Corry BanksLast week, Teenage Engineering and their new Chief Brand Officer – Emmy Parker – was a huge part of a story in the New York Times titled “The Music Industry Is Wrestling With Race. Here’s What It Has Promised.” The article chronicles music industry insiders that vow to create change where black and brown artists are concerned.
We all know that there is not enough representation in many areas of almost any industry. But the music business and the electronic music tech business stand out in mind, particularly as a technologist, beatmaker, and electronic music maker. After all, that’s what BboyTechReport is built on.
At any rate, in today’s climate of high tension over race, politics, equality and topped off with all that comes along with a worldwide pandemic, a bright spot appeared in the form of Teenage Engineering announcing their plan to create equity for black and brown artists.
The Teenage Engineering plan is an artist fellowship/revenue sharing plan that finds them partnering with some of today’s culturally significant and prolific electronic artists – Underground Resistance (Detroit), Suzi Analogue (Miami), VoltageCtrlR (LA) and Baseck (LA).
Emmy Parker, Chief Brand Officer of Teenage Engineering, had this to say in the New York Times article – the revenue share “could be anywhere from $100,000 a year to, in some cases, close to a million dollars a year.”
That’s how you show up and show out with equity for black and brown artists that put in the work daily. This is the sort of move that will change the way music and electronics companies approach and deal with the artists from whom they so obviously reap benefits.
Despite what many realize there is an entire underground community of artists that companies tap for just about everything from product input/testing/development to music production and tech insight. Most times it’s largely fruitless for the artists and very lucrative for the companies. That’s why this is such a huge move on Teenage Engineering’s part. It appears that they are taking charge to change that paradigm in a huge way and in this case the artists are the winners.
Although, there is more to come in the coming months about the fellowship program and I am certain we will see great things from these artists as well, its great to know that such a cool, tech-savvy and forward-thinking company is showing and proving just how cool and forward-thinking they are.
Featured photo credit – Bethany Mollenkof for The New York Times