In this episode, Tai Anderson of Third Day sits down with Jason K Powers to talk about the early business lessons of a touring band, a brutal review that reshaped how he thinks about success, and the fan-first framework behind his new book, Market Like a Rockstar.

Tai is a founding member and bass player of Third Day, a Grammy-winning Christian rock band that's sold over 7 million albums and just wrapped the first half of a 30th anniversary reunion tour. Tai and Jason get into what it was like playing to 20,000 people at a festival in Holland, and the one line a friend told him afterward that's shaped how he's approached his career ever since. They also cover how a rejected live album turned into a much better record deal, what Tai calls the "bouncer principle" for guarding who gets a voice in your band or business, a Taylor Swift meet and greet that turned him into a fan for life, and a lesson from Bono about what fans actually want from an artist.

If you're a musician trying to figure out how to build a real, lasting connection with your audience, and make better decisions along the way, this conversation is full of specific, hard-won lessons from someone who's been doing it for thirty years.

If this helped you think differently about the money side of your career, share it with another musician who needs to hear it.

Tai Anderson

Book: https://marketlikearockstar.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/taianderson3d

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TaiAnderson3D

Backstage Money

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/backstagemoney

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/backstagemoney

Free guide for musicians: https://1024wealth.com/music

Jason K Powers: Welcome to Backstage Money, where music and money collide.

I'm your host, Jason K. Powers, and every episode, we sit down with working

musicians and industry insiders who have been figuring it out in the

trenches, so you can learn from people who are actually making it work.

Today's guest is Tai Anderson, founding member and bass player of Third Day,

Grammy Award-winning musician, keynote speaker, and marketing strategist.

Drawing on more than 30 years of building loyal audiences on stage and

in business, he teaches organizations how to earn trust, strengthen brands,

and turn customers into lifelong fans through authentic connection.

He's also just launched his newest book, Market Like a Rockstar, and built around

everything he learned doing exactly that.

Uh, Tai and the band just wrapped up the first half of their 30th

anniversary tour and getting ready to head back out for round two pretty soon.

Tai, welcome to Backstage Money.

Thank you.

That, that intro sounded great when you said it.

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

so it's fantastic.

So appreciate it.

Really g- really, uh, glad to be here today

Jason K Powers: Yeah, I appreciate you being on.

Uh, as always, we always start with kind of an origins story for everybody.

Tell, tell me, how did you get into this?

Take us back to, uh, uh, maybe a middle school talent

Yeah.

Jason K Powers: right?

And

Yeah.

for me, um, it, it was, uh, I think anyone who's ever written a book,

it's very cathartic, but you go, you go back into the cave for your origin

story, and for me, music's always been a part of it my whole life.

It started in just this love of live music was really an instinct.

When I was in eighth grade, there was this little, uh, t- you know,

talent show for my high school.

They had had it for 50 years, called Mr. Chamblee High School here in

Atlanta, Georgia, and you had two representatives for each class.

So I guess I was a popular, popular enough kid that I would-

got to represent my class.

And, but everyone… And, and I found, looking through old stuff

for the book, I found, like, the program for this, uh, for the Mr.

CHS contest, and everyone lip-synched.

Everyone just got up and, the guys would, someone would do, you know, apropos the

day we're recording this today after we last- we lost Dolly Parton, someone

would do a Dolly Parton, you know, impersonation or, you know, uh, Madonna

in Vogue or Material Girl or something every, you know, it was kinda, uh, guys

dressing up like girls lip-syncing.

And I was like, "Nah, I'm forming a band." So I got together, and

check this out, just friends, eighth grade, 13 years old- The guitarist

I got is, his name's Steve Hardy.

I think he's a Grammy-winning engineer out in Los Angeles now.

A drummer, uh, Andy Hill, I know he's a member of the, of, uh,

NARAS, of the recording academy, uh, engineer himself, great drummer.

And the bass player that I selected went to Julliard.

And then I dressed up and I sang, uh, Purple Haze, and that, that realization

that even if you're not a great singer, live music beats lip syncing every time.

And so I won the contest as an eighth grader, and I was hooked, and I was

just like, how can I keep doing this?

So I just, any band that I could find, I would, I would try to play,

and whatever instrument I could find.

It, you know, it was so much more like being in a gang

than, actually being talented.

It was just like I just loved the camaraderie in the

bands and figuring out music.

And so, uh, but found there was a lot of opportunity if I picked up the bass guitar

and, uh, 'cause everyone, guitarists were a dime a dozen, but you, you could kinda,

like, help cut through if you played bass.

So I would do that, but really rock and roll became my identity.

And, uh, just like now I haven't lost that.

The posters on my wall behind me, and even what I'm looking at, I'm looking

at U2 and The Black Crows, and Dave Matthews, and Bruce Springsteen.

And, uh, let's see who we got here.

Uh, Coldplay and The Wallflowers over there.

And so I- it's always been that when I love a band, I wear

the T-shirt, I get the poster.

So middle school Ty puts the poster on the wall.

At the time it was, started with U2 War, where there's,

the bruised and bloodied kid.

And so my parents see that poster, okay.

And then down the road was REM getting started.

So I got this poster, and it was this gargoyle, uh, from this early,

uh, one of their early albums.

I had this huge poster from the record store of REM and U2, and then I added the

Chili Peppers, Red Hot Chili Peppers, but I think it was Mother's Milk, and so it

was kinda like a, a, a half topless woman.

And then I added Jane's Addiction for the Ritual de lo- and it was,

like, some, some nudity on the cover.

So my parents, growing up here in the South in Georgia, they thought

that I had, like, gone to full devil worship, and I was going off the edge.

So they called my youth pastor the church and really a great moment for me instead

of, at the time there was this like, uh, still in the church was like rock

and roll is evil, and there was this video they would play, Hells Bells, that

talked about the evils of rock and roll.

I'm so glad that my youth pastor didn't take that approach with me,

'cause I would've been out the door.

Instead he was like, "Hey, you're into music.

Why don't you come play with the youth group, and we'll go play music together?"

And from there met the drummer of Third Day, and we've been best friends, uh,

ever since then, 13 years old, and very shortly thereafter connected with

the other guys in Third Day, and our youth pastor really put us together.

So, um, my love, kinda started with music, and then my kinda introduction

to then be in Christian music, fortunately, it wasn't that it was a

lot of strategy, it was just that I met some great people that it didn't make

it like if I had to take a theological test, I never would've passed it.

It was, it was just that they were welcoming and, and invited me in.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

So how did you get from high school band to, I mean,

Third

Jason K Powers: developing

Rocks.

Jason K Powers: this out and yeah, to Red Rocks, right?

High school band to Red Rocks.

That's it.

I'm gonna, I'm gonna call the show that

Yeah

I like it.

Um, definitely not a straight path, but, um, we … right from the beginning,

anyone who's heard Third Day music, pretty undeniable that our singer just

has a fantastic gift and a great voice.

And so right from the beginning, um, when I heard his voice, the, the

very first show that I heard Third Day, I was actually running sound,

and it was like, man, he's just

Even in a 12 by 12 room and really, cinder block walls, like, there was

just an undeniable talent, and he was already, from the beginning it was like

this wasn't gonna be another cover band.

Mac was already having song ideas and writing songs.

So the whole Christian band thing, I didn't really give it a lot of thought

because my favorite band was U2.

So to me, I didn't understand that it was a separate genre.

I thought this was like, man, what else would you sing about but the big

stuff, like faith and hope and love?

Like, 'cause that's what U2's done their whole career.

And, um, but then what, what we found, and I think just being honest about it, was,

like, it was almost a shortcut for us in that we had this church world that was

opening up to Christian music at the time.

There were still those that were really resistant to rock and roll, but it gave

us … it was like our club tour where we would just go pl- maybe not as,

uh, sexy, you know 'cause we're just, we're playing for, teenagers and junior

high kids in just little youth group rooms, but hey, you get an audience.

And I think any artist will appreciate, um, any time … it's almost like your

audience makes you, and I think the book gets into that more than you just

going, "Hey, we're gonna go just, uh, find the perfect audience." It's like

there's that, there is that synergy of just like, man, when you find

Uh, so there, it definitely helped shape us.

Like, man, we wanted to make music.

A lot of it was for making it for p- people our age and a little

bit younger at the time, and just authentically singing about our faith.

So probably about four years.

It wasn't that we struggled.

I mean, people talk about that now.

It was a joy.

We were in high school.

We were just starting college.

We, we worked other jobs, and we got to go out and play at other churches,

play at camps, play at retreats on the weekend, and it was just a joy.

And then, um, from that we started building our own following, and we

had a little, there was a little club.

It was in a old theater, and it was yet to be restored.

Now it's a beautiful theater in downtown Marietta, a suburb

of Atlanta, called The Strand.

At the time it was not a beautiful theater, but, but we got to play there,

like, once a month, and it got so big that when national acts came through

they'd let us open because we would, we could help fill out the tickets

And, uh, from that we got attention.

And then right from the beginning our, um, our, I mean, our first record went

on to sell, now it's a gold record.

