The Capitol Data Tower cuts a formidable determine within the Hollywood sky.
For Kieran Thurgood, Capitol Music Group’s Head of World Advertising and marketing, strolling as much as the 13-storey HQ on his first day at work a decade in the past was “one of many greatest pinch-me moments” in his profession.
“It’s such an iconic constructing,” he says. “There are actually buses exterior with vacationers taking images – and I get to stroll inside and name it house.”
Certainly, as he notes, “a few of the most iconic recordings have occurred” within the studio on the backside of the tower, from The Beatles and Seaside Boys to Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan and extra.
“The Capitol Tower simply emanates music to its core,” provides Thurgood. “That legacy of Capitol Data is one thing that we’re very cognisant of in our day-to-day workings.
“And clearly, we’re very proud and respectful of that lineage, however equally, we’re right here forging the way forward for Capitol Music Group.”
Thurgood joined CMG in 2013 as Director of Worldwide Advertising and marketing, after spending almost 10 years in London, holding numerous home and worldwide advertising positions at Columbia Records UK, Sony Music UK and Decca Records.
He grew up within the States, and his profession in London adopted on from a research overseas programme within the metropolis, throughout which he was employed for work expertise at dwell promoter Imply Fiddler in 2006.
“That was my first actual introduction to the UK enterprise,” he remembers. “Clearly it was loads of admin-based work, however I completely liked the vitality of being round dwell music.”
What was meant to be a three-month keep ended up being for much longer. After returning to the US to finish his psychology diploma, Thurgood purchased a one-way ticket again to London.
“I slept on a buddy’s ground, working numerous jobs at pubs and inns,” he says. “All of the whereas sending my CV to any sort of music firm saying I’d work without spending a dime. I simply needed to get within the door.
“I did a stint at what was Virgin Radio again then, and now Absolute Radio, at 1 Golden Sq. [in Soho], which was unbelievable. I really like the vitality of a radio station.”
That led to work expertise at Sony Music’s Columbia Data UK underneath then-Managing Director Mike Smith in 2007, the place Thurgood climbed the ladder and ended up in Sony’s industrial music division.
“I [gained] expertise, each in engaged on frontline repertoire at Columbia, with artists like Kings of Leon,Kesha and The Ting Tings, juxtaposed with the unbelievable catalogue that Sony Music has, with Michael Jackson, AC/DC, Bob Dylan and so many extra.That was actually my first main label expertise. I knew I used to be hooked for all times.”
Now, at Capitol Music Group, Thurgood leads advertising and promotional technique in additional than 80 international locations for CMG’s whole roster.
That roster consists of superstars like Paul McCartney, Ice Spice, Lil Child, Katy Perry, Niall Horan, YoungBoy NBA, Maggie Rogers, Kodak Black and Troye Sivan, amongst many others.
As Thurgood explains, throughout his two-and-a-half years main world advertising for CMG, the division has been overhauled and its world digital technique rewritten.
And, regardless of worldwide challenges for US repertoire, together with a rising pattern of hyper-localisation and an ever-evolving multi-territory social and leisure media panorama, CMG’s efforts have resulted in numerous successes overseas.
Amongst them are Ice Spice (Capitol/10K Projects), who he says, “is the most popular creating artist on this planet proper now”, and who broke the file for greatest streaming debut for a feminine rapper on Spotify, with over 50% of these streams coming exterior of America.
“There are actually buses exterior with vacationers taking images of the constructing and I get to name it house.”
One other marketing campaign that noticed success in a number of markets was Niall Horan’s The Present, which achieved eight No.1s on album charts within the UK, Eire, Holland, Belgium, Australia, New Zealand, Poland and Canada. “Niall labored extremely arduous and deserves all of the credit score on this planet,” says Thurgood.
Amongst many different wins for CMG internationally was the US No.1 album Hope from rapper NF, who Thurgood calls “a real artist in each sense of the phrase.” It additionally topped the charts in Holland, New Zealand, and Switzerland.
As a part of the division’s refresh, Thurgood shook up its administration crew, bringing in what he calls “the very best executives that I might discover globally”.
Kieran Thurgood, Orla Gorman (World Advertising and marketing Director), Kate Haffenden (VP World Advertising and marketing), Mollie Chen (World Advertising and marketing Supervisor), Lauren Marques (Senior Coordinator, World Advertising and marketing), Jessica Staats (Senior Director, World Streaming & Social)
These appointments embody Kate Haffenden, VP World Advertising and marketing, who joined CMG after 15 years at Warner Music. Jessica Staats was appointed Senior Director, World Social & Streaming, becoming a member of CMG after spending 10 years at Universal Music Australia and a latest stint at Extensive Eyed Leisure.
