Iām about to share a video with you that ruined my music career forever.
I shot this video in Nashville, TN in 2023 to promote a single called āUntitledā (how creativeā¦) for my now defunct solo project, ātelcoā.
Shortly after filming this video, "telcoā ceased to existā¦
Iāll explain in a moment.
Check it out:
Youāre confused, I know.
How did this painfully gentle/boring video ruin my music career?
Well, exactly 45 seconds after filming this video, I was struck by an oncoming freight train and flung from my douchey loafers onto the side of the train tracks, never to play music again.
Iām kidding. Thatās a horrible joke, but Iām kidding.
Now I feel badā¦
This video ruined my music career because I immediately realized after filming it that I no longer enjoyed being an artist.
For the love of God, look in my eyesā¦. You can see the pain and the discomfort as I lip-sync a song about my OCD dressed like a waiter on a yacht.
Anyone who knows me personally (hi Mom) knows that Iām incredibly uncomfortable on camera.
Iām like Chandler from Friendsā¦. and being on video is even worse.
At the time I convinced myself that this was just āpart of the processāā¦. something I just needed to suck up if I wanted a career in music. I thought that doing things I disliked meant that I was āpaying my duesā.
I really believed in the songā¦. it was an incredibly personal track about my deep struggles with OCD and spiritual abandonment.
But filming this video sucked all of the passion/authenticity out of my art.
Not to mentionā¦ it didnāt even perform well on my socials, which made the embarrassment even worse lol.
And to be honest, Iām not surprisedā¦ why would a video that I didnāt even believe in inspire others to listen to my music?
So why did I do it?
Wellā¦ I was told I āhad toā if I wanted to make it as an artist.
Social media is where music gets discovered, for better or for worse, and I was told that āplaying the gameā is just one of the many sacrifices I need to make to have a career in music.
But what no one ever bothered to tell meā¦. is that pretending to be someone Iām clearly not will never work in the long-term.
In fact, Iām beyond thankful that this video didnāt workā¦ because Iād still be standing on train tracks across America whispering sad-boi lyrics into an (unplugged) Shure SM7B.
So shortly after I released this single, I shut down ātelcoā completely.
I decided that āmaking it in musicā wasnāt worth it if I have to sacrifice who I really am every single day.
At the time, I was pretty upsetā¦. It felt like I was giving up.
But I focused on the things that truly made me happy: my marriage, my family, and my career at an up-and-coming online music school (long live Mastering.com š«”āļø) .
I stopped gaslighting myself into believing that lip-syncing my music on train tracks was āmy passionā, and gave myself permission to re-examine my relationship with music completely, even if that meant giving up telco forever.
I used this time off to dive head-first into a new project that actually aligned with my values and reignited my passion for music: building Mastering.comās education-funded record label, MAD Records.
Maybe this was what I was meant to do in music all alongā¦
But I knew I was going to have to promote the new label, which likely meant utilizing social media again.
So this time, I made a promise to myself.
I vowed to be myself completely. No compromises this time.
I didnāt want to be the focus of the videoā¦. I didnāt want to show my faceā¦ā¦ and I DIDNāT WANT TO COMB MY HAIR.
So I posted this video shortly after creating the MAD Records Instagram:
The video got 300,000+ views on Instagram, and we immediately had a few thousand new followers for the label (@madrecordslabel).
And because I created a video that aligned with my true self, it was super easy to replicate.
I posted several similar videos, and within 30 days my personal account (@michael__gilbride) grew ~4,000 followers after several Reels popped off.
So whatās my stupid point of this stupid article?
āFake it till you make itā is terrible advice. No one is going to enjoy your music/content if you donāt even enjoy it yourself.
Not only will people sniff out that youāre faking it (just look at my eyes in the first videoā¦), but even IF it works, youāve created an entire career out of something that you donāt enjoy.
If you feel like youāre faking it, then stop whining about it (like I did for years) and find another solution that allows you to be authentic in your art (and your promotion of it).
Give yourself permission to admit that you donāt enjoy your current strategy, and focus on creating an alternate path, even if the āexpertsā advise you against it.
If youāre standing on the tracks and a train is barreling towards youā¦ donāt try and outrun it.
Just step aside and let it pass.
Lest you lose your loafers (and your career) like I did.
Long live MAD Records š«”āļøš«”āļøš«”āļø
Michael
This resonates so incredible clearly with me and many of my music collegues! thanks for putting it in writing
Hi Michael. I do like your articles exactly because of that: you put yourself totally on them. You donāt fake what you are not. And, as a small note, I did not understand what Telco, as music (which I found quite good in the video excerpt), has to do with a bad video exposure. I feel that song has a lot of possibilities e.g. in syncā¦ Never give up. Cheers.