Um, and at the time, even in its kind of initial cycle before we made our second

record, it sold over 300,000 copies.

So really some, a, a four-year overnight success, I guess you could say.

But, but still always growth, always, um, finding an audience,

always resonating with it.

So I, I've, I've heard even other members of the band or maybe even

myself in the past, at the time we would talk about struggling, just the van

and trailer and breaking down and… But looking back at it now, I, it's

hard to describe it as a struggle.

It was just a joy.

We got to play music.

We always connected with people, whether it was 20 people or 20,000, and really had

a fast path where, people resonated with what we do and, and we found an audience

Jason K Powers: Yep.

Yeah, I think that that's a great perspective is just that while it may

have been a struggle, the perception of, like you put it, it's j- it's a joy to

do it 'cause you got to play for people.

You got to s- s- speak that message you were wanting to speak

Yeah.

Jason K Powers: impact people

I s- and I look at music so differently now too, where, as the

band kinda went on that first, 22-year run before we sorta hit pause, I was,

the business guy in the band driving all that stuff, so I would get really

competitive, and there's things that I would describe as a struggle at the time.

Now, as we're getting back to do Third Day, but as I'm doing other music

stuff, what could be described as a struggle to me, again, is just… And,

and other friends that I meet where it's like, man, if you get to play, if

you're playing at a little restaurant, if you're playing at a little club, if

you're playing at a theater, if you're playing at a sold-out arena, if you're

getting- if you're playing at church.

I think there's a time where maybe people would look down at all these kinda like

working musician things, playing in the lobby of a hotel, playing at a, the,

the lo- the, patio of a restaurant.

To me, it's like any time you get to do music, it's a joy.

Now, it's, it's, it's certainly better when people

are giving you their focused attention, uh, as opposed to trying to play over

the, the, the, someone bussing a table.

But, um, but any time you get to do it is great, and any time you're in

that moment of where you're resonating with an audience, I mean, what a joy.

Is there anything better than… And so I have a new appreciation for it

and sort of a willingness to, the audience size doesn't dictate my

level of, uh, joy from it anymore.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

So when did you first realize you were, like as you put, you put it a minute

ago, the business guy in the band, not

Man

I think I first realized it, I mean, it was just an instinct.

Again, it's like the band sort of got started and, um, I was kinda

like w- none of us really came from a lot of money, but I o- I already had

sort of an entrepreneurial instinct.

Like, I would mow lawns and I would, uh, save money and I would…

So I, I just always had that ability to… And my dad modeled that.

He had his own business, which the other guys didn't necessarily have.

And so from that, I, I just, no one asked me to, but I just like, okay, if

something needed to be done, I did it.

So, like, right away it was like, hey, we all needed to work other jobs.

And I was like, "Well, we need to sell merchandise." So I went and got a job

at a T-shirt shop, at a screen printing press, and learned how to do screen

printing, and that really served me well as our merchandise became a huge

part of our business through the years.

And I kinda just took that a- approach.

We went to go work at a summer camp as counselors by day, and then we would play

a concert at the end of each week, and go out on the weekend and play other shows.

So, um, w- we had that gig, and I learned an expression from the camp director.

He said, "If it's to be, it's up to me." And so I just kind of took that,

and then it really developed, um, when we got to make our second record, we

were in the studio and our producer, a guy named Sam- Sam Taylor, and he

had worked with ZZ Top and King's X.

And we were in there and we already had like, sort of, we'd had enough

s- success that there was already k- this kind of thing that seems so silly

now, but it w- it was almost like the guys, it was like this contest I didn't

know about of like who could spend the least amount of time in the studio.

Like, we're kinda already, that bands get into, like, who can show up last.

And I was never that way, but I remember our producer kinda chastised us, and

no one likes to get rebuked, but Sam kinda pulled us aside and said, "Listen,

if you guys are gonna be professional musicians, your first record you put

together on, shoestrings." I had emptied my college fund and funded the record

and it's like, "If you're gonna get to do this, you're working in a great studio

with a great engineer, and you guys need to learn everything about recording."

And some of the guys didn't receive that that well at the time.

I really took that to heart, and then I applied it to everything in the band.

I said, "I'm gonna learn about booking. I'm gonna learn about management." I

picked up Everything You Need to Know About the Music Business, kind of the

Bible of, of, uh, of, of getting started in music, and I just purposed to do that.

So it wasn't, I wasn't delegated to be the business guy.

It was just an instinct and a passion, and that sorta drove it.

And then you really realize often it is the bass player, I

think there's something to that.

So maybe there is a, uh, a, a, a overcompensation.

We don't, maybe we don't always have the biggest role musically.

In some bands they do.

Bands like Tool and the Chili Peppers.

But for a lot of bands, and I think in Th- in Third Day, the, the bass has,

it's certainly not an oversized role.

It's just kind of part of the mix.

But from that, maybe we sort of compensate by earning our keep by

really driving everything else.

Jason K Powers: Yeah, yeah.

kind of spinning off that then as the business-minded guy for the

band, early on, and for musicians today, I- the industry has shifted

quite a bit, since you were in high school and college years, but there's

some things that are unchanging,

right?

A- and so what were some…

What's maybe one or two early lessons, hard lessons if

if

if it's that?

What's one or two lessons that you learned early on that the band forming

today, the band up and coming today can still learn from and keep an eye

out for and be, be watchful of these

Yeah

Jason K Powers: potholes in your road?

What's interesting is when we got signed in 19- 1995,

1996, it was like the, the music industry very much still had, the

publishing was a huge deal from the revenue that generated and, and album

royalties were really a big part of it.

And it was almost like the record companies at the time,

management, didn't really…

Like, playing live was almost secondary to that, to just the

radio promotion, the press exposure.

And so that's all the things I, I would really lead was our, our

live show, our live production.

I would, put together our road crews and, and then design all the, the

merchandise and all these things.

And it was almost like the rest of the business couldn't be

bothered with the live aspect of the business and the merchandise.

Well, today, that is the business.

Like, that's kind of, you

Jason K Powers: Right

that's, that really is the music business now.

So that's really shifted.

But I think the biggest lesson that I learned, I, I put this

story, uh, to give it away.

So, I have released this book that, uh, uh… So it's coming out.

Well, it's, it- you can order it now, and it'll be out on

release day, on September 15th.

Um, but it's, out on Amazon.

The encore of the book.

So I put it together like a, uh, like a setlist.

So it, it, first you form the band in the garage, and then, there's

an opening act, and then it goes through like a great show, and

the, the, the chapters are songs.

Well, the encore, the very end, I tell a story about early in our career, 1995,

first chance to ever get on a plane to play a show, and it would've been

great being from Atlanta if that was like a regional hopper to Charlotte or

Nashville, but instead it was to Holland.

And we got invited to this festival to play over there.

So we go over.

We didn't know about customs.

We smuggled in all our merchandise.

We didn't… I shouldn't say that.

We didn't know, um… There was so much we didn't know.

We went, and we went down to, uh, The Black Crowes already had like

a backline company in Atlanta they had set up, Moonshine Backline.

So we rented a, a drum coffin from The Black Crowes, and we put a- our guitars,

our merchandise, everything, and showed up in the airport with this thing that

had to have weighed like 1,000 pounds.

Jason K Powers: Uh-huh.

And somehow I sweet-talked it onto the Iceland Air connecting

through, Reykjavik into Holland.

And some…

I mean, now I feel like I would've been arrested, but this was pre 9/11.

Um, we got it over there, but we go to the show- And the biggest crowd

we'd ever played for was 500 people.

And we show up at this festival, they open the curtain, we go on stage, and

it's just a sea of people, 20,000 people.

I mean, just this huge European festival crowd.

We've all seen the footage.

And European fans… American fans are great, but at the time, even just

culturally, certainly in Christian music, the, the starting position was

kinda like, "Let's see if these guys are okay. Is it okay to have fun?"

And it was a little bit of, people had kinda their spiritual baggage, that I

think people have let a lot of that go.

But we go over there, the crowd, it's pogoing.

It's, like, jumping up and down, and you get… When a crowd gets that big, it

becomes like a living, breathing organism.

It's its own thing.

So the crowd's just going crazy.

And w- I'm on stage, and I was literally… At the time, we still

were doing the band part-time.

We were all college students.

And I was on stage playing, going, "We're gonna make it." Like, th- and I

was th- I was literally on stage… I mean, I remember we finished the set, we

went backstage, and every one of us was having the same thought, 'cause we were

like, "I'm dropping off o- I'm dropping out of college as soon as I get home.

Like, we're gonna make it."

So we're, uh, we're… This incredible moment, the crowd singing along.

Somehow they knew our music, and it was just… It was incredible.

And we stayed at the festival, stayed in a little artist bungalow.

And the festival was so big that it had a newspaper that would come out every day,

a little daily for the festival, lots of advertisements, but there was reviews from

each of the previous day's performances.

So the paper is, like, half in Dutch and half in German.

It would, like… Same content, it would go upside down on one side or the other.

But there's one sentence in English on both sides of the newspaper.

This, this very spinal tap.

