Andy:

But I'm really keen to build up exclusivity for the music that we make. We control the rights. As soon as I put it on Spotify or YouTube, it gets fingerprinted. And so it's then in the worldwide system, and then if you start playing it on Facebook, it's muted. So we've kind of flipped on its head. We will control the rights, but we'll keep it exclusive. So over time, people will come to realize that hey, you know what? If I use Pure Energy Go, which is a record label for fitness, I've got great, exclusive music, I can rest assured all the rights are included for life, so I can create my content with comfort.

Will:  

Hey, I'm Will Brereton, founder of SH1FT Fitness. And this is Group Fitness Real Talk, a show about how to survive and even thrive in group fitness in 2021 and beyond. Music is such an important part of teaching group fitness, it should be fun, inspiring, and help people lose themselves in a class. But when COVID hit, almost all of the music that was once totally fine for teaching classes became unusable online. And the entire music situation suddenly became a confusing and stressful minefield and something that was really, really difficult for all group fitness instructors. Many instructors didn't understand the rules. And that makes sense because music industry licensing is incredibly confusing. But over the last 18 months, we've all educated ourselves and attempted to find music solutions that work for us. Now if you want more details on the basics behind licensing and the impact of COVID, I recommend listening to Episode 15 of this podcast. Because here's the real talk: streaming has irrevocably changed the way music producers get paid. Now I'm talking about Spotify and Apple Music and all of the streaming services, we're not talking about just fitness here. And every producer is looking to see where they can find any extra revenue streams. Now during the pandemic, online fitness became such a phenomenon, such a news story, and you can be sure that there will be even more of a microscope put on music using online classes moving forward. That unfortunate reality that sometimes your classes get muted on social media is not something that's going away. In fact, it's probably going to get even worse. Now with Apple and peloton doing multimillion dollar deals with music publishing companies, you can be sure that the ability of the average instructor to teach a class (and this applies to online and potentially in person), using the music of their choosing is only going to get more difficult, more costly, and more confusing. That's why today on the podcast, I want to look forward and deep dive into the topic of finding a music solution that is 100% Future-Proof. My guest on the show today is Andy Pickles from Pure Energy Music. Pure energy is a right stream music company that creates incredible music exclusively for the fitness industry. And they've just launched a really exciting new app that aims to make music selection fun, affordable and smart. Now full disclosure, Pure Energy are our partners at SH1FT. They create the mixes that go alongside our workouts. And we chose them because we face all the same issues that instructors do needing the content that we produce, to be able to be played in as many places as possible. And I don't just want a PPL free version of something else. I want a great song in and of itself. Make sure you listen right to the end of the podcast because we've got a very special discount exclusively for you our podcast listeners. Now here's my chat with Andy. So welcome Andy to the podcast. How are you today?

Andy 

I'm very well. Yes, Will. Thanks for having me.

Will:  

So we are, we're on today to talk a little bit about music and the fitness industry and your new app, which you've just created. And as someone that has created an app in the fitness industry. I know the trials and tribulations of doing that all too well. So last week was your launch week, correct?

Andy  

Yeah. So however, these things don't always go to plants. So we launched the app last week. It has taken several months for us to get it open out there. But yeah, it's I'm really, really pleased with it, I think. I think it could be a bit of a game changer for the fitness industry. But like any new innovation, technology, it's there's going to be the early adopters. And there's going to be those folks that maybe just take a little bit of while to come on board because they used to work in a way they work. But yeah, I'm really, really excited about it, we've had a great takeoff.

Will:  

I know this very well, we launched SH1FT, wow, it was five years ago. So in 2016, 2017, we launched SH1FT and doing everything via digital and everything via phone on a subscription that you pay for monthly we got access to everything was completely out of the box at the time. And it did take people a few years to understand exactly the value of the proposition which come the pandemic when everybody had to move to being online and virtual. Everybody came to understand really quickly so I'm sure that as technologies continue to change people will realize the value of what you're providing. But let's wind it right back. So full disclosure, pure energy is our music partner with SH1FT, and you create all of our music mixes that go with our workouts. But without putting words in your mouth, why don't you explain a little bit about who you are and what Pure Energy is. And then I'd like to talk about how you ended up working in the music industry with relation to fitness.

