Sam Gribben - Local Practice
Sam is the former CEO of Serato and a champion of music tech in the context of New Zealand, where he is based. He discusses what makes a place work as a capital of innovation, of music tech and creativity - and why Auckland might be an attractive place for people looking for an alternative to a programming or startup career in Silicon Valley.
Music: reCreation by airtone (c) copyright 2019
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
AI Transcription
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, music, serato, new zealand, companies, worked, learning, big, instrument, play, tech fest, lots, artists, dj, practice, world, ableton, auckland, tech, bit
SPEAKERS
Sam Gribben, Andrew Dubber
Andrew Dubber
Hi, I’m Dubber, on the director of Music Tech Fest, and this is the MTF podcast. Now if you heard last week’s episode, you might have picked up a bit of a New Zealand accent in my guest, Morgan Donoghue. That’s because like me Morgan’s from New Zealand. We did the interview in New Zealand and we talked about some fantastic and well known New Zealand music tech companies. And since I was in New Zealand, who better to open to the studio as well. Then Sam Gribben, formerly the CEO of Serato, taking it from a tiny company making a pitch and time stretching plugin for Pro Tools to a global leader in DJ software, Sam’s now the CEO of Melodics, a company dedicated to helping you get better at making music and beats by making practice something that you just do with input from some phenomenal international musicians. Some really usable software, and some solid psychology. New Zealand seems to be a really fantastic place to not only be making music, but also to be creating music tech. So I wanted to quiz Sam on what it is that makes for a capital of music tech. What are the ingredients that can turn a place from somewhere that’s a long way away from anything to the place to be if you want to make something creative and innovative that can have a positive impact on the world. So from Auckland, this is the MTF podcast featuring Melodic CEO Sam Gribben, enjoy. Sam Gribben, thanks so much for joining us with podcast
Sam Gribben
Nice to be here.
Andrew Dubber
Where do you start? I mean, this this all these sort of dots on the charts of Serato and Melodics. And that was the beginning of the journey for you
Sam Gribben
as well going way back, but I’m not going to take too extreme, don’t worry, I had lots of music lessons as a kid and my parents placed them allowed me to lose interest really quickly, and then switch to another instrument and my young brain, I can’t actually remember how long I played each one but a bit. If we could figure it out or be absurd. I think I just would do a few practice sessions, I want to be like, I’m sick of this, I want to do something else. So they indulged me. And I never really learned to play instruments. But clearly something stuck there. And at university, I learned to DJ and I was like Finally, this is the one for me. Because no matter how bad at that, at that I am, I can just put the lead on the record and let it play and it will sound good. But I can still do stuff. And so I got really into that. my flatmate had a pair of turntables, and I use them when he wasn’t there. And at the time, I was studying electrical engineering and learning about machines and how to measure position and on machines and just kind of had this idea of like, hey, the cool thing about DJing with vinyl is that you can put your hand on it and manipulate it. And it’s this big, tactile thing that you can control. And the fact that the music is on it is kind of almost secondary. I mean, it makes it sound good. I never really got into that whole kind of vinyl sound debate. I like the sound. But that wasn’t the reason for me. And so I kind of had this idea that it would be possible to have music coming out of a computer and control it with a turntable. When are we talking? That is I think 94 or 93/94 kind of around in. And it’s interesting timing, because it’s kind of the times that mp3 were really taken off and digital music, you know, like, I knew this guy that had a computer that had seen three CD drives, so he could rip lots of mp3 at once it was that era, you know, like just before just before Napster, Napster. So the idea that the music could be on the computer was there. And I through my engineering studies, I kind of knew that it was possible, but definitely didn’t have the chops to actually do it. But I was really obsessed by this idea. And then fast forward, I left University and went on my way. And for various reasons. I went to Amsterdam, on my way, one of the reasons was, there was this company there that created this product called final scratch, which was one of the first digital vinyl systems on the market. And I was like, I’m gonna go and meet those people and find them I did actually ran into them at a party very dragged very late at night and completely destroyed any hope I had of ever working with them through my blood drunken enthusiasm. I couldn’t believe that I bumped into these guys. Right, right. But fast forward. And it was actually a friend of mine emailed me and said, I just was at a barbecue in Auckland of all places. And I ran into a guy that’s been doing that thing that you’ve been talking about for the last 10 years. And that was someone who worked at Serato. So long story short, I came back and I say, you have to give me a job. And I think Steve and AJ who are the founders of Serato had lots of people come and show interest in what they were doing. And I was like, No, no, no, I’m different. I’ve been literally thinking about this for 10 years and his notebooks full of drawings and here’s what you could do with video and here’s a solution. Other ideas. And so they allowed me in to be a kind of a general, I was hired as General Manager. And they allowed them to focus more on the technical and r&d side. And I ran the operations, basically,
Andrew Dubber
because there was software about that time stretching and that sort of thing before.