And the sentence was the, the headline to the review of our concert.

It said, "Third day, please stay in America."

Jason K Powers: No

And so talk about a gut punch, an artist, like musician, our love

language, I think every one of us, our love language is words of affirmation.

Like, and so it's like our oxygen.

So I was just gutted, and I had this friend, he played in this band that

we loved called The Prayer Chain, and, um, they were at the festival too.

And he came by our little bungalow and he saw that… He, he saw the… Maybe

he had, uh, seen the, the, that same headline, and he said, "Ty, let's go

for a walk." And we went for a walk.

He's a few years older than me, and he said, "How did you feel when you guys were

on stage yesterday?" And I said, I felt on top of the world, like I'm gonna drop

out of college, like we're gonna make it.

We just connected with the fans." He said, "And how do you feel now?"

And I'm like, "How do you think I feel, man?" Like, I'm devastated.

And he just stopped me and gave me this wisdom that I think anyone doing music

is a lesson that you could grab onto.

He said, "You have to decide right now if you're gonna do this for

the critics or the fans, 'cause you'll never please them both."

And I tell you what, that wisdom has just carried me through my entire life,

and it's allowed me to enjoy every step of the journey, and we really

live that out even professionally.

Our, our second record, probably our most critically acclaimed when it

came out, at least I remember it, great reviews, and, um, even kinda

like mainstream reviews, but it just didn't resonate with the audience.

And then we put out a record called Offerings, and I don't remember

great reviews, but man, did it connect with fans, and now it-

that's a double platinum record.

Uh, so, um, I would encourage any artist starting out, it's a long story

to answer your question, but man, make your passion the fans, the people

that you are for and that are for you.

Fans want you to be the best version of yourself.

Critics wanna compare you to other people.

And to develop that thick skin that you don't define success by somebody's

negative word about you, or, or we don't, we don't consider that a

failure, but knowing that, the people that we're for is what it's all about.

What… I think whether it's music or life, if you can learn that lesson, I

mean, Dolly knew that lesson, didn't she?

And that's why everyone is mourning her today, 'cause she's somebody who,

uh, she was for her fans, and if you didn't get her, she w- she was as

self-deprecating as they came, but…

And, but man, she was for her fans, she was for her community, and, uh,

really left a legacy because of that.

Jason K Powers: Yep, yep.

Yeah, that's pretty powerful.

I think, um, wraps up the episode, man.

What

Yeah.

Jason K Powers: say?

Like

I know.

Jason K Powers: don't know.

It is pretty powerful

I told you I'm getting into public speaking, so I like to give

these, like, inspirational stories.

It's kinda my jam

Jason K Powers: Love it.

Love it.

So, uh, on deals, let's, let's talk about… Can

Okay

Jason K Powers: walk us through a deal, good, bad, uh, from

touring or, or throughout the business and what it taught you?

Yeah

I think what's interesting is, um, that record I talked about, Offerings,

our label didn't wanna make it.

They, um… And usually, it was so funny, I watched a v- a, a social media

clip this morning, and it was talking about the state of the music business.

But it was saying the music business has always been a hard business.

It's not like y- even back in the mid-'90s and when, when you could sell

record deals, well, CDs are experimental media, so you get a half royalty.

And there's always all this stuff that, you know, as, as Prince had tried to

champion for us, when you're on your first record deal, it's usually not a good deal.

I mean, it's just… But it's that trade-off of like, hey, even for a

bad deal, um, you're getting access to this machine that can break you

and that can take you to the masses.

I don't know if that's the case today.

But our first deal, it wasn't that it was so bad.

I think we g- we got a, um, a fair deal at the time.

But you know, certainly it got better as we got to through that deal to our next

deal, and then to a deal after that.

So w- you're, as an artist, if you remain viable, you can improve your terms.

But when we went to go make, we had done three records and we

went to go make Offerings, and it was a record for our fans.

Like, it was, half of it was live, half we did in the studio.

But I was like, I wanted to capture these moments of our

show that were the most powerful.

And this was before even worship music was its own genre.

But it was these worshipful parts of the, of the, the concert.

And first I had to win over the band, and that took, six months,

'cause we weren't sure if, they weren't sure if it was a good idea.

And I had to win over our team.

And then the record company was like, "No, if you wanna do this record, it's

not gonna count towards your deal. A half live record is gonna be what's

called an overcall record." And when you're in that first record deal, you do

everything to get signed, and then you do everything to try to hurry through

that record deal to improve your terms.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

it turned out to be a huge blessing because they said, "Well, we

don't want it, it's gonna be an overcall record." And we said, "Well, great.

If it's just an overcall record, then you, you need to pay us, like, double

royalties." So we got, like, a much better royalty scale, and then they were

like, "Well, we're not gonna pay for it."

And we're like, "Isn't that the whole job of a record company, to be the bank

f- like, if you're not gonna pay for it, then we want even more royal-" so we

really negotiated our best terms for an album that went on to be our best seller.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

And, um, so it really, all of those things at the time that

were frustrations turned out to be a huge blessing for us financially.

And so again, though, I think it comes from that instinct I was talking about

before of, for an artist, you have to You have to develop a real meaningful

connection with your audience.

I talk about in the book, in the garage, back at the beginning,

it's like, with apologies to Simon Sinek who says start with the why,

you have to start with the who.

And that goes to who's in the band, who's not in the band.

But also is who is your audience, and understanding your audience.

And this is f- goes for music, for anyone in business.

Um, if you, you have to know who your… We call it an ICP in

marketing, ideal client persona.

Who are you talking to?

If you're trying to talk to everybody, you're talking to nobody.

So you have to know your audience, and better that, a- and this

is the Taylor Swift principle, you have to love your audience.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

if you actually love your audience, like you would go to

war for your audience, you would… You care about them, you have that

kind of connection, let that guide your instincts with your business.

And if you're always keeping your art- the- your fans front and center,

that's gonna be the North Star to guide you towards the best decisions.

If those decisions that come of like, "Hey, it's a little compromise here,

compromise that. Uh, yeah, I'm not… we're trying to go reach these people

over here because we think they have more money, or we think they're a…"

A- and I think that's across genre.

I think s- m- maybe someone's listening, if they're going, "Ah, Christian artist,

I don't know," I think that's wisdom w- if you're a metal artist, I think it's…

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

I, I talk about in the f- the first chapter of the book, the real

principle is spillover, not crossover.

The best way to success is to just be so authentically you and to be

authentically who you're meant to be and who your audience is, and have

that kind of connection, and then other people will wanna come to that party

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

I love in the book, y- and you just touched on it a second ago, about the

of who is or who is not in the band.

Can you

expound on that a little bit?

Yeah

I call it, I, it's just like a one-off line in the book.

I call it the bouncer principle.

But it's like,

Jason K Powers: Yeah

It, for us in the, in the band when we started, there, we, there

was a keyboard player who was around.

He was 10 years older and kinda, uh, and, played keys.

And then he came to us and he's like, "I don't, I, I don't need to do this."

And at the time it almost felt like a rejection.

Like, why wouldn't you wanna be with… we're doing this cool thing.

But then it so shaped who we became as our core identity,

was that we didn't have keys.

Now later we added keys and it became a big part of our sound.

But in that initial stage, if he had been in the band, we would've been a different

band, and it would've changed everything.

So it's like just, on one side I think you have to really guard

who gets to be in the band.

It is, is so important.

I mean, on the other side, I think I think the danger that I think now

is not there anymore is you really h- it, the early days, you really

had to protect your publishing.

And so you had to really…

It's like little things of, like, I remember it being like, "Hey, we

can't even accept, fans giving us a demo on the road," because they could

later say, "Oh, that song you wrote was really influenced by this demo I

gave," and come after your publishing.

Well now, because album, 'cause publishing isn't nearly what it used to be, uh, I

mean for the, for the Taylor Swifts of the world it is, for the Ed Sheerans of

the world, but for, for the vast majority of artists, they're not gonna be selling

gold record levels anymore, and publishing isn't generating that kind of money.

I think it actually opens that maybe you can be a little bit more collaborative.

Um, 'cause we would have people, I mean, 'cause it happened to us in a small way,

someone that we allowed just to hang out at a rehearsal, three years later,

'cause they had like, oh, it was another guitar player and they kinda dialed in

a delay for us, and then later was kinda claiming, and he, we've since totally

worked it out, but he was saying that, like, he wrote the song because we had,

because we didn't, like, keep the room, we didn't protect who was in the room.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

and So we really learned that lesson.

You had to, you have to kinda make that a safe, sacred place, and I think you have

to, I talked about critics before, I think any band has to guard the voices they

allow into that inner circle, especially at an early stage, 'cause it can really

sway you away from your best instincts.

It, they, uh, and so I think that's true, but at the same time, I, I

know I'm speaking on both sides.

I do think now, because publishing isn't as big of a thing, it opens it up to, hey,

g- get more ideas, collaborate with more people, be open to the best idea wins.

I think the worst thing in bands is when they're not do- everyone's

sh- kinda like fighting for their idea because they're thinking about

what's the songwriter's share.