Andy  

Sure, so yeah, I'm Andy Pickles, 52, father of 3. I started when I was 16, working in recording studios as a sound engineer, created mixes for DJs. And just have a real passion for music. And so back in 92...

Will:  

Oh, wow we're going way back.

Andy  

...so my my introduction to the fitness industry was back in 92, when there was a gap in the market to create your tailored mixes for the fitness instructor, which were licensed by PPL, which I'm sure we'll come on to. So, so my background is music producer, artist. I I did actually have three number one records in the 1980s, Will. You're too young to remember to be fair.

Will:  

Three number one records. Wow. 

Andy  

Some of your listeners may may remember the the artists known as Jive bunny in the master mixes so yeah, although I've today I'm a man who runs a fitness music company and do sensible things. When I was 19 years old I did have three number one records with a rabbit from Rotherham up north in England. So, so if you Google me, it's quite interesting sort of...

Will:  

We might have to put a link to that in the show notes, I think.

Andy  

Yeah, I think so. Well, I was having a meeting this morning with one of the big gym chains and working from home today. I've got a gold disc on my wall in the background there. And the guy said, is that a gold disc? I said yeah, but you probably won't remember the artist cuz you look too young. So yeah, so I've got my 30 odd years in the music industry is sort of spanned, you know, sound engineer, producer, recording artist, running publishing companies, record labels, and then we launched pierogi, back in 1992, as the first sort of tailored music service for fitness professionals across Europe, really, and you know, 30 years later, we're still still going strong. But we've, you know, we've pivoted and changed to meet with the times that we're in now,

Will:  

Indeed, and much different times we find ourselves in then than just two years ago, right. So like, let's fast forward a little bit. You've obviously been going for a long time. But I, I know that we've talked about this before, tell me a little bit how pure energy was operating going into the pandemic and how things changed for you during that period?

Andy  

Yeah, well, pure energy is part of the Music Factory Entertainment Group, which is, you know, is my family's company. So I'd stepped out of the business for a while to set up an education technology company. And so I came back in about two and a half years ago, dad retired. So I became Exec Chairman, and I looked at pure energy as I first came in, and thought there's real potential here, but it needs to change. So pre-pandemic, we were looking at an app with a different way of delivering music. And then march 2020, I'm in the office and you know, we know what's coming and I get a call, I hear the girls on the phone to an instructor talking about what am I going to do when we have to go online and do this, all the music is going to get muted, so pre-pandemic pure energy was still delivering, and still does original artists, music mixes for instructors and providing services for gyms. But it was quite flat, the industry was becoming quite flat. And it was then when I heard the call, comes through to the office, I thought hold on. Yeah, this is where we can probably address a need because of our background in running record labels and producing music, not just for fitness, that I thought, okay, we need to create some really good quality new music for fitness that we own outright. There's not been distributed, it's not on Spotify, you won't get picked up by Facebook. So instructors could go online and teach without getting muted. So quite literally from here and a phone call in the office in March 2020. That's when I came up with the notion of okay, we need to move fast and make music for instructors to go teach online. And that's where pure energy go came from.

Will:  

Right. And so you that's where and that's where I understand that you guys are a little bit different than some of the other operators in that all the music that is available through pure energy go and through the new app is 100% rights included. So you can teach with it in any of the forums that instructors now find themselves in which I broadly describe as teaching live, teaching live stream, but then also pre recording material and others allowing people, their members and their users to watch pre recorded videos, which is a bit of a departure from most other music companies that often have restrictions, sometimes restrictions on all three of those, but very, very often restrictions on the pre recorded stuff.

