Successful Musicians Podcast
Interviewee: Ezra Vancil
Interviewer: Jason Tonioli
Jason Tonioli: Welcome to the podcast. Today my name is Jason Tonioli and my special guest today is Ezra Vancil. Ezra is a singer-songwriter. He’s been a producer. He’s an author. Ezra, you as we were talking earlier before we started, you’re an entrepreneur, you’re doing marketing stuff. You’ve got a very interesting kind of early years background story where you’ve kind of been some you know, record label type of stuff, which I think is was everybody’s dream back in the day. You’ve got
Jason Tonioli: I’m sure you have some battle wounds to share about that, which I think it’s gonna be really fun to hear. But and you’ve had some comment some demons in your life as well, like I think most people do, that I think everybody has their own little set of demons that we work through that and oftentimes music gets us through a lot of that. So I am super excited to have you on the podcast today. So welcome.
Ezra Vancil: Jason, thank you, man. I’m really glad to be here today.
Jason Tonioli: So Ezra, you are you’re a Texas guy. Singer songwriters. I like to kinda share a little bit of just where people came from, a little bit of kind of their early, you know, how did you end up doing music and start out and then we’ll kinda progress. So sh share a little bit of background for people so they can get to know you a little bit.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. I yeah, I don’t know if I had a choice. My parents were musicians and they traveled around and they were gospel musicians. So they played music, they tr started churches and we pl we moved so much I don’t even know how many places we lived. I don’t remember any of my young school life. But I it was all music all the time. And when I became like a early teen, thirteen, fourteen, probably fifteen years old actually.
Jason Tonioli: Nice. And s and so d t talk a little bit about that s signing with a record label. I mean it I mean this was probably what, twenty five, thirty years ago now?
Ezra Vancil: Yeah, this was it was ninety two, ninety three, I think it was the end of ninety two maybe, when that when the I got signed. And it was it was crazy because we were just small town kids and it’s like the movies. We went in, somebody financed us making a record, a friend of ours. So we went to a pretty big Dallas studio and it just happened that there had been an LA team in there.
Jason Tonioli: And I’m just so people can kinda hear how those type of deals kinda work. I mean, they paid for your album to be done for the most part and then they were probably taking a big cut if you ever made it big, correct?
Ezra Vancil: my gosh. Yeah. Yeah. And I was so young and naive. I had no idea what was going on. What they basically paid for everything. We I we quit. I had a job, I no longer worked. They bought us a studio, we lived in the studio, so they paid for that first album, but then they set us up to tour, they got a t a tour bus, and we just were living off of our future earnings.
Jason Tonioli: Well and I’m guessing that you were having to pay them back with your small cut as well, correct?
Ezra Vancil: Well, so I kind of lucked out on this. I d I never did pay them back. So I my band broke up and then they signed me as a solo artist. And what my deal was that it was supposed to come out of whatever proceeds came from my sales through a the label, which we never even got a full album put out by the time they dropped me.
Jason Tonioli: Yeah.
Ezra Vancil: And so what it was is that I had seven years, if I made any kind of money over a certain amount, which I don’t remember, they would start taking their cut from me. And it wasn’t a whole lot. It was like 10,000 a year or something. They would start getting like a 20% cut of that. And then there was two people involved. There’s management and a label. So they basically would have taken all my proceeds when I started making over a certain amount.
Jason Tonioli: Gotcha. So I mean as you look back on that, do you re you probably learned a ton along the way, do you re ever regret going the label route?
Ezra Vancil: my goodness. You know, back then I don’t know that there was a lot of other ways, like in the 90s. Indie stuff, you know, there’s a few bands. In fact, I knew one band that was kind of trying to do it on their own, but in the end, they also got a label to go, you know, bigger. So I don’t regret that. I do regret I was so back then I was I was unbending at all. In fact, that’s why I got dropped.
Jason Tonioli: Yeah. Well and the money’s gotta come from somewhere, right? You know, it’s just
Ezra Vancil: It’s gotta come from somewhere, yeah.
Jason Tonioli: So if it was the government, we’d have a whole different story around that. But with I’m just curious. So if you if you could go back and just give yourself advice or if you could go back and like redo some things, or give your younger version of yourself in the nineties some advice, what would you tell yourself? I mean, would you tell yourself to go read some books? Would you say go to some school classes? I mean what I’m just curious what specific things you wish you could tell yourself now.
