Hires Carter as manager
Banks signs Carter as her manager.
I just switched management.. Literally like three days ago, and have a whole new set of resources to take advantage of. We’re gonna vamp this up and make it official.. No more ghetto mixes and closet recording.. I have a budget now.
Little Monsters launch
Gaga launches LittleMonsters (https://littlemonsters.com/) as an invite-only beta for Gaga’s fans, who she refers to a “Little Monsters”. The site is the first project by Backplane and acts as a social network for her fans. CEO Michelsen says the project, in common with other Backplane project aims to :
Unite people around interests, affinities and movements. Backplane is about bringing together communities and Gaga’s community just so happens to be the community we’re using to learn about proper functionality. We think we can really change the world.
Gaga had called her manager, Carter, after seeing a screening of The Social Network:
She said she’d like to build a social network for her fans, and build a community where they could congregate and have conversations. So I called some of my friends in the Valley.
Carter then talked with Palantir CEO, Lonsdale, which led to the creation of Backplane, which has built the platform for the site. They receive backing from Google Ventures and others.
DLD 12 interview: Connect with your Fans
Carter and Michelsen are interviewed at DLD 12 about connecting with fans. Michelsen:
I’m known as being Troy’s arms dealer in The Valley. So when we use social media we look at these things as reaching the most amount of people, and the power behind it. If you look at Silicon Valley there are big [technology] weapons. Troy and Lady Gaga are the detonators. They have these platforms and the individuals become the network.
Carter on Gaga’s rise:
Our timing was great. Facebook had just opened up. Twitter was on the rise. MySpace built this platform that was specifically for artists. So we were alternative ways. It just so happened that Gag’s voice is so authentic that she used it as way to say really connected with the fans, she never used it as a place to sell, sell, sell.
DLD dialogues
Carter talks with The Economist’s Bishop at the DLD12 conference (video was not released until May 2012). Carter:
We’re learning that there aren’t any rules. Just when you think you know something a new piece of technology will pop up, or a new company will pop up. And right now with content you just really have to follow the consumer. I recently watched the movie The Artist, which shows the transition of silent films into talking pictures and at that time how disruptive that was, and it just reminds me of exactly what’s happening in the content industry today. We’ve been through several cycles of disruption and this one is nothing new. You just have to follow the consumer…When you have the luxury of having been able to live through cycles you fear them a lot less, and you embrace it,
Founds AF Square, A\IDEA
Under the umbrella of Atom Factory, Carter founds A\IDEA, a product development and branding agency, and AF Square, an angel fund and technology consultancy that holds interests in many technology companies at various stages of growth.
Facebook f8 conference
Carter participates in a panel session on digital music Spotify’s Daniel Ek and Clear Channel’s Bob Pittman, moderated by Facebook’s Justin Osofsky. Carter says there is a trend of artists making their music widely available to listen to, rather than putting all the effort into making people buy it.
What we’re looking to do is not just about selling the CD or the digital file. It’s how many people can we get the music to. How many people can experience it? If it was up to me, I’d give away the next album and put it on every handset that I can put it on, to get that scale,. You can’t be scared to fail. Sometimes we’re going to get big results, and sometimes you learn a lesson, make an adjustment and move on.
On how an artist like Gaga would use data-crunching features on Facebook.
For us it’s how do we laser-focus on that, how do we make it less passive, how do we focus on the super-fan as opposed to somebody who just liked one single? The more layers on top of the community, the more sticky it is. For us it’s not about Lady Gaga talking to the community, but it’s about the community sharing with each other.
On mobile extending the concert experience:
People watch concerts like this now [holds up imaginary mobile phone]. For us, it’s how do we extend that experience? Right now it’s very simple: people are tweeting from the concert, they’re uploading their YouTube video…In the next year or so, something we’re working on internally is going to make it a much more interactive experience… not just how you share the experience on the outside of the concerts, when you go home, but how you share it on the inside of the concerts too.
Harvard Business Review case study
Harvard Business Review publishes a second case study, this time concentrating on the launch of Born This Way.
