Discovering Artists “Before Fame”
Noah Kahan, Webster Hall, NYC. 2021. (taken by me)
I grew up with answers to music industry questions floating above my head, tantalizingly out of reach.
I also grew up with a desperate need for challenge that was never satiated.
I’ve always wanted to be one step ahead of everyone else, discovering the next best thing and enjoying the search. I’m an avid secondhand shopper, scrounging thrift stores to find secondhand treasure. The prize is always worth it when I work hard to discover it. I’m known among my friends for being a “thrift store god”. I’ve discovered limited edition pink Doc Martens in mint condition, and a perfect Jessica McClintock vintage ballgown for 13 Euros, which I wore to a Viennese ball while studying abroad. And all for a cheap price.
I also love to flip clothes at local consignment and thrift stores. It’s worth it to spend a few hours transforming a men’s XL old pair of stained vintage overalls into a charming denim dress, for three reasons: The process is fun, I save money, and the end product is extensively more special.
I only realized recently that the same goes for music. I listen to at least 5 new playlists a week: my Discover Weekly, Daylist, various college radio channels… the list goes on. I have 10,028 songs liked on Spotify, and I’m not stopping anytime soon. Many of my friends ask me to make specific style playlists for them, and I jump at the opportunity to do so. With over 100 million songs existing on Spotify alone, playlist curation is the ultimate treasure hunt: and understanding the Spotify algorithm and SEO is a huge part of that.
It’s the same with discovering new artists on DSPs, of which the reward is a simple, sweet pleasure. It’s getting to listen to a song that satiates that itch in my brain… whether it’s a comforting cadence, heart-stopping lyrics that make me rethink everything, or an insanely catchy guitar riff.
I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the bragging rights that come along with knowing an artist before they catapult to fame. We see it all over TikTok and Instagram Reels….
I have to say, the psychological marketing tactic used here is genius. It seems that the desire to gatekeep artists is common among Gen-Z individuals…. maybe it has something to do with the current connotation of a “Tik Tok song”. Or maybe it has something to do with the rising average ticket prices for music tours worldwide, as shown by this Statista graph and the grumblings of concertgoers worldwide.
This is partially due to dynamic pricing, which is well-worded by Charlotte Peacock in the following article:
“Ticketmaster’s pricing system is demand-based. So when tickets go on sale, prices are driven by demand from fans, which means prices can be two or three times higher than expected for the most popular shows. When there’s seriously high demand for tickets, if you can get on to the site to buy one, you might find there are none available by the time you get to the checkout. Or that the price has jumped sky-high. If there’s not much demand, on the other hand, prices drop.
Dynamic pricing has been introduced as a way to prevent ticket touts from buying tickets and ripping off fans when they resell them. Thanks to dynamic pricing, the money goes to the artists instead of touts, but it still means that many young fans are being priced out of attending concerts. It also makes it hard to budget and easy to overspend because it’s impossible to know how much tickets are going to cost” (GoHenry, 2023).
Another reason why Gen Z-ers may want to gatekeep artists is because of the nature of what often happens to viral TikTok songs. For instance, a 15-30 second segment of a song could begin to catch the ears of listeners on TikTok through a trend or dance challenge. That short segment of the song is replayed and reposted, and the song’s streaming numbers grow subsequently on DSPs like Spotify and Apple Music. Next thing you know, the song has multiple millions of streams… but is only discernable at certain points, while “fans” may have never heard the bridge in their life.
These same fans may only follow the artist because of that song, instead of supporting their entire discography. This happened to Steve Lacy and Lizzy McAlpine, who both expressed frustration when concertgoers only bought tickets to hear the one song they loved from TikTok. Lizzy McAlpine fans left right after “ceilings” was played. Steve Lacy had a similar problem…
These songs are often pushed to a wider audience due to the TikTok algorithm and may be described by users as having “mainstream” exposure. They might be overplayed in shopping malls, on Sirius XM radio, or at the grocery store.
Many listeners may be upset that something that was once their special secret is now cherished and raved about by the greater public. It feels special to be a part of a small group, witnessing the flourishing of an underrated gem without the overly priced concert tickets or the clamoring of fans waiting to take a picture at the meet and greet. And going back to my original concept, the listener may have worked hard to find the artist. For me, that’s scrounging through multiple playlists of mediocre songs and artists that don’t tickle my fancy until I finally land on that gem. It takes time and effort.
It’s just like my side hustle of flipping clothes—“The process is fun, I save money, and the end product is extensively more special.”
My twin sister showed me Noah Kahan’s music around early 2021. We quickly became fans of his music and I’ve seen him three times in concert since: in November of 2021, October of 2022, and September of 2023. I used to religiously watch his monthly Instagram live streams, hoping to catch him playing a new unreleased song from his cabin in Vermont.
Although I can’t remember exactly how much I paid for tickets, I can tell you that they were under $60 for being about 5 rows of people away from him, in the heart of Manhattan. I even snapped the cover photo of this blog post with my iPhone. For that distance nowadays, a ticket 5 rows away from Noah Kahan can sell for over a thousand dollars.
So while gatekeeping artists can sometimes be taken too far, I won’t be too harsh on listeners… for now. But, I’ll leave you with some food for thought. Does an increase in fans of an artist shrink the average slice of the shareholder pie, negatively affecting the fan experience? Or does an increase in fans promote the idea of community?
Bibliography
Peacock, C. (2023, September 24). The reason it’s so hard to buy concert tickets online. GoHenry. https://www.gohenry.com/uk/blog/bread/the-reason-its-so-hard-to-buy-concert-tickets-online
Statista Research Department. (2024). Average ticket price for music tour concert admission from 2011 to 2023 worldwide. Statista. Retrieved July 19, 2024, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/380106/global-average-music-tour-ticket-price/.
