Latest / The Scene Projects / Kortney Morningstar on Music Careers, Community, and Evolving Media with The Scene Projects

Transcript

Kortney Morningstar on Music Careers, Community, and Evolving Media with The Scene Projects · The Scene Projects

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  This program is part of the Scene Projects podcast network.
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  Scene Project features interviews with independent musicians, comedians, and artists
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  across the Midwest.
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  Become part of our community and support local art wherever you are.
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  Welcome into this exciting episode of Real Biz.
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  I am your host Bubba Starts, and with me today is personal brand consultant, Courtney
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  Morningstar.
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  Courtney, welcome to the show.
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  Good morning, Bubba.
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  How are you?
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  I am fantastic.
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  We finally had a little bit of a break from the brutal cold here in South Dakota.
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  So it was, like, 30 degrees yesterday.
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  It was beautiful.
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  Were you wearing flip flops?
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  Was that, like, South Dakota flip flops?
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  I this close.
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  I was this close to pulling them out, Courtney.
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  I'm really appreciative of you spending a little bit of time with us.
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  I know that you've spent the majority of your career kind of behind the scenes, although you
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  started out, you know, as an artist yourself and with big dreams.
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  But I I think you're gonna provide some really great insight to the the nitty gritty behind
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  and how artists actually make money.
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  So before we get into all that though, I just kinda wanna give you the floor, let you give us
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  a little bit of your backstory, and then we'll pick it up from there.
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  Well, I'll tell you the story that my mom loves to hear, which is I started off as a young
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  passionate, musician.
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  I got tested as a savant.
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  I was told I had the ear.
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  So after I got out of of college and and everything else, I went to a major label, and I
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  can't say which one, but it's a stacked vinyl record tower somewhere in California.
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  And slowly over that process of listening to how they treated music as an investment only
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  and no passion, I kinda became a little bit jaded.
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  But then I figured out how to game the system.
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  I guess that's the best way I could say it.
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  I had a great conversation with my friend Manny Fryzer, and Manny worked for A and M Records
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  back in the, late sixties, early seventies.
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  And he shared a couple of stories about how these executives would talk about how the
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  artist just why don't they go get day jobs?
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  You know?
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  Why don't they go get jobs and and the commodity that their art was?
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  And, yeah, I think it's very it's almost hard not to be jaded by that as an artist once you
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  get in and and behind the scenes.
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  And we're very fortunate now to live in an era where the independent artist has more power
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  over their own careers than they ever have through,
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  you know, home ordering.
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  I say it all the time.
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  Right?
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  I I know that we can find a lot of bad things on the Internet, but you find what you're
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  looking for.
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  For me, it's provided an opportunity to grow this network, not just, you know, the physical
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  podcast network, but my network of community.
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  I live in a small rural town in South Dakota.
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  Right?
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  Without the Internet, I have nothing.
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  I have no semblance of a career, out here in the music industry.
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  But I've been able to cover, you know, not just big music events, but PGA tour events.
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  I worked at the Grand Ole Opry House back in November for the Josie Music Awards.
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  I've interviewed over 500 artists on the scene projects and even more than that that we're
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  supporting now with our shows like unsigned spotlight that feature over 30 artists every
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  week and share their music with the world, typical of what a, you know, local radio
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  station or, you know, a a local radio show used to be in days gone by.
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  Now the industry is I mean, at this point, they're cannibalizing themselves because there
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  are no more small fish to eat up.
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  The big fish are eating one another as Netflix is buying iHeart, and and it it's crazy to
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  watch the system as it sits now.
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  Where do you find yourself in all of this now?
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  As someone who worked inside of it and and kinda saw the inner workings of it, Where do
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  you find yourself in the business these days?
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  So I am essentially fighting the good fight by taking somebody and teaching them how to be the
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  big fish.
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  So I am architecting their solution to fame them.
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  And if if they keep you know, you have something beautiful.
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  You have the songwriter showcase.
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  Right?
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  I was actually listening to that in the car with my two year old son yesterday because I,
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  you know, wanted to to truly know, and and the song you wrote for your wife was absolutely
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  beautiful.
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  I'm sure she cried buckets.
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  But, you know, I I talked to parents of kids that were, you know, waiting in line for twelve
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  hours a day for American Idol, and their hopes and dreams are crushed.
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  And it's not that this kid doesn't have talent.
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  It's just they have no clue how to market themselves, how to make themselves seen.
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  So we spend some time.
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  We go through the stuff, and, I even pulled together, social media analytics and a bunch of
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  other things just to get them seen.
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  Because when I first started, working for that big spiral building in California, you used to
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  have to go as the ear to, like, a club and sit there and listen to open mic nights and decide
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  who has the it factor, who can make eye contact, who is resonating with the crowd, who
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  can they shape and mold into this investment project.
