Welcome to season two of the New Music Business podcast! This first episode of the new season is with Mothica. She is an incredible artist in the pop realm. She kind of blew up in 2020 from TikTok and is one of those crazy TikTok success stories. After her song went viral on TikTok, she gained a lot of traction on streaming platforms. Just in 2020 alone she garnered more than 25 million streams on Spotify.Mothica has been releasing music for about six years now and released her debut album in 2020. We talk all about that. The pandemic and quarantining got her to try out TikTok, and she exploded from there. I'll let her tell you how that all happened. We recorded this outside in-person in December socially distanced. We were very careful. We were wearing masks as we were setting up and tearing down. We only took them off during the interview. We sat probably 10-15 feet away from each other. We made sure we were being very safe. -- Articles/Links mentioned: Teespring vs. Printify vs. Gooten vs. Printful vs. Teelaunch: Best Print On-Demand Merch Companies for Musicians: https://aristake.com/print-on-demand-comparison/--Quick links:3:52 - How quarantine has been for Mothica7:10 - Advising musicians to join TikTok and what to do on the platform10:03 - Going viral on TikTok and other factors that attribute to Mothica's success13:50 - Getting sober and releasing a debut album17:58 - How the Mothica brand and world was created25:11 - Mothica's music video "Blackout" and how it came to be and funding the video from merch sales31:55 - Has Mothica been approached by major labels and will she remain independent?35:03 - Working with AWAL for music distribution39:15 - Being open with her suicide attempt, drugs/alcohol, and being sexually assaulted 45:25 - Writing "VICES" and the process behind it50:03 - The release strategy for Mothica's album 'Blue Hour'59:10 - How to build a TikTok strategy into your release strategy1:04:31 - What it means to Mothica to make it in the new music business--Connect with Ari’s Take:Website: https://aristake.comAcademy: https://aristakeacademy.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/aristake_/TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@aris.takeTwitter: https://twitter.com/ArisTakeYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/aristake1Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aristake/Connect with Ari Herstand:Website: https://ariherstand.comInstagram: https://instagram.com/ariherstandTwitter: https://twitter.com/ariherstandYouTube: https://youtube.com/ariherstandFacebook: Our GDPR privacy policy was updated on August 8, 2022. Visit acast.com/privacy for more information.