Sam Gribben
Yeah, when I joined them, they had one product that was really successful. And it was a ProTools plugin called pitch in time. And it’s still really industry standard, in many ways. For sign down. Audio, there was a main use case was slowing down audio and preserving the quality, which had been done for a long time, but never sounding good. Or never sounding true to the original, you know, that I’ve been listening to a lot of I’m a bit of a jungle revival has never really, really into jungle in the 90s. But at the moment, I’ve been listening to a lot of MS sound of off the pitch down Akai rackmounted samplers has this kind of part of the sound, right? Yeah, it’s really
Andrew Dubber
cool. But this was right, but at the wrong speed. Yeah. And
Sam Gribben
I think that they had this tick, and they shopped around, around around, but the opportunity they found was film studios, who wanted to be able to take like a scene and shorten it by half a second and preserve the quality of all the recordings. So the role about quality. So they had a great business running when I joined. And I joined just before the very first DJ product launched, and got into that was what I was really into. And worked with a lot of partners, because Serato was an interesting business in that we had this really strong kind of consumer brand. But actually all of the money came from the companies that were licencing
Andrew Dubber
because it relies on other people’s hardware.
Sam Gribben
Yeah. And especially at that stage, that early stage, it was just a product that you bought from rain Corporation who were from Seattle, Washington. And we were the software behind it, but Serato, but kind of became the name and the brand that we had this kind of interesting direct to consumer relationship, even though it wasn’t our product. We’ve licenced it to someone Okay, yeah. But work with a lot of you know, and then kind of negotiated to extend that beyond just that one exclusive agreement to work with lots and lots of different companies and with pioneer and a chi and a lot of different brands. And along the way, had a partnership with Ableton. And we did a project together called the bridge, which was way over ambitious. And we created this crazy convoluted lesson and over complicating things, yeah, wasn’t a success, I was gonna say wasn’t a great success, but it just wasn’t a success at all, but formed a really, really strong relationship with Ableton. And, and then 10 years into that I was kind of thinking about doing something new and decided to start my own company. And a lot of it was thinking about these relationships I had with different instrument makers, like, you know, DJ companies, but in a broader sense, instrument makers, and I was aware that there was a problem with, you know, people buying instruments and being really keen, but not sticking with it, because it’s hard to kind of get
Andrew Dubber
a switch to something else.
Sam Gribben
So and I was looking at things like clear, headspace, duolingo, Strava, all of these companies that were using this kind of suite of techniques to motivate people to stay engaged and doing something that you might wanted to
Andrew Dubber
- We’re talking about gamification. Yeah,
Sam Gribben
yeah, yeah, yeah. But why? Why is no one applying this to learn to play an instrument, because it’s like, something I want to do. But I need all the help I can get to stay hooked. Yeah. and looked around. And I didn’t think anyone was really particularly nailing it. There were some people doing it, but and then to start bringing up all of these hardware companies and was like, I’ve got this idea. And if I do it, and pull it off, and it’s good, and you’re confident that it’s good, will you help me to distribute it and reach people? And that was really what gave me the the head start, you know, kind of the league app to get started was having distribution figured out before I had to hire anyone to actually build it.
Andrew Dubber
Right? Well, so you actually, you sold it and got the distribution nailed. Before you had a product?
Sam Gribben
Yeah. Just all conceptually, you know, it was like we’ve worked together in the past. You know, me, you know what I’ve done. There’s this big out clause that you can take of like, you have to like it. Yep. But if I do do this, and you think it helps your customers to use your product in a better way, or you know, get more out of your product, will you basically tell them about what we’re doing? Yeah, sure, why not? And I thought that was actually going to be a hard sell, but I went to all of These companies and selling this idea and expecting to have to really work hard, but I got a really great reception. And I think one person said it really well, that if this works, then people will play more instruments and the whole industry will benefit. So we all want it to work, you just have to do it. Well. I was like, Okay, this seems like a good deal. I have to do a good job of it, and then you’ll support me. So that made a huge difference.
