0:00 who are you and where are you going what do you [Music] want hello and welcome to people making money I'm your host Kevin bemel and we are here every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time to talk about all those things related to starting a business job hunting professional success and
0:35 Building Wealth and I I I I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on intro because I these guys know I've been really excited to get them on the show pretty much since I met them I think we met a little over a about a year ago I guess it was yeah about a year about a year yeah so um this this this is the the the team at a business called Underground Studios these are all young men I as as an old guy with gray hair hopefully I won't embarrass them by saying some of the finest young men it's it's really
1:10 been my my pleasure to to me um in in the business world for an old guy like me I I don't I don't get to meet a lot of young guys anymore now that I'm out of the Navy uh and and for those of you who are regular viewers of the show you know that I I brag on my uh you know young um um service member colleagues uh pretty regularly I will tell you that that uh Andrew Gavin and Michael are as fine as any of the people that that you will find uh in the military they really are uh at the top of the game for for uh
1:47 being in business so um without you know any more Ado I really want you to hear their story hear how they um were able to build this business that they have and so um gentlemen if if we can start out maybe each of you will just take a few minutes to give a little bit about your background so people can see you are not all you know trust fun babies and you know Mom and Dad hany said hey okay now that you're out of high school here's a million bucks you know go you know go build yourself a business that that is not their story so I know Andrew
2:23 you wanna you want to go first yeah I'd love to first off thank you for that introduction maybe the best introduction you ever had before that was awesome and once again my name is Andrew Mason I'm one of the three owners here with Gavin and Michael of like you said underground Studios which is uh media photo video creative space based in downtown Los Angeles um I am personally from Thousand Oaks California shout out the 805 and that's also where I met Michael who maybe you go go into it Michael maybe an
2:58 introduction definitely sorry I'm literally just walking to my house sorry again for the runaround no no problem yeah basically Andrew and I met um briefly in high school um in Newber Park and we didn't really know each other that much in high school but you know I was making music he was doing journalism and not to tell his story for him but he um you know was doing more sports stuff at the time and as he kind of lost interest in sports connected with me I had the music thing going already and so that's where the magazine kind of created and that's the
3:34 root of why we even created the studio so a lot of history a lot to go into um little bit of background on me I've been an artist for over 10 years I started off playing guitar and always kind of wanted to be a vocalist took me a long time to get comfortable doing that and now I'm singing rapping performing writing for artist myself all of the you know above so fantastic Gavin how did how did you meet these two guys then I actually met Andrew and popsky my first day that I moved to LA
4:09 um the one person that I knew from my hometown of Medford Oregon small little town that I'm from uh he's a recording engineer and he was holding a camp for artists and engineers in Big Bear California and I once um covid hit I switched full-time to doing videos I used to be a manager over at a brewery before Co and then once Co hit I was like you know what I'm I'm going to just take the full swing into this video thing and so um when I moved down to Los Angeles with my girlfriend obviously I was trying to get new customers make new
4:44 friends make new connections and so the very first day I wasn't even unpacked or anything I took the car and I was like sorry babe I got to go for two days I'm gonna go up here and I went up there and actually shot my very first music video in LA with psky uh and you know we've just been locked in ever since it's it's been a great journey with these two guys yeah it was really cool honestly with Gavin like he said we met at this like big camp with other artists and a bunch of other people and like no shade to anybody there everybody there is cool doing their thing but we kind of felt me and psky like we didn't really fit in
5:20 great with anybody and or felt like people were maybe a little egotistical which happens a lot in a hip-hop or just entertainment world but Gavin came the second day I don't think you were there the first day Gavin but you showed up the second day and we just immediately clicked and now a few a couple years after that we ended up starting the underground Studios and now a couple years after that here we are Gavin one of our most solid connects you know our partner and and now from what I understand and correct me if I'm wrong you actually were publishing a magazine before you open the studio is is is that
5:55 correct yeah that's correct te technically underground magazine was created in January 2020 that's when the first mag came out and then just kind of through doing that me and Michael constantly needing to book different photo studios and just kind of needing to do that all the time needing a a headquarters you know that was really honestly Michael who really kind of like spurred that move to we need to get a spot that that need like once we have a spot that's going to really tie things together and so at the time even I
6:30 actually wasn't really trying to open the spot and and have kind of the whole two businesses going I was really trying to just do the magazine and so he went to Gavin Michael went to Gavin and they really kind of created it and then a couple years later I came on as an owner so sticking with kind of the predecessor here for just a minute what was the impetus for deciding to start a magazine even in 2020 and maybe I'm wrong I'm I'm not super up to speed on on the media business especially the print media
7:05 business but it seemed to me that even by 2020 magazines were pretty much a dying uh you know breed um you know was this was this a a print magazine an online magazine how did you know how did all that work that that was it sounds like that's kind of the that that's kind of the the launching pad for what then be uh you know became underground Studios can you can you take us through that so people can understand your thinking and and and
7:40 your process a little bit any of you guys not not just for you know for for uh for Andrew so yeah I mean I think Andrew could speak to it more because he kind of started the magazine and then I guess I could kind of take it from there yeah like really like I guess the root of it like I went to I grew up in California but went to college in Boston went to Boston University go Terriers if anyone watching shout out be you um and I studied journalism but like Michael said earlier I was Sports journalism that was my major and like kind of you know as I