That's never good.

And that's why, my favorite bands, U2, Coldplay, they eliminate that

because they just split everything.

That's not really how we do it in America.

There's, there's not a lot of examples of that.

It's more of a Nashville… Because publishing is such a big deal, like,

you can watch the quiet riot behind the music and, lead singer's in a

mansion and the rest of the guys are sharing an apartment because of that

disparity that's created by songwriting.

I think now it actually is forcing everyone to maybe be

a little bit more democratic.

So l- I know that's a long answer to your question.

It gets into the nuance, but, um, yeah

Jason K Powers: So a couple thoughts.

So, like, talk to me about maybe something that, you've had

You did a full, what, a full t- 20 years before you took a break,

Yeah.

22 years and then had really 11 years, 2015 till 2026, really didn't

do music except an occasional, uh, sit in with somebody.

And then we started talking a few years ago about marking this 30th

anniversary of our first record.

So we did 30 cities for our 30th anniversary, and

then one show at Red Rocks.

And, it ended up, cool thing, I know that's near you, the promoter came back

at that show and said, "I've never seen this in all my years doing b-," but we

have our, the Ticketmaster printout.

He says, "We have… People bought tickets for this show from all 50

states were represented, as Well,

as the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil," and it's

just rattling off countries.

So our fans really came from all over the world.

That show was sold out before the tour even started.

But incredibly successful reunion for the band, and then now that sparked,

I think, for everybody like, "Hey, we don't know what the future holds,

but we're not ready to Uh, to, to just all go back to our day jobs.

And so, uh, from that, uh, we've added 12 shows this November.

We're doing it as a triple bill, so with two other artists.

It's all Ts.

So it's Chris Tomlin, TobyMac, and Third Day.

So, uh, Tomlin, Toby, and Third Day.

Uh, so we're doing that in, um, some, some smaller markets, 'cause I think…

all of us have already toured this year.

And, um, and then they found 12 cities we haven't played in.

And then the r- the anniversary tour, we have 24 dates for the March through May

of next year, or April and May next year.

So, um, with that, it's kinda giving me this runway where I've felt like,

man, I wanna take, the advantage of this season, maybe advantage is

I wanna maximize this season to, this … The idea of this book, Market

Like a Rockstar, it's been this framework I've developed to take to the business

world and the marketing space, these lessons I've learned in- from music.

And now it's kinda like, man, because of the success of this

tour, it's given me this window of like, I just kinda wanna go for it.

Like, I wanna see how I can … that's what we were talking a little bit before.

It's a scary thing.

It's so much easier to promote a band than it is to promote yourself.

Uh, c- and then you feel like such a tool out there, holding up your book and doing

social media posts and, uh, and then

But also, I really love, the book is full of stories, and I really have … Uh,

I know we're not supposed to speak as bass players, but, uh, I really enjoy

getting out and talking to audiences and bringing these lessons to companies.

So I'm, I'm, I'm kinda like shooting my shot in this season with the

book and with public speaking, and so grateful to the band.

And with that really to the fans that have … I thought, I really lobbied and I

was, thankfully I was overruled, 'cause I thought, "Listen, no one's … Like, this

is just gonna be nostalgia. I don't know how many people are gonna come out to see

Third Day. Like, maybe we … Like, let's go play theaters and sell them all out."

And really got pushback from, the promoter, and the band manager

was like, "No, this needs to be arenas." And They were Right.

I mean, the, the, the demand was there.

Um, it, so, yeah, it was, it was incredible.

And I guess K-Love, which is like the largest sort of radio network for

Christian music, they, uh, they came and filmed our last show of the tour in

Atlanta and just made that available.

And really cool, I just saw it.

I mean, I'm like, it's so wild that all these years in, like it's the

coolest live concert thing we've done with the biggest production and,

the highest quality recording of it.

It sounds great, and it's just … So really proud of that.

If people wanna go check that out, you can see Third Day at its best.

Maybe not our, not our youngest.

We got a little more gray but, but at our best.

Jason K Powers: Right.

Right.

think it's great.

I mean, but you take all these years of experience and, and in your case,

you've translated it into, um, a book, but, but that's been your business for

a while, is, is helping businesses, uh, in the marketing area, right?

And, and that's just using the experiences in life and the experiences you've

learned in the music industry all those years, and being able to translate

that, uh, into other areas of life,

Yeah

Jason K Powers: which is great.

I think that's, that's, that's really what was intriguing to me about when I

first heard about the book and, and just how… 'cause everybody listening, right,

we're all involved in some manner in the music business and music industry,

and I think this book, it's still, right, right, it's applicable- Yeah

more than ever, when I left, 2015, leaving music, going in the

business world, I felt like everyone just saw me as, "Oh, you're just a bass player,

just a musician." And it took me a while.

I thought, "Man, I've won four Grammy awards. I got my marketing

degree." Um, I'd gone back to school, got my marketing degree.

I'm like, "Probably Coca-Cola wants to hire me to be their next CMO."

And I feel like nobody saw me.

I felt invisible.

I was like this hard season.

But then I found my footing and, I was the marketing creative director for a

mortgage lender for nearly a decade, and then going out in the community and

helping other companies and, and speaking, speaking for a lot of real estate offices.

But it was so wild coming back because we went… As we went on the

road and the level of this tour, the professionalism of the crew, the, the

business aspect of it, I mean, I was still going… I would go tour Thursday

through Sunday, fly back, go Right

to my office.

I, bring my sports jacket on the, uh on the tour bus so I'd have

something to change into, go right into work, and then work in the

office Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

So all during the tour But it was like, it almost was hard going back

to the corporate world, 'cause I was like, I feel like I was coming from,

like, Special Forces and going back to, like, big army, it's… People

that are in the military will… My son's, uh, he just got selected, so,

um, I'm not even supposed to say that.

Erp.

Uh, so anyway, so but y- if you watch the t- there's just a difference when

you're around, Nick Saban says, "High achievers don't like low achievers.

Low achievers don't like high achievers." And what I found is sometimes people

can look at the music business and say, "Oh, the road crew, they

dress, they don't, they're, they're just dressing for function, not…"

And we're like, Yeah

they, they dress for the however to get the job done.

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

they express themselves the way they want to.

But talk about professionals.

I mean, you give a great dialed-in road crew, like, y-

I would take them into battle.

I would take them into business.

You're talking about people that get up in the morning, the crack of dawn, work

till after midnight, nothing to work an 18-hour day, that you encounter multiple

problems throughout the day, and there's never an attitude of like, "Oh, okay.

Well, we'll fix this tomorrow." It's like, "No, you scramble, you solve the

problem, and the show must go on." And it's like, our tour, I mean, it was like,

I, it was like technical perfection.

I mean, everything worked every day, the mixes were great.

The in-ear mixes were great.

I mean, and that's, it, it's come so far.

When we started, before in-ear monitors, I called monitors

just feedback generators, you

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

like, and just ta- it, you'd go to a show, this, like, uh, how

often I'd go to a show and it was, like, the exception that it sounded good.

Like, it was noteworthy if you went to a show and like,

man, they really sounded good.

And now, it's like, it's noteworthy if you go to a show and it doesn't sound

good, 'cause the technology's gone so far.

The, um, and just, I'm just so impressed and a- and I think, you look at music,

you look at the skills we learn.

We're experts in collaboration.

If you're in a band, you're an expert in not getting your way.

Right?

You're an expert in y- having to, y- work through adversity.

You're, uh, a network… A- and then what I really have tapped into is

that what bands are experts in is that people don't just… It's not just

a preference for the bands we like.

Look at your office, look at mine.

It's identity.

Fandom is a big deal, and s- what I really found in the business world is

the best companies understand that.

But everyone, their default setting is marketing is a journey from

talking to strangers to hoping to get somebody through the door.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

That's only half the battle.

Like, in a band we say, Yeah.

it's awesome if the promoter does a good job advertising and

can s- can sell out the show."

That's great, but if the fans don't leave going, "That was transformational.

Next time I'm buying the VIP package.

Next, I wanna go on the cruise.

I'm buying the T-shirt.

I'm telling my friends about it," then the artist hasn't done their job.

They… You know what I mean?

It's like… 'Cause the best bands, you're constantly moving up.

When You go see your… when I saw Coldplay, I saw

them on my birthday in 2021.

I think they're still on the same tour.

It's like, uh, I think they're going, "We're gonna keep going until we

break Taylor Swift's record." But it was such an amazing night, and

I know that's not, like, your genre of choice, but it's like you left…

I left that show feeling connected with, like, humanity, and it was

so transformational that, like, I would… Like, it doesn't matter what

their ticket price is on their next show, I'm gonna find a way to go.

Jason K Powers: You

go.

Right.

and the best concerts do that, and I think… But

then the best brands can, too.

The best…

you think about, like, Apple and how I've gone from, I mean, my first Mac

product was, like, a Quadra 660AV before they came out with the iMac, but then

to the first iMac and oh my gosh, I was already doing some video editing.

I, on this computer now, what used to be $20,000, I can do at home.