Ezra Vancil: Like yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Yes, I would have I would have educated myself, however that looked back then. I mean, we had we had good music business books back then. I could have gone to the library and probably even more so there was a lot of other bands. We were in a whole, you know, culture of bands back then that I could have went and talked to some of these other bands that were signed and learned from each other, had more of a community thing. And we just I was just by myself.
Jason Tonioli: Well and I think I mean that’s great advice. So if I one thing I’ve found in the music industry is even the people that you think are untouchable, you know, like big deal acts out there, they’re just normal people too. And I think if somebody’s reaches out to say, you know, here’s my situation, I’m just looking for some advice, I think in general most musicians
Ezra Vancil: yeah. Yeah, I’ve just done that recently. Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: And oftentimes in enjoy just being, you know, treated as a normal person in a lot of ways and sharing what they’ve learned, you know, whether it be the hard way or the easy way. Because we’ve all done things hard, you know, if we can help somebody avoid the landmines and pitfalls along the way that we’ve experienced, then you know, life can be better for the next person coming down that path if they’re smart enough to realize that they should call and ask about how to do that, right?
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. Absolutely. And I do think it is natural to us to want to give away what we find, you know, and somebody asks and I’m more than willing. I know what well I’ve asked for other help from musicians. They’re it’s they’re excited to give it away ’cause you’ve you’ve learned it. You’ve come to it by hard means, you know.
Jason Tonioli: tot totally.
Jason Tonioli: having access to people who’ve can educate you or help you learn and avoid problems, essentially you’re gonna ten X your speed of how quick you can learn it. You can go learn stuff from a book like you, you know, that’s how we had to do it in the nineties, you’d go look for whatever the book was and there was probably one or two out there at the time, or there was some music school where you go pay, you know, however tens of thousands, hundred thousand dollars, whatever to go to university and learn it. But the reality is, you know, if you’ve
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. That’s again that’s really big because we don’t know what we don’t know and we don’t know it and then unless you get around people that do know and sometimes it’s hard, you know, to get around them. So I’m all about if you if there’s a paid solution to sit with a coach or something, why wouldn’t you do that? ‘Cause that’s really what you gotta do anyways. You gotta get in a room with somebody else that can tell you what you don’t know, you know.
Jason Tonioli: Right. Well and it’s interesting. I mean you talk about being in the room with that one person. I’ve been in a lot of they call them mastermind groups. I don’t know if you’ve been any parts where essentially there’s a dozen people or twenty, thirty people. Essentially, you know, conferences oftentimes kind of function a little bit of this if you’ve gone to a big conference with hundreds of people, but it’s harder to find the right people. If you can find that right similar experience type of group, you know, the twenty, thirty people in the room, all of a sudden
Ezra Vancil: I’ve been in some.
Jason Tonioli: That are similar to you and can have done the thing. They’ve, you know, like, you know, we’ve done albums, we’ve done, you know, we spent money on Facebook ads, you and I are talking earlier. We’ve done marketing. You know, you start getting people saying, Well, I tried this and I tried this and finding out what worked. All of a sudden, maybe it would have taken you ten thousand dollars worth of Facebook ads to spend it. But, you know, if I talk to Ezra, it’s like, Well, I tried that thing and I spent ten thousand dollars, don’t do that. Here’s what is working. I just saved myself ten thousand dollars. So it’s so it’s so hard to put a
Ezra Vancil: Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: a price on I think, you know, what it you know, when people are trying to get into those rooms with the right people, those really are game changers. And I think what’s funny is the bigger I don’t want to call it big deal people, they’re not necessarily big deal people, but getting in the right rooms that are really going to help you level up oftentimes will require more sacrifice or a higher price or going somewhere and making the effort to do that. But
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. It’s man, it’s so true. And you know, I had something from an I’ve been in several bands and I had one band in my twenties after all this went down that man, it was really good and we were the critics loved it. Everybody loved this and we just couldn’t get it working. And then the guy that I was partnered with in that band, he went on to another band right after me and they blew up all over the radio and everything. And he goes, he called me and he was dude, it’s just the network. That’s all it is.
Jason Tonioli: You do.
Ezra Vancil: is to t to start getting around these people that you want that what they have, you know.
