Ian Montone has spent 1 / 4 of a century constructing artists’ careers on his personal phrases.
The founding father of Los Angeles administration firm Monotone (and a companion with Rick Yorn’s movie and TV shingle LBI Leisure) has stayed defiantly impartial in a enterprise that retains making an attempt to consolidate: no firm web site, no social media… answerable to nobody however the artists he represents.
A former music lawyer turned Grammy-nominated producer, Montone’s firm homes one of many business’s most fiercely curated rosters: Jack White, Vampire Weekend, LCD Soundsystem, The Shins, Angie McMahon, Briston Maroney, Spacey Jane, This Is Lorelei, So!YoON!, The Kills, Nonetheless Woozy, Pete Yorn, Solomonophonic, and Chanel Beads amongst them.
A champion of artists proudly owning their rights, Montone helped shift the paradigm away from conventional label possession. He received began managing a two-piece from Detroit known as The White Stripes; he was later Jack White’s greatest man.
The final time MBW sat down with Montone, in 2019, he warned that the business had began chasing “music for algorithms” on the expense of nice artists – insisting that music was “basically necessary to individuals… not disposable.”
Seven years on from that dialogue, the majors are publicly listed, catalogs commerce like commodities, and AI can spin up a satisfactory sound-alike. The world round Montone has been rewired – however his ideas have stayed precisely the place they all the time had been…
What’s the scariest factor concerning the music enterprise in 2026?
Being trustworthy, there’s nothing significantly scary concerning the music enterprise. Most of us aren’t working in conflict zones; we’ve got what are basically make-believe jobs. Usually irritating, however a privilege. And for the artists we handle, there’s actually no selection; that is their calling.
Trade-wise, it looks like we’ve been in a interval the place music has develop into too protected and conservative, a byproduct of algorithmic playlists. Artists, usually unconsciously, started making music for algorithms; now algorithms are making music for algorithms, shaping a complete era whether or not they notice it or not. All the things’s a bit too polished, too formulaic.
Lyrically, a lot of it isn’t actually about something. Name it the commoditization of tradition or the industrialization of style; the result’s that every thing will get safer and fewer fascinating. There’s all the time been a cycle in music tradition: pioneers, then artists who broaden the attraction, then copycats of copycats with one final business push… then imitators who kill the style outright. That’s not new – what’s totally different now could be the pace at which it occurs.
“We’ve been in a interval the place music turned too protected, a byproduct of algorithmic playlists.”
A part of the conservatism I see is that few artists wish to take a stand, fearing cancellation, demonetization, or alienating followers. Almost everybody performs it protected – not simply in music, however in comedy, journalism, and information. There are exceptions, however there’s been an actual chilling impact on artwork. I’m not saying all music needs to be protest music – in fact not – it’s simply noticeably tougher to search out.
What’s the excellent news?
Loads of fascinating artists are filling the void – artists who aren’t making choices primarily based on streams or algorithms, however by making actually distinctive work and doing their very own factor: Cameron Winter, Dijon, SAULT, Caroline Polachek, YHWH Nailgun, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, and Saya Grey, to call just a few. There’s many extra and that’s actually thrilling – that is the house [Monotone] lives in with our artists.
Artists additionally appear to be re-embracing craft and musicianship and specializing in their stay exhibits. That’s thrilling; each metropolis has an actual scene of actual gamers. Perhaps it’s a part of a broader starvation for what’s genuine? Perhaps it’s a human have to bodily work together with a tangible instrument. No one needs to see anybody at a celebration choose up a pc and “immediate”.
I don’t suppose the youthful era’s rediscovery of music from the previous is solely nostalgia. It’s as a result of it’s genuinely good, and these artists can play. I see increasingly new artists transferring this fashion – honing their craft, being nice stay, and utilizing that to construct what persons are truly craving for: group.
Loads of managers will let you know privately that streaming issues much less to their artists’ livelihoods than it did 5 years in the past. The place does streaming rank to your artists now?