Andrew Dubber
Right? Right. So that’s the overall trajectory. There’s a point in there, which Serato give you a managerial job. As somebody who’s essentially a technician, with a notebook. Yeah. What was it about you that made them think this guy should be running things?
Sam Gribben
Um, well, I had studied engineering, but I’m a terrible engineer, not, you know, I am not that technical, technical enough to kind of understand concepts, but I can’t write code or build circuits or anything like that, right, a bit of a hack with a soldering iron. And after studying, I’d worked on kind of project management and operations. And I may have embellished my CV, really heavily to Steven AJ, the founders of Serato be like I did all these things. I mean, I had, but I talked to that. And I think the big thing was, I’d worked at startups in Holland, in that kind of a general operations role. And I was like, it seems to me that you need to write a user manual and hire people, and you need an accountant and you need a new office, and that office is going to need blinds, and then we’re gonna have to have beta testing, and I can take care of all of that. Right. That sounds good.
Andrew Dubber
Yeah. And also sounds like things that they didn’t want to do themselves. Yeah.
Sam Gribben
Definitely sold it to them as a, you know, you guys do the things that you’re best there, which I’ve got no idea how to do and I will just like keep things rolling and help make things happen.
Andrew Dubber
What is it about New Zealand that makes it possible for things like Serato melodics, to kind of get the kind of foothold that you have?
Sam Gribben
I think that Serato helps allow melodics to get the kind of foot hold. Okay, so that, you know, is a huge, I mean, I got a lot of tough the ground because of my experience. And I got my experience from Serato. And reputation and context and network. So it was really there. What allowed Serato to get that was, I mean, I think a lot of it was just like really, really talented people at the right place at the right time. And there is a little bit of a New Zealand attitude can do, but I think it’s more actually down and more down to the personalities of the founders of Serato. And they were like, yeah, this is rubbish, we can do better than that. And you know, but with the especially with the original pitch and Time, Time stretching, and kind of origin story of Serato is that Steve West, one of the founders wanted to learn to play bass, and he wanted to slow parts down so he could learn how to do it. And he got the current state of the art technology, and he was like, this sounds awful, I’m gonna do it better, right. And he’s really that kind of guy, you know, like, he got into electric cars, and you couldn’t buy a Stanley for a Tesla. So he ordered the parts off the internet and built one, that kind of guy. But kind of looping back to the question, though, part of what really motivates me to do melodics is that I think New Zealand can’t New Zealand companies and as kind of as a country, we can do this sort of stuff. And because we can, we should, because it’s way better than flying people here on two planes to you know, drive around a camper vans or, or exporting milk in terms of where it can take us and how sustainable it is. And, you know, I very much think of this the future.
Andrew Dubber
So the idea of New Zealand as a music, tech capital is of interest to you or something that you want to reflect out to the world or something that’s already happening.
Sam Gribben
The wider thing is New Zealand as an exporter of IP, and tech. And then yeah, there’s there’s a lot of music happening here now. And we kind of you know, I was talking to the now CEO of Serato, youngly. A while ago and kind of joking about how we should take on Berlin and Sweden and mostly those places, right, as known as a music tech place. And so why not? Yeah, we’ve got some great companies. There’s Serato melodics. Of course, in music, Ableton have not so much an office here, but one of their senior people is good friend of mine who works from here. And there’s other kind of, kind of like Serato in particular gets to a certain stage where there’s enough people who have trained up and learnt there that they’re, you know, I’m one of them that have spun off these kind of second generation companies. And we’re in position we can create an ecosystem and then together like we can go to the university and say, hey, there’s there’s jobs for people who trained with these particular skills? And so that means that there’s more people coming through. And this is how it kind of gets started.
Andrew Dubber
Yeah, at Music Tech Fest, we’ve been to a lot of cities around the world, all of whom want to see themselves as sort of music, tech capitalism, you know, every single one that
Sam Gribben
was made there was made.