In March 2011, Troy Carter, manager of pop star Lady Gaga, reflects on decisions made regarding his artist’s concert tour and faces a new set of challenges regarding the launch of Lady Gaga’s new album, Born This Way. Is a huge, expensive launch akin to that of a “tent-pole” movie the best way to capitalize on Gaga’s popularity, or is a more moderate approach that relies on word-of-mouth the right way to proceed? Designed to help students understand the decisions that helped propel Lady Gaga into one of the entertainment world’s biggest names. Written from the perspective of her manager, the case provides rich insights into the artist’s touring, recorded-music, and social-media activities, as well as supporting economic data.
Slate interview
Carter is interviewed by Slate magazine, as part of its Top Right project, which lists 25 Americans who “combine inventiveness and practicality: our best real-world problem-solvers”. He talks about Gaga’s entrepreneurial deals:
Our strategy is that business follows the creative. We’re not out there scouring the marketplace for opportunities. It just happens. If [Gaga] has an idea that works with a song or a project that she is working on, we go look for best-of-class partners to help us execute it. And a lot of businesses bring ideas to us.
About the upcoming release of Backplane:
The problem is: How meaningful is that social media imprint [on Facebook, Twitter, and her own site]? Just because you have 43 million likes on Facebook doesn’t necessarily translate into 42 million albums sold, 42 million concert tickets sold, 42 million pieces of merchandise sold. So this really builds on a concentrated audience, as opposed to making it bigger.
On his other entrepreneurial projects:
I love entrepreneurs. In the tech space, what I found is this incredible energy that reminded me of the early days of hip-hop. Back then, guys were all starting their own companies. It wasn’t about the money. It was about passion for a specific product or project. I’ve just been meeting a ton of smart kids who have a deep passion. I’ve become an advisor to some, an investor in some of these companies, and they’ve been helping me with some of my projects.
Harvard Business Review case study
Harvard Business Review publishes a case study about Carter’s work with Gaga:
In September 2009, Troy Carter, manager of up-and-coming pop star Lady Gaga, has to decide on a new course of action now that his artist’s planned co-headlining arena tour with hip-hop superstar Kanye West has been canceled. Carter knows that continuing the tour solo comes with huge risks, but scaling it back to smaller theaters or postponing the tour altogether has disadvantages as well. Making matters more complicated, Carter also has to consider the implications for Gaga’s partners, including the concert promoter Live Nation and the William Morris Endeavor agency. What is the best strategy? This case is designed to help students understand the decisions that helped propel Lady Gaga into one of the entertainment world’s biggest names. Written from the perspective of her manager, the case provides rich insights into the artist’s touring, recorded-music, and socialmedia activities, as well as supporting economic data.
New York Times profile
Carter is profiled in NYT’s Dealbook. He talks about the upcoming launch of Backplane and the convergence of music and technology.
Technology has long been the driver of growth in the music business from the invention of lacquers, eight-track players, vinyl, cassettes and CDs. In order to continue the growth we have to go back to embracing technology and the way that people choose to consume music.
Backplane
Backplane is founded by Carter, Michelson, Lonsdale and Lady Gaga. The seven-person project aims to provide a way to organize and power online communities based on certain interests, such as sports teams, musicians, and also bring in feeds from Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites. Gaga has a reported 20% stake in the business. $1 million has been raised in angel funding from investors including Schmidt’s Tomorrow Ventures.
Praises Born This Way
Carter praises Born This Way:
We’re just starting to play music for the label. We’re very excited about it. We’re starting to play a little for people and getting a feel for it, and she’s done an incredible job, a really incredible job.
Carter also says he and Gaga have yet to decide on how to market the album.
Well, you know what, it’s not where I go from a business standpoint, it’s more about where she goes creatively because, truth be told, we built the business around her creative infrastructure and that business that was built is unique to Lady Gaga.
Gaga meets Jobs, criticizes Ping
Gaga and Carter travel to Cupertino to meet with Jobs at his request to discuss Apple’s music-centered social network Ping. Gaga and Carter criticize Ping’s lack of connectivity to other social networks, especially Facebook, as well as its design. It is reported that the leave “respecting Mr. Jobs’ overall vision.” After the meeting Carter calls Michelsen, a well-connected technology investor and entrepreneur, to find a platform for entertainers that could help them manage their fan base across all major social networks. Michelsen:
I said why try to find a platform, let’s try to build one.
