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The internet reshaped every industry, but few more dramatically than music. Today’s producers, many of whom once burned CDs and downloaded tracks off LimeWire, have lived through seismic shifts with the rise of streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music.
“I don’t think any other generation has seen changes like this in the music industry,” says Justice Baiden, cofounder of Atlanta-based record label LVRN. “Those shifts definitely influenced how I approach discovering talent.”
As the head of A&R at LVRN, Baiden is constantly shepherding the company through transitions, learning not just to adapt to trends but to anticipate them. In the ’90s and 2000s, he recalls, media channels were far more unified.
“If you had a song and an artist everyone believed in, you could get people to see it — because back then, with radio and TV, everyone got their information at the same time,” he explains.
Those days are long gone. Today, the outside world might as well be in the recording booth, watching artists develop in real time and weighing in at every step.
“The luxury of just putting out a record and hoping people find it doesn’t really exist anymore,” Baiden says. “It’s about building a world — an ethos and atmosphere around the artist — and a lot of that comes down to growing the fan base.”
That level of visibility can create pressure for emerging artists, turning Baiden into part producer, part therapist.
“The veil has been removed,” he says. “The whole idea of saying, ‘This is my special project I’ve been working on for six years, and now you finally get to see it,’ doesn’t really exist anymore, because now the consumer plays a big role in deciding what takes off.”
Related: ‘You Are Somehow a Villain If You Use It’: Tons of Music Producers Are Secretly Using AI, New Study Reveals
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