Disco Fries, Building Beyond Beats: Elevated Frequencies Episode #3

Danny:

figure out what you're good at, and then the things that you aren't good at, that's where you start to look for help. So For example, say it took me 3 hours to do some sort of promo video for our release that's more like a graphic design sort of thing, but I could go to fiber and get the same thing done for, you know, 20 bucks what's more valuable? Like, 3 hours of my time, or do I just spend the 20 bucks?

Olivia:

Welcome to elevated frequencies, the show that gives you access to the next level of how some techno so you can explore an elevated lifestyle. Time is one of the most precious resources we have. And for creatives and anyone trying to uplevel their lives, there never seems to be enough of it. You you get through your to do list for the day. Right?

Feed yourself, feed your family, go to work, Take your dog out, whatever it may be. And by the time you're done with all of that, you're so exhausted. You don't you don't have brain calories to to dedicate to the things that you wanna manifest in your life and learn and grow and nurture. So today, I am talking to the dynamic DJ duo discofries. They are not only super successful in the music industry as artists and producers, but they have built multiple music businesses along the way on their journey.

We're talking about the art of delegating and how it can completely transform your life. They're dropping so many nuggets of wisdom in this episode So without further ado, disco fries. Guys, welcome to the podcast. It's so nice to have you.

Danny:

What's up? Thanks for having us.

Nick:

Thanks very much.

Olivia:

Absolutely. So you were just telling me, Danny, that you guys are actually not together. You're in Virginia. And, Nick, you're in New Jersey. Is that correct?

Danny:

Yep. Cool.

Olivia:

So you guys have so many projects going on. How are you staying, you know, focused and collaborating when you guys aren't close, but you have literally 15 things going on at once.

Danny:

It's kinda interesting how we got into it. So, like, Nick and I went to college together. We obviously worked together there, and then I lived in New Jersey and later New York for a time. So we had a good, I don't know, like, 10 year stretch where we worked very closely. We would go to each other's studios, work in person.

And after those 10 years, we just kind of, like, had a rhythm down. I know the kind of stuff that Nick excels at and vice versa, so when I made the move back down to Virginia, we transitioned pretty easily into, like, doing our own separate things and just kind of like update in the other person, like, what do you think of this? Can you hop on and, like, do this part? And so we just got into that workflow, and it's actually I mean, now it's been almost 7 years since we've lived in different states. And I feel like we're more productive than ever because instead of both of us working on one thing at a time -- Mhmm.

-- we can sorta divide and conquer and get in a lot of ways twice as much done

Nick:

Yeah. We always preach the duo philosophy, whether it's a duo you see up front like us, like, where they're out DJ and together and producing together, or it's just somebody that you have as a sidekick, a manager, somebody that you can trust that you have to bounce ideas off of, and then they can always pick up on things that you're not good at. So we're always advocating to up and coming artists that it's a really good way to kind of cement yourself and good checks and balances too. Like, Danny and I have similar schedules. We we obviously, like, we work our ass off, but we keep, like, a relatively strict 9 to 5 schedule during the week.

And, obviously, like, running our own business hours go way beyond that. But we're pretty we're pretty consistent with with keeping a schedule, keeping deadlines, and I think that's one thing we try to preach to other artists to to get your to get yourself to the next phase. Those are things you have to do.

Olivia:

Yeah. And I wanna talk about that in a second, the boundaries you guys have set up because you need to have boundaries when you have all of these projects going on at once. But I know you've known each other for a long time since college. Right? I think that definitely helps when you're when you're working with somebody else you can trust.

Right? Like, I know that Nick will take care of these things, Danny will take care of these things and will be done in a way that I trust the quality will be good. I think a lot of artists and creatives in general are a afraid to lose that control, and they'd rather do everything themselves. So what would you say to somebody like that? Who's like, no.

I I have to do this is my project start to finish. I don't wanna, you know, give away any part of it.