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  Right?
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  And now everybody gets discovered on YouTube or social media or one video blows up to 1,000,000
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  views in less than a weekend on TikTok.
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  And all it was was a fifteen second thing, but somehow, some way, they they got recognized
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  that way.
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  So I find a way to put that passionate artist into that spotlight.
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  It's just a it's a it's a lot of different problems to pull together just to make it
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  happen.
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  Well, and to help them build a business behind that so when they get that moment in the sun
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  that they actually know how to grow that into a career.
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  Because morality doesn't do anything for you these days.
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  You know, you better have millions upon millions of streams or whatever for a major
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  label to kinda sniff you out, but you can build a very solid career off of a little bit of
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  attention.
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  And we don't even have that.
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  Right?
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  Like, our YouTube channel had 360,000 views last year.
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  That was over 1,500 uploads.
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  You do the math.
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  We're not getting these huge moments on one single video.
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  We're just putting out so much content that we're undeniable in that.
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  Now where that's going to pay dividends for us and all of these artists is that when we do get
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  that moment in the sun, we have all of these seeds that we have planted inside of that
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  ecosystem that are going to grow.
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  Right?
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  We we have this terrarium, right, that we've planted all the seeds in.
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  And when the conditions are finally right, and to me, the attention is the sunlight.
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  Right?
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  The community is the water to that.
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  Having these people in here, sharing our knowledge with them, having everyone building
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  their careers up, having their rights in order, and building that from the ground up with all
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  these artists is almost more important because what we want to do is to get everyone
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  successful.
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  I'm not about being famous myself.
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  I live in a town of a thousand people, Courtney.
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  I'm about as famous as you'd want to
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  say you're famous.
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  Yeah.
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  Everyone knows me.
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  I grew up in a small town.
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  Once again, in in my hometown, you know, on the other side of the South Dakota, everyone knows
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  me there too.
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  Right?
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  So, like, I I under I don't like that.
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  You know?
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  Like, everybody knowing everything about you and your all your business isn't the greatest
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  thing in the world.
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  But for other people And
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  here's ceiling, isn't it?
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  Right.
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  Well, it was important for me to build that platform for them.
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  Right?
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  Cool.
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  You want that?
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  Alright.
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  Well, here's how we're going to build out this thing.
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  And across the board, we have a sports network.
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  We have, you know, a network that's more for coaching.
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  We have this one now to feature business owners and not just in the music industry, but really
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  any business owner to give them a moment to come on and to share their story because that's
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  what sells.
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  Right?
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  It's not just about good products anymore.
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  It's not just about something that can make someone's life a little bit easier.
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  I think people will pay a little bit more and use something that maybe isn't the cheapest and
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  easiest because they like the person that they're buying from.
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  And in music
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  be able to trust and buy into that.
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  Right?
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  And so that's what I do.
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  I I craft the solution.
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  And, you know, you mentioned something about having all of this content.
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  Right?
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  And I noticed this through this last week.
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  You have so much content.
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  You're missing the links to convert to views.
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  You know?
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  Whatever that system is, it it could even be something as simple as the keywords that you
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  use for SEO purposes when you post it onto YouTube.
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  Something minute and tiny that is preventing those conversions to views because you have and
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  there are there are artists that come to me, and I go, okay.
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  That's great.
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  How many things have you uploaded into the Internet?
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  And they're like, well, I haven't started that yet.
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  And I'm like, okay.
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  So we don't have much content yet, but we'll figure out how to post that and and, you know,
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  and go along.
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  You know?
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  But, most of the time, it's that they've been pouring their hearts out in songwriting for so
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  long, and they've had all these YouTube videos for ten years.
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  We're just missing a way for people to find you.
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  It's it's literally called, like, a click point conversion in in marketing.
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  Right?
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  And it's just some little thing that can be fixed in there to get that exposure.
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  You have so much content.
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  There's just some tiny thing missing.
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  Right.
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  Well and when we find that and kinda put that piece together, then we kind of unlock the
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  entire thing.
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  And what I've been very focused on is building out the infrastructure so that we are ready.
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  Don't believe I think that our moment is coming, regardless of what the small thing is.
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  We're going to find it.
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  And it's taken me you know, we just went to YouTube, like, last January where we were audio
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  only for the entire, you know, first nine months we were around.
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  I was solely focused on getting to a 100 episodes so that podcasters would take me
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  seriously.
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  I didn't even call myself a podcaster for the thing.
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  I was like, I got this thing that I do.
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  I'm just talking to my friends on microphones.
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  Right?
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  Like, it's not
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  It's my hobby.
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  Yeah.
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  It's well, and I always treated it more than a hobby, but wasn't quite a professional about
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  it.
