Collaborative Magic in Modern Music with Asher Laub

WEBVTT
00:00:06.472 --> 00:00:11.060
this week we are going to let agus introduce himself again.
00:00:11.060 --> 00:00:15.587
Go ahead, how are you doing?
00:00:16.408 --> 00:00:35.417
I'm doing fine thanks for having me of course I, um, I guess, uh, I have great debt of gratitude for having me twice, I think, in a year can't get enough of this show why do you keep mentioning Ashton Robbins?
00:00:35.417 --> 00:00:44.140
Well, you know I've done about 100 shows this year and this by far is the most memorable, really.
00:00:44.161 --> 00:00:45.127
Well, probably because you get really good advice.
00:00:45.127 --> 00:00:47.137
Know I've done about 100 shows this year, and this by far is the most memorable really?
00:00:47.158 --> 00:00:48.201
oh yeah, well, probably because you get.
00:00:48.201 --> 00:00:53.274
You give really good advice I try yeah, absolutely.
00:00:53.274 --> 00:01:03.204
I mean it always helps to kind of bounce your ideas off other people and uh and I know you've, uh, you've been around the block in the music industry.
00:01:04.548 --> 00:01:05.311
You think so?
00:01:07.182 --> 00:01:08.427
Well, you definitely come off as that.
00:01:08.939 --> 00:01:11.567
You just stay up on the information.
00:01:11.567 --> 00:01:12.870
You're bad in the middle.
00:01:13.740 --> 00:01:26.975
Yeah, well, just staying up on the information is enough to just take an enormous amount of time out of the very limited period of time for independent artists to focus on the music, myself included.
00:01:26.975 --> 00:01:38.432
In addition, I have support, I have assistance, management, but that's stuff that I also have to manage.
00:01:38.432 --> 00:01:39.646
I have to manage the management.
00:01:39.646 --> 00:01:45.680
So it's just between that and keeping up on the latest.
00:01:45.680 --> 00:02:00.007
I mean, you could spend all day watching YouTube updates on the gurus and, oh well, now AI is changing this and there's new like Google updates and there's Facebook updates, and now, frankly, I'll go for months.
00:02:00.046 --> 00:02:02.612
At a time where I just I'm like you know, I got to focus on my music.
00:02:02.612 --> 00:02:12.102
At a time where I just I'm like you know I got to focus on my music, I can't just keep checking up on on every little micro change um, that happens on a literally a weekly or monthly basis.
00:02:12.102 --> 00:02:16.992
Uh, it's exhausting and oftentimes it's not even all that useful.
00:02:16.992 --> 00:02:34.802
Um, when it boils down to the end, the end goal for me, which is really to just produce good, high quality content for my fans and, um, you know, encourage them to support me and go out and do my, do do my gigs um, I feel like a lot of the nitty-gritty details.
00:02:34.802 --> 00:02:51.026
I just need people to manage for me as an independent artist, and I would assume that a lot of other independent artists need the same kind of support so talk to me, tell me what you want to talk about uh, well, I guess.
00:02:51.067 --> 00:02:51.908
Well, I mean you.
00:02:51.908 --> 00:02:57.647
You just opened up the whole bag of worms with the ai thing, because that is uh that is just never ending.
00:02:57.647 --> 00:03:14.189
And now and then I'm like seeing uh, these, these like clickbait, uh titles like chatPT5 is out now and I click on the ChatGPT5 video which is gonna hopefully tell me what it's all about, and should I install it now?
00:03:14.189 --> 00:03:18.384
And it's like it's gonna be out very soon, like, oh, come on.
00:03:19.420 --> 00:03:20.784
I'm a fan of the AI.
00:03:20.784 --> 00:03:29.848
I am, but I have worked with artists that need a collaboration.
00:03:29.848 --> 00:03:33.164
With the voice recognition, you can really create.
00:03:33.164 --> 00:03:42.562
I'm not saying in all situations that that's the way that it should go, and you can create with the sound that you're looking for without it.
