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Hey! Last night I was scrolling through Netflix and I stumbled upon The Playlist, a new six-part drama series about the rise of Spotify.

How is this my first time hearing about this?! Especially given all the build up for The Dropout, WeCrashed, and Super Pumped. It may be because The Playlist is isn’t acted in English, but neither was Squid Games. Anyway, I might check it out this weekend.

Today’s newsletter is about one of the most successful independent artists I know, Curren$y. He’s been signed to No Limit, signed to Young Money, and done it by himself. I talked to him and his longtime manager, Mousa, about how they run their business and the secret behind their success. Let’s dive in.

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how Curren$y runs his business

Most artists want career growth and they want it fast, sometimes to a fault. But this is where Curren$y is an outlier. From the jump, Spitta has set out to grow both his career and fanbase slow and steady. It’s why he’s stayed in the rap game for almost twenty years, is earning more money than ever, and has outlasted most of his peers who fizzled out years ago.

Curren$y and his longtime manager, Mousa, joined me on this week’s episode to explain how they zigged when others zagged. They talked about leaving Cash Money Records label to create their own, Jet Life. The two have grown the brand into a full-on enterprise that includes apparel, athlete management, products, and more verticals on top of the music label.

They have turned down more brand partnerships than they can remember, and even music festival appearances. They won’t say yes to a bad deal, no matter how big the bag is. We discussed these moves at length in our interview.

grow like a balloon

Jet Life first got off the ground in 2009. Even back then, Mousa said Curren$y repeatedly talked about growing the label like a balloon. Blow air in it too fast and the balloon pops. But blow into it slowly, then the balloon inflates and stays inflated. That mirrors the growth path they wanted for themselves.

That growth had to come authentically. Curren$y and Mousa were adamant about staying in their lane and not doing something that didn’t feel right — to them and the Jet Life fanbase. That meant turning down inauthentic TV appearances, sponsored posts on social media, and brand deals, like an air freshener to kill the smell of weed.

This is Curren$y. Why would he do a deal to kill the smell of weed? Come on.

For instance, authentic for Jet Life instead meant creating cannabis products or a nightclub in New Orleans. As Curren$y described it, Jet Life has a “six-burner stove” with different revenue sources, a luxury that allows them to turn down bad-fitting opportunities.

touring as the pulse check

In the streaming era, touring is where most artists have made more bank. But for Curren$y, who started rapping in a completely different era in 2004, touring was always the lynchpin of his career.

Curren$y can remember not having the money to pay for beats. Instead, he’d use a Dr. Dre instrumental and release the song for free, hoping it would lead to people paying for his shows. Even now with the various revenue streams Jet Life has built, touring remains a cornerstone of their strategy.

Shows are how they gauge their fanbase. Attendance starts getting light? It’s back to the drawing board. Apparel sales slacking? Time to revisit clothing designs.

This is also why they prefer solo touring to music festival appearances. While Curren$y admits loving the big festival guarantees, that money is a means to an end. He puts money earned from festivals back into Jet Life, specifically the sports car dealership they own and operate.

keeping up with the fans

At the height of the NFT craze during April 2021, Curren$y released an NFT-only EP “Financial District”, which also included an exclusive smoke sesh with him. Not to be confused as another celebrity NFT cash grab, Curren$y hoped the drop would bring his Lifers fanbase up to speed with the emerging technology.

It’s an on-brand move for the pair considering they struck a deal with BitTorrent back in 2014. While most artists lashed out against the pirating software, Curren$y and Mousa, realizing that’s where their fans were, released a mixtape exclusively on the service.

Listen to our full conversation here:

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