Streaming issues much less for our shoppers’ companies, however we don’t ignore it; it’s nonetheless a tough gauge of who’s listening, and for those who’re in a label deal the place your companion solely participates in royalties, you possibly can’t afford to disregard it. Nobody complains when a music takes off! However I don’t actually consider it as streaming versus every thing else.
Our job is to construct careers that maintain over many years, and the form of that’s totally different for each artist. Touring is one thing our artists, and this firm, occur to be superb at, and it’s usually the inspiration. However we’re simply as deliberate about merch, sync, vinyl and bodily, and discovering new methods for an artist to succeed in the individuals who truly care.
What runs via all of it’s constructing a significant reference to a fanbase. Anybody keen to rent a babysitter, pay for parking, purchase a ticket, and provides an artist just a few hours of consideration – that’s an actual fan. That’s a real time and monetary dedication. Fostering that relationship is tough work, nevertheless it’s way more necessary than pre-saves and clicks.
“It’s not ‘labels versus managers’. It’s about constructing the perfect crew round any artist.”
As an business, we’ve confused followers with group. They’re not the identical factor. Music is meant to deliver individuals collectively, and that’s gotten tougher. Virgin Data began as a report retailer; individuals went there to find music and join.
Third Man nonetheless builds that type of universe; so do the nice impartial report shops. Dwell music can do it too, particularly as soon as individuals put their telephones away for a few hours. We’ve satisfied ourselves that actual group exists on-line; I don’t purchase it. It’s the distinction between texting and speaking, between knowledge switch and communication.
On-line is much less about group and extra about being a goal group – one being offered to, and finally having its knowledge offered. To feed that, distraction has been monetized. However persons are catching on, and that’s a very good factor.
Simply as necessary for us is who’s listening to our artists – not whether or not they’re on SNL, however whether or not they’re changing into a part of the cultural dialog. That’s laborious to quantify. Typically you simply really feel it. And once we really feel it, even earlier than others do, we go to work making others imagine it too. That’s the essence of administration: we imagine in what our artists imagine, and we amplify it.
You constructed Monotone with in-house radio, DSP, touring, licensing, and manufacturing groups – a ‘label companies’ infrastructure earlier than that phrase was modern. The place does that depart the normal label in 2026?
I constructed it this fashion as a result of I kind of needed to. A part of it’s the artists we work with, and what I touched on earlier – making individuals imagine. That takes individuals and sources.
Within the early White Stripes days, I had a map of the US and Europe with pushpins, understanding city-to-city distances – “van tour or bus tour?” That’s essential stuff, however I’m not nice at it; different persons are, and I’m higher used elsewhere. So we constructed an in-house touring and manufacturing crew. Similar with radio. I spotted I wanted my very own ‘translator’ [for that corner of the industry], so I employed my very own crew, and their position now goes properly past radio and streaming.
I by no means needed to be depending on somebody with a special agenda, or for our artists to stay or die by label politics. Our artists had been by no means going to be priorities at a significant, and most independents didn’t have the sources. So we constructed what made sense for us, as a result of transferring tradition towards our artists’ imaginative and prescient requires it.
There’s a bonus: working throughout touring, advertising and marketing, licensing, DSPs, and growth offers us an unusually broad view of what’s occurring – not simply in music, however on the earth. I simply see us as a complete, well-resourced firm.
Good labels additionally do lots of what we do – however everybody understanding their lane is paramount.
The perfect music corporations now are “every thing corporations.” It depends upon the label and the crew round a given artist, particularly the place there’s belief on either side. Interscope can successfully handle a few of its artists as a result of they’re that near them – no shock, given the caliber and tenure of its senior workers, which is uncommon.
John Janick used to handle artists at a excessive degree; we’ve truly each managed M.I.A. at totally different factors. Rob Stringer has impeccable style and artists worth his opinion. He’s not afraid to have a tough dialog with an artist – they belief him.
All the perfect label and publishing individuals have that in frequent. When there’s belief throughout and everybody has the artist’s greatest pursuits in thoughts, you’re all pushing in the identical course.