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  And having won the content creator of the year award in April '25, that gave us that
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  authority.
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  And I was like, okay.
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  Well, you need to start taking it a little more seriously.
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  Right?
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  You've been given this thing.
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  Right?
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  And it was just the title.
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  Yeah.
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  But titles separate people in the business world.
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  And now going high on Bubba Sartz, I have an award winning podcast.
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  Seeing what that did for me in the, you know, last nine months has been unreal.
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  So now we have that to move forward to looking to, you know, hopefully repeat this year again
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  with that award so we kinda have a little bit more authority.
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  Hey.
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  We didn't just fly by night and do it once, but now we've repeated in that position.
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  And this year, we're swinging even harder on our content with visions of taking it onto the
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  large streaming networks.
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  Right?
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  We're already on Roku, Apple TV, and Amazon.
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  How do we get to that next one?
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  How do we get to Prime?
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  How do we get to Hulu and Netflix and really elevate that game?
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  And, those things are in the works as we speak.
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  And, having a lot of different poles in the water, if you will, to make a fishing analogy
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  out of it has been very important to us.
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  And knowing that everything that we've done is building a platform for us to stand on and to
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  look to.
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  Yep.
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  You know, it's it's you came you hit the nail on the head by saying, you know, you know,
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  having this foundation, the reason why you got those awards is because you are candid.
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  You are, you know, earnestly yourself.
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  You are likable.
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  People resonate with that.
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  And more importantly, musicians, especially indie musicians and budding musicians, they
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  look up to you because they trust you.
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  They truly believe that even if they put their heart and soul in your hands and it doesn't go
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  anywhere, that they have a kindred spirit because you have walked the walk yourself.
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  You're not trying to use and abuse their content in any way.
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  And I have no doubts that, you know, that is a very strong brand voice for you.
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  And you just have to always make sure that you highlight that brand voice, and you be that
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  that guy on that podium that is doing this with, not for, but with these artists.
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  And the more that you amplify that brand voice, people realize, okay.
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  This is the guy.
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  This is what what he stands for.
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  I know that usually they say the man who is king doesn't have to say he's king, but it's
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  nice if the king reminds people, hey.
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  I got your back.
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  So always hone that brand voice.
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  Right.
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  And so much of what I've done up to this point, has just been to do the work.
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  I'm very about the work, and I think that's what's very evident and not always about
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  telling you, what we're doing and what we're going to be doing and why you should work with
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  us.
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  I've been a little bit better about that lately, especially building this songwriter
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  showcase tour that we've been working on that we'll be launching here in March, where really
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  the entire tour isn't necessarily about, like, the doing of the thing.
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  It's about capturing it so we could show everyone what we did in the past.
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  And realizing that a lot of these, like, viral moments for people are stuff that had been done
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  a year prior.
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  Right?
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  Like, people are, like, catching up always.
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  The the world and the content world is always playing catch up.
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  So having realized that, you know, sometime in 2025 where it was like, okay.
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  We just need to stay forward focused.
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  Keep doing bigger things.
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  Eventually, the funding and the attention and all those things are going to be there.
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  How do we prepare ourselves for those moments the best way possible?
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  2025 and early twenty six now has been a lot of the team building.
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  And it's not necessarily like people that we're hiring, but strategic partnerships.
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  You know?
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  Not much different than
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  Yeah.
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  Now finding those other kindred spirits out there, whether they're, you know, independent
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  record label owners like we talked to yesterday or they're marketers or they're brand
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  consultants or whoever that is to find alignment.
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  And I think a big a a key to unlocking those has been our creator conferences where now we
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  can provide a stage for the educators to step onto where we can get a little bit of juice and
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  knowledge from them and be working with them without having to just fork over money out of
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  pocket that we don't have right now anyway.
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  Even still,
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  you you wouldn't I I have found that when you can get somebody to believe in your cause, to
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  to be a part of you, to bond with you human to human, that relationship and its dividends are
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  so much stronger than the ones that you pay for.
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  Because the guy who you pay for, he has agreed to do x.
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  Right?
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  And he is only ever gonna do x.
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  He is not looking at things from a broad scope.
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  You paid him to do this thing, and that's the one thing he's gonna do.
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  But if you bond with somebody, you have a shared common interest and, you know, dare I
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  say, crusade in your, you know, terms, I mean, or or what you are trying to accomplish for
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  songwriters and artists, If you get other kindred spirits like like myself who wants to
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  see the the big music burned to the ground, you know, and doing everything I can to combat
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  that, you know, we believe in so much.
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  It's our cause too, and we fight tooth and nail together to make that happen.
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  So even the guy you pay, you know, $300,000 to, he is not gonna fight for you the way that
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  somebody who has shared interest will.
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  And that is exactly what's been so beautiful about the last, you know, not even two years.