Andy  

Yeah, so with pure energy go, it is all rights included, we're in a unique position that we own all the copyright. And that's this, the song composition. It's the recording rights and also the sync rights to all our music worldwide. Because we've been working with artists, producers, songwriters, DJs, for many, many years, I was able to mobilize that that crew of people to make really like commercial music, but for fitness. And because of the nature of the deals that I'm able to do with these guys and our producers, that we can control the rights for the world. And so I wanted to keep it really simple, because instructors gyms have enough to think about and not worry about. So you could buy our music, you can subscribe to pure energy gom the app and you can be confident that you're not going to get muted online. If you want to record your videos and put our music to them and distribute them to your members, put them on your website, put them out on YouTube, you can do also you can use your stuff face to face. And this is where we've seen a transition that whilst we created the music for online, actually, because the music is such a high quality, instructors are taking it into the face to face classes and negating the need to pay their ppl and venues to pay their prs fees.

Will:  

So just just just just a reminder that we have certain we have UK, UK listeners and also global listeners. So the UK listeners and I think in some places that New Zealand and Australia is called ppl and prs in the Status it's called different things. But we've we've talked about this briefly on the podcast before essentially, there's a whole lot of different rights that existed. So when you used to look at in the olden days, the back of the record or the back of a tape of the back of a CD, you'd have a whole little list of names under, and they'd be the various rights holders. Do you want to can you give us a for anyone that hasn't come across this before whistlestop tour between sort of the rights that exist in any song?

Andy  

Yeah, it is. It's a complicated landscape for instructors, the dark arts of music licensing, and it's also there is a perception of the frustration that why should we be paying to play music anyway, is a thing but regardless of people's perceptions, and it's not for me to tell you what you should or shouldn't be doing. The reality is if you're using copyrighted music, you have to pay because within a song, there's there's essentially two rights as the recording, right. So if I'm the artists, so if I'm the performer, then you will are the songwriter, we both have our separate copyrights and me, my copyright is protected and, and, and collected by my record company, and you as the songwriter it's collected by the publishing company, and ppl or the performance aspects wherever you are in the world. That's the record company, the performer piece. And then you'll have an association wherever you are in the world or collect the royalties for the songwriter. So there's those two compositions and the thing is, whether you're running a restaurant, a hairdressers or you're, you're in a fitness class, you're effectively using someone else's music to enhance your product. Without someone else's music your class isn't so good. So consequently the rights holders then say to you the instructor look we're part of the mix here. So we want to we kind of want our cut so that is why there is copyright within music and that is why instructors and gyms have to play to pay to use the music and it's no different to sitting in a restaurant with nice background music playing.

Will:  

I don't think that most people realize that restaurants have to pay for their background music though I think herein lies the herein lies the thing because you need to listen to pay to listen on the radio but that's because on the radio they are paying for it for you and they are funding it through advertising.

Andy  

Listen, I'm you know, as a as an artist I'm a member of prs and ppl so I get my checks in the post every quarter. So the records I made years and years ago, if they get played on the radio, if they get played in nightclubs I get I still get royalties on those. So in any commercial setting, nightclub restaurant, hairdressers gym, where musics been used to enhance the place you're in, you got to play think the baseline is for people to understand if you download a song, or if you choose to use Spotify or you're gonna buy a physical recording, if as long as you're using that for your own personal use. That's absolutely fine. Yeah. As soon as you go and start using that to make money. That's where the the authorities say you got to pay. Yeah.

