79 I got into the specialism madness and the beat and, and all of that. And that really got me into new, exciting music and also independent music as well. I think independence played a big sort of part in my life. So when I am, when I came out of school, I came out of school with very little, I think I got a drummer Oh level or something like that. My mum made me go to college to try and get some old levels to sort of top it up a little bit. And I got sort of kicked out because I didn't really want to be there. And then just by default, a guy who I'd met at college who's you know, a lifelong friends was working in the virgin record store in Portsmouth and which by far is the coolest record store on the south coast of England. And he said, Look, there's a job going, there's a full time job going apply for it, I will tell you what to say in the interview. And and say you're listening to these records, listen to these records, say this, say that and you'll get the job. And that's what I did. So I sort of I thought I wanted to be a record producer, then I got some work experience working in the studio and hated it after about half an hour. So I started in music retail and worked my way up there. And then I think we you know, answering your question about artists management. I think it was just a natural path. I didn't realize that I should be doing artists management until might be from Grand royal and Beastie Boys just sort of said, Look, consider looking at management because every time we we have a meeting between the label and the artist, he seemed to take the artists side more than the label side. So you'll, you'll get towards that. So I took his advice and and just without really knowing what I was doing started up a management company and bluffed it for a couple of years. And it started to grow, you know,

Roy Sharples: 4:11

listen to some of the key themes. It's coming out of there, there's certain deputy there is relationships, there's empathy. And obviously it's going to grow in organically transcending that into your approach for artists and label management. How would you typically characterize your approach?

Dave Cronen: 4:28

And it's quite interesting. I love the fact that you say serendipity. Because like being in the right place at the right time has been the key part of my life. Even sort of tech, you know, when I got the call from rough trades, it was just because I answered the phone to someone. And it sort of grew from there. And then when I was at rough trades, you know, these vacancies came up and no one applied for them apart from me, so I worked my way up by default, really. And I think the approach I'd love to I've never I got when, because when I was at Rough Trade, I became the youngest ever sales manager of a record company. Again, not because I was brilliant is because no one else wanted to do it. And, and some of the labels were a little bit concerned, like, I know that for ad and mute were a little bit concerned that I was a little bit young, so got, you know, checked on training courses for body language. And yeah, and that and the body language one really helped me. But I sort of don't, I don't go for this sort of self help. Or that, you know, this textbook thing, you know, I read is the trial and error of it really. And I think that this might sort of come up in a question that you asked later. But I think that the thing that sort of got me through with the approach was emotional intelligence, time management, and a really exceptional work ethic. And I think you'd agree with me, like, you know, your work ethic, if you're driven. Then you're, you know, the harder the work. The harder you work, the more lucky you get. There's something that looks sort of Johnny Johnny mo says to me a lot, and it really is true. So I would say emotional intelligence, definitely serendipity, time management and, and a really sort of good work ethic.

Roy Sharples: 6:23

That's that comes across really strong Dave as well. I think the other thing the other flavor and applying the do it yourself, sensibility within you know, what you're doing, like see, like, you know, am culturing the textbook, education and focusing more on instinct and do it yourself at your own pace at your own kind of stay like that comes across really strong. And your ethos.

Dave Cronen: 6:46

Yeah, and I think that I think that was the exciting thing about rough trades, like Rough Trade. I'm lucky enough, you know, um, look, we work with you know, we had number one singles with KLM. You know, we had a number one albums with, you know, arrangement, Depeche Mode and charlatan and Smiths. Yeah. And the great thing about working with all these bands, it wasn't just a rough trade label, it was all the associated associated independent labels as well, the DIY ethic, you know, like we've Yeah, it's like the only way is up. Yeah, it was, it was I think the second biggest Single of the Year, next through obviously Cliff Richards mistletoe wine. But it's like we were literally sitting on the curb of the warehouse at Cali street put in vinyl seven inch vinyl into a seven inch bag because like one loaded come just from the printers and one just come from, you know, in the manufacturing plant. And we were trying to get 50,000 units out to three UK and Woolworths and, and it's the fact that we could not just dent the charts, but we could have top five singles, top five albums. And then, you know, just after I joined, we had sort of a consistency of number one singles and, and it was a real, I saw it as a real two fingers to the majors who were just, you know, throwing money at stuff and everyone was on an expense account. Rough Trade and different, you know, other independent distributors, we were working our, you know, our nuts off to to make it happen. And I think that really inspired me from an early age

Roy Sharples: 8:18

sticking up for two fingers to the to the industry. And you mentioned key lf there as well. And I remember them in the early 90s where they did a brilliant piece of exhibitionism where they burned a million a million pound. Yeah. As a statement. What did you insert? Was it you that instigated that?