And then all the way to the, the, the iPod, then the iPhone, and then y-

Apple has a way… I talk ab- it's in my chapter is advance, the A in my

acronym, but the best brands have a way of just sucking you into their ecosystem.

I started by buying one Yeti cooler, now I have the Yeti luggage.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

it's like you just get pulled in, but it becomes part

of the brands that we love are also how we tell the world who we are,

just like the bands that we love.

Um-

Jason K Powers: So what about… So, like, for, for the musician, marketing,

I mean, what you're saying, I mean, the importance of marketing in some

form is, is pretty substantial to the existence of your band, I think.

Mm-hmm

Jason K Powers: so, so speak to maybe how a musician with little

to no marketing budget approach things to, a- a- apply some of this

in their own career right now in

Yeah.

I'm a, I mean, I'm living it myself, applying it to both launching this book,

I feel like I'm starting from scratch, and this other musical project that I'm

starting, we're starting from scratch.

And it's daunting because the first thing what you have to do is you

have to get over… Uh, Mel Robbins talked about this with an interview

with Seth Godin about a week ago.

It was a great little podcast, and they talked about your social

media isn't for your friends.

It isn't for your family.

Your social media is for the people that you're trying to reach with your message.

And so first of all, you have to get rid of any of that feeling

of like, "Oh, this isn't cool.

Self-promotion isn't cool." You just have to embrace that in this, in this day of an

attention economy, where, you have to be willing to sort of put yourself out there.

And I know a lot of musicians that that isn't their preference.

They'd rather just be discovered, but that's not the world we live in.

So you have to embrace that side of it.

The second thing I would say, pick up, great book, transformational

for me, Seth Godin, Tribes.

And what he talks about is the smallest viable audience and that an

artist only needs 1,000 true fans.

And so realizing that these are the people I'm for, they're my core

fans, I'm gonna give them access.

It used to be this like shroud of mystery and inaccessible.

Make yourself accessible to your fans, to these diehard fans that, um, you

know, and you build them one at a time and you build them… In the book, I,

I talk about meeting Taylor Swift and how she got down on her knees to look

eye level with my daughters, and how that turned me into a fan for life.

Well, that's what you need to do for your fans.

Like i- if you're out there, your fans, like you need to be available

to them, and you need to be moving them up a ladder of loyalty.

So for a fan, it's like you meet them where they are, you give them

a moment of surprise and delight, something they didn't expect.

It can… I mean, and this day and age

I would start, whether it's social media, um, send them a direct message

where it's not just, uh, the same thing you're saying to everyone.

They connected with you, you follow up with a, a video.

"Hey, hey, I just wanna thank you for coming out to the show.

I enjoyed talking with you afterwards.

I gotta tell you, we g- we got another show coming up.

It's not that I want your, uh, the, your, the ticket sale from it, but, like, it

would mean everything to me if you were there, and it would mean even more if you

brought some friends so we could show them what this is all about." Great, personal.

What fan isn't gonna respond to that, right?

So you have to hustle more than ever because great Chris Stapleton

single last year, White Horse.

If you're looking for a cowboy on a white horse to kinda run in and save you.

I think as musicians, that's what we used to look for.

Like, we're gonna be a band, and then, uh, who am I th- I'm thinking of, uh,

oh, why can't I think of his name?

Uh, Forrest Gump, uh, from his movie, the wonders.

Or, That Thing You Do, it's gonna show up, sign us, and the whole world's

gonna be opened up to us, right?

Like, that ain't happening anymore.

Jason K Powers: Great

It's like, if it's to be, it's up to me.

Like, y- and maybe it always was, but it used to feel a little bit more like,

hey, there's these magic gatekeepers that can unlock everything for you.

Now, your gatekeepers are your fans, and what they can unlock is one more fan.

Because a fan that has a Great

experience with you, to get to the R, the final R of rockstar, is referral.

There is, as we're connecting, we're talking music, there's nothing more

powerful, of all the marketing that's out there, all the, all the people

trying to get on Spotify, an ad in Rolling Stone, even social media.

If at the end of this you say, "Hey, Ty, you were talking about this,

that, and the other. There's this act that I saw live that they were so

great. You have to go check that out."

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

cuts, referral psychologically cuts through everything,

and that's, fans are referral machines.

Fans, that's why, my favorite part of the band, like what I'm artistically supposed

to say is, "Oh, it's writing songs.

It's that moment God walks through the room, and out of nothing comes

something, and it's incredible." I'm supposed to say that.

It's just not true.

I'm supposed to say even that it's playing live and the moment of

resonance where the audience vibes with you and, and it's incredible.

But if I said that, it just would be a lie, 'cause my favorite part of

the band has always been merchandise.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

Not sexy, but think about it.

People pay us money to advertise for us

Jason K Powers: Yep.

Yep.

If you can achieve that with your band or your brand, like

I mean, I, I talk to small business owners all the time and I go, "Can

you imagine that real estate agent?" At the end of the deal, you're like,

"Wow, you did such a great job.

I wanna buy a T-shirt so I can wear it to the gyms that says,

'You are my real estate agent.'"

And they laugh 'cause they go, It's impossible." And it's like, is it?

'Cause I'm wearing a Lululemon shirt and I ain't doing yoga today.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

I'm wearing a Yeti branded thing and I'm not going camping.

Jason K Powers: It's so true.

I mean, 'cause there's, there's even, uh, a, a few of us friends

that we've all met at concerts.

That's how we- that's how I met each and every single one of them, and,

and we've gotten to know each other over time, and we're always, texting

who you go to this show or that show.

But we're doing that, we're introducing each other to other

bands and going, "Oh, you're not?

You should go, you should totally check these guys out." And then you

just start discovering other bands.

So there's, there's power in that just when you're a fan, you're

going to tell other people.

I mean, or you're just in the car listening, and people are, you're

in the car with other people, "What are you listening to?"

"Well, let me tell you. Let me tell you what I'm listening to."

Yeah

Jason K Powers: And, and it is that, the power of w- word, the power

Yeah.

And that's where I get, for those of your, uh, your audience members that have a

spiritual bent, I think there's something

really profound and even divine about this whole fan thing.

'Cause what do you say as a fan?

Like, I've already said today, I am a Taylor Swift fan, as,

as much as I lose my rock cred.

I am a U2 fan.

I am a Coldplay fan.

I'm a Dave Matthews fan.

I'm actually, I'm a Týr of Nordic metal band fan too.

I've talked about how such… Like, I have an eclectic range.

I'm a Killers fan.

I'm a Black Crowes fan for sure.

All these things I am.

Present tense statement of identity.

Apple understood this in their campaign.

That's why they had their most successful campaign ever was, "I am a Mac, I am a

PC." Present tense statement of identity.

Um, if when you achieve that with your band, when you achieve that with your

brand, that's what success looks like.

Well, on a spiritual level, there's a great s- there's a story in the Bible

where God, the Old Testament, God shows up to Moses in a burning bush.

I, like, uh, metal fans appreciate all the biblicl- biblical imagery,

'cause metal music's full of it.

Uh, so they go, he… In the burning bush, and it's not consumed.

That's was… Our biggest song was Consuming Fire.

Uh, as they… The burning bush and, but it doesn't burn, and that's

when God shows up and the first time, like, we've seen God on the

scene in, like, hundreds of years.

And he says, "Go and we're g- you're gonna free the Israelites and go to

Pharaoh." And he sa- and Moses says, "Who should I say is sending me?" And

he says, "Tell him I Am sent you."

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

So I'm like, I'm not a theologian, as you can tell, but I'm like,

well, God uses the very words when he a- when is asked his name, he says, "I Am."

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

How do we describe our favorite bands?

I am.

This i- this idea of fandom is about identity, not just preference.

Like, and that's what I love.

I, I, I did… I told a story on social media And it, it got some good resonance

talking about discovering this band Týr.

I might have probably already told you about it.

It were like-

Jason K Powers: when we were first talking, I don't

know, a couple months ago,

we were talking about you'd just come off, come out of that show,

Yeah.

Jason K Powers: and yeah, that was really

And like, I mean, I'm so out of… i'm like, listen, I'm a

dad, I've been in the marketing space, I'm a little preppy, I'm dressed for

comfort while I'm traveling to visit my son in Austin, and it's like, "Let's

go to a show." And I found this band.

I walk into, like, a biker bar, and so all the metal fans, and, they're communicating

who they are by their musical preference.

It's this identity.

And I was so intimidated to go in, but I was so embraced that all of

those stereotypes were, like, torn away, and I had the time of my life.

And now I love this band.

I love that they're so committed to it.

I love that they, after all these years, they're still going.

And, and if I dug in deeper, and I, I'm sure there's, there's people

out there that would go, "Oh, hey, they're, they're not a…

good for a Christian to listen to 'cause their, their stuff

is, Viking, pagan," whatever.

But I'm like, I don't know, I felt accepted by a community and I loved it.

Like, I feel like we're… And wouldn't any artist want that for their fans?

Listen, if somebody comes out… 'Cause the next time I go to their

show, guess what I'm gonna be wearing?