Will:  

And I think you're an instructor and you potentially not making very much money. But it can make it a bit tricky, right and this is also why I think instructors often get a little bit confused as to, as to the way this works essentially, when you use an original original songs are often prohibited within certain environments like fitness teaching for various reasons. But there's also a lot of copyright attached, which is the artist and the artist gets a chunk and the songwriter gets a chunk. And so when you use cover music, which I know a lot of fitness people have been using in the past, that gets you around the Performing Rights license, but doesn't get you around the publishers license. So for people that teach formats that used to provide them with, you know, dub door cover music with a voice was like, the quality was often a little bit lower, the voice was a different, it might be a male voice for a female song, or vice versa, because that will get around certain, certain restrictions on copyright. But what was happening is that the company that you bought that music off was paying the publishing rights when they sold it to you, and then you weren't having to pay the performance rights, because the performance was covered off and the rights that you're purchasing from that company. So but the problem is, is that when people came to start doing live stream and pre recorded that changed, as well, and do you want to explain a little bit about sync rights? And why why the why the online transition complicated things even further?

Andy  

Yeah, I mean, that's a whole whole other

Will:  

I'll give you the challenge of trying to explain it succinctly. Yeah.

Andy  

Yeah, I mean, synchronization means when you take pictures and put sound to it, so you're syncing music with pictures. So So for example, if there's an advert on the TV for whatever the latest car, and there's some music behind it, someone's got to negotiate with the publishers and the record label to use that composition. And that is helping promote that car. And so the same thing applies. If you are going online and create a fitness video and putting some music behind it, you're effectively syncing music. So by rights, you've kind of got to go and seek out permission from all the songwriters or the publishers, and negotiate a fee to use that music. If you just choose to put it on YouTube without asking anybody. Two things will happen. One, you'll get muted. Or two, it will get monetized because actually, the rights holders have agreed with YouTube that a it's fine. We're okay for people to use our music on YouTube, because it's been monetized that way. So yes, sink rights are quite an expensive and complicated landscape to get involved with. And folk really don't understand it. And that's why you get muted on Facebook when you put the stuff on there because Facebook's not a streaming platform, and they don't have the rights to enable you to use up music.

Will:  

And this explains why people were very, very confused and upset when for example, I know that Les Mills had a lot of instructors that are upset because those instructors couldn't teach online with the Les Mills music that they purchased even though it was covered music that they thought was different to original music. And the same with some of the old Beachbody live music. And the reason for that is that when those pieces of music were sold to the instructors, it was never with the intention of teaching online. Because teaching online pre recorded a live stream pre the pandemic was something quite specific and different. And if people were going out to do that, then often they were buying fully rights clear music to do so. I know that a Beachbody live we had some specific virtual music that was completely rights included. It was the stuff that we use to film with them, which we then on sold but we use to cover music, so non famous artists singing favorite songs, but you weren't allowed to use that music in any digital form. And I just think that instructors didn't realize that restriction existed before. So when they got tripped up when they were just trying their best to keep delivering classes. Um, it was it was a bit frustrating, but had, you know, kind of the the legal backdrop to it, it was completely, completely just the way things are. But now that we can flash forward a year, and one of the reasons why we decided to partner with you guys is because everything with pure energy is just included, meaning that there's no stress about any part of your catalogue, which was one of the big things that drew me and shift into partnering with you guys. Just to take the complexity out for instructors.

Andy  

Yeah, and I think you know, as an instructor, as a online fitness delivery, if you want to call it that, or a gym, you've got three choices, you either use the original artist music, and you you know, you got to pay to do so. You try and get away with it until you get caught. Or.

Will:  

Which I know that people have and then they create this whole video library of things that they use, which is very frustrating.

Andy  

We don't make the rules, the record industry make the rules. I kind of liken it to speeding you know, there is a speed limit on a motorway. Yeah, some people adhere to it. Some people don't, you know, and you end you can crack on all day long, but eventually you might get caught on getting there. It's the same year. And if you're a professional teaching online, the last thing you want is halfway through a plus, suddenly you just get taken down, you get muted. And, you know, on Facebook, three strikes, and you're out. So the final thing is, as you guys gravitated towards was, you know, find a solution that is of quality and gives you all the rights. So it's just one less thing to, to worry about. So, so the thing for us was, if we were going to do that, I hate the term license free music. Yeah.