Andrew Dubber
We can do it, from from Mannheim, to North shipping to you know, wherever you go, it’s like, well, we’ve got these great companies. And we’re the same and we want to do what’s the, I guess, what’s the USP for someone like Auckland it say? What is it about the place,
Sam Gribben
the place I think has a real draw for take people who are into music because of the lifestyle, you know, I think that that’s not to be underestimated. If you’re a hardcore techie, you, you know, probably quite attracted to Silicon Valley. If you’re into music, generally, you’ve got a little slight lift of seem to be in order, you’re more interested in other things, and then like, the place really appeals. So I think that’s, that’s a big factor. And again, to this kind of wider mission, I have a lot of friends who left New Zealand in the late 90s, or early 2000s, to go to London and go to real countries where there were real jobs and to be able to wave the flag and be like, hey, we’ve got real jobs here. Now he should come back.
Andrew Dubber
What’s changed since that time,
Sam Gribben
I think that the overall tech scene has kind of had enough throughput, that it’s reached this level of maturity, where you can kind of look at like a big company, like Trade Me, made a lot of money. But you know, some rich people came out of it, they funded another generation of companies like zero and vend, and kind of serratos along there. And now there’s another generation coming out of that. And so it’s like she, there are actually now some really interesting companies doing interesting things and offering interesting jobs.
Andrew Dubber
Is there the funding infrastructure
Sam Gribben
here in New Zealand? No, not really. But it’s coming along. Yeah, it has been something that’s held companies back, but I think the ones that have succeeded, have found it a little bit a New Zealand and a bit out of New Zealand. And, but I mentioned Ableton before they were our lead investor. And so they’ve that’s really opened a lot of doors for us. But I was lucky to have those kind of international networks. It’s much harder if you’re just starting out here, but it’s getting better.
Andrew Dubber
And as the infrastructure they have, technically, in terms of things like, for instance, the internet speeds are not Yeah, to be a super hot. Yeah. I mean,
Sam Gribben
I think that personally, I don’t really get that. And it works. You know, it’s much more about talent, and networks and context. And like being able to talk someone to someone who’s been there and done it before. That’s a much bigger factor than how fast your download speed is. I think.
Andrew Dubber
It seems like there’s no shortage of music, though.
Sam Gribben
Yeah, there’s a lot of music. And I don’t know actually how much more music we have, or different music and other countries, but a lot of people are into music here. Yeah. Yeah. And we consume music slightly differently. You know, like, I think, maybe I’m in my own echo chamber, but I think Kiwis maybe have slightly wider tastes and more just straight mainstream pop. I mean, you put in radio, right? I’ve got this theory about radio population and music tastes. Okay. If you allow me a couple of
Andrew Dubber
dollars for it. Go for it. This is totally in my in my camp.
Sam Gribben
Yeah. So in a big city, like New York, there is a fixed amount of radio spectrum, you know, where I’m going with us. Right? So there’s a fixed amount of radio spectrum and you know, pre digital radio, you could have 10 stations or hundred stations, or whatever it is, that’s all fits. Yeah. And because there’s so many people and so many consumers, one particular model will like rise to the top and be successful, and they just eat all the other ones. And so it just kind of naturally tends towards all being the same, because the most poppy and the most mainstream or does when an eat everything else, whereas the amount of spectrum relative to the population in New Zealand was always kind of flipped around the other way. So you could have these weird student radio stations. Yeah, basically, and other radio stations that could exist on the spectrum, because there wasn’t someone else who came along without a pay 100 million dollars for that little slice of the spectrum. And so we were exposed to why to music.
Andrew Dubber
Yeah, I think there’s that. And also, I mean, there’s a lot of things that are unique about New Zealand radio, I mean, to, you know, put my geek hat on. New Zealand was massively deregulated. So every single spot on the spectrum was available for sale, and the laws in place about every radio but access radio, a student radio, things like George FM came out of the god band situation and basically the only country in the world where anybody who wants to combine a transmitter and just turn it on broadcasting, as long as you’re not sort of broadcasting over the top of somebody else, you just go for it. So I think there’s a lot of really interesting unique things that happen because of that. But I think I mean, there’s there’s a lot you could put at the feet of of student radio BFM in particular, that open people’s ears up to things because it’s disproportionately popular for what they broadcast. Yeah. Which is, which is kind of interesting. But do you think that leads on to melodics users? Is there more of an appetite to make an experiment with music? Yeah.