The T-shirt I bought at that concert, and I'm gonna be a little

bit more a part of the tribe.

So I, I do think artists can lead their tribes, and I think it's really important

to create an atmosphere where you're inviting other people to the party.

Yeah, and the best brands understand that.

Nike is for athletes, but it's not like they're going, "Hey, hip hop artists, you

haven't gotten your 10,000 steps in today.

Don't wear those Jordans." It's like, no, it's inviting other people

that even are outside of that.

And, behind me is the Dave Matthews Band.

Like, what a great example.

Like, they're, um, they just are true to themselves, and then other people come to

the party who would have never listened to jazz-influenced music or they don't…

people go and have a great time at a Dave Matthews Band who have never listened

to a song longer than three minutes, and they're up there doing 20-minute jams,

Jason K Powers: Yes

know?

And that… But it's… But how welcoming is their fan community?

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

So it's

Jason K Powers: so I, I mean, the, the power of marketing and, and getting out

there and, and building relationships with the fans or communicating

with the fans, um, the power, the importance of merchandise is there,

and we have that conversation a lot.

And, and a lot of musicians on are… That's in the- that's

the top two, hands down.

Like merch, gotta do merch.

Don't you dare go out there and not do merch,

yeah.

and don't dread it.

If, if, and if You're not, if it's not your passion, hire

someone great to help you.

But I would encourage people, like, merch is really cool.

Like, make it… The coolest thing at the Third Day reunion tour is everyone

showing up with all these T-shirts that I designed, some of them 20 years ago,

30 years ago, and they were well-worn.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

told me is they didn't just, they weren't just a souvenir,

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

they had been doing some active marketing for us over the years.

So your fans will take you and your music into rooms that you'll

never go in, and that is the most powerful kind of marketing.

'Cause if you're just relying on yourself to get your message out,

there's only so far you can go.

So equip, your Kiss army e- to, to go out there and

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

All right

your, take your music and message to the world

Jason K Powers: Right.

Well, and spinning off of that, another discussion we have a lot of times is,

and, and there's, there's interestingly a, a split opinion about this.

So, um, I'd love to talk about your opinion on meet and greets,

um, and the power of that.

And I know you've got a personal story, uh, you can share on

that if you'd like as well

Yeah

I mean, mine is, I, I alluded to it earlier, I had this opportunity to do

a meet and greet with Taylor Swift, um, where I was at the time the president of

the Recording Academy for Atlanta, and Taylor Swift, Even at the time I would,

I would say I was a casual fan at best.

Um, I, I'm not a hater of anybody, but I'd only seen her at the Grammy's

one year, and it was the year she sang with Stevie Nicks, and it's

kind of a famous performance for, for Taylor Swift fans because, um, Bob,

uh, what's, what's his last name?

Music, uh, business blog, uh, Lefsetz.

Uh, so he's in the, he's in the audience and kinda like wrote a

scathing review of her performance.

And I, I was in the audience, a- and I'll just say, I mean,

I'm a big Taylor Swift fan now.

It wasn't her best performance.

I, I would hope that even she'd acknowledge it.

From that, she wrote the song Mean to- talking about Bob Lefsetz in that review.

But I was just, like, this casual fan, but Taylor Swift, my daughters love her.

Uh, I get this opportunity for a meet and greet and before the 1989 Tour, and Taylor

walks into the room, walks past anyone who can do anything for her professionally.

Like, if you're down on Taylor, you'd say she's calculating.

If you love Taylor, you'd say she's intentional.

Um, but I would say she's intentional.

She, she's like, "Hey, I wanna win Album of the Year. I'm gonna do a meet

and greet in the 12 cities there's Grammy boards for the, these, uh, board

members that also happen to be voting members." And so very, very strategic.

She walks past everybody and goes right to my daughters, looks at them, drops

to her knees, looks at them right in the eye, and spent what felt like five

minutes just with them And by the time she got up, I was a Swiftie for life, right?

And it's like, and now, I challenge… I think more and more artists recognize,

like, one of my favorite albums is Ryan Adams' 1989, where he took her entire

record and did an entire cover album, not just a cover song, and every song is in

a different genre, a different style than the original, but the songs still hold up.

So I've really, I appreciate her for that, but that power, the meet

and greet, if you don't look at it, I think the right- the bad way to

look at it is a, is as a have to.

Um, I think the r- the right way to look at it is a get to, that this is

your opportunity in this exchange to take your fans up what I call the ladder

of loyalty, to take them up one rung.

So if they come in, they've never heard of you, you have that opportunity to, get a

little connection and step them up to fan.

If they're coming in as already a fan, you have that opportunity to

take them up to the kind of fan who would buy a shirt and advertise.

If they're already at that level, you have the opportunity to take them up a,

that rung to where they're a super fan who, you know, their poster's gonna be

hanging on their wall and their tee…

And so, um, I think that's how… And again, it's the same thing as bus- a great

restaurant owner knows that same thing.

Um, but it's like those meet and greets are actually a gift.

You can't do it for… as you get bigger, you can't, you might not be able to

do it for everyone in the audience.

Uh, when you start, you can.

But as you get bigger, at least for these people, they're the people that

have already indicated that they're ready to go up, they're ready to

go deeper, they're ready to go up.

So I'd encourage artists to just embrace it and to really be present.

It's probably better not to do it if you can't do it gracefully, but to do

it gracefully, give people your full attention, look people in the eye.

What fans want, I read this in a book from Bono.

I haven't, I have, I've gone a long time in this without talk- giving a

Bono quote, which normally I do a lot.

Um, I read this book.

He was being interviewed and said, "How are you so great with your fans?

I watch you signing autographs after the show. I wa-" all of these things.

And he said, "Well, I know what fans want." So 'cause I'm a fan myself.

And then Bono in his classic Bono way goes on a long story, as I'm want to

do, but he talks about this biblical story of Jacob and Esau in the Bible

where Jacob tricks Esau out of his birthright and gets his blessing.

And he says, "I know what fans want because it's what I want.

Ultimately, we want a blessing.

We want… I wanted Bob Dylan to look at me and go, 'I validate you,' Bono.

I wanted Paul McCartney to look at me and go, 'I validate you.'" He's

like, "What fans want when they say, 'Hey, Third Day, you're so great.

I love you guys so much,' what they really want is in some way to s- for me

to look at them and say, 'You know what?

You're so great.'"

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

Like, uh, man, and so an artist that gets

that, and the best get it.

Bruce gets it.

Taylor gets it.

Bono gets it.

The legends all get it.

The artist that would just take the time, even if it's just in and out,

because you can't retain it all, to say, "Hey, what's your name?

Hey, what's going on?

What's happening with you?

Anything cool?" Just to be, just to show up as a great person and to not

look at fan/artist, but to look at it as like, get down on this eye level.

If you can do that, um, you'll… It, it's a powerful tool to unlock loyalty

Jason K Powers: Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's great.

I think it's… Th- there is power in that because the fan,

I think it's two-sided, right?

For, for, for this context, staying humble.

It's staying humble and not presenting yourself as above your fans, right?

Because they're gonna see through that pretty fast.

A- and it's sort of, there's, there's definitely been artists over the years

that I've met, and then after I met them, it really, I, I was really, I stopped

listening to them pretty quick after that.

It was a rather disappointing, uh, series of events or conversation or how

I was treated, things like this, right?

So that's happened.

So I get it on the fan side, where you're like, "Mm." I mean,

it, it kind of disrupts your, your, uh, perception, I guess.

Yeah

Jason K Powers: But there's power in authenticity and being authentic with your

fans and when you're communicating with them and, and like you've talked about.

Like, you get to do this.

You have the opportunity to do what most people in the world would love to do,

Yeah.

I think it's keeping that gratitude, that humility.

When you say authenticity, all I can think, the word, I just… again, this,

this'll come out later, but what, we're filming the day after Dolly Parton died.

And I'm like, "Why is everybody so universally shook by losing Dolly Parton?"

Jason K Powers: Right.

she was so authentic.

And so I think even if you're, uh, we all on stage dial it up a bit,

whether we're speaking or playing.

That's what stage, stagecraft, what showmanship is.

So to have this moment where you can be, um, just authentic with

people, um, I'd say as an artist, there's a great expression, be

more interested than interesting

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

And so I think that's your opportunity.

Like, you're already interesting on stage as an artist, so look at a meet

and greet as a time to be interested.

And that can be exhausting, but if you flip the script, and do that, um, I've…

My mentor puts it, "Be more curious than captivating." So instead of… If

you really treat these opportunities…

And when you're starting, meet and greet's gonna be, hey, everyone has access to you.

And then those early days, there wasn't a show we weren't doing an

autograph line afterwards where, it's much more just for the masses.

Meet and greets only really become a thing when you're having a level of success

that you can't be available to, 10,000 people, but you can be available for 200.

And so with that, and then the financial thing, I get why people might push

back at it, that financial thing.

It does create that little window where they're self-selecting, they're

choosing you with their dollars, but every business does that to a degree.

So they're, so they're, they're self-indicating that, that they

see the value in this exchange.