Will:  

Because it just gives connotations of lift music or whatever, the music or whatever they call it on American movies. Yeah, it's, it's because

Andy  

You've got to use it because you can't use anything else. Whereas we're trying to turn that wheel and change people's thinking that we're using artists that have been working with David Guetta, you know, producers, they're working with really established folk across the world. So the music we're making is not Production Music, it's not a guy in a back bedroom, just banging some tunes out. We're working with very, very established artists. So my criteria was it had to be quality. Yeah. So when we're making drum and bass, it's got to be as good as the commercial drum and bass. So yeah, so we now have a service that you guys are using, which gives you all the rights included. But the quality is the kind of stuff that you'd hear on the radio. And it's gone. Well,

Will:  

You actually, I remember when we were first talking about this, and you mentioned how you'd started to work with your art, your repertoire, and artists and repertoire. So the department have expanded quite a lot because of a lot of a lot of professional DJs that were kind of working the circuit and producing stuff for various events. We're just unable to do any of that during the pandemic. And I know that that's something that fitness instructors will really sympathize with. Do you want to tell us a little bit about sort of how the how the the role of being a DJ was impacted in change during the pandemic, and how you guys came to work with more of them?

Andy  

Yeah, so we're in a very unique position that we run record labels, we run DJ management companies, we put big events on. So we're on the, we live in the dance music world. On the other side, we live in the fitness music world with pure energy. So when the pandemic hit, I was able to call on the services of this huge pool of DJs, producers, songwriters, artists who were kind of sat at home unable to perform and do their thing. And so I think there's a big opportunity to enable you, the the DJ producer, artists to make money, create great music, so I've got a route to distribute it because there's a need over here, within the fitness professional world, these guys need really good music to play online. So we were able to mobilize guys, you wouldn't expect to be making music for the fitness industry. They were happy because they were making albums for us, they were making good money. And part of our ongoing catalog. And we wrote provide to the fitness industry really well known good quality music. So it was kind of a win win win, if you will, that we were able to sort of hit that sweet spot and give guys work because I mean, I'm a DJ, you know, kind of retired in my older age now.

Will:  

You're not at clubs at 4am in the morning?

Andy  

Every so often. But every now and again. Yeah, my age, I sort of kind of thought, you know, I didn't want to be in a club at five in the morning.

Will:  

Fair enough. 

Andy  

It worked very, very well. And yeah, we've got a, we've now got over 1,300 titles in our catalog now. And we produce them as albums. So you always get the continuous mix be held individual tracks. So the repertoire is growing. It's diverse, from meditation through to strength through to combat and such, like so. So yeah, it was one of those things that was never planned. We didn't write it down, there was no business plan. It was a case of reacting quickly, innovating and thinking differently. And, you know, fast forward to where we are today, you know, just launching the app. And we've through the pandemic, over 5000 instructors signed up to use the music, which is testament, I think the quality.

Will:  

And so we're like how do you see, I'm quite interested to know how you see the future of music and fitness because I think that music is something that instructors have often seen as a real differentiator. And it's also something that in an age that wasn't digital, it was very easy for an instructor to use an original song in a freestyle class and get away with it in the past. If you're taught to the big gym, and the gym had a GFM or Group Fitness Manager that knew what they were doing and the gym wasn't using original music, you could sometimes get pinged. But it's becoming a lot harder. And it's certainly much harder now that we're going digital because the reality is that as you've mentioned, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, they all have algorithms that will check, check the music that you're using, and they will just mute that background music if they feel that it's offending, so it's become harder now. to use original music, and at the same time, you have some really big companies like Beachbody and Peloton doing massive global deals with talent directly so that that talent can use them use or that talent can have their music used in specific fitness scenarios. And I think that as we get further and further into that, you're going to find that certain music will just be off limits for instructors to use and fitness, because the artists will have given all the rights to one of those big companies. What like, what are your thoughts on that? It's feel I feel like that's coming down the track. And that is maybe a problem that instructors don't currently foresee. But it's definitely it's definitely, potentially on the horizon.

