Laurence Hobbs, SAFO Music Group

In this series of articles, I chat with people who share my love of recording so much that they make their career out of it. Here's what Laurence and I spoke about when we chatted recently.

Platinum selling producer and songwriter, Laurence Hobbs is passionate about helping up and coming singers to fulfil their potential in a positive, creative and honest environment. And that environment is London's SAFO Music Group. Comprising rehearsal rooms, recording studios and an infinity cove for photo/videography, they describe themselves as “a place for music industry creatives to perfect their craft, learn about the music business and connect with industry professionals.”

I caught up with Laurence and his colleague Mariana and learnt about

• The wide scope of work that keeps the team busy
• Why he’s glad he’s not an 18 year old artist trying to make it in the music industry today
• The artists they’re most excited to be working with

Laurence also shared some top quality advice for musicians and songwriters looking to set up their own studio and I had a masterclass in what educators should be teaching about making money from music.

I learnt so much from this conversation, I’m sure you will too.

What inspired you to start your studio?

It grew organically from my little bedsit to thinking right, there's some more people I want to work with and then creating it because I wanted to work with creative people and make a successful business I suppose.

So from my bedsit, I worked with someone who had a big company. He went bankrupt so I started my own. And then from there I had a dodgy business partner and then I started this when it all fell out with the other guy. Back then I was in a much smaller place. And then in 2015 I decided to just take a big risk and go for the whole building because I thought I could set up a business and do something.

Artist development is what we do. There is a need for people, for young singers, young creators to have a good, honest, decent place that they feel they’re valued. And it's a reasonable price, it's not expensive at all. I feel that, especially for London, what we offer is amazing, you know, with all the things we do here for the price.

So I think that the inspiration was building up a business and wanting to do better.

What does the day in your life look like?

Our lives are so varied here given all that we do.

Sometimes we’re taking photos of an artist in the infinity cove. Sometimes we’re having music sessions. Sometimes we’re making videos from gigs. We have mentoring, songwriting sessions, networking nights, industry seminars, masterclasses. We’ve also just started doing kids parties.

And, most importantly, every one of our artists has a career so we're constantly talking to all of them, finding gigs for artists, doing PR for artists. That kind of thing.

It's not boring, that's for sure.

So what sort of musicians do you typically work with?

We work with singers, rappers, creatives. Not particularly bands, it's not because we don't like bands, we just concentrate on solo singers or sometimes the odd duo. But generally singers, rappers, we have a lot of producers and songwriters, that sort of thing.

And we have a lot of different styles as well. Country, rock, rap, R&B, soul. So really it’s across the board.

Have you ever worked with, or mentored, any famous bands or artists?

Yeah, I've done quite a few. Sam Smith, a lot of X Factor winners, we've had people in here like Ella Eyre, Becky Hill, we’ve had Michael Jackson's son in here. So yeah we've had lots of people.

I suppose that goes with the territory of being a development, mentoring thing as opposed to a pure rehearsal studio.

Yeah, very much. And also we have all the record companies and publishers pop down for the seminars and things so yeah that's important for artists to feel that there’s connections to help them. That’s important to us.

So what do you believe is the biggest challenge that your industry faces at the moment?

The biggest challenge is for artists to make money out of the music. That's the biggest, biggest challenge. It's the hardest thing. Creating music is the easiest thing. Selling it, getting it out there, is hard. I feel for them. I'm glad I'm not an 18 year old artist.

We come across so many people and your heart bleeds for them when you think oh my god you're not getting through, you're just part the crowd. By the same token, you can just meet people and you just know that they've got the energy and the attitude to get places. It’s the commitment, and the drive that’s important.

It’s, I think, hard work over talent sometimes. I've met many talented people who are just a bit lazy and just not good enough. It’s hard work And music is is a mixture of everything you know, talent, look, hard work, right person, right place. The biggest thing we say to people is yeah, do your music but you've got to be able to network. You got to be able to talk to people, that's going to open up doors. It’s so important. We've had so many examples of that where people have just met the right people and they’ve signed the deal because we’ve told them to meet someone and they went out and did it; they signed up to a management and publishing deal. So it's possible, that’s the other thing. It's possible.

What do your business plans look like post COVID? Were you affected by Covid?

To be honest, and this is an embarrassing thing, not really. We weren’t really affected.

We were building. We got a nice grant - grant rather than a loan - and we’re very, touch wood, financially stable. Despite everything, we're all really good. And I’m just seeing it going up to be honest. All the things we're creating. And I think in this business, you've got to be able to create. We recently lost some funding so we thought can we do something different? So we started doing membership. We do a lot of stuff in education and we work with the local council so you know, we're creating lots of revenue streams.

And the membership works two ways. Of course we need the funding because we're not going give to give the studio away for free, but at the same time as a moral cause of supporting about 300 young artists. That’s quite amazing.

We’re also a believer that when people come in here, they like us. And I do believe that this is a people industry, you know. We may be the best producer, we may not, but if they like the vibe, the energy, like our passion, then they'll buy into us. And that always works. So I just feel it's positive, it’s exciting.

Since restrictions have lifted, we've been pretty busy to be honest and getting busier so we're we're very optimistic with the way it's going.