Dave Cronen: 8:36

No, no. If there was a million pound line around either lover ideas for the plant, or we had a good we had a great relationship. Again, the great thing about KF is it was a collective. Yeah, you know, you know, workers cooperatives, so everyone was sort of paid a dividend at the end of the day, like obviously, Jimmy and Billy sort of ran it. And then there was a the label manager, she actually she was the label manager a rough trade and then they sort of buy nectar to work at K lF called Sally fellows and, Sally, every time I see Sally a lot, I just tell her you were the one who inspired me. She was really hard on us. Yeah. And, and, and yeah, and you know, that they had some amazing ideas. You know, we knew that sort of the million pound burning was was was happening. It was gonna, you know, happen, they told us about what was going to happen at the Brits. Yeah. No, you know, the videos, you know, we're all sort of, you know, we, we found it so exciting. And I think that the great thing, you know, with my involvement that they would listen, like, because I was the sales manager. You know, the radio plugging was the late great Scott piering. Yeah. And, and you know, and we would talk to them about the importance of a seven inch edges. where, you know, if I had a great seven inch edit and it got played on radio, then we would sell 10s of thousands through the Virgin's the hmbs. The the Woolworths, the boots and the wh Smiths and really helped that job position and, and they were the kings of the seven inch edit, it was like how can you get 556 minutes of glorious pop music into like a three and a half or three, three and a half minute edit and, and that was that was so important that they made pop music in the way that no one made pop music at that time. And arguably, since really, on the management side, it was you know, we I think we were sort of more seen as independent and alternative and a little bit electronic. We like working with buttons and bend, bend from buttons in this blank mask guys and stuff. But I think that was the beauty of working at Rough Trade. You know, I I was sort of quite naive when I went to a record when I worked in the record shop obviously got a good musical education. And my eyes were you know, I wasn't really a saints fan until I sort of started working in a record shop. And then, you know, this whole new world of music opened up to me, but even at Rough Trade, you know, we work with with labels like Hannibal, like Joe Boyd, and I didn't know who Joe Joe Boyd was at the time. And then like, you know, a few years later, I wrote his I read his book, white bicycle and it's like, oh my god, this you know, this guy's you know, mixed up with Pink Floyd light. REM No, the Hannibal label, you know, the Nick Drake connection and it's like, and, and it was incredible to be working with any music genre, you know, cooking vinyl, cooking vinyl, you know, they had the Michelle shot, Texas can fire tapes, I have a lot of African music, that no one would go anywhere near that, you know, like little things like there's a guy called mechanic menu rookie light, and we sold hardly any of it. But it was amazing music and I think the diversity of rough trades. Yeah, not just for the me, but the people who work there. You know, you know, we we don't so go out at the end of last night's and, and, and the people that I work with, you know, some of them were in bands and like, they were making money working in the warehouse, someone had like different, you know, university backgrounds, but it was a real mishmash of people and, and I learned a lot that sounds really corny, but I learned a lot about life, Rough Trade, not just music as well.

Roy Sharples: 12:28

Sounded like really exciting times, like and a great grounding for you. And the music industry, especially at time as well, where music is so fluid, and rich and image and sound. And do you feel that there's a same variety and diversity within music now is what the movie was, then?

Dave Cronen: 12:48

I think there is I think there's a huge diversity. And I think that's down to, you know, technology, digital technology. Definitely streaming. Yeah, collaboration. Collaboration has been a huge part of it, but it doesn't interest me. You know, I'm, the music that I'm listening to now is probably similar to what I've been listening to for the past 20 or 30 years. So to me, it doesn't appeal but I love the fact that there is like huge diversity there. Yeah. But I I'm old people say it, you know, I'm 50 free. But you know, music sound sounded better in our day. But I believe that if you see some of my mates top hundred albums for a start from 1984 8586 and you look at that and you know, you've got all the you know, British in the stuff like teardrop explodes echo in the bottom and Julian cope for me. You've got all the American stuff, Dream syndicate, REM, Jason and the scorchers you've got Australian bands, like the maths and the church and things and it's like, oh, my God, you know, we were so lucky to have not just tracks but albums of brilliant. Yes. And, you know, I go back to my, to my roots a lot because that that drives me, you know, you know, I still, you know, embarrass the kids and do a bit of a guitar too. I just have to put up with it on the phrase a go.

