Artist

Artist
Alexey Komov

In this book, Aleksey Komov will share his knowledge in the field of the music industry, which he has accumulated over 20 years of work. Aleksey Komov has been a performing musician since 1996, leads his own musical project “Zeskullz” is an artist of UMG, also an ideologist and co-founder of the IT platform “The Amadei” which helps and educates independent musicians around the world.

In this book, Aleksey will talk about basic knowledge in order to successfully launch a musical project, what important stages in the formation of Artist's profile should be taken and what mistakes young artists make.

This book is made as a reference book for constant practice and work with it.

Anytime you can open this book and get an answer to important questions about the workflow.

Aleksey wishes good luck to all musicians and success in their careers and he hopes that this book will help to achieve goal faster and find answers to important questions!

Алексей Комов

Artist

The author expresses gratitude to his team, without which this book would not exist:

to Komova Marina Evgenievna, in co-authorship with whom this book was written; to Komova Victoria Georgievna for assistance in proofreading; to Zabirov Ramil Shavkatovich, the head of the translation bureau «Aatoslingvo».

Forewords

Why you will find this book useful

About the author

«I always wanted to create music that will influence the next generations and inspire them. Well, really, who has the interest to be mortal?»

    M. Jackson

I know the difficulties of a new business, hence, I want to give you a hand. The secret of long-term success lies in obtained skills and accumulated knowledge. I want to share it with you.

You will find information about:

• how to make a career in the music business from the zero

• who do you need in the beginning

• how to create a successful team around you

• how to stay to your principles during your work with managers

• how to start earning right away

• how to properly distribute your earnings

• what kind of unexpected difficulties and problems may occur

• tips for a newbie to avoid making mistakes

• how to become a popular and important person in a musical career

I am doing a musical career for 22 years now. I don't want to praise myself, but I know how it works. I have created this allowance to describe all the specifics of this career in the music business. In addition to this, it helps newbie musicians to make their dream come true.

I doing musical business since 1996. I perform my music all around the world, including Asia, Europe, Russia, and USA. For now, I am doing several musical projects.

I am a «Universal Music Mena» artist now. During my whole career, I was collaborating with an enormous amount of fashion brands, and I was performing my music on their close event parties. Those brands are:

«LVMH» France («Louis Vuitton», «Moet Chandon», «Henessy»), «Givenchy» with Liv Tyler, «Russian Music Awards» with Missy Eliot, «Fashion TV» in London, participated in the oppening of a jewelerry store «Carerra& Carerra», «Stephan Webster», in a show «Dolce&Gabbana», «Christian Dior», «Neil Barett», at afterparty «Fillip Traicy» and in the show «Julian Mcdonald», I was making a music mix for «GRAZIA magazine» (120000 copies sold), «Elle Style Awards», also participated in «Filipp plien», «Trussardi», «Mtv Movie», «Versace party» with Donatella Versace, «L’etoile Party» with Patrizia Kaas, during their presentation of a new cosmetic products «Christian Dior» with Sharon Stone, also participated in presenting of a new perfume «Kenzo», at the «Vogue magazine» parties, and «In style magazine», also I was participating at presenting of a new perfume from Paris Hilton, finally I was a part of jury team at «Elite Model Look», and I was representing «Givenchy»(men's cosmetic products), and participated in the openning of the barbershop «Tony&Guy», in the show «Martin Margela» and «Brioni».

Also under the nickname Zeskullz, I was making an official musical mixes for «Victor&Rolf», «Antonio Marras», «Elle fashion days», «Bosco Liliegi», «Alberto Feretti», «Jil Sander» and many others.

In addition to this, I published my tracks on the most popular world labels such as Universal Music, Dim Mak Records, Mad Decent, Armada Music, Sony Music, Warner Music, and others.

I performed on the same stage with such great musicians of electronic music such as Steve Aoki, David Guetta, DJ Snake, Diplo, Skrillex, Yellow Claw, Martin Garrix, Tiesto, and they played my tracks.

