The Mental Health Crisis The Music Industry Refuses To Address

What if I told you that musicians have one of the highest suicide rates among all occupational groups, yet major labels don't have a single executive dedicated to artist mental health?

Music is one of the most powerful forms of communication on planet Earth.

As human beings, we need music just like we need water and food.

We need water.

We need food.

We need music!

Therefore, artists who make music should be seen as incredibly important members of our society.

These are the people who soundtrack our lives, who help us process our emotions, who give voice to our deepest thoughts and feelings.

But this is not how the music business sees them.

The industry is obsessed with the intellectual property of the artist and how they can exploit the artist at every level imaginable.

The major record labels have all the big corporate departments you'd expect:

But they do not have executives whose job is to make sure their artists are cared for on a mental health level.

They do not have a department of wellbeing for artists.

They do not have counselors, therapists, or mental health professionals on staff.

The industry focuses on artist mental health last on the list.

It's left to underfunded charitable organizations to pick up the pieces when artists break down.

But this is not enough.

Not even close.

Post-pandemic, the world itself is in a mental health crisis, one that has compounded the situation for artists exponentially.

All of the exploitative practices I've exposed in my recent posts contribute to this mental health pandemic that is affecting artists more severely than almost any other profession.

The growing body of research on this topic shows that things are catastrophically bad right now for artists:

These aren't just statistics.

These are real people.

Creative souls who pour their hearts into their art, only to be chewed up and spat out by an industry that sees them as nothing more than content generators and revenue streams.

While labels count streaming numbers, artists are counting reasons to stay alive.

While executives celebrate quarterly profits, artists are struggling to get out of bed.

While the industry focuses on "maximizing asset value," the humans creating that value are drowning.

This is not just wrong - it's evil.

The current system doesn't just exploit artists financially.

It destroys them psychologically.

It takes people who create beauty and meaning and subjects them to conditions that would be illegal in any other industry.

Imagine if tech companies treated their programmers the way record labels treat their artists.

Imagine if hospitals treated their doctors the way the music industry treats musicians.

There would be congressional hearings.

There would be lawsuits.

There would be outrage.

But when it happens to artists, we call it "the business."

It's time for this to change.

We're not just building a better music company.

We're building a human-first ecosystem that recognizes artists as complete human beings, not just creative assets.

On September 10th in Mexico City, I'm revealing exactly how we're going to revolutionize artist support:

How we're going to:

Because you can't solve the world's problems through art if the artists creating that art are broken by the system meant to support them.

Here’s the link to register:

Free live stream for everyone who registers.

The music business mental health crisis ends here.

Kind Regards

-The Baker

Solving The World's Problems Through Art | #thetimetodoisnow