Roy Sharples: 14:15

Yeah. But on the topic of change and evolution and the passing of time, and everything that kind of goes with that. What do you see is the main difference in terms of what record companies do now? versus kind of what they used to do before? Yeah, and I'm sure that if

Dave Cronen: 14:30

someone was on here from a major they put a different perspective on it. I've always Yeah, I wouldn't say I've been anti major, but I've always you know, I remember when being at Rough Trade, I think it was a car. It was either the Carter album or Sunday's album and it was mid waking at like two or three. And like someone from the majors phone phoned me up and just say Who is this band? You know, why? Why Why is it so high, you know, in the mid weeks and and it was always That, you know, we all wanted to do that I think that the majors, there's been some amazing people working at the majors. Yeah. And there are now you know, a lot of people that I grew or grew up with early in my career who were working at independence now work at majors, and they do an amazing job. But it's, it's not for me, it's just like, clocking in and clocking out, really, and it's like a music factory. And, you know, there, I think that the problem with the majors is they've got a really high turnover of staff. So you can't really establish a relationship with an a&r person or a project manager or even in someone in manufacturing anymore. You know, they've, they're getting younger people in Yeah, I think there's a lower skill set. But the majors still sell records successfully globally. So they're doing something right. But for me, I just feel uncomfortable with it. And I just, you know, looking at the business model, if I was a successful independent artists, or if I was managing artists, like still now, I'd go, I'm not going anywhere near that, I want to take as much money for myself and get the support structure in place where I can work with people pay them fairly, but control it. So if there's a problem, we can nip it in the bugs in a day or two rather than you know, the the oil tanker that is the record, the corporate record companies where it takes six months to change something sometimes

Roy Sharples: 16:29

how has technology disrupted the distribution model?

Dave Cronen: 16:32

I think that for me, technology is down to is really dull, but it is data and analytics at the end of day. You know, the, because I'm not creative on a musical side, you know, I don't know how to create music and I don't really want to create music because there's people out there who do a far better job of it than me and then I could say, but I know you know, with the technology you can make great records and without having to go into top studios for and you can get it mastered and EQ to a very professional level. And I think that once you've got that hardwired content, yeah. Then the the sort of disruptive element of it is the you know, the digital aggregators, the walls you know, the tune cause SoundCloud, I think SoundCloud are doing a magnificent job at the moment. You know, you can you can deliver music to people's phones and laptops, within you know, two or three day turnaround. So technology is made that easier and slicker. And I like that. I think the downside is that I think people have less attention span, you know, people, younger people don't really listen to albums in the way that the older generations do. And I get that you think music is more disposable, I get that. But you know, if if you're uploading 40,000 tracks to Spotify every week, then there's got to be a quality control issue there's so I think it's easy to distribute digitally, it's still possible to manufacture records and that's really important you know, CDs still have a place for people vinyl definitely it's easy to manufacture good quality independent vinyl product now. And you know, the markup you know, if you're getting paid 0.004 pence per stream, but you're selling a piece of vinyl for 25 pounds then you know you as a sustainable living an income stream you can you can rely on physical and then balance of that, you know, it's the data and analytics of your social media platforms, Google Analytics for your website having a merge store. Spotify for artists, Apple for artists like Amazon are just starting to make their data available now I think these are doing the same. It's sitting down and reading that data and finding out where your market is and doing it so I think it's been extremely disruptive. I've just done an ever interview earlier today actually and and I would say that even though the music industry is such as embrace disruption and technology, it hasn't done it at the pace of ever creative industries as well. So I still think we're lagging a little bit but there's some incredible bits of kit out there that you can help to make a sustainable living as an artist as a manager as a label, you know, as a digital marketing person, whatever really.

Roy Sharples: 19:51

So moving more on to the the the skills and capabilities needed for effective artists and label can a management I always connect them used to think of it as more of the fearless cameras mic and bolder speakers. Such as you know, the Betty got what Barry Gordy did for for more time Brian Epstein did for the Beatles or them for the stones, Warhol, the Velvet Underground McCloud and the Sex Pistols, john peel for independent music, Tony Wilson, the Factory Records where they really saw around the corner and embrace and expose the unusual and the unexpected, and really kind of brought them to life. And that was going to give them one thick view of kind of what I noticed in a manager in a dealer. Do you see that as kind of key key to kind of be in the role of an effective