Sam Gribben
To create, like music products? Well, yeah,
Andrew Dubber
to make music? To make music? Yeah. Do people want to sort of come out of listening to eclectic, different things? And, you know, having their ears open to the big wide world of music? Got this? There’s room for me to make something in there?
Sam Gribben
Yeah, I think so. And I think there’s, like, certainly, compared to the US, there’s less of this kind of the US has such a strong cult of celebrity, we’re fine talking to music makers in the US, they all want to make it right. Yeah, and hit the big time, be famous and be rich and popular. Whereas I think here there are more people who want to express themselves creatively through the music, rather than reach the top of the chat. Yeah, nice to reach the top of the charts. But that’s not necessarily
Andrew Dubber
gonna make you rich and famous, either know, exactly.
Sam Gribben
There’s a lot more people doing it, because they want to make the music that they hear in the head, or we’ll just create two.
Andrew Dubber
So what is it that made melodics work? Because you you said, you know, you would get the distribution? If it worked. Clearly, it’s worked, what is it that makes it work?
Sam Gribben
I think that I mean, our fundamental driving idea is that you need to practice to get better at playing a musical instrument and and practice is hard, and kind of quite boring or challenging. And that what we do is we made the practice part, not so much of a, like, grind that you just have to get through, but the actual fun part. So it’s, you want to do your practice and you feel I mean, I think there’s some interesting psychology in it where motivation often or generally kind of comes from a sense of progress, but you feel like you’re making progress and the kind of the key word, and there is a sense of it. Yeah. So you might actually be making amazing progress, but not feel like you are and give up. Right? Yep. And fortunately for us, you might also be making terrible progress. But if you feel like you’re making progress, you’ll keep at it. So a lot of it’s just feeding back. It’s
Andrew Dubber
plateaus.
Sam Gribben
Yeah, and helping people to break through those. So what we do is, you know, is presented as it’s a product or software to help people learn to play instruments, but it’s much more actually to help you practice and get into good practice habits and set you up to succeed.
Andrew Dubber
So I was gonna ask you, you’ve got this methodology of getting people to practice and breaking through these plateaus. And we’ll restore, because some really heavyweight people going, this is a good idea, like on the on the website, you go, Oh, my God, that and fill in the blanks, was that part of the gamification of it is to get people to aspire to being like the heroes? Or is it just a sort of endorsement thing?
Sam Gribben
It’s interesting, because the setting round in 2014, I think it was thinking about what to do a big part of it was like, Well, I know, the instrument makers that I talked about, but I also know artists, and I really liked at Serato. having their artist involvement, it made a huge difference to like the commercial success, but it also made, I think, culturally, the product a whole lot more relevant. Because we were working with artists and changing how they were DJing. And getting really involved in the culture of DJ. So I wanted to keep that part of it as well. And what I wanted to do with melodics, was create a revenue stream for artists. So that’s something that we we weren’t, you know, I’m able to go to the outside now and be like, Hey, we want to licence your music, turn into a lesson. Which is cool, especially in a world now where artists are interested in changing how they make money because you can make money, the old ways. And that’s a really interesting way for others to engage with their fans. I think we’re still very early days, and we’re still quite small. So we’re not talking about huge amounts of money for any of us, but the idea they really buy into, and it’s like, if you’ve got fans who consume your music passively. This is a way that they can really get inside and understand how it’s constructed and what chord progressions you use and how the beats all go together to
Andrew Dubber
this is about music teachers dissecting the kind of musical logical components of somebody’s piece of music or is it master classes by the artist,
Sam Gribben
it’s more of a more basic bent either of those things, it’s much more like just playing the music. And something that we were doing a little bit of now. And we’ll do more as more kind of theory and dissecting and understanding how it all works. But a lot of the feedback we get from people is just like, I’m learning, say beat making, or like arranging beats, I’m learning lots of new ways of doing it by being exposed to like all of these different variations from different artists and from the content that we make ourselves by just learning how to play it. And there’s nothing quite like learning how to play, you know, say like, you take a simple kick, snare, closed head, high hat pattern, and then you learn lots of variations of that a lot of our lessons are based on those four sounds, but you start to really appreciate what the difference is, when you start to swing that fourth kick a little bit this way, in that high head this way, and if you’re getting really deep in it, so it’s not so much theoretical, just deconstruction, but we are really interested in that. And we’ll do more of that. It’s more just like getting under the hood. And by learning how to play it, and committing it to muscle memory, you get a much deeper understanding. So a lot about I mean, we, when they haven’t said it was we are really aiming at the moment at music producers, they’re our main audience. And a lot of people use melodics as their like daily warmup. So go into the studio and do five minutes of training. And it’s kind of like training rather than learning, right as a way to kind of get in the groove and just be like, I don’t know what I’m going to do today. But at least I’ll just do that. And then I’ve made music today, and it’s a good thing. And be exposed to different million different styles, different genres we keep. The other thing about working with lots of different artists is to keep the diversity of genres and musical styles really broad. And that’s exposing producers to you know, that might be a track producer, who’s paying some Tuesday lessons. And you know, that’s kind of interesting, you know, that that’s why that particular drum break swings in that way is because of that particular arrangement. And then they bring it into their own production.