For more than 10 years I have been conducting my weekly radio show on the best dance radio in Russia «Radio Record» (where 2,000,000-3,000,000 or more listeners), together with them I do my events, which Bass music lovers gather for, and organize performances with the best representatives of Bass culture from America and Europe – Diplo, Snake, Borgore, Apashe, Yellow Claw, Carnage и and others.

My tracks fall into the rotation of the most popular world radio: BBC1, Sirius XM, etc., they are in the top lists of Billboard USA Dance charts, Itunes, Shazam, Beatport, Spotify, etc. My video clips can be seen on MTV all around the world.

I also train young musicians to write music, to perform, to do management, marketing, and building a personal brand of themselves. I lead the artists and create them a complete concept from scratch as a personal manager. Also, for a long period, I made my parties, from small VIP private events to big raves.

A year ago, my team and I launched «The Amadei for Independent Artist». This is an IT music platform, which helps to start working from level 0 and quickly become a professional. Our platform includes all the tools for writing music, creating a personal brand, controlling the legal aspects of business, advertising, and product promotion. Using our platform, musicians can earn money by publishing their works. They also get to know each other and create collaborations despite being in different parts of the world.

I communicate with different people from business area and always ask them how they came to their success. As in any other field, in music, there is no simple answer and no formula for how to become a superstar, but there are important achievement rules that we must know and adhere to. In order to reach your goal and achieve everything you want, you need to take certain steps and adhere to a precisely specified goal.

I wanted to write this instruction book for musicians for more than two years, but my hands never reached it. Now I'm in Los Angeles, in the capital of the music stage, and I can’t explain why, but there is such a strong creative energy that in the last month I have made more than 10 tracks and still can’t stop. Ideas come by themselves, and waking up this morning, I realized that I was ready to start the text.

This is manual, assistant, and reference book for musicians. This is a reminder of how important it is to follow the rules of success, to discipline yourself, and to use all the available tools in life. Then we will succeed!

The back of the profession

«It’s better to die on the roadside but to know that you did everything to achieve the goal. Rather than to live 100 years in abundance, realizing that you have cheated on yourself»

    Robert Plant «Led Zeppelin»

Before I begin to tell you the basic rules of work, I want to warn you what kind of work it is and how difficult it is. I don’t want to scare anyone, but I don’t want you to waste your time anymore. After this chapter, some of you may suddenly understand that a musical career is not yours and you do not want to do it. This is normal since not everything is as simple and festive as it seems from the outside.

I'm going to take off your rose-tinted glasses. Right here and right now.

Sometimes people look at successful musicians and think that it is easy business and easy money, quick fame, recognition, fans, beautiful life and all that they dream about. Any long-term success is hard work, tough discipline, team spirit, faith in yourself and the team, the ability to anticipate trends, as well as internal balance, and understanding why you need it.

Professionals never stop learning. Also, you must be able to communicate a lot and correctly with the right people, constantly engage in promotion, and protect your reputation. It is advisable to be active and travels frequently to increase your chances of finding yourself in the right place and at the right time. And always keep in mind that you are responsible for everything you do and your future depends only on your actions in the present.

There will always be those who want to lead you astray, but self-confidence, love of music, daily practice, and self-improvement in the discipline will not let this happen.

For example, when I started working in '96, the club industry in Russia was just emerging and my friends and I paved this difficult path to the future – we were confused and unwilling to accept electronic music as part of new youth culture. It happened that they wanted to kick me out of school for an informal appearance and an incomprehensible musical taste. Subsequently, these people will be proud of my achievements.

I was 13 years old when I met Sergey, my future teacher and music partner. Every day after school, we trained for 3–4 hours a day. Having no money for professional equipment, Sergey and I bought two old Radio Engineering turntables, changed their rotation system because it was no big deal, making it more advanced, and on this equipment, despite the dissatisfaction of the neighbors, training in DJing came.