8:16 was doing it I I I realized the biggest thing that I didn't like about it was that the athletes the people that you're taking this time to write about to to whatever they didn't really care about the coverage you know athletes don't really need the coverage a lot of times so you know and so you kind of get that mood you get that energy from from them and then after graduating and coming back remating up with Michael um you know I saw that like wow artists and people like who need coverage they really appreciate the journalism I appreciate the work they appreciate the
8:52 coverage and so I think kind of that General like connection there kind of spurred me to decide to go more in the music lane and then exactly like you said print media outdated it's been outdated it's digital digital digital and so kind of just looking and kind of surveying the the the playing field I realized it's definitely all digital digital digital but maybe it's so digital now that a hard copy magazine is unique and it's retro and you know underground has always thrived on WE we've never printed thousands and
9:28 thousands of magazines when we have a new mag you know we always print somewhere between 200 to 500 mags so it's it's a collectible thing you know it's it's more of a hard copy so it's it's we we are running a magazine and bringing that magazine back but we're also approaching it with a new like modern business structure interesting so what it sounds like is you you you shifted from a market where you know athletes who really there wasn't really any demand to to a focus where you
10:03 really could be of service to the people that you were uh profiling in your magazine on the one hand and yet you know also like you say taking advantage of some Trends retro and all of that in in in order to do something that set you apart from what everybody else was doing I that's very very very clever way to approach it yeah so so now you've got the magazine going um and and and talk talk to us if you would uh how did the idea for a
10:38 studio to open a studio how did that come about um and and you know again what was the impetus for that yeah so that really like Andrew was kind of touching on started a couple years into the magazine um and you know just to kind of follow up on what he was saying the way that obviously it's a cool idea to make a magazine and do something fun right but doing something cool and fun is a lot different than having a business and being profitable and um creating longevity right so what we realized early on was you know we could charge to
11:14 be in our magazine but have different things that we provide not just charge to be on the cover and not talk to these guys again you know we're putting in a lot of hours with all of these cover artists um and it took years sorry someone just G me a call um and it's just a lot to kind of figure out at first but um one of our biggest obstacles was the studio aspect right and we were doing photo shoots and renting photo studios for thousands of dollars each time and um you know it
11:49 just became clear to me that we could sorry can you guys still hear me yes uhhuh yeah it's a little laggy like in terms of the video with the audio but we can still hear you and see you clearly my thing froze up can you hear us yeah can you hear us sorry guys my thing froze I need to um sure I I'll keep it going they were um you know I've worked with underground magazine since what
12:24 issue one or two right Andrew since issue between like issue one was out before even added is too right and um you know we've been working together for years and now at this point I'm kind of the head media person for the magazine and we're you know working with all these different artists and stuff but yeah they would rent out a studio for a whole day and it would end up costing them thousands of dollars and so I think at a certain point it just logistically it made sense to not only save this money in the magazine but then have another potential Revenue stream um and
12:59 combine them both together and at one point I actually owned a studio before I teamed up with psky and Andrew and I was just it was a you know like on Tenth of the scale that we have now um and I I actually closed it because it ended up being too much work for just one person to run you know I was there five six days a week and so when psky approached me with the idea of being Partners um it really stood out to me just because it really does take a team to run a business on this level and this scale you know we all have different roles that kind of intertwine and mesh together and I think that's a part of
13:35 why we are finding our own success because you know Andrew is working in certain areas and doing web development and then I'm over here doing videos and photos and every but you know um posy is helping the artists with their artist development and showing them okay if you're releasing a song you need to have what's called a DJ pack you need to have this and get playlists and so all of us really have expertise in different areas and I think that's why we mesh so well together interesting I this is not an area that I know really anything about
14:10 so like so just for for people I me what what is a DJ pack so I just learned this the other day popsky was telling me yeah me too but um a DJ pack is like say you're an artist and you make a song you have that full complete song what you would do in a DJ pack is you have the song you have the clean version just the instrumental and then an extended intro and so it's almost like a four or five parts of the song that way you can send a DJ all those different parts and they can do DJ things to it you know how DJs have the intro and do their own
14:46 shoutouts and their own names and so it really just gives people the flexibility to change your song on the Fly and that um helps with getting your music out there because it's making it more accessible to people that want want to share it right gotcha I you know in my day right um the thing was to get radio play you produce a song right you want to get it on the radio because then you'll sell records uh you know and at the time we're talking you know 40 vinyl 45s or maybe you know a you know a vinyl album 33 and a third RPM right and then
15:21 eventually of course it went to CDs and and and and you know now so but nowadays it's not like that right so I mean when when you're working with your clients um well I mean there has been a Resurgence in vinyl but I don't imagine well let me ask you the question how many of your um clients are you know really looking to you know um record an album and you know press vinyl and and get it out there as opposed to you know what is otherwise what what is sort of
