The Hardships of Getting a Job in the Music Industry

Jeeni Blog

Helping the next generation of talent to build a global fanbase

The Hardships of Getting a Job in the Music Industry

When an area of employment is as culturally, historically and economically important as the music industry, it’s hardly going to be a walk in the park to insert oneself into it. Despite the giant range of positions and opportunities, a mountain of deciding factors and conditions stand in the way of graduates and the enticing notion of working in music. Many corners of employment have their difficulties, whether it’s overwhelming competition from like-minded hopefuls or a seemingly unfair demand for experience but the music industry seems to set up these hurdles at steeper heights than most.

This is why companies like Jeeni can be an answered prayer for optimistic music graduates that are seeking experience in this confusing and challenging industry. Jeeni is always looking for fresh young talent to help its gears run smoothly and efficiently so that more support can be provided and offered to unrepresented artists, meaning that Jeeni holds out a helping hand to upcoming talents in the industry in more ways than one.

Music is still a growing industry with a 7% increase in employment from 2017 to 2018 (UK Music, Music By Numbers 2019 report) which sounds like a great thing and it is, however this is also a rise in competition due to an unprecedented increase in revenue from the music industry, according to Goldman Sachs, “In May 2020, Goldman Sachs estimated the entire music industry's revenue (live, recorded, and publishing) to increase from $62 billion in 2017 to $131 billion in 2030, representing a 6% CAGR. The 2030 estimate was an increase on its original prediction of $104 billion, made in October 2016.” (Toptal.com, ‘The State of The Music Industry in 2020’) Business is booming for the music world which means everyone is looking for the best and they aren’t willing to take a chance on anyone without near-impossible standards of experience. However, music graduates can begin their climb to greatness with companies like Jeeni

A testimonial from Jeeni’s Marketing Leader, music production graduate, Ella Venvell offers an insight in the uphill battle that finding a future in the music industry can prove to be, “I always knew finding a job within the music industry would be challenging but I didn’t know just how hard it was! Even though I have a musical background and have a degree in music production, that alone was not enough. As the music industry is quite niche, most companies ask for years of experience to prove your abilities and knowledge, however, nowhere is willing to give you the experience!”

Jeeni Marketing intern, Annesa Sukul decided to begin building up her music industry experience with Jeeni and has been a total asset to the entire company in research, maintaining artist relationships and so much more. She was taken on at Jeeni amidst her studies and given a chance to contribute her skills and hard work to the team, ‘As a music business student, it is quite difficult to get into the music industry if you don’t know where to look. Often times when someone doesn’t have experience, the first thing would be to look for a work placement or an internship. However, most of these tend to also ask for previous experience and would leave one feeling lost as to where to gain this experience.”

As an intern at Jeeni, Annesa still has a say in the type of tasks she carries out and is given roles that challenges her and puts her specified skills to the test. As well as simply giving interns experience on paper, we try to truly set them up for success in their future roles by giving them chances to propose new ideas and contribute to the company in a hands-on and proactive way, which is all useful inclusions to CVs and portfolios. Annesa also has access to a supportive team to help her with her time at Jeeni in any way she needs.

As Jeeni still finds itself in an early stage of its journey, we’re in a position where we can provide much-needed experience for people like Ella and Annesa to prepare them for their future careers in music and put them to good use in furthering the reach and effectiveness of Jeeni’s mission.

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25
Aug

Ready for Victorious 2022! by Holly Tarrant

This Bank Holiday weekend is the hotly anticipated Victorious Festival, a staple of the summer festival season that has only grown in size since it’s humble beginnings. And here at Jeeni, we're all ready, willing and able. Starting out in 2011, Victorious has grown to great heights, and has made Portsmouth a beacon for music-lovers during the summer. During the 3 days of the festival, ticket holders get exclusive access to Southsea Castle, Southsea Skatepark, the D-Day Museum to name just a few. With huge headline artists like Stereophonics, Paolo Nutini and Sam Fender, Victorious caters for all, and for those who prefer undiscovered musical talents such as those found at Jeeni.com, head down to the Jeeni sponsored People’s Lounge stage where acts such as local talent Portsmouth Radar, Nayana, Martha Eve, Beatroot, Creature. and Zed, The Dreamer will be performing the gig of their lives. Prefer something a little more child-friendly? CBeebies’ very own YolanDa’s Band Jam will be joining the festival in the Victorious Kids Arena, alongside the Go Jetters, Fireman Sam, Octonaughts, and Baby Shark. There are many fun activities to occupy little ones with bouncy castles, the colouring tent, the Southsea Skatepark Mini Wheelers and Pop Kids, as well as a full size circus to name a few. Victorious is proud to donate a percentage of ticket sales to many charities including Jeeni ambassador Ellie Milner’s foundation Arms Around The Children, a wonderful charity dedicated to providing children who have been diagnosed with HIV and aids with the love, care and support they so desperately need. Victorious festival will run on 26/27/28 August 2022. Buy tickets for Victorious at www.victoriousfestival.co.uk/.