Do you have any advice for anyone else looking to set up something that you're doing here?

Yeah, oh my god, I could go on forever. My advice? I’ll tell you my biggest advice actually. If you’re a musician or a songwriter wanting to start something like this. Don't. Do it because you want to run a business, not because you love music. That’s the biggest thing. So many people say I’m a songwriter, I want to build this and they have no understanding about business. This is a business. And you've got to understand it as a business rather than ‘hey man, I do some great beats.

That can work, absolutely. Especially the people with small studios and that's fine. And I'm sure if we had one studio we’d be nailing it, but, you know, we've got five studios and we rent some out and we get things in. So I think, think of it as a business rather than doing great beats.

I’ve seen so many people, friends who start studios and they do alright, because also you know as a business you wanna grow, you want to expand. Music, you just wanna do music. You know when I started, I’m a songwriter and I spent my life in the studio. Now, I spend most of my time outside, building the business as opposed to doing beats. I've got producers doing that now.

So I think that's the thing. If you’re a musician, think of it as a business rather than doing beats.

And also, don’t think you're going to make money from selling records. I think make your money because you offer a service that people need.

That can work, absolutely. Especially the people with small studios and that's fine. And I'm sure if we had one studio we’d be nailing it, but, you know, we've got five studios and we rent some out and we get things in. So I think, think of it as a business rather than doing great beats.

I’ve seen so many people, friends who start studios and they do alright, because also you know as a business you wanna grow, you want to expand. Music, you just wanna do music. You know when I started, I’m a songwriter and I spent my life in the studio. Now, I spend most of my time outside, building the business as opposed to doing beats. I've got producers doing that now.

So I think that's the thing. If you’re a musician, think of it as a business rather than doing beats.

And also, don’t think you're going to make money from selling records. I think make your money because you offer a service that people need.

Yeah, it's really sad isn't it that music doesn't make money anymore

It's horrendous. I mean it can do if you’re a live band and you’re PRS and all that sort of stuff.

You know what it is, and we had a discussion with some educators, it's like musicians don't know how they can earn their money, they don't know PPL, they don't know PRS. They had a top 10 in Portugal, what does that mean? How much? They don't know. The education is horrendous. They come out of music colleges, they don't understand you can get money from from PRS

And it's not only with musicians. But in general, with artists, there's always the artist and then there's like the brain and the money behind it. But most of them, they just want to do what they like, they don't care about the other stuff which they should care because then what makes you keep going?

I mean we do this because we love music, number one. There’s a real disconnect between loving music and earning money from music. And people don't tell them, the educators don't tell them that, you know, this is how you can earn your money. If you do 200 gigs you’ll be earning x amount because of your PRS. Don't do covers, do your own songs. There’s loads of things. I used to run six live shows around the country at the same time. I would say a good 40% didn’t know about PRS apart from club scheme. And none of them know about PPL, rights, they don't know anything about that. And this is where, you know, PRS do a horrendous job. This is the thing, where do they get their money from, their funding? Well, some people don't collect their money. That’s how they do all this PRS funding. You know, they should be actively saying ‘you earnt this money’. People don't understand so they need to go out and show them. But it's not their job. They collect the money, it's down to me to collect it.

They should be tracking people down really. There should be an app where instead of… You know, the pubs and clubs scheme is open to abuse. I could say tomorrow I do 20 gigs and they wouldn't know. There should be a way where you go in, you put your app and tool into the promoter of the songs you play, make sure they're registered and automatically you get your song money. That's something you'll earn money though because it’s scandalous. And I speak to them they got oh yeah but you know that's a little bit complicated or we can't be bothered. Well you're spending millions on funding, spend it on something that actually helps songwriters. That really annoys me.

It should be so easy. Just go in, every song you do is registered, you go in, you play the song, you do a click in the app and you earn your money. And not taking a year to come. But really, it's all digital, it should be instant like a bank. It's so behind.

It's scandalous because since records went, a whole income stream for songwriters has disappeared and Spotify was supposed to you know, sort of take its place but it's not. And therefore a whole generation of songwriters won't be able to earn money.

And this is why we offer mentoring.

So are there any new recruits or any local people that you've got that you're excited about?

We have so many good, exciting people coming in. There’s a lot of things happening. We've got an artist who was here like 2-3 years ago who’s now signed with Virgin. You’ve got New Music Friday. So that feels exciting. A couple that immediately spring to mind:

Breeze Redwine, a 19 year old country singer, she’s amazing. [Hear her stuff on Spotify, SoundCloud or YouTube. Follow her on Twitter or Instagram.]

17 year old Aimee Broom has released a couple of amazing singles over the last few years. [Hear her stuff on Spotify or follow her on Instagram.]

Freya Alley makes great music. Pop meets electronica and she has such a great tone to her voice. [Hear her stuff on Spotify or follow her on Instagram.]

Eddie Jones, an 18year old who he creates melodies and songwriting like this [clicks fingers] and they’re all very catchy. [Hear his stuff on Spotify or YouTube. Follow him on Twitter or Instagram.]

That’s the most exciting thing about what we do here at SAFO Music Group. Seeing new people and just knowing that they’re going to be something.