15:58 the you know the the process that that you guys at underground Studio are helping them work that will lead them to success got you got you so okay so in terms of like actually getting hard coffee vinyls right I like that I don't see that that doesn't happen much anymore right it's more of a targeted limited release if an artist is going to do that they probably drop it with a piece of merch uh you know t-shirt or something and then try and sell it as part of a package but you have to be at
16:33 a certain level as an artist to make it profitable right but I always tell artists if you're trying to make a project sell a t-shirt with that project you can make the t-shirt for 12250 sell it for $25 make 50 copies and then there's going to be 50 people out there want to support you and that helps pay for the album you know so as an artist it it is harder to find ways to monetize and people just want uh other people to listen to their music right but I always try to explain to artists that like this is also a business and you can run it as
17:08 a business without taking advantage of people still provide excess value and that's going to just bring you more longevity and more hardcore fans yeah and also Kevin my bad but Michael he just texted me and saying can you ask Kevin to add me back in it says I'm on stage I was so focused on you guys sorry I was so I forgot I needed to let you back in yeah sorry I was on my phone and someone called me so it messed it up but I'm on so so I was just asking um uhh Andrew and Gavin um you know what is the path
17:43 that that you guys at underground Studios take your your clients on to um you know for them to achieve success on you know however that's defined and and however you know with within the you know the limits of what's available I mean and this this is like I said I I know how the You music business worked you know 40 50 years ago right you you recorded a song like I was saying to them you you get it on the radio you sell albums you go on a tour right and
18:18 the tour is tour and albums are really where you know where you make your money right and then hopefully you parlay that into a movie career and you know you clean up you know I'm thinking of Someone Like You Know Madonna right that that was her her road to success and you know record companies operated on the theory of we're going to record you know um a 100 albums 90 of them we going to lose every penny we invested eight of them were gonna maybe make back what we invested and two are going to do so well they're gonna compensate for the other
18:54 98 right that went nowhere or just barely broke even right that it seems to me that model doesn't work in the media business anymore um and by the way to a certain extent that's how it worked in the video business as well um which was something that my longtime producing partner Rick and I were involved with for many years so um uh Andrew and Gavin were talking about you know how you guys help the the the artists and clients that you work with um gain success is I guess as they Define that
19:29 so yeah so you know music being kind of my expertise right um you know I think a lost art in the music industry is what's called artist development um and that's something that used to happen a lot more traditionally in like good record labels right you'd find an artist who has no experience and when they go to a radio station they don't necessarily know how to maneuver those type of things or how to you know just brand themsel all these how to dress all these different things right right um what's cool about Underground is we really like take the time to assess each client and kind of see what
20:04 they need and and help develop them and obviously again like I was kind of touching on before I cut out we are very service-based and so we work with these different people and like find what services and best things fit each person um and help develop them right and then that's kind of step one which like I said it's kind of a lost art now because most of whether it's just music or entertainment in general is kind of just based around things going viral or you know just being extremely popular for that moment all the hype that comes around things then it dies out very quickly um things like Tik Tok and
20:39 YouTube and stuff whatever um but yeah like Gavin was kind of saying you can get really creative by bundling stuff with merchandise or even something cool that we did was a custom magazine for an artist and not only did they put their album kind of bundled with the magazine but they put exclusive music you could only only here by scanning the QR code in the magazine um that was an idea I brought to them and you know that's a incentive now for like you were saying what's a physical magazine what's the incentive to buy that now when everything's digital um like Andrew said
21:15 I think that in 2025 retro is really cool and popular whether it's clothing sneakers music whatever so the magazine really hits well in that um but yeah you know just getting with these guys for real and it's really it is like Michael saying just all about finding what the artist needs you know if an some artists will work with us and they're funny and so we can play into like the that funny side of them and make skits with them and really like Elevate their social media content to really show that funny side of them all the way to where some
21:50 artists they just need to develop the music making so we had our recording studio we have our engineers and they're just locked in working on the actual CFT you know so we have thanks to our compound we have all the different assets and we really can cover a lot really we're here for whatever the artist needs right so it's interesting because um M Michael you you mentioned um the sort of demise they used to be called anr right artists and repertoire people right and on all the all the major record companies and even the smaller reputable ones they all had anr
22:25 guys who helped develop a particular performer not just in their music but in in their appearance how they how they do you know various um appearances whether it's radio or super mar all that kind of stuff and and yeah you know until you said it never occurred to me that who's doing that nowadays that that sort of artist management function um I I I don't think you know I don't think it really exists anymore so you guys bring that to the table as well yeah I mean and we all there's different levels of doing that
23:01 right like an anr could be somebody who just connects somebody for one song and you work with them one time and that could be that or for example we're about to start managing an artist and that when you manage the artist you know you're doing everything for them you're aning you're helping develop them right and I think also to speak to one of your other points like traditionally musicians definitely the movie um star kind of thing after the music career is a great way to keep that going the most common thing you're seeing now that even people are doing simultaneously is podcasting or live streaming is really popular right now
