Team Billie Eilish to Independent Artists: Start with Singles and a Plan At this years Career Jam, the group that manages and promotes Eilish spoke to students about both the star and the industry at large.
By
Kimberly Ashton
April 29, 2021
Billie Eilish
Image by Lars Crommelinck/Wikimedia Commons
Earlier this week, Billie Eilish made headlines by announcing that her greatly anticipated sophomore album, Happier Than Ever, will be available July 30. She also dispensed a third single from the record, as part of a slow-drip, momentum-building campaign that began July 30 of last year, when the album's first tune, My Future, dropped.
Nothing about this timed-release approach is arbitrary, nor is any other aspect of Eilish's promotion, as was evident when her tightly knit marketing and management team appeared at Berklee's Career Jam earlier this month to talk about how they helped one of musics freshest voices achieve extraordinary success.
During the event, the team-which included Paul Wachter, CEO of Main Street Advisors; Justin Lubliner, CEO of the Darkroom; Chelsea Dodson, manager of creative at Interscope; Eilish's managers, Danny Rukasin and Brandon Goodman, from Best Friends Music; and Hannah Gold, vice president of marketing for Interscope-discussed a host of topics:
The importance of artist authenticity
What makes an artist stand out
How to best use social media
NFTs (non fungible tokens)
How to get the attention of a label
The evolving role of a label
How an artist's team influences their success
Their reaction to the Billie Eilish documentary
Singles or an Album? Toward the end of the panel discussion, which was moderated by Panos A. Panay, Berklee's senior vice president for Global Strategy and Innovation, student Maksym Pisotskyi asked the group about the strategy it appears to have used to promote Eilish's upcoming album: Is it better to release an album or try things out with a single release, for an independent artist? Here's an edited version of what they had to say:
Lubliner: For an independent artist, one thousand million percent single release. Its incredibly hard to get a full project, each individual song, recognized. You might have a shot at one of those songs in the project becoming big and then the other songs getting, you know, 1,000 to 2,000 streams, and then you kind of just threw everything you had at the wall and only one stuck.
I think, to build a fan base, slowly tiering out songs, in an organized fashion, with having as much creative assets as you can-with having a visual narrative, covering all your social media platforms-and giving each song its own priority and attention and a shot, and then [you begin] slowly building into a project-based artist.
Ultimately, to break as an artist, you need to have albums, you need to have a project that people can listen to from start to finish to get to the next level, and we saw that again and again with Billie. But I feel like to give your music your best shot, you have to tier them out slightly, because each song could be that one song that takes it over the edge.
Were in an attention economy, and people dont even have the ability to listen to more than, like, a minute of a song. So, forcing 25 minutes on people early on, its a little bit too aggressive.
-Danny Rukasin
Goodman: And youre creating more moments by doing so that way as well. But it's just better in general: youre louder that way, theres more potential press moments.
Lubliner: But if the song does catch, you want to quickly have music available. The last thing you want is to have one or two songs out and one catch and then you dont have other music for a year. Thats also a huge issue.
Gold: It's important that you have singles, for sure, but then also that you have the year planned out. You know what song is coming next, you have the assets ready to go, and that youre just consistently releasing, driving back to your project.
Lubliner: You have to really take it one at a time as an independent artist. The rules change once you have a huge following. The biggest mistake some people make when they release music one at a time is not having anything prepped. I feel like you should have five to six songs banked before you start releasing music, and then start to just think about how youre doing it. If you just throw songs out without any plan, it can quickly catch up [to] you and you can find yourself in a very dangerous situation, especially if you do start getting recognized by fans and labels and partners, [and] everyone is focused on whats next.
Rukasin: Were in an attention economy, and people dont even have the ability to listen to more than, like, a minute of a song. So, forcing 25 minutes on people early on, its a little bit too aggressive at the beginning.
Gold: Every moment where youre releasing a new song youre driving back to the whole catalogue, so youre giving those other songs another chance to be heard, maybe from a new audience.
Lubliner: But when you start to tour, you need to have a body of work out. So when you start to tier your singles out, if you have shows coming up, thats a perfect time to start having a project on the platforms because thats when youll have new fans wanting to listen to you and go through your body of work. And if you only have two singles out, it makes it a little bit dangerous.
Watch the whole discussion here:
Related Categories
News
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
09/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
09/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
09/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
09/10/2026
September 10 2026, 06:00 (PDT) Dolby Expands Dolby OptiView Platform with New Capabilities at IBC 2026
New Sports Intelligence helps providers better unders...