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  I started this program in, like, 2024.
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  I was welding.
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  I had quit my job welding at the factory in, like, February, and I thought I was gonna be a
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  rock star, Courtney.
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  I had a bunch of gigs booked.
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  I was playing the big, you know, festivals around in South Dakota and, you know, playing
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  some of the biggest stages that we had around us.
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  I had the five, six night runs and got out there and was like, oh, I don't want this.
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  Right?
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  Like, it took it took a few weeks of that.
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  Well, because touring season for musicians is in the summertime.
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  Well, my kids are out of school.
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  My wife works at the school, so she's out of school.
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  Like, that's the time that I have to really dig into my family, and I'm missing all of it being
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  out on the road.
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  And it was just like, I don't want this at all.
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  Like, I want to do something much different than this.
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  And in the meantime, the podcast had kind of, become something.
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  Right?
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  It it had been, at the very least, had become a passion of mine.
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  Having these conversations, capturing them in the moment, and being able to share them with
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  people regardless of whether people were listening now or not.
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  Right?
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  And that's why I think I came into the whole content game from a much different perspective
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  than a lot of people get into it where they're looking like their whole goal is just to go
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  viral.
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  Right?
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  And and to all of that attention.
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  Yeah.
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  And I'm like, no.
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  I'm trying to build out a community and an ecosystem and to grow this knowing that when we
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  get that opportunity, not only are we going to make ourselves famous, but we're gonna make
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  everyone around us that is dying for that opportunity famous as well just by proxy by
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  being part of our world.
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  And that's the most rewarding thing to me is knowing that those moments are coming very,
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  very soon, and we're gonna be able to look back in, you know, the '26 and and on through the
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  rest of our careers and to go every bit of that work that we put in when when everyone was
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  pushing us to, well, it's gotta make money or it's gotta do this or it's gotta do that.
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  Me going, I think I know what I'm like, I I'm pretty sure I'm doing the right things.
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  Right?
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  And, yeah, I could have nickel and dimed things along at certain points, but it was never the
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  goal to sell out.
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  And it's never the goal to just build something for myself.
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  And I think that takes so much more, passion and a bigger team.
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  And I I love the crusade term because that's what it is.
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  This is something that's not ending in a single season or a year.
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  This is what I wanna do for the rest of my life, and I'm not trying to retire at any time
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  soon.
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  You know?
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  I'll be 40 in May, and I plan on doing this for another four decades at least to be able to
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  support independent music.
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  And like you said, tear down the big they're all gonna eat themselves anyway.
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  It's crazy to see what's happening in music right now.
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  Yeah.
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  But, I mean, you know, one thing that people don't appreciate is doing something like this,
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  even just starting a podcast, which you have so many other things attached to it, is
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  entrepreneurship.
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  Right?
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  You you founded a business.
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  Right?
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  And you had to figure out we were even before this call talking about CRM systems for emails,
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  for heaven's sakes.
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  You know?
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  All of those things are part of being a business founder.
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  So you go through the same trials that a business owner would go through in the very
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  beginning.
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  And when it comes down to to big music, I mean, I still will contract and take certain jobs for
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  big music and and in film.
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  Here and there, it just depends on what the project is, but they have made bad investment
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  after bad investment after bad investment.
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  And, I mean, we we've all seen you you watch a movie and you go, what the heck is this?
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  You know?
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  I granted, we were raised on eighties and nineties movies, which, you know, nostalgia
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  kicks in and you're like, you know, this is the most amazing.
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  You know?
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  Get to the chopper.
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  You know?
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  It's so iconic.
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  Right?
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  But, you know, we keep watching these movies on, like, you know, our our TV streaming
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  services, and what the heck is this?
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  Well, it was a bad investment.
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  So it's all business when you look at it.
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  And you started a company.
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  You are adding people to the company.
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  You are getting suppliers by, you know, musicians and songwriters, and things are going
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  out.
• 20:22
  People will buy those songwriter songs.
• 20:25
  People will will buy into the indie stuff.
• 20:28
  You may start a revolution that outlives you just because you gave a platform to these
• 20:35
  people who were just trying to do something they loved.
• 20:39
  Legacy.
• 20:40
  That that's a word that I I used a lot, you know, in the last twelve months where I was
• 20:44
  like, this is this is my legacy for my kids to look back on and go, hey.
• 20:48
  That's what my dad does.
• 20:50
  Right?
• 20:50
  Because just working in that factory and welding on those machines and being able to
• 20:55
  walk by one or drive by one occasionally, Very blessed, you know, in our local economy here in
• 21:01
  rural South Dakota to have, you know, like a Wilson trailer.
• 21:04
  So I built cattle trailers that you'd see on the road.
• 21:06
  I'll be like, hey.