Danny:

I think ahead I I'll let Nick talk about it in a sec, but I think it's interesting. Like, you need to be able to do all of the things for yourself. sort of before you can give up that control of it, if that makes sense. You're going to make mistakes along along the way. You're gonna mess things up.

whether it's related to business, contract something like that, or just scheduling. You, like, you run yourself too thin, can't hit deadlines, whatever. we try to keep the philosophy that we are able to do everything for our projects, all of our different businesses, But we sort of, like, give give other tasks to other people where we can knowing that, like, we can check-in on them, know how it should be done. Mhmm. It it's different if you're like a new artist starting out and you connect with the manager and you're just like, He's gonna handle the business.

She's gonna handle the business, and I don't need to worry about any of that. That's where you can get into trouble because unless you really know the person or honestly even if you really do know the person, like, you can still, like, start heading in different directions, have creative differences, have different ideas of where you should be going, I don't know, Nick. Maybe you can put that more concisely.

Nick:

No. I I think you hit the nail on the head. I a lot of it for us has been about knowing how to communicate with the people that you're hiring too. So whatever, we bring in a graphic designer. Danny and I are well versed enough in graphic design at this point because we've done enough of our own design over the years and worked on our label stuff and you know, no photoshop inside and out because we've, you know, had to bootstrap it for for a long time to do our own stuff.

Now when we hire somebody, we can speak their language and get to a destination a lot faster if we wanna make changes. even if we bring another producer on board on a record and there's specific things that we love that that producer does, knowing how to how to speak their language whether they're really well versed in, like, music theory or they're not. because we had to almost work back backwards with that. Like, we come from the school of thought. We come from a formal music training background, which a lot of producers and dance music do not come from, which is perfectly fine, but we had to almost unlearn all the things we learned to be able to speak the language of a producer who's in the room that doesn't produce the way we do.

So I think everything from that to, you know, Danny did our accounting for our company for the 1st few years. And, like, Now we know how to read the accounting of our business manager because, you know, when he spits out a report, we know how to go through the numbers. We're self managed. You know, we have somebody on board that looks over stuff and handles our label, but it's good to know the laws and who's collecting your money, neighboring rights. Mhmm.

Like, all of these things are parts of your career and and Like, if you think about it like a car, you've got all these different parts of the car, but without the individual parts, you don't have a freaking car. So, like, to know what all those mechanics are is super important. Do you need to know, like, the weeds of every detail? No. But I think the overall point I was making was just like, knowing your business will allow you to have the opportunity to hire the best people for the job too because you'll know who is well versed in a task and who isn't?

Danny:

I think another thing sort of on that point, and it took us a while to figure this out is figure out what you're good at. And then the things that you aren't good at, that's where you start to look for help. So for example, say it took me 3 hours to do some sort of promo video for our release. That's more like a graphic design sort of thing. but I could go to fiverr and get the same thing done for -- Right.

-- you know, 20 bucks. What's more valuable? Like, 3 hours of my time, or do I just spend the twenty bucks versus there's there's other things where you know, like, no. I I have to do this. or it's not gonna be on brand.

So always just sort of evaluating, like, the time and the cost involved figure out that's how you maximize your time so that you don't end up, you know, either spending a bunch of money or just, like, filling your day with work that doesn't --

Olivia:

Right. Right. I I saw somewhere once there's four boxes that you should write. It's what you like to do when you're good at, what you love to do when you're good at, what you don't like to do when you're good at, and what you don't like to do, and you're not good at. And the goal is to, like, shorten that list so you're only doing what you love to do and you're good at and you can outsource the rest.

And I think one thing that people are afraid of and I've personally experienced this is the first time you outsource something, there's a good chance you're gonna get burned. Right? Like, you like, I remember I needed help writing a bio for my website, and I'm a writer. It's part of what I do for a living. But I said, you know what?

Let me hire somebody to step outside of myself and, like, get some help with this. And the bio I got back was, like, objectively bad. And I was like, cool. That was, like, 200 bucks I just you know? I just threw in the in the garbage, but it happens.

Like, I think it's it's part of trial and error, and I think that's another fear artist have, especially when they're bootstrapping things. By themselves, they don't have a big budget. Right? So it can be scary. But is there anything you can speak to that about, like, figuring out the process?