23:37 and so there's a guy named ad um who's a pretty big rapper from LA but he is almost more popular now as a podcaster Liv streamer but he still makes music and so again just like me you know people know me I would almost say more people know me for underground whether that's the magazine or the studio cuz that's we built it intentionally to be that umbrella but then the music people know me for B just all works and people know me as this music business guy and that plays well into my brand um so I think it's just really about
24:12 understanding that and kind of what you're going for nowadays and there's no box you know you can be a podcaster and a rapper at the same time nowadays and people accept that kind of stuff yeah interesting it's it's funny because one the I was just going to ask you are you guys thinking about getting into talent management because that would seem to be essentially what you're doing already right um but but to do it on a more formalized basis absolutely um because we can help them in all these different aspects like you were saying like Andrew said you know we have the recording studio we have the content also recently
24:48 you know Gavin not only is our partner at the studio but he's really became our head of media for the magazine as well so it's just cohesively working really well with whether they're client or artists that we want to manage you know there's a big difference between signing an artist to a record label deal like a recording deal versus a management deal um and for us as a company what that means is just getting our Capital up because when you sign an artist it's just about being the bank really and like you were saying taking risks and having it be a numbers game and all that and you know most people too nowadays
25:25 the LA record label world word is very taboo most people don't want to in a record label nowadays especially in rap yeah especially in rap so there's this whole stigma that people just want to be independent but I think the other side of that coin is people have no idea what it takes to be independent you know whether that's as a business or as a artist you know it's a lot of money like time failure you know well and and there's independent and there's independent right because there there's always been independent record labels but often times the
26:00 independence extends to you know what they record but the distribution is still being you know channeled through one of the major record companies right that's that's how it worked for guys like Frank Sinatra and um you know he started his own uh reprise was his own record label right but I think reprise was distributed through Capital Records which was his longtime record company before he started his own you know his Independent Record Company right so there's all kinds of ways that these um that these deals happen and you know is it is it creative Independence that they want is it
26:36 literal Independence right I think those are all different things so so are you guys creative Independence nowadays you know people don't want to be told what to do or not to do or stuff like that you know yeah so are you guys contemplating uh starting a record label or we've kicked it around um and that was kind of the conversation when we were looking at whether to do a label versus management and pretty much the difference is if you have a record label like was saying you're really the bank and you're really just responsible for
27:11 everything related to this all financials yeah like absolutely everything and then all the money that comes in goes through you and it's very much like a real like partnership even more than a partnership you know you're really becoming like an investor in this person um so again like we're just not really at that point yet um and just financially or just kind of in our notoriety you know I think as we grow whether that could be me growing as an artist that could help the brand get more notoriety or the brand growing or vice versa um so yeah I think and we've
27:48 already kind of brief like briefly started it by putting out music as the collective and you know doing different things um somebody some somebody told me really something interesting the other day when I was picking their brain about whether we do management versus a label and he said to me because especially we're such a company of services and we got the studio and the mag you know we want to work with the labels we want capital or Warner to come to us and say I want to book your spot out for a week or you know um book your whole magazine or whatever right um somebody said to me when you're a label and you brand
28:24 yourself as that it kind of makes the labels not want to work with you yeah because that makes sense but if your management it's cohesive more seamless yeah so not to say that I wouldn't start one if I had a million dollars sitting in an account right now I probably would start one you know because yes everybody wants to be independent but a lot would change when you put six figures in front of someone and a real opportunity you know right absolutely so I've always thought of underground stos as kind of being the air beam and B of of the the
29:01 you know media Studio business so if you would take us through you know how how the studio Works kind of in its its guts if you will um you know someone wants to do a a video or an audio project um how how do they find you how do you get set up with them how does you know how does it work in in in terms of them coming to your student stud give us a flavor of that if you would totally go ahead Andrew all right all right I was just going to say the
29:37 what's cool about underground is yeah we've been talking a lot about like the business side and kind of the the ex's and O of what we do behind the scenes but really the studio space we have right in Downtown LA we got 20 plus different sets of all these different kind of cool things that you can do photos music videos all these things content whatever so we got a one room is a casino one room is like a '90s bedroom that's like probably the most popular one we have one room that's just a big orange furry room with all these weird furry orange things and like so
30:14 basically we have it all available online really is how people book it right through underground mag.com that's where we have everything all different sets that you can book and see and just see pricing and all that um Gavin do you want to elaborate on that absolutely so we we have underground mag.com and that probably accounts now is approaching 40 to 50% of our business which we're really trying to push because it's more independent for us and the only fee is the credit card fee right and we're we're also on other platforms like you said Kevin similar to
