Pink Floyd to NFTs: Scott Page on Direct-to-Fan Music (Episode 154)

Make Music Your Business.

You learned how to make music. Nobody taught you how to make a living making music. In Episode 154 of The Career Musician, Nomad sits down with Scott Page, the saxophonist and guitarist known for his work with Pink Floyd, Supertramp and Toto, and the CEO of Think:EXP, a Los Angeles media company focused on live immersive entertainment.

Scott walked in calling himself a career musician, and then spent the hour talking like an entrepreneur. His big subject is NFTs and a direct-to-fan music business model, but the lessons underneath it work no matter what platform you use: know your story, build a small community that loves what you do, and get educated. Here is what stood out.

Is this a business or a hobby?

Scott starts every artist conversation with one question. Is this a business or a hobby? Both are fine. If you want to cut records for fun and you don't care about the money, he loves that. But if you want a career, your fans become customers, and you have to think like an entrepreneur.

He laid out why the old model hurts. Streaming pays a few thousand dollars per million streams, and only a small slice of any catalog ever hits a million. Clubs still pay what they paid decades ago. Scott remembered making 50 to 100 bucks a night playing clubs almost 40 years ago, when his house payment was 235 bucks. The club money has barely moved. Now you often have to bring the audience too.

"Businesses make money. Hobbies are fun. And I have nothing wrong with a hobby."

Scott Page, 6:07

That is the whole TCM mission in one line from a guest: Make Music Your Business.

What an NFT actually is

Nomad called Scott's explanation the best breakdown he had ever heard. A fungible token is something like a dollar bill: swap yours for mine and nothing changes. A non-fungible token is unique. It points from the blockchain to an object, digital or not, so you can own the original and nobody else has it.

For musicians, Scott sees it as a fan engagement and loyalty tool with a contract built in. Splits can live in the smart contract, so if four writers agree on 25 percent each, everyone gets paid at the same moment every time it sells. Creators can also earn a percentage when an NFT resells on the secondary market. He walked through examples from that time, including the Stoner Cats project funding a show before it was made, and a Kings of Leon album drop with perks like show access built in.

Whatever you think of NFTs today, the principle he kept returning to holds up: own the relationship with your fans instead of renting it from a platform.

Build a hive, not a follower count

Scott's motto: if you want to survive, you have to build a hive. He referenced Kevin Kelly's idea of a thousand true fans, then went smaller. Get the first hundred people. Build a repeatable model. Then scale.

His proof was a 19-year-old photographer he met at an NFT meetup. She paid all her bills from a small community of collectors, and even carved off part of her contract for her local community center. Another artist friend told him 125 fans covered her whole year because they buy everything she does.

He also warned about building your house on social media. A friend of his built a massive following and lost it when the platform cut him off. Use social as the front door, then move your super fans into a space where you own the data: your list, your site, your own community.

Nomad tied it to the working player's version of the same thing. Repeat business. A small circle of people who love your sound and keep hiring you. Work begets work.

The SPACE formula: story, plan, army, conversion, execution

Scott teaches a framework he calls SPACE.

Story. Nobody cares that you are from Cincinnati and play guitar. What problem are you solving, and what do you stand for? Get that clear and you have the words and phrases to find the audience that cares.

"What you stand for is more important than what you sell."

Scott Page, 19:04

Plan. He swears by Lean Startup principles and the lean canvas, a one-page business plan you fill out in about 20 minutes and keep refining. Find the smallest thing you can make, test it with real people (not just friends and family who will say it is genius), and only then put money behind it.

Army. Your influencers and super fans. That guy who shows up at every gig might be a world-class web developer. The drummer's dad might run charity drives at a bank. List everyone around you with influence and figure out what is in it for them. His example: a country duo in their 60s who also ran a foundation helping veterans get into homes. They built their whole business around playing veterans events, and that community now supports them.

Conversion. The best place to convert a fan is face to face, and a gig is exactly that. Get the email, then build trust by giving value before you ask for anything.

Execution, and education. Put in 30 to 40 hours learning the space before you jump in.

Use the downtime to educate yourself

Scott's own story is a lesson in curiosity. His father was a serial entrepreneur who, Scott says, helped develop the wah-wah pedal, and Scott grew up around the studio that became Sound City.

On a two-year tour with Pink Floyd, he decided to use the road time to read business books. David Gilmour asked what he was reading, and he said In Search of Excellence, because he planned to have a business after the tour. Within about 18 to 20 months he started a company with Pink Floyd producer Bob Ezrin, which became the CD-ROM company 7th Level. Scott says their interactive cartoon starring Howie Mandel sold 11 million units.

Nomad loved this part most. Most musicians get the gig and think they have arrived. But on the road and in the studio there is tons of downtime, and nobody is going to educate you for you. That is Savvy from the ETHOS code: learning the business side while everyone else is just hanging.

"The only thing that's real is you and me talking right now. Everything else is an illusion."

Scott Page, 43:19

The takeaway

Tech changes. The principles in this conversation don't. Know what you stand for. Build a small, loyal community you own. Make a simple plan, test it, and keep learning in the downtime. If you want a framework to start with, grab the free plan of attack (POA) worksheet, and read up on the career side of the job with the free Get the Gig guide.

Get the gig. Keep the gig. Build the career.

Watch on YouTube or find every episode on the TCM Podcast page.