Because people just want things to work perfectly right away, and it's it's not realistic.

Nick:

Yeah. I mean, like you said, you gotta go through it to to figure out like, how to who to hire, how to hire them, and where to just trust people to do what they do best. Like, if you're going If you saw a bunch of examples of a video editor or a video animator that you loved, you're gonna go to them and say, like, hey. I love your work. Can you do x for me?

Now at that point, you you should give them direction, but you also need to, like, think about the idea of like, yo, you just hired them because you love what they do. So let them be the best them, and then you go focus on your other shit because they're gonna get hopefully, give you the product that you want. But to your point, I don't think you know any of this stuff and know how to, like, work through it until you start doing it.

Olivia:

Yeah. You gotta start somewhere. And And also, people are afraid, I think, to they don't wanna start something because it's not gonna be perfect yet. I can give this this podcast as the perfect example, right, all the technical issues. I'm not a technical person, but I have a passion to wanna do something like this.

And so I'm just gonna go for it. I think really creative, really talented people gets stuck in this loop of I don't know where to start because I'm afraid something is gonna go wrong, and then it and then it just all crumbles.

Danny:

Yeah. I think it helps it's helped us being in a duo. Like, sometimes I'll get frustrated with something and think, like, I don't know. This isn't that great, and Nick will be like, not like, if we tweak this and tweak this, like, there's something here, and I feel like it's always helpful as an artist to have someone like that. But sometimes, I don't know, that could be a label.

That could be a manager. That could be a friend. Sometimes, you just have to take that risk of, like, You know, I know I've spent a lot of time in this. This isn't, like, a half baked idea. I'm gonna send it to a label and see what they think.

Now maybe the label says, you know, this isn't the caliber of track that we would sign, or maybe they say it's cool, but it needs a little bit of work. now at least you're moving in the direction of having a release versus if it just sits on your hard drive, you're like, I don't know. It's not ready yet. I gotta tweak it some more. we try to push people towards do something, you know, take a chance, send it out to people, be smart about the way that you do it, But your career is never gonna move forward if you're not being proactive about --

Nick:

Right.

Danny:

-- taking the next step.

Olivia:

Yeah. Taking action. So you guys have I wanna get to some of these projects you have going on because you've really developed a music business. You're not just musicians. You're not just artists.

You have a diversified business, which is a huge not just for musicians, but for anybody, right, to have these different revenue streams have multiple projects going on at once. Obviously, it didn't all happen at once, but you've built on on other things. So first of all, talk to me about finish my my track because that is, like, the coolest the fact that these these artists get get you guys to consult on their track is amazing.

Nick:

So this was an idea born out of COVID to a degree. but it it kinda speaks to some of the topics we've already touched on. We we definitely didn't have a perfect concept when we went out the door with this. So over the years, a lot of people might know we've done production for, you know, everybody from Thiesto on down in dance music and we've had the ability to, like, come in on a track when it's, like, 70 or 80% and take it over the line and finish it. So COVID came along, and we were doing a lot of this work anyway.

But COVID came along. We weren't doing shows, and Danny and I were talking about it, and I was like, well, what if we just spun this into its own business where ultimately we could scale this on its own If we were part of it at some point, cool. If not, we could sell it as its own idea, and it wouldn't be tied to our name directly. Like, it would be powered by us, but it

Danny:

--

Olivia:

Right.

Danny:

--

Nick:

we'd oversee it. But, ultimately, as we scale, we could bring in more producers, more mixers, etcetera. So whatever. Within 24 hours, I went on Squarespace, and I was like, finish my music, finish my oh, finish my track. Finish my track dot com.

That's available. Let's buy that. And we had the website up within a couple weeks and then we started doing a livestream every Friday, which was basically us bringing on our friends from the music business and saying, hey. Tell us everything you learned in the music businesses, in the music business, and give us some tips for up and comers, and that turned into its own thing. So now we've been doing that.

what? Almost 2 years?

Danny:

Yeah. Something like that. Yeah.