• 21:07
  I know I built that one.
• 21:08
  Right?
• 21:08
  Like, I worked on that.
• 21:09
  Yeah.
• 21:10
  Or, you know, some, you know, forklifts or whatever from a company called Manitou, and I
• 21:14
  can go, I I built that part of that.
• 21:16
  You know?
• 21:17
  Yeah.
• 21:17
  But this is so much bigger.
• 21:19
  And to be able to look at the artist eventually you know, right now, are we breaking people
• 21:23
  like Joe Rogan?
• 21:24
  No.
• 21:25
  But the goal is to get there.
• 21:27
  I mean, Joe Rogan show wasn't that for a decade.
• 21:29
  Right?
• 21:30
  It took
• 21:31
  it took a long time, and he was already famous.
• 21:33
  Right?
• 21:33
  Yeah.
• 21:34
  So it takes a long time, and sometimes it takes a little tweak on the back end.
• 21:39
  And, you know, it's crazy for me, you know, MTV shuttering its doors at the beginning of this
• 21:44
  year and closing down completely.
• 21:46
  To me, it leaves the door wide open for a community like ours to step in and to fill in
• 21:51
  that role because there's so many independent there's more independent artists now than there
• 21:57
  ever has been, but the discovery tools are very few and far between.
• 22:02
  And even those discovery tools are independent in nature as well.
• 22:06
  So it's about kinda pulling it all together, working with partners like a Music Mogul AI
• 22:10
  who's become a great partner of mine.
• 22:12
  Founder Brad Stewart, I talk to every single day, who's building a booking agent, marketing
• 22:17
  agent to combat the booking, you know, and to unlock that side of it.
• 22:22
  So we're bringing in and tightening up this team around us to where it's like, no.
• 22:26
  You come into the scene projects and you are able to elevate whether it's teaching with our
• 22:31
  academy or it's the elevation through having all of your business right and then going out
• 22:36
  on the road, we kinda become a one stop shop for artists to fall into.
• 22:40
  And that's what's gonna be really cool to see over 2026 grow is that the the dream has been
• 22:47
  realized.
• 22:48
  That's what I always wanted it to be, but it took a really long time of, like, just getting
• 22:52
  all the pieces together.
• 22:53
  And now we're actually, like, the pieces are starting to fit into the puzzle and you're
• 22:57
  going, oh, this is very clear of where it's going.
• 23:00
  Yeah.
• 23:00
  And, the tour is a big part of this, where people will be able to finally see, like, holy
• 23:05
  shit.
• 23:05
  This is massive.
• 23:06
  And it's like, yeah.
• 23:07
  And I'd be it's taking me two years of kind of fitting everything together to get there, you
• 23:12
  know, working sixteen hour days and waking up in the middle of the night and like, oh, I
• 23:17
  gotta design this website or I gotta do this and and, oh my goodness.
• 23:21
  The the amount of work that's gone into it, but I've so it's already been so rewarding.
• 23:26
  You know, we're having artists submit in different major cities.
• 23:29
  We've had people from Detroit and Atlanta and Austin and Nashville now that are buying into
• 23:34
  what we're doing.
• 23:35
  And even if it's only a small handful of artists on this initial tour, it will prove a
• 23:40
  point.
• 23:41
  Oh, yeah.
• 23:42
  You know, one thing that is incredible is that you have all these artists in different cities.
• 23:48
  So, when I went to, university, I got a medical anthropology doctorate.
• 23:55
  You know?
• 23:55
  I I don't use it now.
• 23:57
  You know?
• 23:58
  I I mean, I use the influence to make a cool poster, you know, that represents myself and
• 24:03
  all the brands.
• 24:04
  And if anybody's wondering why there's a raccoon in a hat, it's just because I'm
• 24:07
  obsessed about raccoons.
• 24:09
  But, you know, I just had to address that because some people ask what the heck is behind
• 24:13
  her.
• 24:14
  But, the the thing is when you look at things from a cultural perspective, we stopped hearing
• 24:21
  how different music sounds in different cities because everybody was trying to emulate what
• 24:27
  the big labels said was current.
• 24:30
  So, like, mass marketed pop music.
• 24:32
  Right?
• 24:32
  Everybody was chasing that sound.
• 24:35
  Taylor Swift in her, eras tour.
• 24:38
  All the young girls were trying to emulate Taylor, right, instead of being themselves, you
• 24:44
  know, Jessica, Britney, whoever you are.
• 24:47
  So I am actually excited to see when you go to Detroit, what does Detroit music sound like?
• 24:53
  What's in the heart of these artists?
• 24:55
  When you go to Nashville, what does Nashville sound like when it's outside of the music
• 24:59
  industry?
• 25:00
  You know?
• 25:01
  Does it still sound different?