Dave Cronen: 20:39

artist and label manager? I don't actually like the one thing go back to your first point is that for me, the most important label for me was diff records. You know, I'm, I'm, you know, those individuals, you know, but for me like Steph, I'm an obsessive Stiff Records collector. Yeah. And the reason I did it, they were the greatest and the most shambolic label of all time where, you know, you know, they got they got the first punk single out they were the damn new rose, you know, they beat everyone else to it, they got the first damned album out punk album out. Yeah, you know, they had number one singles of injuria madness and, and they were independent, and they signed the most god awful bands on Earth as well. So it's that thing about making mistakes, and the business model didn't work into the day, and I think they might have run out of steam run out of money run out of ideas. But I think that, you know, let's say with the Beastie Boys, I didn't manage the Beastie Boys, but I know I work with them on on their labels. So I was on that for the Hello, nasty campaign. I was close to it when like when I joined the album was almost done. So we were just starting on the promo. You know, john Silver's looking after as the manager and then sort of the team over I think it was gold mountain at the time. Yeah. And, and but, you know, we liaised with Parlophone of it and, and the thing is, with that it was it looked after itself. And, you know, it wasn't managing, but especially with Johnny, like, there's some artists that I've worked with where we've managed, and we've given them their creative input. And especially like younger bands, development bands, like there's a band called splash who moved over to London, in their sort of early days, and we sort of picked them up. And we really did sort of steer their career and advise them and, and I think we did a really good job. And I think we made some, some mistakes along the way as well and to have that input, but we're working with people like Johnny Nash, and we are scientists, he hates them, especially with Johnny, it's like, I wasn't Johnny's manager, I, I I represented Johnny and his ideas and his vision at the end of the day, because, you know, there was a few things that he you know, gives me credit for the Record Store Day single, we did have Depeche Mode cover and the the live album of adrenalin baby, which is now one of the best bits of vinyl that I've ever worked on packaging wise and sort of concept wise, but, you know, I'd say 90 to 95% of it came from Johnny and he wanted to meet me to do it. And, and I wouldn't, I'd stopped by that my sort of ego had run out of steam a little bit, so I wouldn't, I wouldn't sort of confront him and just say no, I want to do it my way. I just say Yeah, and I think this is really good. And, you know, maybe with your ID, you should consider this, consider that because in my experience, you know, that might be a, you know, a pitfall or something like that. But it's taking those ideas and, and trying to move them forward representing your artist. There's also another thing with artists, like even with the younger development bands, if they agreed on something, they wanted to do it, even if we disagreed with it, we would do it. Because that's what they wanted, you know, and if it went wrong, we'd sit down with them and look at it and just say, why do we think this went wrong? What we do in the future, we'd have a little bit of a smug grin on our face, because we knew that it potentially would go wrong. And so I think it's being open to it, I don't think you can come in and command what's going on, especially with someone like Johnny, you know, Johnny, Johnny has worked in different areas of the music industry, whether he liked it or not, you know, as the manager of the Smiths, you know, handling Morrissey, you know, you know, working with the label, looking at BMI Do you know working with going from, you know, from the other to the and the pretenders to other bands, you know, Modest Mouse. So he's seen it all so he doesn't need a similar age guy to sort of come in and tell him what to do is it's more to support him, I say, and I thought we worked really well together. I thought that, you know, in the, I don't know, three or four years that we did it. You know, it was my responsibility. To take over from Joe moss, you know, the original Smith manager because Joe unfortunately passed away. But we knew it would get to the point where it needed to go to a bigger structure or Global's. That's when ATC came along. And I stepped down at the end of the day. And, and I don't see that as a failure. I think I was part of the process of helping to build Johnny's career. And I'm, I'm extremely proud to have done that job. Yeah.

Roy Sharples: 25:26

What a good job is, well, you did I mean, one thing, one of the things that you've you really helped enable that as well with Johnny is just how relevant he is today. That's a guy that's been through, like you said, like so many different musical changes and evolutions and reinventing themselves but at the same still, at the same time, still having the same values, style and kind of taste that's been true to him, which makes him even more authentic as an artist, the creativity, and the digital age of movie that we did with Johnny a few years ago. He was just an absolute joy to work with. And the thing that really stood out as well within that is just how much of a person of action he is. He's a Dewar and a member as well, you seem to me because we met in London, to prepare for the shoot a few days before we did it in Manchester on November, pro veneer about so what's Johnny Lee, you very eloquently said, Look this, you get Johnny, who's not in his zone and not being the rock God that he is. He's a very humane personality, if you click with him, it's very easy to become really friendly and creative within his space, what an absolute pleasure and joy to collaborate with.