30:49 Airbnb there's platforms called ppace and called gigster There's even one called spacer and that's basically Airbnb but by the hour right so our spaces start at $75 an hour and it's a 2hour minimum plus a $50 cleaning fee so it's basically $200 flat and you can get in for two hours usually with brand new customers especially to incentivize them booking through a website we offer an hour free because ppace and gigster similar to Airbnb they do the advertising for you you know so they're still finding us clients but then they
31:25 take fees 15% from us and then also add 15% on the customer end so it's a it's a total of 30% extra for the customer or you know in total that they're getting on each transaction which don't get me wrong they do get a lot of business for us and it's free advertising you know so their fee is definitely Justified and they provide insurance but um we're trying to kind of migrate some of our business especially with people that we know personally now that we've developed all these relationships you know if somebody hits us up that we know we just say hey go book through the website it's
32:00 a lot easier that way it's a win-win we're making a tiny bit more money but they're saving a tiny bit more money too um you know but there is all these different aspects we have advertising on Instagram and people hit us up on there um to book so we try and have multiple different streams of income that can all add up that way we're not putting all of our eggs in one basket you know and how many how many um individual um I I I guess they're not called booths but individual sets or or Studios within your overall Studio how many do you have now I know
32:37 this I'm related to the company that manages the building but I don't we have about 15 to 20 looks sets however you would call it even some of the areas that are not made for like shooting particularly people utilize like our changing room for example um sometimes when it's appropriate people may use some of the hallways are outside in the parking lots and stuff so it's a lot of just opportunity even for small events as we've done before and um yeah it's really great and we do have three different rooms so one of them is just
33:13 one kind of set which is like our club set very popular for parties and stuff and then our other two rooms are like multi set what you would call them so you rent those rooms and you get access to like seven plus sets versus the club you really just get the one look so sometimes book people book multiple rooms at a time or we've had people book the whole place you know for days stuff like that yeah like right now sorry Andrew um right now we have a whole film crew in there and they are shooting on these really expensive cameras they have a audio guy a lighting guy all like a 20
33:49 person crew today and they're filming it all for vertical and it's for a vertical platform and so it's interesting to see how the market is Shifting to more Domin dominant um vertical content sometimes we have people come in and they just film with their iPhones so with all of our sets we try and make it not only as customizable as possible we have these LED lights that you can control either by button or with an iPad that you can control to any different color that you want so we have our Casino our Armory mirrorbox LED hallway like Andrew is saying we have a orange carpet room Pink
34:24 Carpet room '90s bedroom and when you book these multi set space bases it really um with what we were talking about with the 2-hour minimum if somebody comes in for two hours they're really only going to use two or three of those spaces and that's why we really love the multi set because it is not only longevity for us but it also helps with client retention you know sometimes somebody will come use the uh casino but then they'll come back another time and they need to use the mirrorbox or the Armory and so that really helps us with getting multiple people in there multiple times um but yeah overall you know I would agree I think we have 16
35:00 sets now and we have uh you know we're adding a few more here and there but it it's really fun to be able to explore different options within the same room but you can have 10 different looks right and and how does it work in terms of uh video or audio equipment do people bring in they have to bring in their own equipment their own lights and all that or or do you guys have that available as well how how does how does that aspect of it work they bring it all you know that would be like the next level of growing the company would be like creating the rental side of that which
35:37 again would just take Capital to buy a bunch of lights and cameras and something that's really important to have for the next level is we have what's called a psych wall which is like a a corner wall all white kind of rounded it looks like an Infinity wall really um great for photo shoots products stuff like that and something popular that they do at the big studios they have like a grid I think it's called right Gavin on the ceiling where the lights kind of they may even just be there already when you come in or you can put your lights on there or you can rent them so to answer your question right now we're just in the rental space
36:13 of the the spaces but then when we get into more capital I would love to see us get more gear I'm sure Gavin would love to have a bunch of gear that he could utilize in our company for his own stuff for our own stuff too you know and and um so I I I take it someone they'll rent the studio space from you they bring in their equipment they they do their audio Andor video recording so then now they've got their raw material right right now it has to be edited down maybe some some alternative tracks need to be laid in um do do you do you guys
36:52 work with with that as well or do you have um relationships with you know editing Studios how does that part of a project work for you know for someone who's who's uh working with you guys yeah so people will rent the space to do stuff right if someone's coming through like Pier space gigstar website that's typically just them coming in to rent it and they're totally responsible for whatever they want to do you know now there's the other side of it where we're kind of saying out Gavin's like our head of media this is me and Andrew putting together packages typically for past
37:27 magazine clients that will take advantage of different things that we offer like recording studio time you know content whether that's photo or video and they're hiring us to essentially come use our space we'll produce the the content for them we'll even promote it through our platforms um and so that's where Gavin really heavily comes in um and not only being a super big help just with the studio running it together um but also for example this Saturday Andrew and I won't be at the studio but Gavin can be there working with the client he's GNA film something for them he's going to