If you can go into it with that mindset, and I to me, it takes

sometimes a mantra 'cause, you know

like, "Hey, I'm gonna be more interested than interesting. I'm gonna

be more curious than captivating." And i- if we can, if we can do that,

then it, the, uh, then powerful moments happen and the whole world…

Like, I feel so sad today 'cause the whole world's posting their picture of the time

they met Dolly Parton, and I feel like, man, I don't have a picture to post.

I never got to meet her, right?

And but you think about that.

Anyone who met Dolly Parton has gone on to probably tell that story no less than

100 times, and to make a f- a powerful advertising, marketing for Dolly Parton.

And everyone who stayed at Dollywood and had a Great

experience went on to go tell their friends, "You gotta come to Dollywood."

Everyone that goes to a Chick-fil-A and they say, "My pleasure," goes

on to tell everyone else like, "Wow, they just treated me different.

It didn't feel like McDonald's there."

Jason K Powers: Yeah

and so it's like those little moments of interaction matter.

If you're the manager at a Chick-fil-A coming to talk to your customers, if

you're the owner of your business, whatever that is, if you can get eye

level with your customers, those are the moments that, um, help move them

on that, up that ladder of loyalty where they're more likely to go out

and tell other people about you.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

And that's gonna be more powerful.

Think about all the time it takes to create that social media post, all

that time to craft that next song, to get that, to put that message out

there hoping to sell another ticket, hoping to sell another T-shirt,

um, hoping to get another, stream.

But that, those moments with the fans are so much more effective

of accomplishing those things.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Okay, so kind of winding down a little bit, tell me what is one of the best

financial or, or pieces of career advice, let's say financial advice

you can give another musician, um, that, you learned from another

musician or, or that a mentor gave you

I think the biggest thing in the music business, and this might have

come from the Everything You Need to Know About the Music Business book, but, um

The much more important number than your gross is your net.

And so everyone kind of focuses on the gross.

What was the box office?

What, how much merchandise did you did?

I was always interested in the net.

Well, how much merch did I did?

What was my cost of goods?

What was the cost of getting there?

What is really the profit?

And, um, so the biggest way to make money is not through earning more money.

Like in the music business, especially if you have a big team.

If we t- we take for every dollar of like touring revenue, it's like

immediately business management 5%, management 15 to 20%.

you

know, the booking agent to get there, you're already down 30%.

Now you have the cost of transportation, of, of all the costs that go into it.

So for every dollar, if an artist is netting 10 cents, it's different

when you're selling out a stadium at a… if you're Chris Stapleton

at this point in the career.

But 15 years ago, Chris Stapleton was much more about, it's not about how

much the, the gross, it's about the net.

And so look for ways… There's definitely things, um, where I look

back on going, "Man, the motivation was good," 'cause the motivation was a

great show for the fans, but there was tours where I look back and gone like,

"Man, we could have done that with less production and netted a lot more money."

Transportation is tough, uh, because, you go start a tour, I mean, it easily,

just gas prices from when our tour started, there wasn't a war in Iran,

and then there's a war with Iran.

Diesel prices go up, a couple bucks a gallon.

Well, this tour that we were just on was like seven or eight trucks and seven

or eight tour buses and what- I mean, you're talking about, a dollar movement

in gas prices was hundreds of thousands of dollars on the net of the tour.

So y- you can't control that.

Um, you can control how many trucks you have.

You can… So, um, biggest thing in music business is it's not… y- you

have to really protect, um, your net, and you have to… The b- easiest way

to, to make money is, is, is looking at where can you not spend money?

'Cause those dollars have already gone through that whole machine.

Um, and then certainly, um, I think talking to my younger self, there's

a lot which, I think almost, almost i- it's kinda sad that like even, um,

you're not necessarily, your professional team who's guiding your professional

career is not always going to give you the best personal advice that you

need to set you up for your best life.

They're kind of more just looking at the brand or the machine.

Um, and I just, I know a lot of people that have had great careers

that are, as they get to an older place, they're driving Ubers.

They're, um, because they didn't… I think the other thing

is always live below your means.

Um, for, for any artist, you have to, even if things are great, your,

your lifestyle's naturally gonna go up as you have more success.

Everyone does this in life.

The, the most successful people, it's… I mean, I saw a report years ago, and

it was talking about how much, like when somebody… We all feel like the way to

make more money is to go earn more money, but it's the same thing in business.

Most people when they get a raise, what do they do?

They go get a nicer car payment or whatever, and they actually,

um, are in a worse financial,

Jason K Powers: Yo

place.

So I think the biggest thing, best advice on money came from a pastor

here in Atlanta, Andy Stanley.

He says, most people look at money as spend, and then if there's something

left over, I'll save, and then if there's something left over from that, I'll give.

And what he encourages is start with give, then go to save, then go to live.

And if you've taken care of, the, the first two already, you're, then, um,

it forces you to live with your means.

But you've already kind of protected yourself on that, 'cause it's very hard.

I mean, and It's only getting harder.

I mean, every time… I'm like everyone else.

I mean, every time we went out, my wife, I was leaving the gym yesterday and she

said, "Hey, I've had a day. We're gonna go out to eat." And at the end of that.

meal, I'm like, I felt assaulted, you

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

of just when the bill comes.

Like,

Jason K Powers: It's

there was three of us at dinner, and like none of us…

It wasn't a feast, and you still, the bill comes and, it's just I

think we've all experienced what it used to f- what, you go have a

meal that feels like it should've been 50 bucks, and it's 150 bucks,

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

I

do that.

and

Jason K Powers: about every time me and my kids go out to eat,

yeah.

You're like

here in Georgia, we can't even go to Waffle House without like…

Jason K Powers: yeah.

So, um

Jason K Powers: Well, we have that conversation a lot.

Uh, what you're alluding to, call it Parkinson's law, where

i- it's, it's three pieces.

I won't, uh, get too much into it, but the third piece of it is rise to equal

income, and that's exactly it, right?

As our income goes up, we tend to… We have this propensity to upgrade

our lifestyle immediately, and if you could just, as one of your financial

strategies, you could just stall that for a little bit until you have the gap.

Because if you could leave that buffer in there, you have the

opportunity to move maybe your chess pieces a little bit better

Yeah.

and saving isn't… Saving is paying your future self,

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

but you get to pay your future self with the benefit

of, hopefully exponential growth,

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

And if the right setup, you, the benefit of, uh, some real tax savings,

Jason K Powers: yep

um, yeah, it's definite wisdom.

I mean, it's not… I haven't executed that perfectly mys- I

mean, I think any one of us look back on our lives, it's easy.

Remember in, uh, Back to the Future II, where he gets the sports almanac so he

can go back and make all the good bets?

Jason K Powers: No

Like, I feel like it's easy to get stuck in re- remuneration,

where you're going like, "Oh my gosh, this bad decision I made in 2005, if

I had have just bought Apple stock, I'd have 50 million in the bank."

Well,

Jason K Powers: Yeah,

it's like, it's not that, maybe that's a natural thought

to have, but you go, you can't do anything about it, so you can get stuck.

So I think all that we can do is from wherever we are, what's the

next best decision that we can make?

Jason K Powers: right.

That's right.

We always talk about-- I have a lot of people, we'll talk through some

financial strategies and they're like, "I wish I would've started this,"

just like that, "10 years ago, 15 years ago, 20 years ago." And, uh,

the conversation is just like that old proverb, you know, well, when's

the second-best time to plant a tree?

Yeah.

Ancient Chinese proverb, "The best time to plant a tree was 20 years

ago. The second best time is now."

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

right.

great

Jason K Powers: Right.

And s- and it is, and I think that for, for any listener who's like, "Man, I

just kinda botched it," second-best time to plant a tree is today.

You can, you can autocorrect now.

It's rarely too late.

I think people self-eliminate too quick to, to their trajectory when it comes

to getting ahead in finances and what

Yeah.

But it just, but it might require a lot of, uh, some, a season

of being uncomfortable or some life, some lifestyle sacrifice.

But there really are things that, um

Especially there's just the silly trappings.

The, like, the… And, and what you have to know is, like, you.

know, cars, like nobody cares.

I mean, I, I know I'm speaking against the hip hop community here, but it's

like n- it, it's, uh, like no one's actually ever impressed by those things.

The, the best you get is they resent you for it.

So it's like the coolest people you know just don't even play in that

game, and even some of the wealthiest people you know, like, are some of the

least flashy people that are out there.

They just, you go find great things that work, that get the job done,

just like your, the best musicians don't need the most expensive guitar

Jason K Powers: Sure.

Sure.

Yep.

All right.

I wanna hear… I heard there's kind of a funny story about being broken down

on the side of the road, uh, in, uh,

Yeah.

that's Right

Jason K Powers: m-

Well, what was funny, so w- we go out to, this was a show

in Oregon, and it was just one of those, like, really not great gigs.

Um, and on the way back we were with this, the runner was kinda crazy and

had a lot of opinions about everything.

She was telling us about 'em, and evidently her passion was not automobile

maintenance, because the van breaks down, and we're sleeping by the side

of the road, and, like, semis are going by as we're, like, freezing in the back

of the, this van, just, like, cuddled up, like, waiting for the morning

to j- try to f- flag someone down so we can get to a show in Portland.