Jason Tonioli: Yeah. Well it you were I had planned on kinda going this direction, but with those rooms or the masterminds or the groups of people you hang around, I think if you’re a musician, if there’s a way that you can schedule some sort of you know, we all we all love to vacation or know we should vacation or travel. If you can plan, hey, let’s go get we’re gonna get three bands or the four bands together and we’re all gonna go on a cruise together, or we’re gonna go to
Jason Tonioli: types of retreats. And what’s really cool is if for any and don’t talk to your tax people about this, but if it’s a musician retreat to go and learn education, that’s a write-off for you. Like you can literally write off the entire trip. And so, you know, it’s not that it’s free, but you’re it’s a very much discounted rate when you’re running a business as a musician and you’re like, you what, I went down with three other bands and we talked about our marketing and we talked about how to get more gigs. The whole thing’s gonna be a write-off for you. You know, it like
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. That’s right.
Jason Tonioli: Like anyway, so it’s been really fun to kinda see the team down there just thrive and do just some really neat things. I mean, we’ve done we’ve done musician retreats down there. I’ve done we do a the team does lots of business retreats where you know people that are all in e-commerce businesses, I mean all types. But if you’re a musician and you’re looking for ways to maybe you can be the one to organize it and you know, our whether it’s our team or there’s ways you can actually figure out how to get your vacation for free.
Ezra Vancil: Wow, nice.
Ezra Vancil: yeah.
Jason Tonioli: kind of my wishful thing. I’m like, well would it wouldn’t it be cool to offer, you know, a band or a musician the ability to invite their fans on kind of a high, you know, high touch, you know, really cool experience where you come and hang out for the week with their artists that they’re you know, for your fans. I mean that you know, they’re gonna go on a vacation anyway. How cool would it be to go to with Ezra to go on this coffee tour where we learn about how c chocolate and cacao is made and we’re gonna go run down the river and see sloths and monkeys and, you know
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: Have the trip of a lifetime with somebody that, you know, thinks you’re real you know, there’s people you’re people, right?
Ezra Vancil: Yeah, yeah. I mean this is how it’s done nowadays. It’s I think I can’t remember the there’s an author, it’s gonna it’s slipping my mind, but she calls it a portfolio business is what artists have to have nowadays because it’s more than the concert anymore, the albums. You’re entering into something that is more like you’re talking about a lifestyle,
Jason Tonioli: Right. Well, and one of the people that I mean Russell Brunson, for anybody who’s wanting to learn about a little bit about marketing, Russell Brunson is a name. I’ll probably as soon as you say that out loud, you’re probably gonna get a whole bunch of Facebook ads. ’cause I’m sure somebody’s listening, but go look up ClickFunnels and some of the videos out there from him. But I’ve kind of really gone down deep into that, the stuff that Russell teaches. And it literally was I’d been a marketer for twenty years and done what
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: What most people would say was really I’ve done really well with my music, but kind of changing that how you think about interacting with fans and one of the big takeaways from him that I would just share with others, go look this up, go look up what value ladder is. Type in Russell Brunson Value Ladder on YouTube or anywhere and it’ll you’ll get a whole bunch of videos. But essentially the idea is if you’re, you know, whether it’s any business but it applies really well to music, you know, as a musician you record a song and you’re trying to get people to come in and
Jason Tonioli: get more of those taquitos and well here’s the deal of the day. Well here’s another song. So you can add a little bit more value. And it’s I hear a lot of musicians talk about sales and they say, you know, the word sale is like a four letter word and they’re scared to say it. And I think it’s super important as a musician to step back and say, okay, how, how can I deliver value
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: versus selling. You know, if you can literally help somebody with that first bite, and then if you really do have that next thing that would help them, you know, help them again and again and again, people are gonna wanna engage with you. If you’re helping them and delivering what you know they’re looking for or helping them you know see things in a different way. Or you know, there’s a song you wrote about you know your divorce or your addiction or whatever. There’s just so many or you know you’re finding your first love or breakups
Jason Tonioli: I mean, yeah, just go look at the country music.
Ezra Vancil: Okay.
Jason Tonioli: as well or doing Facebook Lives and YouTube’s lives. There’s so many options now these days to interact and kind of over deliver and you know just bring people behind the scenes, which you know, we don’t think it’s neat as an artist, but the behind the scenes is so interesting to so many people.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. It can be really you know, and I’ll tell you I’ll be honest with you, I really sh I still struggle with it. I’m a marketer by day and I’ve been working I’ve had to make my living in marketing in some sense through most of my life. Music has done it a few years of my life, but never enough. And I still to this day have icky feelings around certain things with music in that. And you know, I find ways around it. My thing is that I have friends though, I have a
Jason Tonioli: Right. Well, I’m curious, and I think maybe this will get to the an answer for you is the whole premise of this podcast is it’s called the Successful Musicians Podcast. And I think the definition of success, it’s so interesting to hear that defined by each person on this show. But i’m just curious for you, what does being a successful musician?
