Jack Conte

“There's a tendency for young musicians - I certainly was guilty of this - of wanting to know what they sound like, before making their first record, before releasing things. But I think that's the wrong order of operations. You only find out what you sound like, when you have five records under your belt.”

“I'm not an entrepreneur.”

“Concentrate on making beautiful things. Everything else will follow.”

“I love music with a violence and a fury that feels unqualified.”

“I usually spend my weekends working on my music and videos.”

“Artists don't have to starve any more.”

“The reality is Patreon needs to build new businesses and new services and new revenue lines in order to build a sustainable business.”

“No one talks about the epic failures that we all have.”

“I learned all about big band arrangement and symphony arrangement and writing for strings.”

“On the Internet, it's not just content that's king. It's regular content. But models like Kickstarter don't work for regular content. And the advertising you earn on YouTube is nice, but it doesn't seem to assign the appropriate value for the amount of work and passion that goes into certain types of content.”

“Building habits is important. One of mine is a weird, small thing, but it's very helpful: I stop eating just before I'm full. I feel so much better throughout the course of the day if I don't pack myself. It's a good way to get more energy.”

“The philosophy behind Patreon is that all the great art we have known has been made because of patronage.”

“We want to make a living doing what we like to do.”

“Artists deserve more than a check cut in half eight times by publishers.”

“In YouTube's early days, my band Pomplamoose was making a living by releasing videos on it, which drove iTunes sales. And because YouTube was small enough, our videos would bubble to the top and new fans could discover us.”

“When I read articles or interviews about building culture, the suggestions are often obscure or hard to replicate.”

“Unless you've given up your business to a record label, there's no such thing as just being a musician anymore.”

“We get to make the music that we love.”

“When I graduated college, I didn't get a job. I started making YouTube videos. I used to spend my days making art, and I love that. And, if I'm being honest, what's the hardest thing? I think it's just becoming a CEO from this path of being a YouTuber.”

“I think my ear is pretty good, but I don't have formal training so my ear isn't that good. I know when I like a sound.”