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Kelby Cannick, publisher of Makin' It Magazine, sits down with King Carter, manager to 2x Grammy Nominee DaBaby, to discuss the music industry and his latest venture, Social Currency Enterprises. 

In the music industry the job title, A&R manager, is deemed to be one of the most important job titles to a music artist in the industry alone. There was once a time where an artist had to know someone who knew someone else in order to get in front of the best A&R managers. Take Woobi, A&R manager for Alamo and Sony Records, for instance, who is considered to be one of the best in his generation.

While explaining to an artist’s manager the benefit of spending nearly $1,000 to register for the Revolt Music Conference, I realized something. I sounded a lot like the many people who’ve tried to convert me to using Apple products over the years.  As I described hearing Puff speak about attending his first concert and the moment he knew he wanted to get into the entertainment industry, I couldn’t help but visualize Steve Jobs speaking to a room full of Apple acolytes at the very first World Wide Developers Conference. In that instance, I thought to myself , “Is Diddy Hip Hop’s Steve Jobs?” While this may seem like a leap for most, being both a fan of hip hop and avid nerd, stacking these two side by side offers some interesting parallels.

Any time and artist comes to me for consulting, the first question I ask them is, “Why are you doing music?” More often than not, I get some existential answer like:

• To change the world...
• To bring the real back to the game...
• To blow up...
• To represent for my people...
• To show "them” [enter State/City/Hood] got talent...

The only answer I never seem to get, is the one I’m actually looking for… “TO MAKE SOME G.D. MONEY!”