Nick:

And then we do another livestream called DoperNope, which is with me, Lauren Padman, who's the VP of Denmark, George Hess from Armada, Raquel Goldie, Austin Cramer Pops in once in a while. And that is right after our finish by track livestream. So they've both kind of become these things that We just kinda did for fun for the heck of it and now finished my track has turned into its own business. But what's cool is, like, when we were just in Miami, we ran into a bunch of guys, and one of the first things everybody brought up was the livestream and how much they love it and, you know, they get so much feedback out of it and are able to build out their tracks in ways that they otherwise wouldn't, which is really the crux of why we do what we do. Yeah.

it's it's cool to be 1, it's cool to help people. We've always been part of that and, like, we always wanna uplift other artists I mean, we had the opportunity to get lifted up by plenty of huge artists when we were first starting, so it's dope to do that for other people. And then the other part of it is, like, We get to then be connected to these artists forever. If they take our feedback, they make a record, maybe we put it out on our label. So that's super dope.

It's like it's just a win win for everybody.

Olivia:

That's incredible. So with all these things that you're doing and all the social media you put out because I I have a list here, and I'm not gonna make this a thing where I just read your tweets and then have you give give me feedback because they're so amazing. Every time I see them, I'm like, yes. Yes. They're they're applicable to literally everybody, not just musicians.

But with all these things that you're doing, how are you developing boundaries around work and non work? Because entrepreneurs really sometimes have a hard time not blurring that line, and I just can't fathom with these different things you have going on especially live streams. Those are, you know, those are time consuming. Where where do you find time to to play and relax and and and do other things?

Danny:

Well, like Nick said

Nick:

Danny's better about this than I am. Yeah.

Danny:

Well so Nick is Nick is for sure the social media guy. So I imagine those tweets I mean, that that kind of happens wherever. And you're always probably just thinking about stuff anyway. But as far as, like, production stuff, that's fairly easy to keep within certain hours, the livestreams. We do next to no prep for all of our lives, James.

So that keeps it that keeps it easy. because, I mean, a lot of it's people that we know. And the idea is, like, in a lot of cases, we wanna go in and not know that much anyway because

Nick:

It makes conversation more interesting. Yeah.

Danny:

So Yeah. I mean, the production, the livestreams, the social media I know takes a lot of time for Nick. And then there everything else is sort of what we would consider like, the busy work. That's whether it's like graphic design stuff, label management stuff, Nick, and we have a label manager for our lift off recordings now. As of, like, a year or 2 ago, You guys have, like, an hour at night where you kind of knock everything out for that.

I don't know

Nick:

what -- Yeah. We we we both work independently, and then we'll just, like, hammer through our list together.

Danny:

Yeah. We send each other, like, checklist of, like, You know, when you're on tomorrow morning, can you hit this, this, and this?

Olivia:

Right. Yes. Well, you didn't answer my question, which is when do you relax?

Danny:

I don't know. I never -- -- though.

Nick:

I I I don't know. For me, it's like music is what I am. Like, it's part of me and, like, this whole thing that we've built is just it's just part of my life. I don't think about it as, like, work and then relax. Like, I'm always in a mode where I'm checking something and hitting somebody back.

If there's a family party and somebody calls about work, I'm like, I'll finish talking to you in a minute, and I take the call outside for better or worse. But, like, I feel like it's helped us propel forward because People know we're available and they're able if there's a gig at the last minute or there's an opportunity that somebody needs something quick, like, we have a habit of never saying no if it's the right opportunity. So some people that does not work for them and they're big on the nose, We've always been big on the yeses, but I think we've, you know, we've been fortunate enough to have a lot of great opportunities come from those yeses. So

Danny:

--

Olivia:

Absolutely. I mean -- -- the

Nick:

way we work.

Olivia:

Yeah. It makes sense. And I think, like you said, for some people, they really just enjoy what they do so much that it becomes enmeshed with the rest of their life. And that's fine. That's fine if it works for you.

And it sounds like like you guys talked about earlier, you've been able to outsource what you need to outsource. So you're not just spinning your wheels. You're actually advancing, you know, all of your different ventures. you know, and and making real moves.