06
Jun

My grandfather was killed by a rubbish truck.

Jeeni has returned to Crowdcube to raise more funds for helping new talent. Jeeni founding director Mel Croucher says, “I admit we’re ahead of our original schedule, but there’s still so much more to do. We need to scale our online platform globally now and build our mass artist showcases. Then we can hit all our targets, and give our new artists the recognition they deserve.” If you want to see our pitch click HERE. Mel has been writing the best-loved column in top-selling tech magazines for over 30 years. Now he’s agreed to share his work with all our members. He’s a video games pioneer and musician, and to to find out more about Mel check out his Wikipedia page. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Croucher. Here’s one of Mel’s latest! One bright Autumn morning, my grandfather was killed by a rubbish truck. He got run over crossing the road on his regular walk to work. He was 84. And I am comforted to know that he loved his work as much as he loved his walk. As for me, I have yet to reach that ripe old age but I am still working most hours, most days. It's not so much that I love my work, more that I don't know what else to do. When I was younger, so much younger than today, I was promised a sci-fi world where all labour would be performed by robots, leaving us humans to enjoy a more meaningful existence. Before my grandfather was born, Karl Marx wrote that in a mechanised society workers would be freed from the monotony of work to “hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, criticise after dinner.” My grandfather certainly never saw such a sci-fi world or Marxist society, and I'm still waiting for it. But the way things are going I may not have to wait much longer for robots to take over the tedium of work. Judging by their behaviour, I suspect that most telemarketers, receptionists, estate agents and bar tenders were replaced by robots ages ago. And for drivers, machine operators and manual workers, it can only be only a matter of time. The first robot aircraft pilot took to the skies then navigated flawlessly and landed safely way back in 1947. Robots have been successfully conducting complex heart surgery since 2004. Artificial intelligence has already reached the cognitive power of a nine year-old human, in which case it is qualified to run for President of the USA in November. But do we really need political leaders to tell us how best to fill our waking hours? If we can develop all these technological wonders then we should be smart enough to work it out for ourselves. Our waking hours are dominated by work, whether we are in work or not. Strikers are depicted as troublemakers. Artists are depicted as idle. The poor are depicted as scroungers. The state cajoles the unemployed, the sick and the disabled to get off their arses and work. We are educated with the goal of work in mind, then having worked all our lives we are grudgingly handed back a mingy pension which we paid for in the first place. The idealised worker works in order to pay the childminder, the Deliveroo driver, the dog walker, the baker, the brewer, the app maker, because the idealised worker has no time left for such things. The idealised worker is too busy working to do any of these things for herself. For huge numbers of us the significance of the old certainties of community, religion, politics, and even family, have all fallen away to be replaced by work. For huge numbers of us work is how we give our lives meaning, while at the same time work has become more precarious, more impersonal, more stressful, and the app-driven gig economy is a perfect example of this. Yet everybody knows that automation is already capable of doing most manual jobs of work, and now artificial intelligence is predicted as achieving the capability of taking over most desk-bound jobs too. Since the pandemic, the entire framework of work is falling apart. But as a species we are not hardwired to work for a living. We never have been. We were lied to by those who said we must work, either to deserve a mythological afterlife, or protect an artificial realm, or for supposed honour, or someone else's glory, or for tokens of currency that can only be spent at the store owned by the company that issues those tokens in the first place. But of course all of those motivations are a con. And an obvious con at that. So here's the thing. Now we have cheap reliable technology, let's get all the robots to do as much of the muscle work as they can, and let's get all the artificial intelligences to do as much of the brain work as they can. Then let's redistribute the remaining working hours evenly to we the people, and in return pay ourselves some of that fabricated stuff called money so we can buy good food and decent shelter. By my reckoning six hours a day, three days a week will do nicely to pick up the slack left by the robots. Work needn't be useless. Work includes child-rearing, caring for the elderly and protecting the vulnerable. It also includes growing food, dreaming up new businesses and fixing the tap. And work includes creating music and dance and poetry and streaming it on Jeeni.com. It is self-evident that all valid work is worth the same valid reward. This is not a Marxist idea, or even a socialist proposal. It's the Tories who bang on about work being such a good thing and everyone pulling their weight, and I completely agree with them. Margaret Thatcher, that champion of work culture, said, “The heresies of one period become the orthodoxies of the next.” Yes indeedy, so bring on the robots and the electronic brains. If work is such a good thing then let everyone have a go for a few hours a week for a universal payment. And don't worry about how the payment is distributed, the accounts have all been reckoned by computers for years. Click HERE to visit or return to jeeni.com