At that time, I don’t actually care what somebody’s title is or the place the normal strains are. I welcome the assistance and interplay; I’m not threatened by it. Finest case, we plug into one another and play to one another’s strengths – typically main, typically following, however working as a crew. The place there’s crossover, labels typically welcome the additional sources. It’s not ‘labels versus managers’ anymore. It’s about constructing the perfect crew round any artist.
Dwell Nation and Firebird have been rolling up administration corporations – Firebird with funding from Raine Group, Ares, and Goldman Sachs. You’ve stayed proudly impartial. Once you see an organization buying administration corporations at scale, what does that let you know about the place the business’s heading?
The very first thing it tells you is that good managers have actual worth and play an important position in orchestrating success. Funds can allocate capital wherever they need, so it’s no shock they’re fascinated by shopping for administration corporations – if we’re doing our jobs properly, we’re usually on the middle of an artist’s profession. It additionally tells you that only a few corporations are actually impartial, whether or not they admit it or not. Look beneath the hood: ultimately, any person is reporting to any person else, and often anticipated to generate a return on somebody’s funding.
I don’t wish to be in that place for the artists we symbolize. I don’t wish to report back to anybody however our artists – not to mention clarify to a banker why an artist is taking one other yr to make a report, or, particularly, why a two-piece band with a guitarist and a drummer doesn’t want so as to add a bass participant.
“I don’t wish to clarify to a banker why an artist is taking one other yr to make a report.”
It is a broader development throughout a number of industries. Roll up companies, create scale, and hope scale creates higher service. Perhaps it does, perhaps it doesn’t. Personally, I’m not satisfied greater means higher. [Monotone has] all the size and tradition we want – and tradition takes time to construct. Artists don’t rent us as a result of we’re the most important; we aren’t, and don’t wish to be.
They rent us as a result of they know precisely who they’re getting. Might a a lot greater firm have extra leverage? In fact. However that additionally creates priorities and agendas – any person should resolve which artists get extra consideration and extra sources, or supply a greater return. An artist who’d be the most important consumer at a smaller firm can develop into simply one other consumer inside a a lot bigger one.
None of that’s essentially improper. It’s simply not who we’re.
On the different finish of the spectrum, famous person artists – Bruno Mars, Beyoncé, and so forth. – are meting out with the commission-based supervisor and bringing administration in-house. What’s your view of that?
No matter works for these artists and their groups is nice. It’s simply not how I’m personally programmed. I received into administration as a result of I didn’t need one thing that felt like ‘a job’. If I’d needed that, I most likely would have stayed a lawyer, or achieved one thing extra secure.
As artists develop, we keep our independence. As they develop into extra profitable, the circle of individuals keen to inform them the reality typically will get smaller. Our job is to all the time be on the middle of that circle, even when the reality is uncomfortable. Being a salaried worker can compromise that.
I’ve all the time considered myself as rather more of a ‘companion’ to an artist than a ‘supervisor’. When our artists earn a living, we earn a living; after they don’t, we don’t – we supply threat alongside them. Individuals suppose fee is solely how managers receives a commission, nevertheless it additionally aligns everybody’s incentives. I don’t suppose a salaried mannequin creates that very same alignment.
Each UMG and Warner at the moment are public corporations, answerable to shareholders. As somebody who sits throughout the desk from them, have you ever seen a change in how they function?
Truthfully, probably not. It’s most likely made issues slightly extra clear from my perspective. Transparency may be painful in a enterprise as unpredictable as ours – nevertheless it’s good for everyone.
One factor I like about public corporations is that they inform you numerous about themselves for those who’re keen to do your homework. I learn the annual reviews. I take heed to the earnings calls. I concentrate as a result of it’s one other solution to perceive how an organization thinks and what pressures it’s beneath. It’s helped me perceive the individuals throughout the desk, as a result of – as we’ve mentioned – somebody is all the time reporting to somebody. With public corporations, it’s the shareholders!
What all the time makes me smile in these annual reviews is that, however all of the business-speak, there’s usually a line buried someplace saying that so-and-so’s album launch has shifted by 1 / 4, or that an artist’s album didn’t hit expectations – and it turns into obvious these items are large drivers of an organization’s earnings. I discover that empowering.