Dave Cronen: 26:38

Yeah, it's what you're saying, like the do a thing, like from the moment he gets up, he knows what he's doing, you know, whether he's work working at home, or going to his studio, wherever on tour, you know, whoever is in, you know, book writing modes for the, for the autobiography, you know, he knows he's got the day planned out in his head. And, and, you know, and that, that's amazing. And that's, you know, you know, he, he's driving it. And that's what you say, like, when when he's in the zone, you know, it's it's different personality, where, you know, we're truly professional. But, you know, as a person, you know, I'm proud to sort of call him one of my best friends. And like, you know, I hope he could sort of say the same from his side. But just his sense of humor is he's got a wicked mank sense of humor. Yeah, I sort of similar to Matt Johnson, from the actually the, you know, you've, you've sort of see a wicked smile, or sort of a spark in their eyes, sort of sometimes, and, and it you know, his great company, and totally inspiring, totally, totally inspiring, you're

Roy Sharples: 27:38

18 again, now, and you knew what you do now, what would you do differently? If I told anything?

Dave Cronen: 27:44

Not a lot. Yeah, that the two things I would be, I would have from I would have given up drinking sooner. I gave up, I think I'm into my 13th year now, not because I was an alcoholic or anything. Yeah. I would get drunk and party and do some incredibly stupid things. And, and then stuff suffer from a hangover. Yeah. And it's like, well, you know, why am I doing this, and I had a bit of a reputation for in the industry as well, which, you know, which, you know, especially when you've got sort of a seat senior role. It's hard for people to respect you if you've been a little bit of a dickheads. So I would have probably saw curb that before. But I just think that, you know, I wouldn't say there's many mistakes that I'm, you know, any mistakes that I made, I learned, you know, none of the jobs that I did, I don't particularly regret at all, like some of them, I would probably reconsider again, but again, you know, to work at Rough Trade with a lot of the artists that I've done, and then, you know, I moved abroad to work with Piazza, you know, in Brussels for a couple of years. And then I'm, you know, lucky enough to work with Beastie Boys. I would say that most of my sort of gut reaction choices were pretty good, actually. So yeah, I would just, it's more about my lifestyle that I would change rather than my work ethic or anything like that.

Roy Sharples: 29:05

What's your vision for the future of artist and label management?

Dave Cronen: 29:09

I think it's definitely going to be more artists and management lead. As I say that, you know, it's, you can be your own management company, you can be your own record label, you can be your own bookkeeping, with no software and things like that. You can do your VAT return at the touch of a button and, you know, as dull as that sounds, you know, it's it's innovative. Yeah. So, I think that I think we've, I think, in 2020, the music industry has learned how to learn to adapt and not take things for granted. The live music industry quite rightly, thought that nothing could knock knock their crown. Yeah. And it has and it will continue to do so into into 2021 Though I, I think it's the adaptability and the sustainability, it comes down to sort of music income streams, at the end of the day being creative. You know, there's a lot of bands who have because they're not doing live performances, they're doing more much. They're doing, you know, they're doing live streams. I think the Nick Cave live stream recently was staggering. Yeah, a lot of people have got the live streaming so wrong, and it's just like, No, please don't set up in your front room with your Washington in the background, because it's just not engaging at all, you know, have have production values for it. But I think it's just being adapt, adaptable. You know, the two things are the live industry is, has been really screwed, unfortunately, it's going to take a lot of time for that to come back. And it's going to take a lot of trust from punters to, to, you know, to think that they're in a safe environment. So that there's some thinking with that. There's a lot of money being invested, maybe to fatten up the calf, you know, Concorde, you know, you know, they paid 100 million dollars for a piece of Imagine Dragons catalog the other day, and it's just like, you know, how long is it going to take for you to get that back? Yeah. So there's, there's a lot of high investment going on, which doesn't really appeal to me. But I just think that learning on your feet being an entrepreneur at the end of the day, and taking these risks and chances the way to adapt if you're, if you're going to lose 50% of your income by not playing live where you're going to get that money from and I think a lot of younger people, entrepreneurs have ideas of where that money can come from.

Roy Sharples: 31:49

Thank you so much for your insights and inspired story, Dave. For more information about Dave:

https: 31:54

//www.linkedin.com/in/dave-cronen/- for more inspirational conversations with creative industry experts on entrepreneurship, pop culture, art, music, film and fashion. Please go to the unknown origins website at unknownorigins.com