My algorithm wants me to quit music 😂

I’ve noticed something happening to my content feeds lately: Meta and YouTube realllly seem to want me to quit music. 😂

Every day I get some new variation of:

• “Touring is broken.”

• “Streaming doesn’t pay.”

• “Bands can’t make money anymore.”

• “Being a full-time musician is unrealistic.”

• “You need five other jobs just to survive.”

And look… they’re not exactly wrong.

Making a living as an artist is hard… it’s ALWAYS been hard. And there are very real economic problems facing musicians right now.

And sometimes that shit gets to me, not gonna lie.

But this morning I caught myself thinking:

“Why am I allowing other people’s business models to define what’s possible for MINE?”

Or as I often say:

“Other people’s fate is not necessarily my destiny.”

Because… I’m realizing that I’m not building a music career anymore.

I’m building a goddamn world.

RIŽIK is my artist project.

TAME THE MACHINE started as the name for my completely live electronic performance format: electronic music performed by human hands instead of hiding behind backing tracks.

Then yesterday I created INPUT: HUMAN, a live electronic event series I’m launching here in Los Angeles on September 25th (I’ll be announcing it later this week).

I teach Artist Entrepreneurship at UCLA.

I write this email you’re reading right now.

I score films and video games.

I consult artists and music tech companies.

Now… at first glance, these might look like a bunch of different things.

But increasingly, I don’t think they are.

They’re becoming different doors into the same world.

And that made me realize something about the advice artists CONSTANTLY hear:

“You need to diversify.”

I don’t think that’s quite right.

Because diversification can easily turn into fragmentation.

Make music.

Sell merch.

Teach lessons.

Start a Patreon.

Make content.

DJ weddings.

Do sync.

Sell sample packs.

Consult.

Get a side job.

😰

Suddenly you’re doing, like… eleven things that have absolutely nothing to do with each other because someone told you musicians need “multiple revenue streams.”

Maybe there’s another way:

Don’t just diversify your income.

EXPAND your world.

Build things that strengthen one another.

A show that creates a community.

A community that creates an event.

An event that introduces people to the music.

Music that gives you something worth teaching.

Teaching that sharpens your philosophy.

A philosophy that becomes writing.

Writing that brings more people into the world.

Now you don’t have seven side hustles.

You have an ECOSYSTEM.

And yes… eventually, that ecosystem still has to make money.

Ideas aren’t revenue.

Followers aren’t customers.

And “world-building” can become a very sophisticated way of avoiding the uncomfortable work of actually selling something.

I, of all people, am very aware of that.

But I think there’s an important distinction between asking:

“How do I make enough money from my songs to survive?”

and asking:

“How valuable can I make the world surrounding my art?”

The second question feels muuuch bigger to me.

And strangely, the deeper I go into it, the more ARTISTIC the whole thing becomes.

TAME THE MACHINE isn’t just becoming a way of performing electronic music.

I’m starting to realize it might actually represent something I believe:

In a world increasingly optimized for automation, convenience and machines doing things for us…

what happens to the human being?

That’s a question I can make music about.

I can build shows around it.

I can create events around it.

I can write about it.

I can teach through it.

Suddenly the career and the art aren’t pulling in opposite directions.

They’re FEEDING each other.

So maybe today’s Zag is this:

They say artists need more revenue streams.

I say:

Build a world worth entering… then give people more than one way in.

Because maybe the goal isn’t to become a musician who also teaches, consults, writes, makes content, throws events and sells things.

Maybe the goal is to become an artist with such a clear point of view that all of those things become extensions of the same idea.

That’s the difference between diversification and dilution.

One makes your career wider.

The other makes your WORLD deeper.

And I think that distinction matters.

Because every time you add something to your career, there’s a simple question worth asking:

Does this pull me away from the thing I’m trying to become… or does it make that thing bigger?

If it pulls you away, maybe it’s a side hustle.

If it strengthens the story, the community, the philosophy, the art or the audience around what you’re building…

maybe it isn’t a side hustle at all.

Maybe it’s another doorway.

The internet keeps telling artists to hedge their bets.

Maybe the Zag is to stop building backup plans…

and start building a universe.