38:02 edit it get it to us we're going to promote it post it you know put these people in the magazine as well so there's a level of it where people can come to us and it could be full service you know they don't have to do anything but that would need to be discussed and stuff like that sometimes people come through and then we make those agreements once they're there and we just meet them you know we've built it to kind of at any moment just create the different opportunities and points of sales and like even for Gavin to be in there might be a client that we brought to him but he can upsell them on a music video that he could do for them now or
38:38 you know we can upsell them on the magazine recording or promo or performing or just all these different things gotcha did you Andrew did you you had something you wanted to add or or I was actually just curious in your um film making Kevin have you ever done anything like a peer space or a gigster have you like booked sets like that digitally no I mean I I I I've been out of that realm for for a long time I think I made Let's see we made our our last feature film inh 1989 so okay and it was a direct to
39:14 video feature um so um my producing partner Rick Carter uh big big uh horror movie fan um me not so much but I was is more on the business side and Rick was on the creative side so it was my job to support him and his Creative Vision basically so um in 1987 Rick called me up and he said uh I need your help I want to make a a short film called horror brunch um and if you go on YouTube and look up horror brunch you will find it
39:49 and you'll also find these two guys who talk about movies they did a thing where they showed the movie and they talked about it that was something that happened just maybe a year or two ago and this horror brunch movie was incredibly successful we won several um horror film awards for it it was shown in college campuses all over the country um in in in in a time when you really didn't make money off of short films we actually did I it didn't cost us that much um but we actually made money off it and so then after that we were
40:24 casting around for an idea for a a feature film and we you know Rick came up with several and we couldn't get any traction because we were trying to get financing and finally I I we were sitting around us with a couple of our friends and I said look we got to put our best foot forward we got to turn horror brunch into a full length you know film right and so basically it became a spoof of the big Big Chill um and we rented this dilapidated house over in what is now West Adams um and over a two week period we brought in
41:01 you know crew and cast and you know generators on and we we shot the footage for this film um and uh and we we had a distribution deal for it but this is this is how you know the the the business worked back then so there was a guy I don't remember his name but he had a company called Vista media he did direct to video um sales basically and he and he loved horror films and he loved our film um but um there but there was no nudity in it because Rick and I
41:37 just we just didn't believe in sort of gratuitous you know nudity right so he says to us I'll distribute your film but you got to put a couple of nude seeds in it wow right this is the kind of stuff that went on right and so I remember getting a call um one it was like a Sunday morning I'm at my new girlfriend's house and Rick is telling me you got to find some woman to be a body double because we got to put nude scenes and he and by the way you need to shoot the scenes because the actor who who would
42:14 have shot the scenes he's on another gig and I'm like okay there is no way I'm going to agree to shoot scenes with a body double while I'm at my girlfriend's house right right so long story short we got it all arranged we he actually put up the money for us to do it we cut these scenes in and it was so ridiculous because the body double did not at all look like the actress they play the role right but didn't care he sends the film he sends the movie out for distribution First Market that's interested is of all places
42:51 Poland this is like 1990 right Poland is interest but we have they have one cat can't have nudity had to take it out so so then we had to take it out I mean it was just this was you know this was the this was the movie business back then and it was around that time I kind of went I think I'm gonna focus on the real estate you know this is just yeah this is you know and I eventually marri that woman right and so you know I think it was a good thing that I exited so um you
43:28 know between then and uh 2020 I didn't do any media projects and then in 2020 as a result of covid I was talking with my friend Rick and as you guys probably know a lot of people in your business they had no work because the media business was shut down and so I came up with an idea to do a talk show called the way to wow show and we converted my living room into a TV studio once a month and we shot anywhere from four to seven eight episodes that then we released over the succeeding month and
44:03 we brought in a bartender for each segment and he the bartenders would you know create a cocktail themed to the discussion and that's cool so that was that was the that was the first season first two seasons of the show was that and then because of some personal things I I had to shut that down and then I reinvented the show as as you see it now so this show is actually an extension of that original show this is the sixth year of of of that show so that's real awesome um and and like you guys I mean
44:39 not honestly not not nearly as successful as you guys um but um you know you have to sort of weave your way through to find what works right that's that's the basic skill in business right and I I talk to people all the time who want to you know start a business when I said and and like like what do I need to do to start a business I say be flexible they're like but if I can come up with a great idea I'm like yeah you know there's a million great ideas out there literally at at least a
45:14 million but yeah and and this is what I think is so amazing about your story is I I don't I I I don't mean to be offensive but I mean you didn't really have a great idea you you have something that you really want to do and you just said okay we're going to figure out how to do it and in my experience there's far more successful businesses that come about because of that than there are because someone had a genius idea and they were lucky enough that the genius idea worked right exactly I mean it's not uncommon thing
45:50 to have a magazine or be in Media or do music right I mean it's the most competitive thing possible right um but I think it's really interesting you look at where Andrew started you look at where Gavin start you look at where I started we all you know 10 years ago had nothing to do with each other and we all had visions of probably how we wanted our life to go and stuff and didn't know that we were going to do this at all um but it's really interesting because we probably wouldn't have been able to do what we're doing now had we not all just been doing that leading up to it and you know this is kind of random but like now