You’ll be able to construct all of the techniques you need and make every thing extra environment friendly, however this all runs on music. In the long run, it nonetheless comes down as to if an artist creates one thing individuals need. The artists nonetheless drive every thing else.
As a supervisor and a educated lawyer, how do you reply when a fund affords your artist a big-money catalog deal?
Lots has modified because the Bowie Bonds within the late ‘90s, although the core idea holds. The catalog has all the time been the bedrock of what made publishers and labels useful; Wall Road has merely caught up. Artists shouldn’t neglect that, for many of them, their catalog is what they cross on to their household.
I’ve all the time believed artists ought to personal their recordings and publishing when doable, so I naturally hesitate to encourage shoppers to promote. But it surely’s a private resolution, and if it’s knowledgeable, I’ll assist it. A lot of our shoppers personal 100% of what they’ve created, which places them in a stronger place than most artists.
There are extra consumers available in the market than 5 years in the past; whether or not there are extra certified consumers is a special query. Promote to somebody who genuinely understands music and is aware of find out how to construct in your catalog? That’s one factor. Promote to somebody who sees it purely as a monetary asset? That’s one other.
“The market can let you know what one thing is price; it might’t all the time let you know why it issues.”
The actual query isn’t simply who’s providing the best a number of, however who’s going to deal with these songs ten years from now. Nice songs don’t exist in a vacuum – somebody should take care of them, introduce them to the following era, make considerate calls on licensing, movie and TV. An ambivalent proprietor can do actual injury. Copyrights, opposite to well-liked music-business opinion, do complain – and in the event that they’re being mismanaged, rightfully so.
It’s good that artists now have extra selections; that provides creators energy. The one factor I’d watch out about is complicated monetary worth with cultural worth. The market can let you know what one thing is price; it might’t all the time let you know why it issues.
The AI music debate has exploded. As somebody who manages artists outlined by singular artistic imaginative and prescient, how do you consider AI’s place on this enterprise?
Truthfully, I believe extra about AI’s impression on humanity than on the music enterprise. So far as artists are involved, I’m not apprehensive concerning the genuinely artistic, imaginative artists who’re forward of the algorithm.
They’re those influencing what’s subsequent and being copied. A human, lived expertise can’t get replaced – it’s what offers music its soul. However we even have the luxurious of working with artists like Jack White, Vampire Weekend, LCD Soundsystem, and others who’re all visionaries in their very own proper. However issues are altering so rapidly, I don’t know what we’ll encounter subsequent.
Nearly each opinion feels instantly dated. What we do want to consider is how artists’ music is valued, significantly when it’s getting used to coach AI platforms and labels are being compensated in return. The artists have to take part in that worth too. Some argue that AI is solely the following evolution of the musical instrument.
As soon as upon a time, drum machines ‘weren’t drums’; sampling ‘wasn’t enjoying an instrument’; DJs ‘weren’t musicians’; Professional Instruments was ‘dishonest.’
We’ve been transferring the road without end, and ultimately somebody does one thing unbelievable with every new software and the arguments develop into irrelevant. However there’s an necessary distinction: a guitar doesn’t have an agenda. With AI, persons are creating via a handful of platforms that any person else owns, trains, and controls. That issues me.
It additionally raises necessary questions on how we worth human contribution. Nothing comes from nowhere. Jack White performs a riff and one other artist hears it years later, it sparks one thing in them, and so they take it someplace fully totally different.
That’s how tradition has all the time labored. One factor influences one other, which influences one other. There’s a lineage to it. AI complicates that lineage, nevertheless it shouldn’t make it invisible.
We will’t neglect that AI is studying from human concepts, human work, and human tradition. If we are able to perceive how the machine received from A to Z, and which artist’s work and concepts had been significant constructing blocks, credit score and compensation can stream again via the chain.
That’s a extra fascinating place to start out than pretending AI creates out of skinny air.
“AI hasn’t fallen in love, misplaced a dad or mum to most cancers, or stood on stage in entrance of 10,000 individuals.”