The crew additionally consists of Orla Gorman, Director World Advertising and marketing, becoming a member of CMG after a decade within the Worldwide crew at UMG in London; Supervisor World Advertising and marketing, Mollie Chen; and Lauren Marques, who lately joined the crew as a coordinator from UMG’s 1824 school rep program.
“We now have an amazing govt crew which can be all true music individuals,” says Thurgood. “We might not be having this nice run of success and reaching such momentum with out [them]”.
Seeking to the long run, Thurgood tells MBW: “We’re in a brand new chapter at Capitol Music Group.
“That’s because of the tenure of Michelle Jubelirer and Arjun Pulijal, our President. In lower than two years underneath their management, now we have had a large, renewed and refreshed concentrate on world advertising.”
Right here, Kieran Thurgood tells us extra about CMG’s world advertising push and shares some distinctive insights from his decade-long tenure on the Capitol Tower…
Credit score: Eric Broder Van Dyke/Shutterstock
You moved over to Los Angeles in 2013 out of your position at Decca. Having grown up within the UK main label system, what was that transition like?
It was happenstance that I went to London, as a result of my father is British. I had a British passport. On the time, I actually had no concept of the necessary position London performed within the world music enterprise.
I’m very lucky that it occurred, as a result of I met so many unbelievable individuals in my time within the UK. I used to be working at Decca with Rebecca Allen when she was the pinnacle of press there. Now she’s the Co-President of EMI and I converse to her every day.
I do know loads of the important thing gamers, the significance of home UK advertising, and, equally, the dynamics of working American-signed artists overseas.
How did the chance to maneuver over to Los Angeles come up?
I used to be working with Robbie McIntosh, who had simply been appointed Head of Worldwide by Steve Barnett, who was the CEO of Capitol on the time.
I had a espresso with Robbie and simply stated if he was ever trying to construct out his crew in Los Angeles, I’m in.
A few months later, I acquired a name from him saying, ‘Would you be involved in coming to LA?’He was extremely supportive and I realized a lot whereas working with him.
As a lot as I liked London, and a giant a part of my coronary heart continues to be in that metropolis, I jumped on the alternative. I in the end took over the crew right here about two and a half years in the past.
You lead Capitol’s advertising and promotion technique throughout 80 markets, which is clearly a large activity. From an general strategic perspective, how do you method advertising an organization like Capitol Music Group’s roster in so many markets concurrently?
We have now unbelievable companions around the globe, beginning proper right here in Santa Monica with Andrew Kronfeld [EVP, Global Marketing – UMG]; Adam Granite in London [CEO Africa, Middle East & Asia – UMG]; David Joseph and his respective label heads within the UK; Frank Briegmann in Europe; Dickon Stainer, who’s president and CEO of World Classics & Jazz; Jesús López, who oversees all of Latin America and Iberia; Jeffrey Remedios, who runs Canada; Calvin Wong who oversees Southeast Asia; Naoshi Fujikura, who runs Japan; Timothy Xu, who was simply named head of Larger China; Devraj Sanyal, who runs India and South Asia; and naturally Sean Warner who headsAustralia and New Zealand.There are numerous extra, after all. It’s an outstanding world crew, and we couldn’t function with out their experience and fervour.
Additionally, the assist from UMG headquarters – Sir Lucian Grainge and his crew – in actually having the imaginative and prescient and championing this purposefully decentralised world firm that fosters wholesome inner competitors.
However, inside that competitors, there’s additionally a sense of companionship and unity, whereby all of our wins elevate UMG globally, notably now that we’re a public firm.
Are you able to talk about your division’s advertising efforts overseas over the previous couple of years?
Past that infrastructure, my philosophy is that now we have to take our future into our personal palms.
I’ve actually spent the final two years bolstering CMG’s capabilities abroad. That’s included bringing on a whole new crew of executives, many from exterior of America, every with distinctive ability units and backgrounds.
We created new roles particularly centered on digital and short-form technique, in addition to international-specific commerce initiatives.
You’ve acquired a plethora of territory-specific platforms that traditionally have been under-utilised by US labels. We’ve acquired new executives who’re particularly tasked with maximising performance on these platforms and interesting with them in a really pervasive approach to create significant cultural touchpoints.
You talked about untapped alternatives globally when it comes to advertising through digital platforms or channels. May you inform us extra about that?