Ezra Vancil: you know, that’s a hard one. There’s part of what success is to me is to wake up and do what I want to do with my days and spend it with who I want to spend it with. That’s part of success. But when I move over and ask that for music, I think for me personally, music is a very personal expression. And it is for everybody. But success for me is to realize my vision. And that’s not just in the creation, but also
Jason Tonioli: I think it’s interesting as, you know, people when you say success, I think just culture today ties success to money. And I think the older you get, the more you realize that freedom that you’re talking about. That freedom is, you know, there’s a certain point where you do need to make enough money to be able to have that freedom, but once you
Jason Tonioli: Once you’ve reached that point where you’re not just stressing about can I pay the bills or the electric bill or p you know, pay for food, you know, what am I gonna eat tomorrow? All of a sudden there’s kind of a shift in what success now is, you know. And I think it’s you know, you talk about the art and the importance of
Jason Tonioli: Of connecting with, you know, making doing something that you’re pleased with and happy with. I’ve I’ve met people who are completely happy if they it’s if they’re just making music, they don’t even have to have anybody hear it. And I think that’s great. I mean if that’s if that’s somebody’s definition of success and it just makes you happy and you’re able to do what you want to do, fantastic. I do think there’s different levels, and I think part of it is what you feel called or passionate about, called to do, you know, or do you feel like you’re called to help.
Jason Tonioli: Others through, you know, you know, go through, you know, get through some of the things that you’ve lived through yourself. Do you do you have a desire to help people feel calm? Do you have I mean every person I think has to a ask that, you know, whether that be music or just, you know, kind of purpose of life, like what is it that
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. You know, and it’s a funny thing because you what you’re saying is exactly right is that it you’ve gotta find something that feels successful to you. And it’s not gonna look like what everybody’s selling, everything that you thought it was. Money is not isn’t gonna do it. It might not even be big shows. I know people that play big shows, I mean huge shows and are very unhappy as musicians. So
Jason Tonioli: Mm.
Ezra Vancil: You know, and in the end, I don’t care if I have to get my money from a business somewhere else or work in this, as long as I’m living in this relationship with music that I love, you know. And so it did take years to get there and it took throwing away the idea that there is a way that’s pat, but it’s just said that you can pick that up and it’ll work for you.
Jason Tonioli: Yeah. What I find interesting is you if you enjoy helping these other people get through I mean, I th I think we kinda found you know, you felt like there was that calling that you had and you do go and do those things for the divorce or for recovery, you know, these types of things. I think the older we get, the more we realize
Jason Tonioli: it’s I can help other people and we f kind of find more joy in serving and helping others oftentimes. And I think, you know, this whole pursuit of success type of idea, the it’s just interesting to find the fulfill you find fulfillment
Ezra Vancil: Yeah.
Jason Tonioli: as that’s what makes you feel full and feel that joy is helping others kind of work through, you know, to what your success is actually when you can pass it on to others. I think that’s a very telling thing that is you if you get yourself around a lot of people that have been successful we’ll call them. That’s gonna be a recurring theme that sometimes I don’t know that we even re realize that we’re doing it but you do.
Ezra Vancil: yeah.
Jason Tonioli: Yep.
Ezra Vancil: You’re playing into the big scheme of things in the world. You’re not just one guy on an island anymore.
Jason Tonioli: Well it’s it’s funny ’cause I think especially entrepreneurs get a lot of this, but I almost feel like when somebody gets an idea in your head, you know, you can call it, you know, I just had this idea or God put this idea in my head or w however you want to look at the world. But we all have these kind of thoughts and you know, they’re all good ideas and I almost feel like there’s, you know
Jason Tonioli: I can give him this next idea and the next idea. And what’s funny is a lot of times those little ideas and those little stepping stones that we didn’t think anything of, you know, you look backwards and you’ve done 20 of these really cool things now, and you’re like, holy cow, I could have never done the thing I just did had I not had all these other little ideas that I followed up on. And you know, I almost I just feel like in a lot of ways, you know, people are here for a purpose and it’s
Jason Tonioli: You know, it’s just interesting to see how certain people respond to those ideas and they progress based on whether they choose to act on hopefully they decide to act on the good ideas and not the bad ideas. But
Ezra Vancil: Yeah. Right, right. I think you’ll get more and more of the same. Like if you act on the bad ideas, you’ll get more of those. And if you act on the ones that are you’re inspired and that you know that can help others, more will be given to you. I think you’re on to something there because that’s how experientially that’s how it’s worked for me is when I was kind of talking earlier about having the courage when those ideas come to be the one that will step out and try it. And I do think like God
Jason Tonioli: yeah.
