Area 4: Artist Management

Being an Artist Manager is arguably the hardest job in the music industry. Your job is a constant 24/7 affair and you're under a lot of pressure. An Artist Manager puts themselves between the artist and the rest of the industry, any information directed at the artist is first filtered and tweaked by the artist manger and then told to the artist (and in most cases the manager will have to arrange all the logistics that comes along with that information too). Artists and their managers are in constant contact. This video uses the analogy of a wagon wheel to describe what's going on: the artist is the hub of the wagon wheel and the manager is the bearings and grease around the artist, the spokes represent areas of the artists career (e.g. recording, touring, publishing, merchandising, PR, record label etc). If any of the 'spokes' are broken or shorter than the others then the artists career can't keep rolling successfully and it's the job of the manager to make sure that the artist has the successful career that they want to have. Artist Management requires absolute commitment and it takes someone very dedicated to do a good job.

The cliché of the artist manager being part of the band is true as far as money is concerned. The manager is paid between 15-20% of the artists gross income, this means the manager can earn anything from peanuts to millions depending on the situation. For example if the manager was in charge of a 4 piece band and a record label had given £100,000 of advances to the band, £20,000 would go to each member and another £20,000 to the manager. 

From the managers point of view, there are definite pros and cons to their job. On the plus side, if you're manager of a hugely successful band, you get to travel first class with the band and go around in limousines, you get to go to huge launch parties and fancy dinners. To quote Chris Herbert [1] (Former manager of the Spice Girls) "The high points are when an artist succeeds and when you're thanked by that artist. When you're pulling up at Wembley and the name of your act is emblazoned across the front of it - they're the little moments that you give yourself a pat on the back for. All those kind of milestones, you share it with the act"

There are also a lot of negatives to being an artist manager. As I mentioned earlier, there is the stress and the constant contact you need to maintain with your artist. You might be called up any time of the day, any day. There's also the fact that the manager is often the first and easiest person to get blamed when anything goes wrong and they often get the least thanks too.