00:03:42.763 --> 00:04:01.139
You know, I think that's really optimistic of you to say, and I hope that you're looking for without you know, I I think that's really optimistic of you to say, and I, and I hope that you're right um, being the pessimist that I typically am I have to counter with, uh, potential negative um, I don't know negative outcomes from this sort of like.
00:04:01.540 --> 00:04:04.406
Yeah, it's totally, totally.
00:04:04.406 --> 00:04:06.729
I can see that being a possibility.
00:04:06.729 --> 00:04:16.372
That, okay, instead of having to like work for hours crunching out a track for collaborative option, you know, just sending this quick AI sample.
00:04:16.372 --> 00:04:40.283
But you know what, the more I kind of get involved with the collaborations and I've actually been fortunate enough to just pump out a new, amazing, probably one of the most exciting collaborations I've worked on um in a long time um miserloo this past week, which I can talk about um, I did not, I did not land that collaboration until I had fully produced the track.
00:04:40.704 --> 00:04:58.100
I mean we're talking like a full, like cinematic orchestral rock, kind of upbeat, miserable and like pretty much good enough that like the movies would, would be cool with it and I ran it by a bunch of artists and the people that were like really interested.
00:04:58.100 --> 00:05:00.910
But then well, let me just get cut to the chase.
00:05:00.910 --> 00:05:02.165
Cut to the chase.
00:05:02.165 --> 00:05:09.408
Ginny, who I pitched, this by Ginny Luke and Johannes Gritschoff, are out in LA.
00:05:09.408 --> 00:05:11.987
They agreed to it because they love the piece so much.
00:05:11.987 --> 00:05:21.009
So I think if I had sent them a skeleton like oh, here's the general idea, and here's who I am, or my management sent it out, whatever, I don't know.
00:05:21.009 --> 00:05:24.750
That's the pessimistic Asher talking.
00:05:24.750 --> 00:05:29.009
I hope I'm wrong, but that's just been my personal experience.
00:05:29.028 --> 00:06:28.365
I feel like a lot of people just kind of look at the numbers it actually could be fully produced you know, I gotta tell you, I was watching this, this sync like movie, sync type like workshop, where they were pretty much warning against, uh, artists who produce music like myself from getting paid or getting up accepting opportunities from companies like pond, for instance, that, um, they, basically they, you know, I don't know if you've heard of that pond like they, they use a raw what's the word I don't know why that the word's escaping me but uh, just video and and uh, audio and then and then photo, um, just pre-produced photos, stock, yeah, stock, that's the word I was looking for.
00:06:28.365 --> 00:06:42.392
So they discourage that because Pond and these other types of companies are using that stock, the photos and the videos and the audio, and building AI off of that at the expense of the artist building AI off of that.
00:06:42.512 --> 00:06:44.153
So at the expense of the artist.
00:06:44.153 --> 00:06:50.978
So I don't know if, again, I think it's one of those things where it's inevitable, but it's.
00:06:50.978 --> 00:07:01.146
It's hard to know, it's hard to sort of stop that game from from developing because there's so much money being pumped into it and so many people want to use the stock.
00:07:01.305 --> 00:07:04.148
So tell me, what have you been doing this last year?
00:07:04.860 --> 00:07:05.985
Oh, just twiddling my thumbs.
00:07:05.985 --> 00:07:12.226
Well, as you know, I'm a workaholic, so I've just been doing a lot more of that stuff.
00:07:12.226 --> 00:07:32.706
I've probably, since last we spoke, I've produced about at least 12 to 13 singles releases, five of which were full symphonies like classical symphonies, two of which are hip hop singles.
00:07:32.706 --> 00:07:52.720
The one I the most recent probably thing I'm most excited about is Miserlew, which is based on a traditional Greek piece that probably most people have heard, but I made it more a contemporary, upbeat cinematic type of production, and that is what I was mentioning before.
00:07:52.720 --> 00:08:03.411
I reached out to some really amazing artists and I had to go through some red tape to get through Ginny's record label to have her sign on to collaborate on the song.
00:08:03.411 --> 00:08:05.024
And then I got Johannes.
00:08:05.024 --> 00:08:07.625
He's been on international tours.