Andy  

Yeah, I think it's, I don't want to use the word, it's gonna get tougher. But you've got to understand that the starting point is someone sat down with a guitar or a piano and wrote a song, okay. And the primary exploitation of music, which was traditionally you made a CD of vinyl or cassette, and you put it in a shop and somebody went and bought as a physical product, the other markets gone. Now, it's a very, that's a niche specialist market, physical product. And so now, for an artist, you are getting your primary income via the likes of Spotify, Apple music. But you've got to do about a million, about a million streams of a track to get a few grand, you know, and now, so, so from a record company perspective, the industry is looking at other ways to make money. Yeah. And so it's very protective of what you would call the secondary exploitation of music. And for example, music music used in fitness and secondary exploitation. Me, you and me listening to Spotify at home is primary. So I think it's going to change, you are going to see more and more deals being done. With the Les Mills in the Pelotons of this world, the online fitness providers, and I think it's going to get tighter and tighter for the instructor to get away with it, unfortunately. So yeah, there is going to be a shift because the industry has got a greater focus on how music has been used in various different ways. So So I think that's, that's a reality that's coming down the track, whether we like it or not. And I think you have got to step back and appreciate that, you know, the the guys that make the music, the artists, the songwriters, the musicians, they need to get paid.

Will:  

Yeah. And I think that's the backdrop, right? It's is that it? Well, to be fair, artists have often been paid really badly. And record companies have taken a monopoly over a lot of that money and sort of only paid them out yet. I mean, you can read, you can read very, very many articles and books on that on that page. But the reality is with streaming, it's just as you said, it's harder and harder to monetize that content. And just like a fitness instructor puts blood, sweat and tears into a fitness class. A lot of singers and songwriters aren't big names, they are they are sort of struggling to keep doing what they love as well. And so music rights as a way of making sure that they get paid, but they're often only getting paid a little sliver of every stream. And so when when that that money gets smaller and smaller, you're right, they're going to look to how can I make the most out of the rights that I'm giving? And how can the companies and rights holding organizations that aren't on my behalf do that? And I think they will definitely come for fitness. And we've definitely seen that in a big way. Which is why personally, obviously because I partner with you guys, but I feel that it's better to just ensure that everything you're creating from this point onwards doesn't run the risk. Because the problem is if you create some stuff with music, where the rights are included today, that doesn't necessarily mean they're going to be included down the line, or that the content that you create will be usable in perpetuity, which I think is a big problem that potentially people could face.

Andy  

Yeah, you know, kind of what we've done is we've flipped it on its head because I've looked at the fitness market globally. And I think there's a big big market in creating exclusive music for fitness new music for fitness as the primary source so I'm whilst a lot of the album's we just did an album called vinyasa flow by an artist called solitude, which we've just released. It's super exclusive on the app, I could go to record companies and I could sign the artists. It's phenomenal. It's as good as anything you'll hear. But I'm really keen to build up exclusivity, the music that we make, we control the rights. As soon as I put it on Spotify or YouTube, it gets fingerprinted. And so it's then in the worldwide system, and then if you start playing it on Facebook, it's muted. So we've kind of flipped it on its head. We will control the rights, but we'll keep it exclusive. So over time, people will come to realize that hey, you know what if I use pure energy go, which is a record label for fitness, yeah, I've got great exclusive music. I can rest assured all the rights are included for life so I can create my content with comfort. And he's just kind of a different way of thinking about it. And I'm talking to artists that way to say look, and this is on a smaller level. This is what why some of the big hip hop artists are doing deals with peloton? Because actually it's It's massive. Yeah, exactly. We're looking at it a lower level, but I'm saying to it, say guys make some music for me, because I've got this global network of fitness professionals who need really good music, and I want to make it exclusive to them. So I think the market is changing. It's going to take time, I think for instructors to maybe fully appreciate it. And also, I think there's a perception that if I'm doing face to face, I've got to play original artists music, but that original artist music was new music at one time. 