Ezra Vancil: Spirit gives me more ideas as I walk out in that kind of faith and go, okay, I’m gonna, I’m gonna be the one to try this and you know, and keep going with it.
Jason Tonioli: Well and I and I think and a lot of people never have the guts to do this and probably a lot of people should not. So don’t go quit your job. But it essentially for that I mean, I ended up quitting my job after twelve years and decided I was no longer going to work at this safe, amazing job at a at a bank that I was set for life in kind of a d what you call a lot of people would call a dream job. And but there was lots of little things along the way that, you know, gave me the courage to make the big step, but you know
Ezra Vancil: No.
Jason Tonioli: Five years earlier I would have laughed in your face and told you there’s no way that you know, you’re gonna leave that because it’s too scary, you know.
Ezra Vancil: well, we didn’t know this getting on this call, but we have that’s the same story for us because I had a safe job and I walked away and everybody thought I was insane and walked into an into a mindset. Now it was a little crazy. That’s I’ll I’ll put that disclaimer too. Don’t do what I did unless you really feel like you want to handle the consequences. I walked away totally without a plan B and said, I’m not gonna do.
Jason Tonioli: Still figuring it out.
Ezra Vancil: I was in a place that I never imagined that I could be after that. Well and I and I think for me as I look back on some of those moments where I feel like I found where what I was supposed to do, it was are you getting an echo on your side? No, but your audio did change. Let’s see here. I’m actually getting less echo because it sounds like you turned I hear you good. Still getting.
Jason Tonioli: Well and I and I think for me as I look back on some of those moments where I feel like I found where what I was supposed to do, it was getting are you getting an echo on your side?
Jason Tonioli: Let’s see here. Does that change it? How about no?
Ezra Vancil: I don’t know what we’re gonna change here.
Jason Tonioli: How’s that now? I am still getting a huge echo. What is going on? This has never done this.
Ezra Vancil: How’s that now? I hear you good. I don’t hear any echo on this side. What is going on? This has never done this.
Jason Tonioli: I’m gonna hit stop real quick.
Ezra Vancil: Let me hit stop real quick.
Jason Tonioli: Well, Ezra, this has been an awesome conversation. I th I think it’s just it’s just interesting to share perspectives. And I think a lot of these younger people that are coming up that kind of wonder how it used to be. I think there’s still a lot of the same business, but I think the reality is people need to spend time figuring out how is it we’re gonna serve people, you know, what are you called to do? And it I think if you can find that for yourself personally.
Ezra Vancil: I would well first they want to do music, they’ve made that decision and realize it’s a business they’re going into. And accept that. Go educate yourself on that. But in general, I would just say fall in love with your music and start to try to understand others. What are you speaking to in other people’s lives? Like you just said there, like what do I give to others that helps them
Jason Tonioli: First, they want to do music that made that decision and realized
Ezra Vancil: in their life and start to understand what is in a way that you can whether you use it in business or not, you can find your audience and go to that audience system given what you have.
Jason Tonioli: You can find it on and go to that on even what’s recovered. Yeah. Awesome. Well, Ezra, if people want to go learn a little bit about you, I mean I you’ve got some great music online. Where’s the best place for people to go check you out? And we’ll put links in the show notes for anybody listening as well, but where should they go check out? The easiest way is put it on.com and on
Ezra Vancil: The easiest way is just go to my website. It’s my name, Ezra Vinceal dot com. And on there I’ve got a couple of new albums out and a book. And you can just stay up to date as I sit right now it’s a limited release, a final, but it’ll be out streamed really soon. So just subscribe to me there. Follow me and check it out.
Jason Tonioli: But you can just after data sit announcing limited lease final, it’ll be out really soon.
Ezra Vancil: Thank you, Jason. I’m really glad to be on.