What was your journey into the music industry?
Having studied English with music at Uni, I knew finding the right words to unpack sound was my true passion. How that was going to manifest itself into a career however was completely unknown to me. Little did I know that Creative Assistant roles existed, matched my career ambitions to a T, and would be the start of a journey I could never have imagined.
Having ogled at the offices in Soho, as soon as I saw the role opportunity at West One Music I knew I needed to apply immediately. I was lucky enough to land this dream role and begin my career just before the country went into lockdown. This has meant that my first steps in the industry have looked a little different than I might have imagined, but the supportive community that is the West One Music team have made me feel so welcome albeit remotely!
Tell us about your role at West One Music?
My role is based within the Production Team. I support creatively across multiple projects for the catalogue and ensure all the assets are delivered on time and ready for release. This includes coming up with album titles, track names, writing descriptions and devising briefs for artwork direction. I also work with marketing to write useful materials such as EPKs and album one-pagers that are circulated to the Sales team to provide the story behind the sound.
I feel really lucky to work closely with a lot of the music and artists that we release, especially when we receive great initial reactions to first listens and album artwork in our New Music Focus sessions. It’s so exciting to see albums we’ve worked hard on nailing down the creative vision out in the world and ready to take on a life of their own.
What advice do you have for anyone starting out in the industry?
Don’t give up. Delve deeper than you have before to discover new and exciting sounds, write reviews of your favourite albums or artists in your spare time, or take an established album and redesign its artwork. One day, that time spent squirrelling around in the depths of Spotify could be really useful in accelerating your career to the next level.
What is your favourite album on the West One Music catalogue?
For me, it has to be Chapters that comes from the insanely talented Yazmyn Hendrix. Not only is she a hypnotic performer, but she is also amazing to work with and it’s been so exciting watching the creative come to life for this project. I’m so glad that we also released the EP on streaming platforms (November 2020) and can’t wait to see her songs become favourites for a whole new fanbase.
Ellie is also a contributing writer for the music blog Girls Need Music, which aims to empower women who love music by sharing musical talents from a wide range of genres.
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