08/10/2026
Modern venues have come a long way since the tinny, echoing audio of the mid 20t...
08/10/2026
ESPN's first Super Bowl production will stream in English and Spanish on Disney+, while the ESPN App carries the full slate of game, ManningCast, studio, an...
08/10/2026
From high-school videoboards to War Eagle Productions, the Opelika native is learning how to lead shows and capture big moments
The future of live sports produ...
08/10/2026
The Television Academy and Prime Video have announced a six-year agreement making Prime Video the exclusive global home of the Emmy Awards beginning with the 20...
08/10/2026
Techex will exhibit at NAB Show New York 2026 (Booth 623, Javits Center, October...
08/10/2026
X Games has announced the appointment of Steve Rogers as Chief Operating Officer. Rogers previously served as COO of World Supercross and spent nearly a decade ...
08/10/2026
Fonn Group has appointed Trevor Spielmann as Sales Director for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Spielmann joins from EVS, where he held sales and business de...
08/10/2026
The flagship program will originate from major PG events with a four-camera production, live distribution across PGTV, social platforms
Perfect Game is bringin...
08/10/2026
Innovation rarely happens in a vacuum. More often, it happens at the point of collision: when worlds that have run on separate tracks begin to converge. That is...
08/10/2026
For decades, the production and broadcast services business has run on a familia...
08/10/2026
Uplynk, Zixi, BroadView Software, and Grass Valley have published The IP Converg...
08/10/2026
The NFL has announced the return of the Big Data Bowl, the league's analytics competition, now in its ninth year and again powered by AWS. Registration is o...
08/10/2026
Eutelsat has renewed its partnership with T l diffusion d'Alg rie (TDA), Algeria's national broadcasting network operator, for continued distribution of...
08/10/2026
Disney will livestream Super Bowl LXI on February 14, 2027, alongside the game's broadcast on ESPN and ABC. All Disney subscribers in the United States wi...
08/10/2026
RHStv and Red House Streaming have announced an expansion of their partnership w...
08/10/2026
Gray Media has announced a distribution agreement with TEGNA and DAZN to simulca...
08/10/2026
SVG readers can save 10% on registration and receive a complimentary Solutions H...
08/10/2026
PROTON Camera Innovations GmbH has been named a recipient of a 2026 Technology a...
08/10/2026
Industry leaders discuss real-world cloud workflows for live game production, pl...
08/10/2026
The next-gen audio technology joins Dolby Vision as part of Apple TV's immersive F1 experience...
08/10/2026
David France, Jesse Short Bull, Mato Wayuhi, N. Bird Runningwater, Jodi Archambau, Jhane Myers, Paul McGuire, Amber Morning Star Byars, Holly Macarro, Nick Tils...
08/10/2026
Dynamic panning plug-ins get an upgrade
Sound Particles have just announced major updates for two of their popular dynamic panning plug-ins. Energy Panner 2...
08/10/2026
New expandable instrument boasts full DMNO engine
UDO Audio have just announced the upcoming release of a new, expandable synth that packs the power of the ...
08/10/2026
Two new subwoofers added to monitoring line-up
ADAM Audio's monitoring range has just been expanded with two new DSP-equipped subwoofers, the Sub8 PRO a...
08/10/2026
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({ content_source:......
08/10/2026
Calrec gives broadcasters freedom of choice at NAB Show New York We're looking forward to meeting up with you all at NAB New York on 21st-22nd October.
Cal...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Globecast, a leading provider of broadcast, media and entertainment managed services, will showcase its next generation of media orchestration services at NAB S...
08/10/2026
Clear-Com played a critical role in the production communications infrastructure for Rock in Rio 2026, one of the world's largest and most recognized music...
08/10/2026
Sohonet Launches ClearView Rush: A Leap Forward in Studio Review, Built for Crea...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Ikegami announces a major expansion to its range of broadcast-quality live production cameras. Scheduled for introduction on Ikegami booth 708 at NAB New York, ...
08/10/2026
Calrec will be located at Booth 444.
Freedom to choose
The media landscape is evolving quickly, and the broadcasters best placed for what comes next will be...
08/10/2026
LiveU has announced that CRD Audiovisuel relied on LiveUs LU900Q intelligent production unit, with built-in native LiveU IQ (LIQ ) connectivity, to deliver live...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/10/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
Team Billie Eilish to Independent Artists: Start with Singles and a Plan At this years Career Jam, the group that manages and promotes Eilish spoke to students about both the star and the industry at large. 