Danny:

I I was just gonna say the other thing is I I wanna make it clear to people. Like, Nick and I are both thirty 7. 30 7.

Nick:

Don't add ears, man.

Danny:

So, you know, we've been at it for a long time now. what we were doing in our mid twenties, our schedules looked very different from what they do now. I you know, when we were just starting out, it was fine for me to sit around and just mess with ideas for 4 or 5 hours. Like, that's not a problem. I don't have that sort of time today.

We both have kids. So it's like we just try to maximize our time. Like, there's there's not a lot of, like, I'm just gonna hop on and, like, see what we come up with. whatever. Like, best around yeah.

It's like you go in with a very clear plan. Like, I have an hour. I need to get an idea down for this remix. Let's get it started so that I can hop off, send the idea to Nick, and he's gonna run with it from there. And sometimes I wish we had, like, a little bit more time to just sort of be creative and, like, mess around for an hour or 2, and it does come up occasionally.

But even if it doesn't like, we've we've gotten that out of our system. We had a long period where we got to do that, which helped develop the skills so that now we can just go in, get we need to get done done.

Nick:

But I I think you touch on, like, a really good topic because I do think like, I still get a hit up now by people I grew up with that are like, yo, let's let's hang out in the studio and make music. And I'm like, for what? Like, if it doesn't have a purpose, then it there there's no point I I have fun in the studio, but, like, I wanna know that everything has a goal, and there's gonna be, like, an end game to whatever I'm creating. Granted, there's a few people I have exclusions for. But in general, that's like the motto.

So I think it's important, like Danny said, to explore your sound. Take time to just mess around and learn and do all that stuff, but you will reach a point where you need to make decisions about where your time is a lot of the best and who you're spending time with, how you're collaborating, Or if you're stronger on your own, how much time you're dedicating to that? And I think that's super important to think about.

Olivia:

Sure. So that brings up a great point because This industry, by nature, right, involves going out late nights, networking, whether that's at clubs or festivals or events, And sometimes that's not conducive to putting in the work. Right? Like, there's only so many hours in the day. If you stay out late because you had a gig, or you're going to support somebody's gig or you're trying to get on somebody's radar, how do you timebox that so that you can still be successful and not be drained because I think it's especially for people in their twenties.

I'm I'm not there anymore, but it's hard. And when you have friends, you know, who are saying, hey. Come out to this thing, to that thing. You have to learn to say no. You know?

I know you're talking about saying yes in a business sense, But in your personal life, you have to start using the word no. So what's your advice for people going through that?

Nick:

It's a tight rope.

Danny:

Yeah.

Nick:

Like, you you kinda have to do a lot of that stuff if you wanna be especially in dance music. Right? It lives in nightlife. It lives in the club If you wanna get gigs and start to meet people who are connected to eventually get you gigs, you've gotta get out and meet them. That said, You don't need to take down a bottle of vodka when you do it that night.

You have a couple drinks? Cool. like, there's nothing wrong with that, but, like, if you're gonna burn yourself out at the club like that, it's not gonna be sustainable long term. And frankly, nobody's gonna wanna show with you at some point because you're probably just a little much.

Danny:

Well and it it probably also depends to, like, maybe if you self reflect and figure out, like, what do I see my most viable path to whatever this career I want is And they could be 2 very different a lot of different ways to get there. Look at someone like I don't know, like, a Mattian or Porter Robinson. I imagine they weren't the like, hey, let's go out and party nonstop. Like, they were I'm gonna really work on my craft, get my music sounding right, and spend a lot of time there because that's what's gonna propel them. There's other people that are known as, like, party animal DJs.

And if you want to develop that persona, then going out is gonna be a big part of that. And maybe you can off you know, you can outsource some of the track production stuff to someone else and you don't need to spend as much time on that. I I think, like, if you try to this is true with, like, pretty much everything. If you try to do everything to the fullest, it's not gonna work. Like, we've talked about it with social media stuff.