00:08:07.625 --> 00:08:14.610
He's been on the Tonight Show, the Day Show, pretty much every show you can think of America's Got Talent.
00:08:14.610 --> 00:08:17.827
It's really an honor to have even met him.
00:08:18.120 --> 00:08:20.805
Just to work with him has been pretty cool.
00:08:20.805 --> 00:08:24.995
Ginny's worked with Dave Matthews, bernie Spears pretty much Jay-Z anybody you can think of been pretty cool.
00:08:24.995 --> 00:08:29.826
Ginny's work with Dave Matthews, bernie Spears pretty much Jay-Z anybody you can think of.
00:08:30.500 --> 00:08:31.083
So yeah.
00:08:31.485 --> 00:08:33.952
I'm the smaller of the artists, if you will.
00:08:33.952 --> 00:08:43.044
It's just been an honor to be able to build the backbone of the song and then to just have them kind of do their thing on it.
00:08:43.044 --> 00:08:51.764
She added some violin, electric violin and even some classical to kind of do this dueling thing with me and Yohannes is a drummer.
00:08:51.764 --> 00:08:57.907
So he turned it less of a, he turned it more into like a rock type beat.
00:08:57.907 --> 00:08:59.009
So that's been pretty cool.
00:08:59.009 --> 00:09:08.804
And we have the producer of the Pentatonix, the musical director, lucas Sater of the Pentatonix, who worked on the song.
00:09:08.804 --> 00:09:09.649
That was pretty cool.
00:09:09.649 --> 00:09:23.929
So yeah, that's been kind of labor of love, just getting it on different platforms and working on the write-up and the blogs and magazines and the influencers and so on and so forth.
00:09:23.929 --> 00:09:29.124
That's what I've been busy with this past week All the gigs and concerts and stuff like that.
00:09:29.124 --> 00:09:35.528
It's just it's been about 150 gigs ago that we talked there's been a lot of events.
00:09:35.548 --> 00:09:36.330
I've been traveling.
00:09:36.350 --> 00:09:42.576
I'm trying to remember anything in particular that was unique.
00:09:42.576 --> 00:09:54.395
I've been out to LA, texas, did some events in North Carolina, atlanta.
00:09:54.395 --> 00:09:56.029
It's been a busy year.
00:09:56.029 --> 00:09:58.350
Busy year, a blessed year.
00:10:00.375 --> 00:10:16.104
Okay, so I'm going to ask you a question then Do you think that because you had such a great experience with this collaboration that you may have been spoiled or not knowing what to expect when you get the collaboration from hell?
00:10:19.610 --> 00:10:26.884
um, you know, I I think it's bound to happen, actually, because I keep seeking out collaborations.
00:10:26.884 --> 00:10:28.548
Uh, I think it's bound to happen.
00:10:28.548 --> 00:10:48.153
I think the redeeming factor is that, even if I do end up with the collaboration from hell I'm not sure I think the only way to really have a collaboration from hell is where you know, like I work extensively and like invest extensively in a single and all of a sudden, like this person wants to completely flip the song upside down after having invested time and effort in it.
00:10:48.153 --> 00:10:51.714
Um, I mean, I've had some.
00:10:51.714 --> 00:10:57.193
I've had, like I had one collaboration that was kind of a joke.
00:10:57.193 --> 00:11:11.221
In contrast, she was really talented singer, really into herself and thought much more of herself than she actually was.
00:11:11.221 --> 00:11:20.030
Like she thought she was this like major celebrity than she actually was.
00:11:20.051 --> 00:11:29.912
Like she thought she was this like major celebrity and, um, I mean, I, I worked on the song and the track and we just sort of like went our, went our own ways, like we never got in an argument or anything.
00:11:29.912 --> 00:11:42.719
Uh, we just didn't like finish the project because I was just thinking like, like this is not the type of person I really have an interest in working with, because she really thinks she's like the shit and she's really not.
00:11:42.719 --> 00:11:50.692
I mean, she's got a good voice and I don't know if she so and she it's funny because she reached out to me first and then.
00:11:50.692 --> 00:11:58.176
So anyway, just to kind of give you an idea of like the exchange, that one of many exchanges that I had, that maybe just sort of like roll my eyes.
