Ko Kawashima, music marketing pioneer, entrepreneur, and co-founder of BPM (brands+music), spoke to Laurence Trifon for Hypebot at last week's Bandwidth Conference. As the environment continues to shift, the branding strategy expert sees tremendous opportunity for artists and brands to help each other grow.
HYPEBOT: What does BPM (brands+music) do?
KAWASHIMA: Back in the Renaissance era, the Medici family was a patron to artists, supporting them in their musical endeavors. In the same way, we’re looking to have brands utilize their resources to support artists. What we do differently from other businesses is that we look to work with the brand to identify where they come from, where they are today, and where they want to go. We then create a program of music that fits them. We don’t have a roster of artists that we just use to try to fit a brand’s needs. We’re actually going to go out and apply something that is appropriate for who they are. And for the artists that we do identify that are appropriate for the brand, we enable them to utilize the brand’s resources in the way of finances and distribution.
HYPEBOT: What’s the most important factor you consider when pairing brands and bands?
KAWASHIMA: Our idea is not for this to be a first date. There have been plenty of other brand-band...
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