If you think that you're gonna nail, like, I'm gonna have maximum engagement on Instagram and TikTok, and Facebook and whatever. Like, I'm gonna stay active in all these other, like, Discord and stuff like that. It's really hard. A lot of times, we think if you really focus on the one that's doing the best for you and then kind of build from there.

Olivia:

Absolutely. The the saying goes if everything's important. Nothing's important. Right?

Danny:

Yeah. Totally.

Olivia:

And and the way music is now and you both can speak on this more than I can, but artists are feeling the pressure to promote themselves, make original content, you know, do more than just make good music. And so like you said, it's a tight rope between all these other things that they have to do. I really think you need to, you know, develop a strong mindset. to be able to focus on all those things, balancing networking with having a social media presence, making music, you know, And then for a lot of people, having a 9 to 5 job, usually 2. Right?

When they're first starting out, that's, like, you know, paying your bills. That's a that's a huge other part of it.

Nick:

Absolutely. I mean, those are things like we're super mindful about, especially now, like, you know, being in the industry a long time and knowing that there's ebbs and flows and the good times are great, but you gotta save during the good times because they don't last. forever. Right? Like, you might have a smash record.

You're killing it. You're playing a ton of shows. And then that might start to fade and the fees might go down, and, like, you have to be you have to kinda see those things ahead of time so you know how to plan for them. But it it goes back to what we were talking about earlier. Like, these are things that we could tell people every day on a livestream, 10 hours a day, And until they go through that process, they really won't understand what that looks like.

So Be prepared because we're warning you now, and we've warned you every week on our livestream that these things happen but you'll end up going through it yourself. But I think what's dope about, like, the time we're living in now is that this information was not available to us. There was no Twitch. There were podcasts were not what they are today. And despite you know, us having to handle social media and the graphic design and all the other things outside of music, there are more people now that able to make a career in music than there were 30 years ago.

So, I mean, like, this industry likes to look at today and just say, you know, it's not fair what songwriters are getting paid. It's not fair what's going on. It's not fair. We have to do all this stuff. But, like, if you zoom out into the macro, we're able to do so much more cool shit and have so many more opportunities available to us now than any time in history.

So I think that that to me I mean, I'm an optimist with this stuff and, like, I'm sure you have plenty plenty of artists you talk to who are not. But I I just think that's super dope. And I I think if you view this industry with that lens, it becomes a little bit easier to deal with some of the bullshit that goes on.

Olivia:

Yeah. You know, I actually I I don't want artists on this podcast that are not optimistic about it because that's not what this this show is about. it's about showing people what's possible. You know, when you when you shift your paradigm and have a positive mindset around these things, and doing everything like you just said, thinking about it from a different perspective. Like, hey.

Yes. You know, it may be harder to get your Instagram post notice, but you have, 15 AI tools that can help you make a badass video in, like, 10 minutes. You know what I mean?

Danny:

Right.

Olivia:

There's there's there's so many more solutions out there now And one thing because I know we don't have that much more time, there was a tweet that you posted. I don't remember when it was, but I wrote it down and it says you only need one record to set you off. You can put out 99 and me a 100th could set you off. Keep going. And that reminds me of my favorite quote, from this motivational speaker who he says, imagine you're only 24 nos away from your yes.

how excited would you be to get those notes. Right? Because the 25th answer is gonna be a yes. And I think that it's such a great motivating tool for these artists who feel like maybe they're treading water and they wanna give up. I mean, what you're telling these artists is it just takes one.

Right? It just takes one one thing to change the trajectory of your career.

Danny:

Yeah. It it those those yeses always come out of the blue too. Like, edit it's not necessarily gonna be, like, a overnight, like, you put out a song, it becomes the next levels and all of a sudden you're a VICI level, it it can build slowly. Like, for us, we had moments where it was like we were doing remixes and, I don't know, some big name DJ like David Getta played one of our tracks. That's a moment.

And for us, that puts us a little bit on a higher level. And then we signed our first track to a label that we look up to, and then it put you up on another level and there's lots of noes in between there. But, yeah, just always know that there's another exciting moment coming up somewhere and look forward to that. Don't pay attention to all the, like, bullshit in between.