00:11:58.176 --> 00:12:02.635
Um, it was like where she made, she made it.
00:12:02.635 --> 00:12:06.609
I'm trying to remember, actually I'm thinking out loud here she made it, she.
00:12:06.609 --> 00:12:09.096
She had a track that she recorded with another artist.
00:12:09.096 --> 00:12:12.815
She said she asked me to record over it my violin.
00:12:12.815 --> 00:12:16.004
I said, sure, I didn't ask for anything because it was a call.
00:12:16.004 --> 00:12:16.927
I saw it as a collaboration.
00:12:16.927 --> 00:12:18.110
I recorded, I sent it to her.
00:12:18.572 --> 00:12:20.256
She disappears for like two months.
00:12:20.256 --> 00:12:22.332
Nothing happens with the song.
00:12:22.332 --> 00:12:23.597
She comes back to me.
00:12:23.597 --> 00:12:29.152
She's like hey, could you record on this song, like well, um, what happened with the last song?
00:12:29.152 --> 00:12:36.965
She's like, oh, it wasn't like, or the label, like um, said that it wasn't ready or wasn't good or something was missing.
00:12:36.965 --> 00:12:39.875
Like, ok, and you want me to record on this for free?
00:12:39.875 --> 00:12:41.285
So that was just like.
00:12:41.826 --> 00:12:57.682
That was like kind of step one in the process of many steps where I was sort of like that's really entitled to sort of like go to another, like an established professional musician and sort of ask them to like work for free, after you didn't do anything with the previous recording, you know.
00:12:57.682 --> 00:13:05.273
But the next one was like, okay, maybe just to like humor me, I'm just maybe I'll start working.
00:13:05.273 --> 00:13:08.669
I gave her a little clip just to kind of entertain myself, see what would happen with it.
00:13:08.669 --> 00:13:12.152
And I'm trying to remember.
00:13:12.152 --> 00:13:15.335
It's like a number of months ago, like many, many months ago.
00:13:15.335 --> 00:13:22.048
She's like this song, um, oh, yeah, it sounds good, let me just run it by the label.
00:13:22.048 --> 00:13:25.196
And then, and then, oh, that's right.
00:13:25.235 --> 00:13:36.105
And then I said, well, so if you want me to finish up the recording, uh, I'm either going to need 50% split, uh, in the royalties, which is asking like we're not talking an artist who's getting millions of streams.
00:13:36.105 --> 00:13:52.113
We're talking like an artist who gets like a few thousand streams, like has whatever, uh, some screwy stuff on on their, their social media platforms and I was like I just look at 50, I think, or just an even split, or maybe a third split, some percentage.
00:13:52.113 --> 00:14:11.700
She's like I'm sorry, if you can't accept basically 0% with the distribution of with this label, I'm not going to be able to allow you to play this at your concerts or performances and I'm like, oh my god, she really doesn't understand reality.
00:14:11.700 --> 00:14:13.471
I can't believe I even got involved with her.
00:14:14.346 --> 00:14:15.892
I was just about to say that's not correct.
00:14:18.328 --> 00:14:26.485
I haven't thought about this in so long since now, since I've just brought it up, but now that I think about, like I can't believe that I actually wasted my time.
00:14:26.485 --> 00:14:32.486
But yeah, so that's just kind of give you an idea as to how insane one of my collabs was.
00:14:32.486 --> 00:14:34.052
So you could say that could have been the collab from hell.
00:14:34.052 --> 00:14:44.114
Normal people like like hardworking people, people who care, who have respect for the people they're collaborating with, people who actually have a resume, that's like legit.
00:14:44.114 --> 00:14:52.129
Yeah, it was definitely a dream, but I've also had, like you know, working with Porter Singer was a dream, was a privilege.
00:14:52.129 --> 00:14:54.910
I'm gonna say you know, that release was a few months back.
00:14:54.910 --> 00:14:58.211
She's awesome, she's out in Washington.
00:14:58.211 --> 00:15:04.851
Anyway, I've had some real what's the word Real great opportunities.
