Thank you for being here!

Welcome to the first edition of The Club List, a newsletter about making a business out of what you love.

A quick intro: My name is Kodi McKinney. I work with musicians (and their teams), designers, artists, and businesses to shape their marketing strategy, grow their revenue, and better reach the people they’re after. I’ve been an insider for my entire career - 13 years in the music industry, and close to 9 years as a marketing agency co-owner - and at some point, I realized that making others feel more like insiders was deeply rewarding. We’ll get back to what I mean by that in a moment.

Each week, I’ll share commentary about creating professionally in the here and now, along with one thing you can use right away to build your practice. And you’ll also get a short List of Clubs, which are a few events around New York City (where I’m based) that I think look like somewhere I’d want to be. Sometimes I’ll talk about music industry issues, but not always. There is a lot to be learned from creatives of all types, from the poet writing in private daily to the entrepreneur who seems capable of raising money from a stone, and we’re going to delve into that full range with lessons I’ve carried through my still-evolving work.

The Club List is powered by beehiiv, the best newsletter platform I’ve ever used. Want to try it out? This link will give you a 30-day trial and discounts past that. I may make a small commission from this.

Okay, so…back to what I said about insiders, and bringing others in. Let’s talk about the true economic strength of the music sector, an open secret hiding in plain sight.

The Currency of Access

If you’ve been in the music industry for any length of time, you know that much of it relies on the currency of access. From veteran insiders who once got “paid” in promo CDs at their early internships to meet & greet packages for fans that cost more than a rent check, access is power. 

That’s seen most cleanly in the form of guests list at concerts. If you’re on the list, you’re either working the show directly, you’re with the performers, or you have something to offer the house. And if you won tickets through a giveaway, the people running the show wanted to market it to fans like you.

The music industry understands access as currency equal to money, and even superior to it. Adjacent to this is the human tendency to adopt a scarcity mindset, which marketing is great at playing into. (“Limited-time offer!” “Don’t miss out!”) So, naturally, the music industry is pretty good at marketing - in fact, it even has to compete against itself constantly to cut through the noise of good bands to listen to and cool shows to see. If access is power, then the fear of missing out becomes control.

Here’s my thing with that. I find that creativity comes from a place of abundance. It’s not some magic thing you eventually run out of; creativity is a muscle that needs exercised, in the same way that meaningful relationships require work. Your creativity is potentially limitless. The thing that actually restricts it is time, which never stops being scarce even if your funds and access are unlimited. The most powerful people in the world still have to contend with time.

And so, if you reframe time as more important than access while also exercising your creative practice, you’ll find it’s possible to begin rearranging your thinking away from what society says is scarce and toward how to get your work in front of more people with the time you have. That reframing might make you perceive the world a little differently. You might start to recognize subtle absurdities in daily life and its social obligations, and you may realize that the access you have to your own creativity is more valuable than access to the stories of people you don’t have a deep emotional connection to. Do this and retain your compassion, and the world will open itself to you in new ways.

That is the essence of why this is called The Club List. It’s my house list, but it’s wiiiiiide open to anyone with an email address who wants on. I’ll do what I can to help you be more abundant: to demonstrate more of your value, to have deeper engagement with less effort, and to have a smoother experience with doing business as yourself (if you wish to). And we’re going to do a lot of this through marketing, scarcity tactics and all - but rewired into an abundance mindset, with tools to help you get organized and to help make your craft available to the people you want.

One very big hint: platforms you rent space on, like social media, grant both you and your fans access. Platforms you own, like newsletters and merchandise, reward you for giving your fans access.

And I’ll go one step further. Platforms you own and then also offer, like newsletter space or the opening slots on a DIY concert you’re headlining, reward both you and the community around you. Especially if that community is on the same page.

Access is power. Let’s reclaim it.

One Thing You Can Use Today

Think of something that is necessary for what you do and requires creativity, but feels repetitive and can have uneven results. For example:

• If you’re a guitarist, this might be about writing riffs.

• If you’re an entrepreneur, this could involve coming up with new business ideas to explore.

• If you draw, this may be about creating sketches.

You get the picture. For this exercise, if you have a broader part of your work that frustrates you, try to focus on the toughest part of it. I just asked a client yesterday whether they felt they had more difficulty with making social media content, or with posting it. That’s the method here, too. One pain point at a time.

Did you pick your something? Okay, good.

Now, I want you to try this. Commit 30 minutes of each day, from now until my newsletter next Thursday, to doing this thing up to three times. If you complete it three times, you can stop for that day. If you can’t do it three times but spent 30 minutes on it, you’re also done for the day. Then come back to it the next day. If this results in something cool for you, tell me about it and I’ll include it in the next edition.

Next week, I’ll tell you how this simple exercise significantly changed my life within two months. No exaggeration. There’s a pretty funny story attached to it, too.

List of Clubs

These are the kinds of clubs I’d like to be in around NYC! Wherever you might find music, art, or a compelling experience under one roof, that’s a club to me. I only list clubs I’d enjoy going to. If I list a client, you’ll know.

Friday, May 31 - Free Friday Nights @ The Whitney Museum
Always packed. If you go, reserve a slot. Plenty sold out already.

Saturday, June 1 - Dance Planet @ Paragon (RSVP to get in free before 11pm)
Paragon is probably my favorite electronic music club in NYC right now. A perfect combo of great lighting/staging, good sound, and accessibility.

Sunday, June 2 - Mister Sunday @ Nowadays
Always one of the best places there is to dance outdoors during a New York summer. And guess what? It’s summer in New York now. That’s the rule after Memorial Day. I didn’t make that rule, I’m just reporting it.

Thanks for reading! And now, an image of me in the club…

The Club List is a newsletter from MeInTheClub.com. All issues are available at TheClubList.net. To inquire about marketing services for your work, contact [email protected] and include "Services” in the subject line.