This is an excerpt from my conversation with my professor & mentor, PRS award-winning musician John Matthias, best known for his work with Radiohead, Thom Yorke, and Ninja Tune.
We talk about how artists could best go about nurturing their audiences. John shares some astute observations on how some of the most successful artists tend to have what he refers to as a 'cultural antenna'.
We go on to talk about how artists and audiences mutually influence each other, how some naturally have a sense of audience 'resonance', while others may need to invest time into developing it.
The dialogue highlights an increasingly complex system of interdependence between the artist and their audience in the current music industry.
(Edited minimally for context).
''Very brilliant people... have this antenna for knowing what's going to resonate.''
John: Very brilliant people, they just have this antenna for knowing what's going to resonate with an audience.
TL: Do you think that's something people can train?
John: That's a really good question. Well, Tom Yorke has it. He just knows and always has.
As well as being brilliant and having a lot of artistic integrity he has this thing that I don't really have, which is really knowing what's going to work then. It's like having a cultural antenna. A lot of the people, the people who have been very successful commercially, do have that.
Noel Gallagher has it. Bjork has it. Even though Bjork does pretty much does what she wants. She always knows how to resonate with an audience.
T.L.: The question I find myself asking all the time is how much does the individual mindset, the fundamental mindset of an artist, play a role in that?
If I (kind of ) make a deal with myself that goes ''...I will figure out a way to take my music to my audiences and find my audiences'', while making sure I find my musical niche first, or built that sound which I really believe in........I feel like so many artists just forget that first step.
John: Well, that presupposes that one comes before the other.
T.L. ...aah yes, it does.
John: I see more of it as a (simultaneous) dynamic.
So you might have some idea of how to go about it, but I think we need to bring the audience with us the whole time.
T.L.: You and think artists and audiences reflect each other?
John: Yeah, I think they need each other.
It's a complex system of interdependence. So if anyone is forgotten about, it won't work.
But having said that, I don't think there's anything wrong with just playing music on your own, in your own shed. Writing what you want to, without involving your audience.
T.L.: No, you didn't sound like you were (saying there's anything wrong with that).
John: Yeah, you need to find your audience and bring them with you in some way.
How that is though, has changed a lot and is changing a lot at the moment with all kinds of electronic processes and distributed people and distributed structures and multiple genres and multiple communities.
It it's an extremely complex situation.
(So) now the question ''what is a musical community?'', has a very complex answer.
T.L.: Thank you.
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Summary: Main Topics
Questions / Answers
Some individuals naturally possess this ability, while others may need to develop it through experience.
It's a dynamic process where both the artist's vision and the audience's reception influence each other.
Yes, there is a complex system of interdependence where both parties need each other for success.
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