Will:  

Yeah, I agree. And that's, I think that's a big thing that I have realized is that a lot of instructors are really stuck on the idea of only wanting to use music that you hear in the radio and a class. And, like I have now done a lot of research and and surveys into this. And the reality is, is that instructors, because they listen with the noise cancelling headphones, and because they they are choreographing to it, they really, really care about that particular song classes, almost never remember the music that you used. Other than that it was motivating and that the BPM suited the moves that you were doing. And then you talk over the top of it. I think that instructors way overestimate how important original artists music is to class members, because spoiler, it's not.

Andy  

Listen. Okay, if you're doing a seniors class, if you're maybe teaching aqua and it's an it's a lighter aerobic workout than the music of the familiarity does play a part 100% I get that I do a lot of spinning, I do a lot of conditioning, I did a body max plus on Monday night, you need the right intensity, you need the right fuel because you're blowing out your your backside, your muscles are killing you trying to do that last rep on the chest. And so, as long as the music feels right, it doesn't have to be something I haven't got time to sing along. I'm, you know, I'm dying. So I think you're right, it's just getting over that perception that I don't go to the gym to sing along, I go to the gym to be motivated by the instructor, motivated by the music, the beat, the intensity.

Will:  

And you know, there's certain there's certain workout genres where the Sing along element in the end, like anything that's sort of dance based, or I think that's what I've done body attacking body step, for sure. But there's other things and particularly in the in the conditioning, high intensity and working out to music, but not choreographed type of class. So you know, anything that you might do in a boutique, or F45 or anything like that, where the music being good is important. The music being original artists is more important to the instructor than it is to their class member, because the class member is so busy blowing out on how hard that they're working. They're not super aware of what the song is half the time. 

Andy  

That's right. And we're getting feedback from our network. Now, we've been using pure disco releases over the past couple years that that class participants are saying, where do I get this music, this music's great, which is which is testament, I think to the quality that we're delivering. So I think you're right. And and I think the other thing for an instructor and a gym to consider is it's a commercial decision as well as a music decision. So if you do want to play copyrighted original music in your classes, it does come with a cost ultimately, and so given...

Will:  

And sometimes gyms are making that decision for instructors, at times,

Andy  

I had to meeting with a gym today. And you know, he was saying to me, look, whether it's the background music that they're using, just for some of their like CrossFit sort of conditioning classes, or is the exercise to music stuff, their bill and that this is just too small gyms is potentially 6000 pound to be paid to the collection associations just for playing the music. And he said he's not even me buying music or buying the source. He said, so your music will save me a fortune. And he because as you as you've just said, he said the same. When folks are coming into the gym, if they're just using the gym floor, they generally got headphones on anyway, in a group x side of things, as you've just said, they're the majority of the classes that this guy said we teach, it's not that it doesn't matter, but actually there's an alternative here.

Will:  

Yeah, you're right. It's not that people don't care. It's just that they they don't care as much about the song being something that they've heard on the radio as instructors may think they do.

Andy  

Yeah. 100% Yeah. And that's, that's our focus. And I think the unique nature of what we do in the production of our music, as we do with sh1ft we work with yourselves as presenters aligned to our music team to make the right music for the right discipline. So we're not just signing music willy nilly. If we do a salsa album, we've got a salsa presenter, working with our producers, sort of that executive producer to direct the feel and the flow of the production. So I think we're quite unique in how we're creating the music.