03
Sep

7 Of The Best Music Sites and Blogs

We have scanned the internet and asked members what they think are the 7 of the best music sites and blogs. Basically, what's hot and what's not! Our choices may well differ from yours, so let's have the debate. Many things have changed in recent months and will change at an even greater pace now. With online streaming services we can enjoy our music for free or at a low cost. So let's get started with the ones we love. 1. Water and Music We love Water and Music which is an audio companion to the email newsletter of the same name, dedicated to unpacking the fine print behind big ideas in music and technology. The title comes from a conversation between Quincy Jones and Kendrick Lamar, in which the former declares: "The last things to leave this planet will be water and music." Host Cherie Hu is an award-winning freelance journalist and analyst focusing on the intersection of music, media and technology, with regular bylines in publications including Billboard, Forbes and Music Business Worldwide. 2. vampr We love Vampr. Vampr is an app that helps you discover, connect and collaborate with fellow musicians, the music industry and music lovers alike. Vampr stats show 33,798,736 swipes and 5,017,135 connections made in 198 countries worldwide. 3. Pitchfork We also love Pitchfork. Pitchfork has some awesome features such as best new music, and we really like the music reviews. The writers seem to be in the know and very much "thought leaders" in the music industry. They are continually updating the website with the latest information related to the music industry. In addition, Pitchfork hosts its own music festival which will be held in Chicago this year. 4. Hypebot We also love Hypebot. Hypebot is one of the most well-known online music sites in the industry, and there is good reason for that! The site is updated very regularly, so you know you are getting all the latest information possible. They also cover other areas such as “Music Tech”, “DIY” and “Charts”. You can also sign up to the Hypebot newsletter to get the daily lowdown on everything happening straight to your inbox! Hypebot covers a wide variety of topics in the music industry, so no matter what you are looking for, you’ll probably be able to find it here. They also have a charts section where you can filter by “emerging artists” or “established artists” as well as the country and city. And of course you can play artist tracks. 5. YourEDM Our next site is Your EDM, dedicated to Electronic Dance Music. Everything you need to stay up to date with the latest in electronic music can found here. This includes all the latest news as well as featured articles and sub-sections/ genres of EDM, like house and bass. On this site you even have the ability to download free songs, from a variety of different artists trying to make a name for themselves in the industry. All the different sub-genres are listed on the site, so even if your taste is really narrow in EDM, you can still find some great information. New info almost daily. Make sure you follow them on social media to get updates on the latest information. 6. All Music Next on our it's-gotta-be-hot list is All Music. All Music doesn’t really have as much news on the music industry as the others listed here, but their focus is mainly on providing information in new music and helping visitors discover their next obsession. They also provide recommendations if you create an account, and once you have rated albums, you will get recommendations on what to listen to next. Covering from all common genres including pop, rap, electronic, classical, blues, country and more. They provide an in-depth review of all the latest albums and give options on how to stream the tunes if you want to. There are three different ratings available to view, “All Music Rating”, “User Ratings” and “Your Rating” so you can have a more detailed view on what people think about a particular album. 7. JEENI Last but not least we love Jeeni, a new platform for Independent Musicians and Performers. JEENI is a multi-channel streaming service for original and unsigned talent. Jeeni provides a showcase for musicians and performers to put their talent in the spotlight, giving superfans the power to make them stars. The Jeeni promise is to treat their creative talent ethically, fairly, honestly and with respect. Additionally, Jeeni publishes its own blog, all about Jeeni and current industry news. Most importantly Jeeni commits to – No hype. No adverts. No rip-offs. No Fakes, and making sure that the artists get 100% of their direct sales. Find out more here That's all Folks!

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