Chooses Carter, Oseary as manager
DeGeneres chooses Lady Gaga’s manager, Carter, and Madonna’s manager, Oseary, to co-manage Chance.
Describes ’95-5′ partnership
Carter is interviewed in Ad Age magazine about Gaga’s marketing partnerships. At this time Gaga has 2.8 million Twitter followers, more than 5.2 million Facebook fans. Digital-single sales are over 20 million, album sales are eight million. Carter says their partnership is “95-5”:
The only thing I do is manage the vision. Ninety-five percent of the time I won’t comment on creative, and 95% of the time she lets me run the business. The other 5% is where we debate about things like, ‘Do you really want to bleed to death on stage at the [MTV] VMAs?’ She wins even when we do have those debates 5% of the time.
Carter says he doesn’t want Gaga to ever look like she’s endorsing a brand — hence why she’s created products for Universal’s Beats By Dre headphones line, Viva Glam and now Polaroid as its new creative director.
You won’t see her face plastered on any packaging or anything. We’re comparing it to when Tom Ford went to Gucci or Steve Jobs went into Apple and brought a different thought process and taste level in. We’re looking for her to do the same exact thing at Polaroid. It’s not about her putting her name on something — it’s reinvigorating a brand.
Founds Atom Factory
Carter founds Atom Factory, a “multi-dimensional entertainment and artist management company” based in Los Angeles, CA, where he serves as chairman and chief executive officer. He says the company can be much more than a simple artist-management firm.
It was more about building a platform on top of music—because music, we realized, sells everything but music.
Promotes Gaga
Carter and Herbert promote Gaga in San Francisco and L.A. Carter:
[Gaga had just been dropped by Def Jam Records. Carter had just been fired by Eve Jeffers, his biggest client. And Herbert had just left his label at Universal to start over fresh] So everybody had something to prove, and nothing to lose. We went from club to club. She was in the front seat of our friend’s truck. Going to four clubs a night, playing for a couple hundred people, between L.A. and San Francisco. She pretty much wore the same outfit for one year. It was something no one had seen before. Top 40 radio was telling us we had to get on dance stations, and it was gay music, not what they played.
Carter called club promoters, designers, DJs, media.
This was hand-to-hand combat
Herbert:
We didn’t have money for the ideas we wanted. We didn’t have people paying attention to us. We had none of that support. But what we had was each other. We had heart.
Carter, Gaga meet
Facing eviction from his office, Carter is introduced to Lady Gaga by Herbert, the executive producer at her record label. Carter becomes her manager.
Vince is a big guy, and I see him walking through the reception area. And behind him, I see this girl with these big shoes, and big black eyeglasses, and fishnet stockings, and no pants, just a leotard. We hit it off right away. Everything she is today she was when she walked through the door. She just had a point of view. The music was there. You don’t meet a lot of artists with vision, not early artists, not at the beginning.
Herbert:
He was going to lose his house. He had no Christmas gifts for his kids. But at the end of the day, if you’re a good person like Troy is, good things will come to you…People still to this day, they don’t understand, and try to figure it out. We still live in this world where there’s black people and white people, and people say: ‘Vince, you guys are two black guys. Why did you let this black guy be the manager of this white girl?’ Because in music no one looks at color. They just look at each other’s heart. And when you look at that, it has every color in the book.
Dropped by Eve
0 0 Mary Devlin Mary Devlin2015-07-29 23:39:392015-07-30 01:20:15Dropped by EveSanctuary deal falls apart
Sanctuary Urban Group terminates Carter’s five-year contract, as well as those of his Erving Wonder partners, J. Erving, and Tony Davis, before they expired. An eventual settlement closes the chapter on Sanctuary’s alliance with the urban music genre. Carter says the cultures of the two firms were just too different:
Instead of me being able to be creative with the artists, I was sitting in finance meetings a couple of times a week. It killed my spirit as an entrepreneur.
He loses his payday from the sale.
As an entrepreneur you take big swings of the bat. I struck out.