• 25:03
  Because I think that is probably the closest you will ever get to how the music industry was
• 25:08
  in the fifties and sixties is actually sensing the heart and the vibe of the city in each
• 25:14
  place that you go that's been kind of untouched by major music.
• 25:18
  So I am actually very excited that you're doing this tour because I wanna hear what comes out
• 25:23
  of it.
• 25:25
  Yeah.
• 25:25
  Because it's not you know, the scene projects are a genre less operation.
• 25:29
  We don't care what music you play.
• 25:32
  We just do you write songs?
• 25:33
  Do you perform them?
• 25:35
  Okay.
• 25:35
  Cool.
• 25:35
  Well, we're gonna give you a space to do that, and I'm really looking forward to that as well.
• 25:40
  The flavor of each city and, the different looks and sounds that you're going to get and
• 25:46
  across multiple genres inside of each city because not every city is just one thing.
• 25:51
  Right?
• 25:51
  You know?
• 25:52
  Yeah.
• 25:52
  I can't wait to get to Austin and the rock and the rock music and the country and everything
• 25:57
  together that you're going to hear.
• 25:59
  Yep.
• 26:00
  Yeah.
• 26:00
  Detroit's another another good one too.
• 26:02
  We'll be there for the Midwest Talent Awards.
• 26:05
  So we're already bringing a a lot of different acts together, the pop, rock, and funk.
• 26:09
  And, you know, obviously, the country music is dear to our hearts being members of the Midwest
• 26:14
  Country Music Organization as well.
• 26:16
  But that's just a product of where I am.
• 26:18
  I've never called myself country at all till I moved to the country, and I was like, you
• 26:23
  better you better adopt a little bit of this.
• 26:25
  You know?
• 26:26
  And and It's
• 26:27
  a lifestyle.
• 26:27
  Yeah.
• 26:28
  It's not just music.
• 26:29
  It's it's a lifestyle.
• 26:30
  Right?
• 26:30
  Right.
• 26:31
  Well and, you know, I'm very fortunate to kinda live in that now.
• 26:35
  You know, my my father-in-law farms about a thousand acres out here, so I've been
• 26:39
  introduced to that lifestyle a little bit and living in these small towns.
• 26:43
  To me, it's a value system, and it's completely different.
• 26:46
  And that's what comes out in the music a lot.
• 26:48
  You know?
• 26:49
  We we deal with a lot of independent country music out here, and I absolutely love the
• 26:55
  songwriters.
• 26:55
  And it's why the platform became more important than just my own career.
• 26:59
  I still play shows, and I write music, and I release stuff.
• 27:02
  You know, you mentioned the song I had written for my wife and performing and doing those
• 27:06
  things.
• 27:07
  I just I don't need to do that to kinda to to feel fulfilled any longer.
• 27:12
  I've done it long enough and have put out those things.
• 27:14
  To me, it's much more fulfilling to provide that opportunity for people who haven't been
• 27:19
  there yet, who haven't had the opportunity to perform in front of thousands of people and to
• 27:23
  have that experience.
• 27:24
  And for me, I'm such like a new experience junkie, right, where once I've done something,
• 27:30
  I'm like, okay.
• 27:30
  Cool.
• 27:30
  Did it.
• 27:31
  What what's next?
• 27:32
  Let's try something else.
• 27:33
  Yeah.
• 27:34
  Right?
• 27:35
  Yeah.
• 27:35
  It's it's wild.
• 27:36
  I don't know if that for better or worse that is, but that's what sucked me out of the
• 27:41
  touring life with my own band was that, like, okay.
• 27:43
  Yeah.
• 27:43
  Cool.
• 27:44
  We played.
• 27:44
  Cool.
• 27:45
  We're playing the same set list again tonight, and we're doing the same thing.
• 27:48
  And it's like, okay.
• 27:48
  I can do that.
• 27:49
  I've proven to myself and to others that I can do that.
• 27:52
  I don't need to do this ad infinitum.
• 27:54
  Like, what there just no there's no juice there for me to squeeze out of it any longer.
• 27:59
  So with and with conversations and podcasting now, I'll start a new show tomorrow.
• 28:04
  Like, I don't oh, like, oh, let's talk about these kind of things.
• 28:07
  And that's the reason that we have four networks and 13 shows and, always doing new
• 28:13
  things because I get can't make
• 28:14
  up his mind.
• 28:15
  Yeah.
• 28:16
  No.
• 28:16
  Well and it's not even that.
• 28:17
  I'll continue to do all of them too.
• 28:19
  Right?
• 28:19
  It's not like I put one thing down to go do a new thing.
• 28:22
  I just pick up a new one and keep going.
• 28:24
  And for me, there's always people around that can kinda fill in that space.
