25/03/2026
Apparently, Iām not worth very much.
Thatās what I was told recently, by someone in the music industry.
Not as an artist.
As a proposition.
Because my social media numbers arenāt high enough. Not compared to artists in their 20s.
Weāve built a system where your value is measured by how easily you can be seen, not how deeply youāre felt.
Followers, streams, reach.
Thatās the language now.
The bit that gets whispered is that those numbers donāt always mean anything real.
I know artists with huge followings who canāt fill a room. Who are still working second jobs, still trying to make it add up.
Because attention is cheap, connection isnāt.
The truth about streaming?
It costs around Ā£25,000 to make a record properly.
Spotify pays about Ā£0.004 per stream.
Thatās over 6 million streams just to break even.
The truth about social media?
Youāre not building an audience, youāre borrowing one. And the terms can change overnight.
Even the people who chose to follow you wonāt see what you make unless theyāre trained to engage with it.
So now the job isnāt to make something meaningful, itās to keep interrupting people long enough that the algorithm doesnāt forget you exist.
But thereās another version of this, a quieter one.
My audience doesnāt just scroll.
They also show up.
They become Patrons.
They buy records.
They come to shows.
They stay.
And thatās the part no one can really measure, but itās the part that keeps the lights on.
There isnāt one way to have a career in music anymore.
There are hundreds.
Most of them wonāt trend or chart or look impressive on paper.
But theyāre very real.
I feel incredibly lucky. Iāve navigated every iteration of the music industry since I was 16.
Iām still here, still making work.
Still building something that lasts longer than a moment on a screen.
So if Iām ānot worth very muchā in that systemā¦ You know, Iām alright with that.
I know exactly what Iāve built.
It is human, slow and real.
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Do you want to be counted? Or connected?