46:25 that I'm starting to learn more just about real estate and looking at just bigger money and businesses and all the stuff you look at these skyscrapers in Downtown LA it's not one person that owns it because they get expensive or because they get wealthy it's multiple giant companies coming together years of planning and time and this is that on a small level you know people look at underground Studios and probably think oh my God how could this happen you know I remember before we got our studio we used to use this one studio called 408 Studios all the time and I was talking to the guy who owned that when we wanted to do like should we get our own like is it good does it make money um and one
47:02 person's answer is just irrelevant to ours because anybody can use peer space and gigster and that kind of stuff but nobody has what Gavin has what I have what Andrew has in a cohesion like we do um and that's why it works so well really and so that's why I'm confident it'll get to the next steps and you know we're all pretty level-headed guys we're all you know we want to grow and take those risks but we're not going to just do something ridiculous that could totally um be detrimental to everything we've built so far right so I feel really good about it and you know I'd be lying to tell you if it was uh
47:38 all perfect you know been a lot of ups and downs and we've all gone through a lot together growing and um that's if it was all perfect it would be something would go wrong sooner than later you know so well yeah probably would mean that you're you're not taking a realistic look at what's going on and there's all kinds of problems festering under the surface that you're just not confronting and and that's what a lot of business owners do as well they just brush all that stuff under the rug and then all of a sudden their business falls apart and they're they're like H how could this have happened everything
48:13 was going so well right right I I mean one of the thing that strikes me and and and i' I've gotten to know the three of you much better than you know be before you know this interview is um how well matched your abilities are um for for how complimentary they are and yet uh and and there there's there's like no ego um between the three of you which is also I think pretty rare in the media business so the only thing i' the only
48:49 thing I've seen like this is I was at the global milk and the milk and Global conference I think it was maybe two or three years ago and I went to a session uh Snoop Dog I'd never heard him speak before um I was just curious you know and he was there with the this this young guy um who um started I think it was a record label um that that Snoop Dog had finan but it was it was more it was more like almost like a management company it embedded a a record label as
49:24 well and you know know you would have thought that as famous as Snoop Dog was that he'd be out there going it's all about me I'm the guy you know if this is success and and quite to the contrary the two of them almost were trying to outdo each other in humility and it was very very impressive to watch because I think that is really the the heart of what makes a good Business Partnership and and that's cool that you pointed that out cuz I think that's what also
49:59 makes underground really like approachable and appealing to artists because like you know there's in this world of upand cominging artists especially in the hipop LA scene there's a lot of just like companies that you can go to that I think the people there are just maybe kind of rude or it's a kind of it's not as friendly of an environment or like you use the word like like I think other places maybe it's more of an egotistic side of things and approach to things and with us it's like you come to us and you're going to talk and meet with all three of us and we really I we really
50:36 treat somebody we work with who has a hundred followers on Instagram the same as the people we work with that have hundreds of thousands of followers you know so I think that's a a thing that has a has made underground Studios very appealing to in in this La world yeah absolutely and I think that the word of mouth spreads really positively for us cuz whether or not an artist ends up booking a magazine or a Content package or booking the photo or the video Studio you know we're not opposed to giving them knowledge like that's what's so positive about our area is of expertise
51:11 is somebody can come to posy like I was saying earlier about the DJ pack when you were gone I was telling them what a DJ pack is you know and he has that knowledge of how to actually be an artist in a in-depth process how am I going to get my music on Apple music on Spotify and then they can come to me and uh ask how am I going to do this for my vertical content how am I going to get the music video and so we have all these resources available we're kind of like a tool shed together an artist can come and record their song at our recording studio and then shoot their music video at our photo studio you know and it's kind of a all-in-one shop uh and it's
51:46 such a collaborative process I think artists find a lot of value in that yeah interesting interesting yeah we lost Andrew so I I I'm tempted to try something with you guys that I've never done before stealing from one one of my uh one of my favorite podcasters I don't know if you've ever heard of a a Woman by the name of Barry Weiss um she does a podcast called honestly and and Barry you know as she's kind of wrapping up a podcast um she'll ask the person okay are you willing to do a lightning round and and the lightning round is really
52:21 just a series of very quick questions and and the answers are supposed to be kind of one or two Word answers and it's designed to give um give the viewers a little bit of insight into who you are um as as people not just as as as businessmen so are you willing to do this experiment with me absolutely all okay so um so if if why don't we just we'll I'll I'll pose a question if we'll just go kind of Andrew Michael gabin will kind of at least from my
52:57 perspective that'll kick us around in a circle okay so um okay so here we go um uh current favorite artist and we just answer in two words right yeah two or three words yeah um Travis Scott Michael um I'll give you a couple I really I'm in R&B right now Chris Brown Usher CH whis okay Jo quis that's a good choice I was just editing his tour documentary last night um my favorite artist right
53:33 now and he's been my favorite artist for like three years now I gotta say pop smoke okay I'm sorry say again you you you you uh it was garbled oh sorry I was saying um he my bad Michael said ja quis was one of his favorite artists and I just was looking at his footage last night because I'm a part of a documentary that he's working on about his tour a couple years ago but my favorite artist would be the the late pop smoke is his name okay so he's no longer with us but he's he made great great music okay okay next um what is your Mo most important core