One thing else I take into consideration: Are artists expressing themselves via AI, or is AI slowly instructing artists find out how to specific themselves? That’s actually the identical concern I’ve with algorithms typically. The hazard isn’t essentially that expertise replaces human creativity. It’s that we expect we’re making fully impartial selections, whereas the expertise is quietly narrowing our choices.
Artists with actual creativeness already form what AI can do; every thing it makes, it realized from somebody. The human brings expertise, intention, and most significantly, style. AI hasn’t fallen in love, misplaced a dad or mum to most cancers, had a music inexplicably make you cry, been bullied, or stood on a stage in entrance of ten thousand individuals. That also belongs to the artist. AI can be taught patterns, however it might’t stay a life.
In 2019 you predicted the majors may pull their catalogs off the DSPs and construct their very own platforms. That didn’t occur. With hindsight, did they miss a window, or was the inducement by no means actually there?
What’s occurred is definitely rather more fascinating. The streaming corporations have largely settled into being extremely efficient international distribution platforms. Document corporations have more and more expanded into label companies.
In the meantime, many artists have neatly adopted a direct-to-consumer mannequin. I underestimated who would develop into the direct-to-consumer model. I assumed it will be the foremost labels; as an alternative, it was the artists.
The actual worth isn’t the place any person streams a music – it’s who owns the connection with the fan. Who’s promoting the live performance ticket? Who’s launching a competition, like Olivia Rodrigo’s Daisy Chain Fields? Who’s constructing direct relationships via one thing like The Vault?
The Grateful Useless most likely understood this earlier than virtually anyone. They had been constructing a group lengthy earlier than anybody known as it ‘direct-to-consumer.’ That ties again to the place we began: group. The neatest artists have all the time understood it. They don’t simply make music – they create universes, and invite individuals to affix them.
What concerning the fashionable enterprise would most shock your youthful self – and what hasn’t modified in any respect?
This enterprise is all the time altering, however the factor that hasn’t modified is the one half I’ve ever actually cared about. The legendary movie producer Larry Gordon mentioned one thing to me years in the past that’s caught with me ever since: “It’s all about having one thing that different individuals need.”
That’s nonetheless the enterprise. I don’t significantly care concerning the pipes, or the supply mechanism. I care about ensuring the artwork exists – and that individuals get the possibility to fall in love with it.
‘It’s nice to see artist possession develop into extra commonplace’
The White Stripes broke via to mainstream recognition 25 years in the past with traditional third album, White Blood Cells, that includes hits like Fell In Love With A Woman.
The LP was launched by way of Third Man Data with V2 in the USA in addition to XL in UK/Europe, however, unusually for a label-priority report on the time, the underlying masters remained inside the band’s possession – a sample that the duo would repeat for later information Elephant, Get Behind Me Devil, and Icky Thump.
Ian Montone performed a pioneering position in securing the band possession of their copyrights, years earlier than such offers turned normal follow – one thing that’s since develop into the norm for a lot of of Monotone’s artists.
Says Montone: “As a supervisor I attempt to create freedom – be that artistic or monetary – and optionality for my shoppers. And when an artist is in charge of their recordings it offers them each.
“As a younger music lawyer, I labored at a agency [Davis, Shapiro, Lewit, Montone & Hayes] that represented expertise in addition to a handful of labels. I all the time questioned why artists didn’t personal their recordings. It was one thing nobody ever requested for, as if it had been merely set in stone. As a supervisor, with Jack and Meg, we decided to make possession a part of any broader deal. And to their credit score, they’d the braveness to face by it, turning down a number of cash within the course of. We already had management of the primary two albums, so it made logical sense. XL and V2 weren’t afraid to suppose exterior the field.”
Provides Montone: “As somebody who’s all the time been a champion of artists’ rights, it’s nice to see possession develop into extra commonplace. And if that’s performed a job in labels constructing extra service-focused companies inside their bigger ecosystems, in flip giving artists extra choices, then that’s additionally an ideal evolution.
“That’s to not say that is the way it ought to work throughout the board. Labels usually take important monetary threat, and usually lose cash on extra information than they earn a living on. There are many methods to construction these relationships. Regardless of the construction, it must make sense and be honest to either side.”
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