Episode 26: Bobby Rymer - Know Your History And Prove Your Worth YOU CAN Make a Living In The Music Industry Podcast

 
This week I’m talking with my friend Bobby Rymer who owns the publishing company Writer’s Den Music Group in Nashville. He’s worked his way from the bottom to the top of record labels and publishing companies in the music industry and has a career that has spanned over 35 years. We are discussing the process of working your way up the ladder at publishing companies and record labels, the importance of knowing the history of the music industry, what publishers are looking for when signing new writers and the best venues to play in Nashville to get noticed by industry insiders.
Show Notes:
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Talking Points:
*I own Writer’s Den Music Group. As a publisher I have a day gig and a night gig.
*During the day I pitch songs and have meetings, etc. At night I go to showcases and meet writers and artists.
*Spend money smartly.
*Look over your options at what you want to accomplish and how.
*You don’t have to have an office anymore if you have a laptop and a phone you can do most of your work that way.
*I was doing social work and realized it was not my passion and I decided to go back to school to get a degree in the music business.
*My friend got a job at Capitol Records in the mail room and called and asked if I would be interested in his old job at a record store. Then 9 months later he called saying he got promoted and asked if I wanted my name put in for the mail room job at Capitol.
*The mail room at a record label is the bottom of the totem pole which is where most people have to start.
*Get in anyway you can and prove your worth.
*Ask yourself “how bad do you want it?”
*Internships and a course called "Copyright Law" are worth their weight in gold.
*You really don’t start to understand how the music industry works until you’re in it working everyday and making relationships and learning how things are done.
*I got to sit in on meetings and learn how you find talent and find songs.
*If you can, try to work out a smaller company because you will stand out more as opposed to a larger company that just churns interns out every semester.
*After about a year and a half an opening came up in A&R and I was able to move up because the label looked within before looking out.
*My main job in A&R was to go out and find songs for the artists on the label by meeting with the publishers in town.
*If you want to consider the music business for a career, you better know your history.
*When looking for songs for artists, I would sit with the label heads after they talked with the artists to know what they were looking for.
*You go out and find songs you’re passionate about and the come back and see if there’s a home for it on the label.
*You have to listen to songs and see if they are checking off the boxes of things you are looking for to fit an artist.
*When you are reaching out to labels or publishers, you better know who they are and the history of people they’ve worked with and what they’ve done and you better know who they are working for now.
*Get Billboard Magazine and make sure you know every artist, label, producer and writer and study the charts so it becomes second nature. That is where you start. You shouldn’t have to pause when someone asks who produced or wrote the latest hit is.
*Before you knock on a door or make a phone call to a company, understand who you are talking to because if you don’t they will quickly realize that you don’t want this bad enough or you haven’t done your homework.
*I was A&R for about 4 years at Capitol, then there was a regime change and lost that job.
*Opportunity is not going to knock on your door, you have to go out and meet it.
*I kept having meetings and eventually bumped into a publisher I knew who used to play me songs and he offered me a job as a tape