• 28:28
  Yeah.
• 28:28
  I'm a starter.
• 28:29
  Right?
• 28:29
  I'm a spark plug to these situations.
• 28:31
  But once it's kinda started enrolling, it's very easy for someone else that has that same
• 28:36
  kind of passion to plug into there and to go, hey.
• 28:38
  Well, here's your thing.
• 28:39
  Take some ownership of this and run it, and this is your baby now.
• 28:43
  And being a a little bit of an incubator with, you know, the scene projects and the Midwest
• 28:47
  Podcasting Network, Midwest Original Music Organization, like, all these things that I've
• 28:52
  started, realizing that eventually you're going to find people that are just as passionate that
• 28:57
  would love to just be about that one thing.
• 29:00
  Because even just being with my wife who is very like, no.
• 29:03
  I do this, and I'm gonna do this until the job is done.
• 29:06
  And I'm like, no.
• 29:06
  I'm gonna start 500 things and do all of them simultaneously.
• 29:10
  And I'll finish them, But I'll finish them when I finish them.
• 29:12
  I don't have to finish that before I start on the next thing.
• 29:15
  Yep.
• 29:16
  That's a it's it's interesting you say that.
• 29:18
  You know, we talk a lot about artists wanting to get seen and things, but there really are
• 29:24
  artists that do not want to be in the public eye.
• 29:28
  Right?
• 29:28
  And so often is overlooked, the songwriter.
• 29:34
  Just just music.
• 29:37
  Write this beautiful music that you feel passionate about and, you know, license it to
• 29:42
  somebody else who maybe wants to be it because, like you said, you are a spark plug of ideas.
• 29:48
  Right?
• 29:48
  Not everybody is.
• 29:50
  Someone may be a gifted singer.
• 29:52
  You know, their vocals are, you know, unparalleled, but they can't write.
• 29:58
  It's just not in them.
• 29:59
  They you know, there's there's a block or something.
• 30:01
  It's just just not something they can access to, but they can feel very passionately about
• 30:05
  music once they start singing it.
• 30:07
  So this guy gets with this guy.
• 30:10
  And for once, without them finding each other on Fiverr or some super sketchy, you know,
• 30:16
  website, now for once, you have opened up this area for them.
• 30:22
  You know?
• 30:22
  So I I really, really hope that there's a lot of cross mingling through your networks of
• 30:29
  people reaching out to each other.
• 30:31
  Like, you know, someone super shy maybe like, hey.
• 30:33
  I wrote this this really sweet song for my boyfriend, and, you know, it'd be amazing if
• 30:37
  somebody sang it.
• 30:38
  And here comes this soulful woman, you know, and she's just got, you know, tear jerking
• 30:44
  vocals in an alto.
• 30:46
  And, you know, they they meet each other, they shake hands.
• 30:49
  Everything is good, and both people win.
• 30:51
  So, you know, you you're sparking other little sparks that are sparkling sparkling
• 30:57
  Exactly.
• 30:57
  Basically, everything's on fire.
• 30:59
  Yeah.
• 30:59
  Yeah.
• 31:00
  Well, exactly.
• 31:01
  You you set the whole forest on fire.
• 31:03
  Right?
• 31:03
  You grow it, and then you light it up, and it's exactly what the creator conferences are.
• 31:08
  That it's not just the education, it's the networking.
• 31:11
  It's putting all of these incredibly talented individuals from all these different walks of
• 31:15
  music in the room together.
• 31:18
  Having the crossover performances and recording and just building a network of people, right,
• 31:24
  that are creative.
• 31:25
  And me, I'm so passionate just about creative people.
• 31:28
  It's why I love the West Coast when I was living in Oregon and then going through, you
• 31:32
  know, California, living on Venice Beach and busking every day and
• 31:36
  Oh, man.
• 31:36
  For me, was it was not just the performers, but it was the artist.
• 31:40
  It was the everyone, and everyone's out there hustling in the same fashion.
• 31:45
  And maybe in the some ways, I'm addicted to the hustle a little bit.
• 31:49
  And Yeah.
• 31:49
  But it's also what has given me the the wealth of experience to be able to come at these
• 31:56
  conversations different.
• 31:57
  I think that's what makes the scene projects and my interviews different than a typical, you
• 32:02
  know, someone who's in media talking with someone who's in entertainment is that I didn't
• 32:08
  go to college for a media degree.
• 32:10
  Right?
• 32:11
  I didn't go and learn all these things so that I could just talk to famous people.
• 32:15
  I am one of the famous people, and it changes the conversation.
• 32:18
  I think it's why a guy like Rogan has really interesting conversations with other
• 32:21
  entertainers.
• 32:22
  I he knows that game.
• 32:24
  Right?
• 32:24
  And that's I think you're gonna see more and more of that, and you do already.