From the Tower, we’re investing greater than we ever have in digital campaigns overseas, in partnership with our groups on the bottom.
We have now invested in quite a lot of proprietary real-time knowledge analytics and viewers perception platforms. These have confirmed to be extremely helpful in our capability to be each proactive and reactive within the world market, and with larger pace and precision than ever earlier than.
We’ve acquired the very best knowledge and insights crew on this planet, and we mix that knowledge with intestine intuition.
“Pace to market is vitally necessary. That has traditionally been an space of frustration for artists and managers with main labels.”
Pace to market is vitally necessary. That has traditionally been an space of frustration for artists and managers with main labels.For instance, it was that if we had been seeing a spark in France, to call any nation, there can be protracted dialogue with that territory earlier than any significant motion was taken.
The reality is, with the best way short-form media and virality is shifting in 2023 and past, you may have a really finite window to inject significant marketing campaign work right into a spark earlier than that second of alternative is gone.
We’re instigating a lot of that ourselves, right here from Los Angeles, overseas, in Europe, in Southeast Asia, in Africa, in additional markets than we ever have earlier than. We’re clearly doing that in shut communication with our companions on the bottom in these markets.
On this quickly evolving social media and leisure media panorama, the place there are such a lot of extra channels accessible to market music globally, is it more difficult within the present world recording music panorama from a advertising and promotion perspective, as a result of there are extra channels?
We’re in probably the most difficult occasions to export US repertoire overseas that I can bear in mind. And there are myriad causes for that, most notably hyper-localisation.
Many markets, notably non-English talking territories, are made up of predominantly native language home repertoire that has eroded the market share of US and UK repertoire.
“Each main label has to decide on its timing and select its winners extra fastidiously than ever.”
If you happen to take a look at Asia, you’re usually speaking about English-speaking repertoire making up 5 to 10% of the charts. It’s the identical in Latin America.
Each main label has to decide on its timing and select its winners extra fastidiously than ever. There’s loads of quantity. You even have challenges with DSPs which can be prioritising native artists, understandably. We have now to work more durable than we ever have to offer our artists the platform that they deserve overseas.
That hyper-localisation pattern is one thing we’ve written about loads and it’s attention-grabbing to listen to how an organization like CMG is going through that problem. What extra may be accomplished to efficiently market your US repertoire in these markets?
Brief-form virality and editorial assist throughout DSPs in isolation are usually not yielding deeper ranges of fandom which can be crucial in breaking new artists.
Streaming technique, media technique, press and radio promotion nonetheless play a key position. However, equally, we spend an excessive amount of time, once more, bifurcating between foundation-level marketing campaign work and precise off-platform artistic advertising.
Perception reveals that artist discovery from off-platform advertising yields larger repeat listens, and deeper ranges of particular person fan engagement than the rest.
“There isn’t any longer one avenue and a one-size-fits-all marketing campaign to breaking worldwide.”
At its core, it’s figuring out cultural touchpoints in stated market, and connecting our artists and their repertoire to that viewers in a pervasive method.
There was a sense within the US that London was the gateway to worldwide. Whereas the UK is clearly necessary – vitally so – to breaking an artist globally, there is no such thing as a longer one avenue and a one-size-fits-all marketing campaign to breaking worldwide.
Now, greater than ever, to actually transfer an artist ahead in a significant method, it requires bespoke territory-specific plans for each particular person key market.
Picture credit score: Goldin
May you give us some perception into particular examples of latest profitable world artist campaigns?
Past the muse degree, box-ticking that typically occurs, we’re making an attempt to foster a deeper relationship that yields viewers acquisition, engagement and retention that may develop all areas of an artist’s enterprise, not simply the recorded music facet.
Touring stays vitally necessary. And from our perspective, so does experimenting. That’s what aided us in creating a world hit for certainly one of our new precedence artists, Doechii, who we’re engaged on in collaboration with High Dawg Leisure.
That track, What It Is, that includes Kodak Black, as soon as we heard it, all of us thought it gave the impression of a success.
We launched it and it was a powerful launch, however not explosive. However we believed in it, and we stored tinkering round with it, and that included the crew instigating tailor-made digital methods in markets like Nigeria, Kenya, and a few international locations in Southeast Asia.
That [TikTok] pattern truly began in Nigeria, then fed into Kenya. That triggered a response from a creator within the Philippines. It set every thing alight to the place, inside a matter of three weeks, we went from the track garnering within the tens of 1000’s of TikTok creates per day, to 750,000 each day creates.
Then we poured gasoline on that; we flew one of many influencers from the Philippines to Los Angeles, created a ton of actually compelling localised content material with them right here, and fostered that relationship.