00:15:05.346 --> 00:15:13.855
Tell me a little bit more about your latest project or process, what you loved about it, what frustrated you about it and anything else you want to say now.
00:15:14.707 --> 00:15:33.879
What I'd like to say probably the most important point, um, first of all, is again it was just a privilege working on miserloo and and I hope that more of the world gets to hear it it's doing really well as far as the far as the playlists are concerned, it's um you know, uh, landing on a lot of like for me.
00:15:33.899 --> 00:15:38.094
I care about targeted playlists as opposed to like, oh, it's on three million random playlists.
00:15:38.094 --> 00:15:44.054
It's kind of targeting rock and classical and some electronic.
00:15:44.054 --> 00:15:47.133
So, yeah, it's working.
00:15:47.133 --> 00:15:48.770
Anyway, nobody wants to hear about this stuff.
00:15:48.770 --> 00:15:53.530
It was I'm going to say I know, oh, I'm touched.
00:15:53.530 --> 00:15:56.260
So if you want to hear, yeah, oh, I'm, I'm touched, so that that.
00:15:56.260 --> 00:16:11.424
So if you want to hear about it, I, I, I care, I care that the playlists are targeted, because what you see in the stats is that maybe on chart metric or within the Spotify for artists, for instance, or even iTunes, you see that the same people are listening to the music over and over again.
00:16:11.424 --> 00:16:21.009
So it's like two, two plays per per per listener, or three plays per listeners.
00:16:21.009 --> 00:16:27.389
Um, my last, my last single um, had eight and a half plays per listener and that's like that's exciting to me, as opposed to like a hundred thousand people who just kind of brushed by it once and then they're done.
00:16:27.389 --> 00:16:35.052
Um, so, because the people that are want to support you or they want to meet you, the people that are streaming your song two, three, four times anyway.
00:16:35.052 --> 00:16:36.674
So that's just one little point.
00:16:36.674 --> 00:16:49.427
Another point is uh, I, I learned, I learned something important in terms of, uh, what it means to collaborate with other artists that are of equal and, if not greater, stature.
00:16:49.427 --> 00:17:04.901
If you will, um, maybe longer, resume, more talent, I don't know Is taking a step into this group, this effort, this team effort, with humility, and I think that that really leads to better outcomes.
00:17:04.901 --> 00:17:07.021
So I didn't.
00:17:08.805 --> 00:17:12.932
The way that Miserlew ended up is different than I had envisioned initially, in fact, had produced initially.
00:17:12.932 --> 00:17:16.834
I produced it, I posted it on my was.
00:17:16.834 --> 00:17:36.400
It probably lent itself a little more, a little more close to my actual listeners, but because I I shut my mouth up when it came to their recording sessions and, you know, I made a couple of minor mistakes, like I tweaked some, I edited some, some notes, um, some rhythm, and and then they said, well, can you actually keep it the way it was?
00:17:36.400 --> 00:17:39.270
And I said, yeah, you're right, this is your baby, just as it is mine.
00:17:39.270 --> 00:17:44.257
And I'm glad that I made that mature step forward because it led to great outcomes.
00:17:44.257 --> 00:17:58.133
It led to a rock song I did not plan on producing, but it led to a really positive experience for all of us and, as a result, um, you know, listeners from all ends that are that are into the song.
00:17:58.726 --> 00:18:06.329
What did you bring from all those other previous collaborations to this collaboration to make it great?
00:18:09.258 --> 00:18:15.492
Um, probably just that, just like the, the understanding that that a collaboration is just that.
00:18:15.492 --> 00:18:19.172
It is not my baby exclusively, it is their baby.
00:18:19.172 --> 00:18:34.525
If I'm bringing them on as a collaborator, it's which is a very different ball game than hey, here's 300 bucks, please record your saxophone or your violin or your trumpet or drums at my direction.
00:18:34.525 --> 00:18:39.601
It's very different because you are stepping into their territory.
00:18:39.601 --> 00:18:53.661
When you are asking an artist to collaborate, you are no longer in full ownership of it's a partnership, it's a business partnership and you need to respect that business partnership the you, I need to respect that business partnerships.