54:12 value H loyalty that would definitely be one of mine as well I would say respect you know very important totally I agree with both those I'd have to go with honesty and integrity yeah yeah yeah all good um um if um where do you think your your your business let me let me make this so it can be a short answer what do you think
54:48 should be the next next aspect of underground Studios that gets added you know on top of what underground Studios is already about H there's so many but I guess one of them I would say is an employee at some point we don't have any employees so an employee would be great okay Andrew's tired of driving downtown I'm just kid I am too but we love it still but I would say um two-part answer as well getting more units or just another
55:24 unit maybe this year right we have four units technically in the building right now I'd love to see us get a fifth by the end of 2025 we hope to hit 15 to $20,000 months this summer in our in our high peak so that's the goal oh wow and then I would say you know we're all Gavin are you 28 just turned 29 in February 29 Gavin's a little bit older than Andrew and I but I would say in the next three to five years Max I'd like to see us own a building as well okay yeah absolutely I agree with all
56:00 those I'd love to uh to just see the studio have a manager and be self- sustaining and have us be expanding in different areas whether that's you know real estate or videos but I would love to see underground as a brand get to that 10 20,000 mark on uh Instagram and and Facebook on social media I just love to see us blow up and not necessarily that that's my number one answer but I wanted to differentiate apprciate you guys uh answers and I think that that's something I definitely want to see for the business and we don't have the biggest audience right now but what we do have is a lot of artist loyalty and
56:36 everybody really you know is a positive and acceptant of the vibe that we're putting out and you know people are really supportive of everything that we do so I'm very thankful for the audience that we've grown so far fantastic okay last last one um assuming that uh Andrew's wish comes true and you get an employee so so you're not chained to to the studio seven days a week um where where would you like to go on vacation once you have that employee I would say Tokyo Japan my
57:11 number one destination that's a good one me and my girlfriend really want to go there um I want to do something crazy like I'm going to Hawaii this summer which will be cool but I want to go to like the Bahamas or something just really cool like that you know totally I'm saving up right now for a vacation to St Thomas it's in the Virgin Islands you don't technically need a passport to visit because it's a US Territory um so I want to take my girl there eventually for sure it's see I could see in like 20 years Gavin you just having a nice
57:46 little like Villa Hut in St Thomas we come once a year it there that'd be amazing okay well if you have that in 20 years um yeah I'll be your caretaker because I'll be a really old guy then and that's probably about all I'll be able to do you're always welcome well you guys it it it was it's really it's really been great talking with you we're we're coming up on an hour um and uh I you know sometimes the show doesn't go that long and and I I I
58:22 sort of you know strung it out as far as I could without uh you know uh tax taxing the audience uh you know because people some people just they just don't want to be engaged you know for for a long period of time but um uh you know hopefully this will be the first of many visits that we have together as you as you guys continue to to grow underground Studios and and all your other activities it'd be great to follow your success and and and see how things grow and develop but uh really thank you so much for making the time to uh to come
58:57 on on the show today I I really really appreciate it thank you for having us I love this this restream I've never seen this before either this is a really good website yeah yeah I mean it it is a nice platform and this is this is being live stream not just to the um you know uh regular places YouTube LinkedIn Facebook X but it's also on dve it's on Twitch um and it's on two or three others so it's it's it's going out to um uh seven platforms um total and like on
59:34 Facebook it's it's on both my um profile but it's also on uh a group that I have on Facebook so uh wow yeah it's really a neat little neat little tool so so if you guys will hang tight um for just a minute while I wrap up the show and then we can just talk offline for for a moment so so folks thank you so much for joining us really appreciate it especially the live viewers I got to give a a shout out to lamman who Tunes in all the way from Africa that's that's how far your reach is going U Lam is my
60:09 buddy um he I he rarely misses a show um so it's always good to see you thanks thanks for your comment there uh tomorrow at 5: PM Pacific time is my every other week show jiggers is place we're going to sit back and and have a cocktail and talk about all the nonbusiness related aspects of Life the topic for tomorrow is um how can we re rebuild societal institutions I you know I don't think anybody would disagree
60:44 with the statement that trust in societal institutions is at an all-time low and and I I think that's that's not a good thing we we need to be able to trust ourselves I me mean trust each other and we need to be able to come together and as as a community and and have a sense that uh you know we're all in this together so but but a topic like that is best discussed over a cocktail so we don't get too so I hope you'll join me tomorrow again at 5:00 pm Pacific time at jigger's place which you guys uh
61:19 jiggers is place is my home bar so okay nice got it and then next week on Monday at 10: a.m is my show uh trust and Estates weekly and Tuesday at 10: a these are all Pacific time of course is my show business lessons from the military and then a week from today we'll be back for the next edition of people making money so one last time thank you so much to my guests Andrew Michael Gavin the the three brains behind underground Studios and underground mag and uh I'll make sure
61:54 that there are links to their site so if you want to get more information you'll be able to contact them I know that they'll they will you know love to help you out if you've got a media project in the offing these These are the the the you know the men to make it happen so uh you don't you don't I can shamelessly plug you guys I know you you're too modest to do it part of my job is to shamelessly plug you so um you will not find a better group to work with uh than than Gavin Michael and Andrew at underground Studios so I I unreservedly
62:29 recommend them to you so we'll hopefully see you tomorrow afternoon and signing off as I always do Marie darling you are my bell you know you are courage at all times