Equally, we began drip-feeding that into platforms like Douyin in Larger China, after which it caught fireplace and in the end peaked at 1.5 million each day creates throughout Douyin and TikTok. As an artist improvement instrument, that’s unparalleled.
Ice Spice (pictured inset with supervisor James Rosemond Jr. and Thurgood), who’s the most popular creating artist on this planet proper now, we’re working in a lot the identical method. She is a genre-less artist and is a real celebrity at her core. We even have an amazing companion in her supervisor, James Rosemond Jr.
Michelle recognised her as a celebrity from the second she met her and heard her music, and she or he and Arjun gave us each useful resource to assist get the job accomplished internationally. Jeremy Vuernick, CMG’s President of A&R, additionally deserves an amazing quantity of credit score, as do our companions at 10K Tasks.
Her characteristic with PinkPantheress within the UK elevated her ex-US share in a really highly effective method. Now, over 50% of her streams within the first 12 months of her being signed listed here are coming from exterior of America. And he or she simply made her inaugural UK and EU pageant run with Wi-fi Competition. The long run could be very brilliant for her globally.
You led world advertising efforts on McCartney III, which hit No.1 in a number of markets. May you discuss concerning the challenges of working with an artist as profitable as Paul McCartney versus newer artists?
What could be very clear right this moment is that nothing is a given. You’ve got a few of the greatest superstars on this planet having their albums debut at 50% of albums they launched lower than two or three years in the past. Clearly, there are artists which can be true world cultural icons, like Sir Paul McCartney, and you’re taking these campaigns very severely and you actually need to ship for them.
Paul is unbelievable. His crew, led by his supervisor Scott Rodger, is unbelievable. And all of us partnered to do an amazing job in creating content material round that venture.
We instigated a world marketing campaign wherein we purposely held again any pre-release music. All of the music hit the day the album was launched, and we needed to do one thing totally different and actually maintain the dialog across the venture as an entire versus specializing in any singular track.
I’m actually happy with one advertising initiative specifically, and one wherein Arjun actually performed an instrumental position. We created sheet music for every monitor and lifted segments of that sheet music and created murals in 14 totally different cities around the globe, from Rio to London to Berlin to Tokyo.
Then we had native musicians in every market carry out their very own distinctive interpolations of these songs, by no means having heard Paul’s precise recordings, however solely by sight-reading the sheet music that we positioned on outside murals. It was distinctive, thought-provoking and created true world pleasure. Most significantly, it blew Paul’s socks off.
Picture credit score: Lester Cohen
What’s the finest recommendation that you’ve got ever been given as a advertising govt?
Power and empathy are vitally necessary. Folks know while you’re passionate and while you’re not. And the very fact is, I completely love my job.
If I hit the lottery tonight, I’d nonetheless flip as much as my 8am Zoom tomorrow. In my position of being an envoy for Capitol Music Group overseas and championing our artists overseas, having that vitality and fervour that translate, at occasions over the cellphone or over Zoom, is crucial.
“If I hit the lottery tonight, I’d nonetheless flip as much as my 8am Zoom tomorrow morning.”
I don’t all the time have the solutions, however I’m going to outwork all people and I’m going to search out the solutions.
Having the ability to join with individuals, cross-culturally by language obstacles and create deep significant relationships in a short time is crucial to reaching success within the world enterprise.
I got down to discover essentially the most passionate, energetic, educated crew I might discover. It simply so occurs that every one of these executives had been girls, and that’s one thing that I’m additionally very, very happy with.Michelle and Arjun (pictured inset) really consider that having a crew that’s as numerous because the roster we characterize is crucial for our long-term success, and that perception is shared by everybody on their management crew.
If there was one factor you could possibly change concerning the music enterprise, what would it not be and why?
We have to recalibrate our barometer of success. We have now to suppose extra long-term, construct careers with the potential for actual longevity, not particular person fleeting moments.
And now we have to place artists first – I can’t let you know what number of occasions I’ve heard Michelle and Arjun say that – and have the idea and endurance to create a really nurturing surroundings for artists to do their finest work.
Constructing long-term artists is extremely arduous and takes time, but it surely’s value it.
Artists that rocket to success too shortly can fade simply as shortly, and we’re all the time cognisant of that reality.
So, all of that stated, and relating it again to the ethos of Capitol Music Group, we attempt to stability the quick and sluggish of all of it.
We’re relentlessly aggressive in creating and securing alternatives each within the US and overseas, and can proceed to take action.