Olivia:

Yeah. Yeah.

Nick:

And it's hard. Right? It's they're so people, you know, go online, and it's just, like, flex nation everywhere where everybody's, like, winning all the time. And it's like, that's not how the world works. The you know, like, we I just put up a thing yesterday where it was like, chain smokers played our record.

And, like, to us, We've had tons of radio play, but it's still fucking dope when the chains focus play your record on SiriusXM. So why wouldn't we flex that? But do you know how many records haven't been played on the radio? Do you know how many songs have sat on hard drives? And I'm like, yo, dude, we gotta do something with this.

It's gotta go somewhere. There's exponentially more of those than there are the radio records that get airplanes. So, I mean, we've always just, like, the wall, and we're not throwing shit at it. Hopefully, we're throwing, like, really good things at it. But, like, that it's law of averages for us.

And, like, If you think about it like a baseball player, there's amazing baseball players that never really hit home runs. They just hit singles and doubles constantly, and they end up being, like, the Derekeaters of baseball, but, like, that's kind of what we've always gone for. Again, like, maybe it's not the right path for everybody, but it's definitely worked for us. And we've applied the theory of that concept to not just songs, but, like, the label being involved in different businesses. Like, these are we're putting more seeds in the ground to grow our business as a whole.

So everything we touch is loosely related to disco fries, and it's cool that it can be part of a conversation like this or you go on a radio interview and you have more things to talk about other than just your new song. It just gives you a little more depth as an artist.

Olivia:

Absolutely. And, you know, I think people forget that social media is a highlight reel. Right? And there's not a lot of transparency and authenticity on there. I think you guys do a great job at it.

There's other people that do in the music scene and elsewhere, but a lot of people aren't gonna aren't gonna share, you know, their losses or their flops. And I I think it's really great when people do that because it makes It makes everybody stronger, and it reminds people that we're we're all human. Right? So so I wanna wrap up with, like, a little nugget of wisdom from you guys because you guys you guys tweeted something else about the power of a DM. Right?

Sliding in someone's DM's could could you know, get you a collab. It could land you, you know, a mentor, so many different things. There's a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it. So I want you to give you this opportunity to elaborate on that because I've I've received some DM from people asking for advice, and sometimes I'm like, oh, yeah. Absolutely because of how they asked 100%, and then sometimes it's a little out of pocket.

Danny:

Danny, you take this 1. Yeah. One thing that I always think about, like, usually when I'm reaching out to someone, it's because I appreciate something that they've done, look up to them, whatever. So I usually start out with, like, you know, I've been a big fan of for a long time or I specifically like this track. I remember I saw you in whatever, like, in Boston back in 2000 something.

stuff like that. And then get get right to the point. Make sure that if you're sending a link to somebody, track to somebody, make sure that the link works. that it's not gonna be like an expired thing, something. Just little details like that.

And honestly, that's it. And then don't get your hopes up about any of it. I I think we, over the years, have gotten really good at we keep our expectations very low, and then you can only be pleasantly surprised when something happens. So understand that everyone's busy. Maybe they, you know, they don't see it right away, something like that.

send it, make it easy for them to read. And then if they don't hit back, e either, like, give it a while and then approach it again down the road or just do the, you know, the gentle nudge like, hey, checking in see if you got this, something like that. And then after a second one, just know that it's it's not the time.

Olivia:

That's great advice. You have to really prepare to not let you yourself get your feelings hurt. Right? Like, it's not personal. These people probably receive

Danny:

100

Olivia:

of DMs, you know, with similar requests. And it's a lot for you know, social media is great, but it's made everybody so accessible. But I think sometimes people forget like, hey, this person cannot doesn't have the capacity to respond to, like, 15 messages a day. So so that's really good advice. It's it's not personal, and, you know, don't let it discourage you from sending the next DM to somebody else.

Nick:

Yeah. Totally. And think about where you're DM ing. Right? Like, you wanna do it where you think that person is living the most.

If you see their super active on Twitter all day, Logic dictates not to DM them on Facebook.