Andrew Dubber
So Are people going from beginner to expert, or as a particular segment of this market?
Sam Gribben
A lot of people are beginners. And some of them do. I mean, one of the things that we one of the mechanics that we use to help keep you engaged is like a streak. You know, we’ve got people who are on a, I think the current record is of like an 800 day streak, you know, so it’s like, coming out three years of at least five minutes every single day. A lot of people don’t have quite that dedication, but those people, you know, like they building confidence, and they’re getting really, really good. But also because it’s around practice and training. And I think the more experienced you are as a musician, the more you realise that practice is really important. So it does actually, it’s not like a course that you complete or is too easy for you, you know, the, if you use it as a, I don’t like to really describe it this way, but as a crutch to help you practice, then we get a lot of quite advanced people using it as well, you know, it’s just like, it’s just that how it may really dial in. I mean, our strength is rhythm training, you know, we teach keys, but we have like a rhythm centric rhythm first approach, and it helps people dial it in.
Andrew Dubber
Why is that? You? This? I mean, I know you’ve got the engineering background, I know you’ve got the Serato background, what is it about education? Particularly that that way? That’s, that’s the next challenge. Was it the you know, here’s a business opportunity, or this is my passion for, you know, bringing music making to the world and
Sam Gribben
a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B, you know, like a little bit. I know this industry really well. And what’s, where are the opportunities? And what’s it missing. And I saw that around that time about, you know, five years ago, education was really changing. technology was changing education, and lots and lots of different ways. But and music wasn’t. And the state of the art was YouTube, really, and in a way, arguably, still is, you know, YouTube’s amazing, don’t get me wrong, but it’s quite hard to watch someone and just understand what they’re really doing and stay motivated to stay at it. And I mean, really, the other big thing was I played lots of Guitar Hero, and I was like, this would be much better if I was actually learning to play an actual instrument. Yep. And also with my DJing, I was quite a distraction as part of DJing. And I was really bad at it. And I had exposure to the best teachers in the world, you know, like, I’d hang out at a tradeshow booth with a track and he’d show me some things and I had all these people who could show me stuff and I did lots and lots of hours. But I didn’t get any better. And I was that frustrated by the fact that I was practising and effectively and in retrospect, just getting worse and worse, the more I practice the bad habits, the worst I got, and the harder it was to have breakthroughs. That was kind of that was my personal and as you know, kind of going back to my early childhood experience of lots of lessons as like, there’s going to be a better way of doing this, right. And that kind of thinking forward, you know, like in 10 years time, I’m convinced that there will be products or a product that helps people learn to play an instrument, you know, this just kind of seems really obvious to me that it shouldn’t be just a slog that you rely on reading books and just grinding away at it, there must be an easier way along records
Andrew Dubber
and things.
Sam Gribben
And so it’s just a matter of like, we can be the ones who can do it. I have a geo streak. I think my bit my record is 48 days. And it helps Yeah, yeah, I mean, I my the most fun I had was music these days is we’ve got an area about office set up with a whole bunch of instruments in the first Friday of the month, a bunch of friends get together at skill levels, ranging from like embarrassed to show up to actual like knowing real musicians who then show up and intimidate everyone else. But it’s just all just jamming, just play. And a few weeks ago, we were at a station and I was paying a drum machine about playing like freeform finger drumming, love. And I’m embarrassed to say how long it took to get to the point where but my friends are all like, Hey, what happened to you? And I say, yeah, breakthrough, I finally figured out handling dependence and how to, you know, play a consistent high hat with one and play the kick in the snare off the beat. And it was just like, the whole world opened up and I was just playing a list. Like classic rabies. Yeah. as hell Wow.
