Devin Townsend is a successful singer, songwriter, performer, guitarist, and music producer. He is also the brain behind The Devin Townsend Creative Academy www.dtcreativeacademy.com

As a part of Devin's Creative Academy Devin offers select student's one-on-one coaching calls.

In this episode of Music Business Facts, Devin has allowed us to listen in to one of those calls, where he coaches one of his students on how to make it in the modern music business.

Chris O’Brien is a bit of a legend in The Australian Music Scene. He’s the general manager of touring for Destroy All Lines and former general manager for Australia’s biggest touring metal festival Soundwave 2003-2015.

During the conversation we discuss a variety of things including how to get into the music business, management, touring and tour management, festivals, and a lot more. We also have a brief conversation about Soundwave and the demise of Australia’s largest metal festival. As well as a bit of a chat about AJ Maddah - the colourful character who ran Soundwave.

Chris is a very knowledgeable guy who has a lot of experience in the business so without further delay - I really hope you enjoy my conversation with Chris O’Brien- General Manager for Destroy All lines.

Well there you have it folks I hope you got something out of that discussion with Chris. Once again some recurring themes about believing in yourself, having a positive mindset, working hard, have realistic expectations. And if you’d like to connect with Chris O’Brien go to:

https://www.facebook.com/whatavibemanagement/

Or

chris.obrien@destroyalllines.com

Guys if you’re enjoying the podcast and you haven’t already, head over to iTunes and subscribe so you don’t miss an episode.

Tim Charles is the epitome of a modern music business entrepreneur. He plays violin and sings with his Australian metal band Neobliviscaris.

He’s also a songwriter, booking agent, artist manager, tour manager, publicist, business executive, label manager, concert promoter, artist liaison, lecturer, teacher, key note presenter, consultant, content creator and social media manager.

On this episode of The Music Business Facts podcast Tim discusses the roles he performs to bring multiple streams of income into his business.

Benji Rogers is the Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Pledge Music.com

Pledge Music is a global direct-to-fan platform that helps artists raise funds and create excellent pre-order campaigns.

Benji Rogers is also an accomplished musician and has been through the major label system himself. But now he is predominantly focused on helping ‘creatives’ raise the money required to bring their projects to life through his Pledge Music platform.

So I encourage all of you to check out the cool shit going on over at https://www.pledgemusic.com/

Today, when I looked you’ve got artists like Black Sabbath using the platform right down to a stack of indie acts I’ve never heard of. Anyhow check out Pledge Music!

Website: www.musicbusinessfacts.com
Facebook: facebook.com/musicbusinessfacts
Twitter: twitter.com/musicbizfacts

My guest today has experienced an enormous amount of success in the music business. Brent DeBoer has been the drummer for American rock band The Dandy Warhols for over 19 years. Since moving from Portland to Australia permanently, he also plays guitar in a band called Immigrant Union.

The Dandy Warhols have a new album out called Distortland and they are about to embark on an Australian tour in October. For all details on the tour you can visit my show notes page over at musicbusinessfacts.com.

If you have would like to discuss anything Brent talked about, I’d love to hear from you. Let me know at Rodney@musicbusinessfacts.com or you can get me at facebook.com/musicbusinessfacts.

Website: www.musicbusinessfacts.com
Facebook: facebook.com/musicbusinessfacts
Twitter: twitter.com/musicbizfacts

My expert guest today is Satchel- lead guitarist for the very talented and incredibly funny American parody glam act Steel Panther.

I’ve got to admit that this is definitely the most politically incorrect episode of Music Business Facts ever, but it was a lot of fun to interview this guy.

Satchel’s real name is Russ Parish and I did inquire if he’d be interested in doing a “serious” interview, but he wasn’t, so when I realised that I’d be speaking with the character “Satchel” I thought I’d have a bit of fun with it and have a bit of a crack at comedy myself. So don’t take this episode of the show too seriously!

Although, there are actually a couple of good music business facts in this interview, most of it is just a bit of fun so I really hope you enjoy it.

Steel Panther are touring Australia next month in June. If you haven’t seen them live before they are an excellent band, kind of a cross between Motley Crue, Skid Row, Van Halen and Rodney Rude- It’s a great show and if you like your 80’s metal performed flawlessly and delivered in a hilarious R rated manner you’ll love Steel Panther!

Website: www.musicbusinessfacts.com
Facebook: facebook.com/musicbusinessfacts
Twitter: twitter.com/musicbizfacts

My guest today is a super interesting guy called Eyal Levi. Eyal is an ex-touring metal musician who went through the whole major label system, and now has positioned himself as not only a successful recording engineer and producer, but also as a successful sound production trainer and entrepreneur. I think you’ll really enjoy this interview regardless of whether you’re coming from a performance, songwriting angle or from the sound production sector.

As always, I love to hear from all of you. So hit me up with any questions or comments at: Rodney@musicbusinessfacts.com

Website: www.musicbusinessfacts.com

Facebook: facebook.com/musicbusinessfacts

Twitter: twitter.com/musicbizfacts

My guest today is a cool guy named Karl Sanders, who is the founding member of the American Ancient Egyptian themed, technical death metal band Nile. I’ve met Karl a number of times now whilst he’s been here in Australia and he is making a full time living as a death metal guitarist. He’s been doing that for many many years, so as usual I thought I’d pick his brain about the music business facts and see what he had to share.

Mike Portnoy is an extremely technically proficient drummer primarily known as the skin hitter for the prog metal act Dream Theatre. He is the second youngest person (after Neil Peart) to be inducted into the Modern Drummer's Hall of Fame (at 37 years of age). Mike has also played in numerous other musical projects including his latest project Metal Allegiance, collaborative super group with David Ellefson from Megadeth and Alex Skolnick from Testament.

Eric Grothe Jnr is a former Australian Rugby League player who played the game for fourteen seasons at the highest level including spots on both the Australian Rep side and the New South Wales State of Origin side.

Post his football career Eric Grothe Jnr has now established himself as one of the leading authorities on the social media platform Instagram.

This episode of Music Business Facts grills Eric for his top tips and strategies when using Instagram for business.