Olivia:

Right.

Nick:

And that we run into that a lot where it's like, yo, dude. I've been hitting you blah blah blah. Where are you been hitting me? Oh, we haven't used that platform in a while. Obviously, look at the post is from, like, 3 weeks ago or whatever it might be.

like, try to try to go where people are living to contact you to contact them, and then you'll have the best shot at it. Also, LinkedIn is, like, unsung hero. People gotta get it on LinkedIn. They're sleeping on it.

Olivia:

Really? That's I would not expect you to say that.

Danny:

Not for, like, the big name DJs and stuff like that,

Olivia:

but we're just

Danny:

Olivia:

slate on on LinkedIn. Right? Yeah. It's gonna be, like, Chris Lake at a at Salesforce and sort of things.

Danny:

--

Nick:

wanna get sponsors. If you wanna get in touch with even, like, on the label side, if you're having a hard time getting touch in touch with the label, I feel like those that's a good place to build relationships. And don't go in there and be like, yo, check out my SoundCloud. I mean, like, if you do something that's complimentary, maybe has a full time job. Maybe you are a video editor, like, you have coding skills or whatever.

It could be a backdoor way into a situation that you could then connect to your music. For any brand, if you're trying to get a sync with a car company but you could do some other cool shit for them that has nothing to do with music and then slide in that you're a producer and start building a relationship that way. I always like that means of an approach where, like, you're doing something unrelated to just like, throw in your music out there and say and check out my mix tape.

Danny:

Yeah. You're providing value right up front. Totally.

Olivia:

Absolutely. So, obviously, also, like, have a good LinkedIn profile. don't just have, like, no picture and, you know, fill it out fill it out a little bit. That's a creative that's different too because a lot of people, I think, wouldn't go that route. So it's, like, it's a unique way to get maybe notice faster.

Nick:

Yeah. And I mean, like, if you're not putting this livestream or podcast on LinkedIn, I highly amended because you'll tap into an entirely different market.

Olivia:

Thanks for the the reminder. It's a great reminder. So okay. So speaking of that, tell people where they can find you in your livestream. Obviously, you're at disco Fries on on all the social media platforms, but the livestream, when does that happen?

Nick:

So that's Thursdays generally. Like, if we have a guest, we we'll go live at 1 PM on Thursdays on twitch twitch.tv/thediscofries.

Olivia:

Awesome. Well, thank you so much for joining me. This was really valuable, and I'm excited for, you know, people to be able to to pick your brains a little bit. and get some more insight on these tweets. Like I said, you guys are amazing consultants, and and, you know, musicians are very lucky to have you.

Danny:

Thank you so much. --

Nick:

much, Olivia.

Olivia:

I think that part about LinkedIn really surprised me, but maybe maybe that's because I I don't like using LinkedIn all that much. I feel like it's a necessary evil as a working professional, but this kind of proves their point even more. Right? Because it's like take the path less travel by others. I think it's really great advice.

And I will definitely be including all of their information, their links, their livestream link in the show notes because they are dropping knowledge like this, free knowledge, On a regular basis, it is so valuable for creatives anybody, right, who who who's looking to up level their life. They're the guys to help you do it. You know, what I really enjoyed about this conversation is that they're so solution oriented. Anytime I posed a a problem or a pain point in a question, they responded from a solution framework. which is hard to find these days.

I think optimists are a rare commodity and it was so refreshing to hear that framework from 2 guys who are just continuing, right? They they haven't reached their pinnacle yet. They're still plugging along. They're developing new businesses. They're helping more people.

And it's just so cool to see and hear that perspective from really humble, hardworking, our They're they're proof that opportunities are abundant and endless whether you create them or find them. They are there for the taking. And so, you know, Take a page out of their book because I think you can do some really great things for your life. We are going to be dropping more content like this with some incredible artists every episode so be sure to follow here on YouTube, subscribe, follow us on Instagram and Twitter at elevated frequencies podcast and send me a message if you want a specific question asked or you want me to interview an artist. Let me know.

See you next time.