Vancouver music mogul Terry McBride has greatly reduced his workload at Nettwerk Music Group to focus more on his passions, the 51-year-old told Business in Vancouver last week.
McBride still listens to demonstration tapes and goes to concerts to seek out emerging talent, but he has stopped managing artists – a role that used to take up about 90% of his time.
“I’m tired of dealing with other people’s dramas,” McBride told BIV. “A copyright doesn’t phone you at 2 a.m. to tell you about some drama. A copyright makes you money while you’re actually sleeping.”
McBride is well known for discovering and managing artists such as Sarah McLachlan.
He co-founded YYoga with Lara Kozan in 2008 and has expanded the company to seven studios, 350-staff and $8.5 million in annual revenue.
Other ventures include relaunching the inspirational music company Nutone Music in 2008 and co-founding Polyphonic, which invests directly into artist businesses, offering an alternative to the traditional label-driven investment model of the music industry.
“What signings in the last year or two am I really stoked about? There are a couple artists: Hey Ocean and Ash Koley. Then there’s a band called Fun who we started working with seven years ago and they’re just exploding. Last week, in North America, they sold 50,000 tracks. That’s huge.”
McBride continues to own a 25% stake in Nettwerk along with Mark Jowett, Ric Arboit and Dan Fraser, who also own 25% stakes, McBride said.
Glen Korstrom
@GlenKorstrom