Andrew Dubber
That’s really cool. So what’s the next big challenge?
Sam Gribben
Well, we just last week, went mobile has always been a Mac and PC app. So we’ve just launched the iPad. And in the future, we’re looking at more instruments and being able to take it to more people. The challenge really, I think, is to just keep making sure that we actually deliver on that promise of helping you to stick with it. The thing that we’re really looking at next year is just like people who have been using models for a while, and it’s making sure that they’re still getting a lot from it. So that that means adding things to help, you’d not fall off. Basically, you know, after six months, when you’re like, yeah, I could do more of this. Or I could go and do other things like keep your head up.
Andrew Dubber
And the next step for Auckland City of music tech,
Sam Gribben
I think, as companies like mine grow, and we hire more people, and then we create more opportunities for new people to come in. And then yeah, there are a few, I don’t want anyone to leave, but also kind of long term, I can see someone who’s worked and a lot of us for a while, who has an idea and wants to do their own thing as they’re going to start their own company.
Andrew Dubber
So let’s just talk about incubation or campus or
Sam Gribben
that would be awesome. But there’s just a natural organic thing where people will move between, you know, there’s now more than one, there’s now options, and some people will move between them, some people will spin off. And that’s kind of hurts when it happens. But they’ll take people with them and then create more about kind of long term, it’s good, it’s good, because it just creates more talent for companies to grow. And I think a some sort of music take incubator is where it will naturally head as it grows, you know, there’s more and more people. And I think the founders of the company, and the CEOs of the companies involved in the New Zealand tech music, take seine have an interest I talked about before about going to universities and schools and training schools and helping more students to choose studies that will then help them get into this space. So there’s that and then you can see it kind of evolving to actually a little incubator, you know, some scholarships, or some prizes, or a little bit of kind of injection capital to help spin off new companies and new ideas. It’d be really cool. And you know, I think we’re not far off from being able to go to government, local or overall government say, Hey, this is the thing that we could do together and get a little bit of support there and space or funding, you know, like, for example, I have had a lot of help from New Zealand trading enterprise with raising money, and they organise these events I’ve been invited. And at the beginning of the event, they show this video that’s like, this is really amazing technology to come out of New Zealand and it’s cameras that attached to helicopters for tracking the America’s Cup boats, and it’s the America’s Cup boats themselves and all this cool stuff. And there’s a big plug for Serato right in the middle of it. Yeah, yeah. That’s cool. So New Zealand is Trade and Industry. Which is government funded and they’re out pushing, this is a area of our expertise for our country. So that’s cool. Actually, you know, coming back to what you’re saying before about why Auckland The other thing is that we’ve now got a really, really solid international reputation. You know, you can go to any of these kind of big players and talk about the companies that have come out in New Zealand and they’re treated with respect. So that creates a lot of opportunities as well.
Andrew Dubber
Right? And you can just build on that success and use that as the framework. Yeah, that’s right. Well, Sam, thanks so much for your time.
Sam Gribben
Thank you.
Andrew Dubber
That’s Sam Gribben, the CEO of melodics. And that’s the MTF podcast. If you’re interested in finding out more about what cements a city as a home of creative tech, something that goes beyond just having a local incubator maker space, good programmers access to capital and some people with some good ideas. Feel free to drop us a line. This is something we’ve been completely immersed in at MTF for the past seven years, and it’s something we’re going to be working on next with the city of Mannheim in Germany as part of the ice labs focusing on innovation and sound for new urban environments. That’s going to be at the beginning of April. And so right now is the moment to sign up to the MTF newsletter. For more information about that, if you’re thinking that might be up your particular strasse, just go to the Music Tech Fest website and click on newsletter. Meanwhile, if you like the podcast, please take a moment to leave a review and a rating on the apple podcast thing. Click on the star and the overcast player or like and share on social media. Don’t forget you can subscribe for free so you don’t miss a single episode. I’m Andrew Dubber. You have a great week and we’ll talk soon. Cheers.