And then we get to the Portland, we finally, this was before cell phones, so,

like, so we can finally, try to get the promoters of that show to come pick us up.

And the big thing was the show, it was this festival they were starting.

Um, one of the acts was this new Christian act, didn't make it, um, named Katy Perry.

Jason K Powers: Yeah

she, I think she went on to have more success in other genres.

Uh, but the festival, like, they, uh, new festival people, and they

just, they didn't sell enough tickets, and it was a bloodbath.

So we were, like, the headliners for this show.

We're broken down.

We get there.

Well, they're, they had found a true thing.

By us doing this show the day before that was not a great show, which was not

our decision, it was the, we're the ones who had to go live it out, the booking

agent had done it, it in fact violated the radius clause that they had had.

So they had kinda, like, their legal out of, like, "We don't even have to

pay you 'cause you're, you playing this other show four hours away," whatever

it was, broke the radius clause.

Which it was like, so I'm going, "Come on, we're not the reason

that this festival didn't…" Was, you're just trying to back out.

But they were like, "We mortgaged our house." Like, the music business is

great when it's sell-outs and awesome, but you're talking about real stakes,

both, you know, one missed show for a working band could, could, uh, end it.

And one bad festival for a new promoter and they lose their house.

So I remember, the lesson I'll try to get to is, like, I was in, like, fight mode.

I was like, "Well, hey, let's…" I, I wanted to, like, let's go have it out

with the promoter and we'll fight this out, 'cause here's the things where I

felt like they were being unreasonable.

This was, I felt like it was a shady, slim argument they had

why they didn't wanna pay us.

And our singer

was like, "Hey, I wanna talk with them." And our singer, Mac, is, like,

such a great dude, and he's always been so great with relationship.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

By the end of that talk, those promoters, the,

it was a husband and a wife.

The wife went on to be our tour manager for, like, 10 years, and

the husband, we partnered with him.

He, he always did his own thing, but he helped us go from, like, build our

f- first websites all the way through managing the fan club to all these things.

They became, like, integral to our team because we chose relationship

over, like, animosity and litigation.

And I think there's a lesson there in it.

Like, don't miss, um, there's… I, I find it usually comes down to a

choice, but there's like, there's ways to become rich in life that, there,

there's money, and there's relationships.

And never miss out on the relationships for the money 'cause at the end of the

day, we all know the story of the people that have great money and, but there's no

one at their deathbed, be Dolly Parton.

Be someone that, you're talking about a generous person who had a book

in every kid that ever grew up in Sevierville, Tennessee, in their hands.

And sh- how many people has she employed and helped the whole economy?

She's, she fiercely fought for her brand, but she was always about

relationship, making people feel seen, making them, feel acknowledged.

And even along the way with other people, you, it's fun to spar with

people, like kinda that business thing, and negotiate, and what is not.

But never let it step in the way of, like, build a great team of people

that you, you wanna do business with, and know that you're not at war

with the other people along the way.

It, uh, there's times when you do have to advocate for yourself, but

never get to this place where it's that hostility that can develop

in, in any of the business world.

I think the music business, what, it's up to us to model, like, really kinda

living out the lyrics to our song.

And you don't have to be a Christian band for that to make sense, where

Jason K Powers: sir

Beatles, The Beatles told us the way.

It's all about love.

So, uh, so that's my encouragement, is to always choose relationship

because just as much as money, that's what can truly make you rich

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

I love it.

So Market Like a Rock Star.

If you are

Woo!

Jason K Powers: to this, I want you to pick up this book.

I think If you're in the music industry, musicians, we have the conversation often.

also need to learn how to be a business person, If you're in this

industry, it, it's, it's not gonna hurt you to learn how to do business.

Okay?

You can't… It- it's very difficult, I think, in this industry to only be a

musician and a terrible business person.

anything you can learn along the way will be helpful for your career.

Um, I love this book that has so many good in it that can teach

you just a lot of takeaways.

Ty, you've got all these quotes and all these just, these things

you can just grab onto and, and

I

Jason K Powers: I'm gonna…

I, call 'em riffs.

They're riffs in the book.

Jason K Powers: Yeah.

See?

And so, a- and there's so much in there that, that you can latch onto, and you

don't even have to, like, go through it cover to cover and memorize everything.

You can… This is one of those books you can keep going back to referencing

different things, and go, "Oh, what, what was it he said about this?"

And, um, so I think it's a great book.

What else do you want people to know about the

book?

I I guess just for me, uh, I'm trying to navigate this world

of like I'm pr- promoting and I w- So the other day I was going out, I was

on a flight and the internet went out.

And I was like, "Oh, that stinks." And I was like, "Wait, I got my first copy of

my book." And I sat there on the plane and I read it cover to cover And by the

time I landed, I said, "You know what?

I'm not gonna shy away from promoting this book because I think it can help people."

And so would I love for you to go to Amazon and buy it and help the algorithm?

Yes.

Would I love even more if you left a royalty?

I have no… My goal is not to make money off of this book?

Like, I, I, I don't have it pr- w- I'd have to sell a

lot of copies to make money.

I w- just for my cost, what I'm selling.

But I do think that it can help people, so much so that, if you wanna

go to my website, tyanderson.live, marketlikearockstar.com, I still have and

I, I will have for a while, if you want the book, like I'll give it to you free

digitally if you just want the content.

Some of us just actually want a book, and that's great, and that helps supports it.

But I do believe in like the message of the book.

I want it to go out there, 'cause I think, um, I, I do think it can help people.

Certainly, in, in all kinds of businesses, entrepreneurs.

But certainly, um, if you're a musician, it should really resonate

and it should really, I think the big takeaway is understanding the power of

fandom and understanding that you do it for the fans, not for the critics.

Understand that there's, that you can engineer those moments of delight

that really help take someone from a transaction to identity, that

they go… And what a sacred place that we could, that we get to

live, even if it's a small thing.

If, if there's 25 people out there that they're describing themselves

as I am a, insert your band, insert your name fan, what a gift.

Jason K Powers: Mm-hmm.

What a gift, whether it's two million or two.

And so there's something sacred to this.

I think this book, if nothing else, will remind you of that.

And I really just, I wanna get it out into the world.

Like I feel that way, like we did a song, Cry Out to Jesus was a

huge song, uh, for, for Third Day.

Big radio song, and when it first came out, still a lot of album sales

happening, gold, platinum records.

But when Katrina happened, we were like, "Man, we feel like the world

needs to hear this song right now." And so we rushed the release.

We got it out to people on the iTunes.

We took all the money from it, and it went to, uh, Red Cross and World

Vision for Katrina relief, 'cause we believed that the song could g- could

go out there, uh, so whenever you… So that's my same feeling with this

book, is like I just wanna get it out there 'cause I know it'll help people.

I know for some, someone out there is gonna go, "This clicks," and they're

gonna run their business differently because of, because of this message.

So I feel like I'm really on a mission.

right now with, with this book.

So I appreciate you having me on to kinda, uh, get the word out there,

even, talking about some money stuff, which is, it's like money…

I think w- I'll add it to the list.

Like, there's religion, there's politics, and there's money, are the three things

that people don't wanna talk about.

Jason K Powers: Great.

All right

But, but… And I think we've, we've, we stayed

clear of politics today, so

Jason K Powers: We did.

We did.

Well, and the money thing, I think that's, that's one of the lacking

things, the, the education of it for people in the music industry.

There's a big hole in that, and, and, and that's been one of my functions is

teaching people… There are 1,000,001 courses out there on how to make

money in this business, uh, courses and classes and books and whatever.

Um, and, and my job is helping people out now that you're making

money, once you're making money, how, what, how do you do to hang on to

it and to make it do more for you?

Not, not investments, because we don't wanna lock it up, but how

do we make it do more for you?

Um, so that's been, uh, my, my, um, my gifts.

Like y- you're speaking to the fans, you're, you're blessing the fans, and, and

mine, mine is trying to bless the people in the music industry in that same light

and just kind of not be looking, going, "I should have started this 20 years ago,"

and helping people figure it out today.

Love it.

So

Awesome

Jason K Powers: you have riffs in your book, we always end with final

riffs on our show, just rapid-fire questions, rapid-fire answers.

You ready?

here we go

Jason K Powers: All right, here we go.

What band or artist will you never get tired of listening to?

You too

Jason K Powers: U2.

What's the first concert you ever went to?

Um, it was the Dead Milkmen.

Is that right?

The Dead Milkmen with, and the opening band… Or no, it was The Connells was

a group out of North Carolina and the o- and the opening band was The Dead Milkmen.

And, uh, I saw them at a high school, uh, field, uh, down the road.

But it was awesome

Jason K Powers: Nice.

All right, first album you ever bought?

Um, first album, I remember my, the first time I went and bought?

one, it was the CDs had just come out and I bought Living Colour, Vivid.

Great record still.

Now I have it on vinyl.

Um, incredible record.

Jason K Powers: Good.