00:18:53.661 --> 00:18:56.732
That's what I learned, that, um, I'm.
00:18:56.732 --> 00:19:12.349
We're sharing each other's audiences, so what they deem is important, if they think a rhythm should be a bit different, perhaps if it doesn't, if it doesn't resonate best with with myself or even my fan base, and might resonate much better with their families.
00:19:13.070 --> 00:19:14.855
So that is a.
00:19:15.075 --> 00:19:19.683
That is a reason to be flexible really, really in any business partnership.
00:19:19.683 --> 00:19:25.542
But this is like a microcosm of a business, business partnerships one contract, one song, you know.
00:19:25.542 --> 00:19:28.506
Another thing I learned is like, okay, it's one song, one contract, one song.
00:19:28.506 --> 00:19:31.213
It's not a full album, so what if it's not perfect?
00:19:31.213 --> 00:19:33.277
So what?
00:19:33.277 --> 00:19:42.501
You know, I obviously considered it to be important enough, them to be important enough, them valuable enough to reach out to them, to be a part of my project.
00:19:42.501 --> 00:19:57.785
So therefore, it's incumbent upon me to take the high road and to respect their decisions and to approach it as just one third of the project is mine.
00:19:57.785 --> 00:20:01.893
So the single is called Miserlew, miserlew, m-i-s-e-w.
00:20:01.893 --> 00:20:02.654
Who cares?
00:20:02.654 --> 00:20:04.199
Miserlew, you know what I think?
00:20:04.199 --> 00:20:04.660
Sing a lot.
00:20:04.660 --> 00:20:06.894
Oh, tell us, tell us, tell us.
00:20:06.894 --> 00:20:10.438
I misspelled it for months and I tell them like whoa.
00:20:10.438 --> 00:20:13.432
So that's the end of the single.
00:20:13.653 --> 00:20:16.045
You can find it on all streaming, on all major platforms.
00:20:16.045 --> 00:20:17.734
You can find it on iTunes.
00:20:17.734 --> 00:20:22.577
It is also on astrolabcom slash merchandise if you want to check out.
00:20:22.577 --> 00:20:41.624
Well, if you want to actually download the single, you can also check out all my music on astrolabcom A-S-H-E-R-L-A-U-Bcom, and my music is posting all these shenanigans on social media Instagram, facebook, twitter.
00:20:41.624 --> 00:20:46.258
Astrolab is my name and I hope you guys can send some love.
00:20:46.258 --> 00:20:54.913
You can send a DM or a comment on a post and I'd be happy to connect and you could just check out.
00:20:54.913 --> 00:21:02.739
You know, I'm just posting like pretty much recordings every day, every other day, to keep people engaged, and I go live every week.
00:21:02.739 --> 00:21:06.618
So anyway, I hope to connect with you guys in some some way shape or form.
00:21:08.611 --> 00:21:17.436
Okay, you also mentioned that you had a single to come out some months ago well, I released a few things, uh, two, two symphonies.
00:21:17.557 --> 00:21:41.153
one is called shamash, another one was a uh a medley, a four-song medley, a tribute to israel, which, uh, that actually, for some reason was the one that had like eight and a half streams per listener on spotify, which is interesting because I'd never seen numbers like that before, but it was pretty wildly popular among like intense listeners.
00:21:41.153 --> 00:21:42.676
So those are two other releases.
00:21:42.676 --> 00:22:14.696
When I say symphony, like 40, 40 tracks like like strings, uh, winds, percussion, uh, um, yeah, just a lot, of, a lot of instruments and huge labor of love, and I hope you guys, uh those of you who maybe aren't necessarily into like typical classical, might appreciate this, the cinematic nature, the beauty of the, the of the pieces Shemesh and and A Tribute to Israel, and I'm kind of like all over the map here.
00:22:14.696 --> 00:22:25.196
Genre-wise, I'm excited to release some hip-hop singles and some EDM classical, so something for everybody.
00:22:27.201 --> 00:22:29.734
Alright, well, show him some love.
00:22:29.734 --> 00:22:31.132
See you next week.
00:22:31.132 --> 00:22:32.499
Bye.