• 32:28
  I mean, it's not like podcasting is a new thing.
• 32:30
  It's been around for twenty years.
• 32:31
  Right?
• 32:32
  Yeah.
• 32:33
  But the media landscape has changed.
• 32:35
  People are completely unplugging from the major TV networks and just cable TV in general now.
• 32:41
  And Yeah.
• 32:42
  The attention is being divided.
• 32:43
  It's about carving out your space.
• 32:45
  You know?
• 32:46
  Feel however you wanna feel politically.
• 32:48
  But when Elon Musk came out and said, we are the media, I took it very personally.
• 32:51
  I was like, oh, shit.
• 32:52
  He's talking to me.
• 32:53
  You know?
• 32:53
  Yeah.
• 32:53
  And he's talking to you, and he's talking to all these different people that are out there
• 32:56
  with a voice and with the ability.
• 32:59
  Our show started on Zoom.
• 33:00
  Right?
• 33:01
  Zoom and YouTube.
• 33:02
  And granted we, you know, shoot on StreamYard now, and eventually, we're going to get into
• 33:06
  more, you know, heavily produced in front of cameras and, you know, edited things.
• 33:11
  Evolving.
• 33:11
  Yeah.
• 33:12
  Well, and exactly.
• 33:13
  And that's what you hit on is that the evolution of where the scene projects is going
• 33:17
  is the community aspect.
• 33:18
  Having all these people together that start working together and me not having to be, like,
• 33:23
  the the papa bear to everyone and, like, you're no.
• 33:25
  You're gonna work with this person.
• 33:26
  Just letting it all happen organically.
• 33:28
  Yep.
• 33:28
  Right?
• 33:28
  Like, just get in the room and get Start hanging out.
• 33:31
  Right?
• 33:32
  Yeah.
• 33:32
  Making some introductions possibly here and there, but not being like a rave a record label
• 33:37
  executive would be like, no.
• 33:38
  We gotta put this person with this person.
• 33:40
  This is how we're going to make money.
• 33:43
  No.
• 33:43
  You don't have you guys do what you want to because I'm gonna do what I want.
• 33:46
  Right?
• 33:47
  And that's ultimately where I like, I'm gonna do whatever I
• 33:49
  Yeah. Wanna
• 33:49
  Wanna And
• 33:50
  I I encourage you all to do the same.
• 33:53
  But if you need a playground to do that in, here's a good space for that.
• 33:57
  So that's, you you kinda hit the nail on the head there with the evolution of what the scene
• 34:02
  projects and our, you know, Momo groups and our Midwest podcasting network and all of these
• 34:07
  different things, are growing into is just that.
• 34:11
  A place where all these creatives can gather and then just start working with one another.
• 34:15
  And it's gonna be a beautiful thing to look back on in five and ten and fifteen years to
• 34:20
  go, damn.
• 34:22
  Look at this.
• 34:23
  Look at this group of people that are together and in a room or in multiple rooms or they're
• 34:29
  on this tour now that's going throughout the country, and then you get to connect with the
• 34:33
  people that aren't necessarily, you know, on the tour bus with you but are in that city
• 34:37
  waiting for you to land there.
• 34:39
  I think it's gonna be a really awesome thing, and and I can't wait to do it.
• 34:43
  Courtney, I've taken up plenty of your time already today.
• 34:46
  I appreciate you being on the show.
• 34:48
  Where can people find you?
• 34:49
  Where can they work with you?
• 34:51
  And, where can we get more Courtney Morningstar?
• 34:54
  Well, you can always find me on LinkedIn.
• 34:58
  That is always the best way for people to reach out and ask me a question when it comes to
• 35:02
  personal branding.
• 35:04
  Nine times out of 10, I will happily, entertain your question and point you in some right
• 35:10
  directions even though I'm you're not gonna become my client just because I wanna see
• 35:15
  people succeed.
• 35:17
  And, let's get indie artists out there.
• 35:21
  Get them on the radio.
• 35:22
  Break down the syndicate.
• 35:23
  Like, go, Bubba.
• 35:26
  I appreciate that, Courtney.
• 35:28
  Thank you so much for taking some time for us today and sharing a little bit of your
• 35:33
  knowledge.
• 35:33
  I look forward to working with you, not just personally, but having you in some of our
• 35:38
  conferences and having you share this in a one to many fashion with the people in this network
• 35:43
  that we're evolving around.
• 35:45
  And, yeah, just looking forward to being a friend for many, many years to come.
• 35:51
  Hate the system, Bubba.
• 35:52
  Hate it.
• 35:54
  Well, we're going to.
• 35:55
  I don't see me stopping anytime soon.
• 35:57
  Courtney, thank you for being part of the scene.
• 36:00
  Of course.