Will:  

And so what are the biggest genres for you guys at the moment? What are the most popular popular types of music instructors are using

Andy  

HIIT is naturally very, very popular. Because I think with HIIT, and we always mix up the protocols every month, we're giving you good class content as an instructor. So we're quite inevitable with our HIIT releases. Mind Body is huge. Clearly yoga, meditation, pilates, so that's a that's a big tribe that we service within pure energy. And then you've got a lot of, we create a lot of what we'd call freestyle albums, which are that's kind of 125 to 135, BPM, good commercial, mainstream the stuff that you'd hear on the radio, the stuff that you'd hear on ministry sound is, you know, EDM house music, which then you can use from condition into if you want to do a row, which want to do step so that they're the sort of really solid releases that that sit in the middle. But yeah, I think, right across the board, you know, we are releasing stuff for combat, we're releasing stuff meditation, but the biggest really, I suppose I would say are HIIT those sort of HIIT workouts. And also, you know, the SH1FT programs, the sort of conditioning programs, we do think called Body Max. So yeah, just we like to make sure we're covering as many places as we can. But But certainly, I would put my finger on HIIT to be the biggest thing that we've done over the last couple of years.

Will:  

And what what's the future for, so now that you've got the app under your belt, all seven days post launch, what's what's the next big things in the future for what you guys are doing? Is it just continuing to expand the catalog? Or are there other things that are things on the horizon that you'd like to do?

Andy  

I think you said to me a while ago about keeping in your lane, which are things...

Will:  

...specifically specifically I said, not about you keeping your lane but that I wanted to keep in my lane. And so I wanted to like go with go with the experts when it came to music, rather than trying to stick my oar in about music, I'd rather just give you a an idea of what we need and let you provide it for us.

Andy  

But I really liked what you said there and so so where are we going? You know, we've so we have global aspirations with what we're doing. And then this kind of, there's a couple of things, we want to continue making great music for fitness and really established this kind of first record label for the fitness industry as I said before, it's the primary thing that we want to do. But I'm really excited about building a global network of fitness professionals, and our focus being on movement and music. So if we can build that global network, the more instructors that we can get signed up to the app and gyms that we can get signed up to the app, the more value we can bring. So your, SH1FT are  the first app that blocks working with us as a partner. So my aspiration is to become the music partner for indeed brands like yourself, gym chains, but to be that trusted music parlor for the fitness professionals. So So yeah, we'll keep building and developing the app. I'm really excited to take it on the road as well and do some some events with our DJs.

Will:  

Exactly. I was gonna, I was gonna say, do you have any events in mind, because I know that our instructors really want to do events too. But as I said, I want to stay in my lane. So if you want to do me an event that, Andy, I would love you to.

Andy  

Well, maybe we could do a collaboration, because that's what we want. That's what we do on the music side, we do big, big events for the in the dance music side of things. So yeah, I've got this idea to take Pure Energy on the road and do a bit of a throwdown with you know, great DJs, great presenters, good vibes. So that's one of the things we want to look at doing. But back to the point about keeping in our lane. Yeah, just keep really pushing the boundaries with the music. And I think as the as our fitness our network of instructors grows, the more the more and more can we bring in really influential artists and producers. So when you've got a few 1000, 5000, 10,000 subscribers to the app, it becomes a very, very viable channel for very credible artists who will want to make music for us. So I think that's where we want to keep going then, you know, 2,3,4,5 years time, pure energy is that global brand, music and fitness.

Will:  

Awesome. Well, I am, I will make sure that in the show notes, we give everybody links to how to find you guys online to check out the catalog how to sign up to the app and everything else. But thank you very much for taking the time to chat to me and congratulations on the launch of the app. And if you are someone who has done any of our SH1FT fitness formats, and then any of the online workouts you will have already heard Pure Energy in the background, but we have some exciting new launches coming out particularly our cycling program, which is going to be our first format that goes into exercise to music. We're actually working to the music and we have partnered with pure energy and I'm super excited. I think the most played songs on my phone from the last year have been some of the songs from the pure energy catalog is a particular from the 80s album that was stuck in my head for about two months. So I can attest to this being to this being great music that you actually want to listen to, and breaking down conceptions of what people might think about license free or rights included music. So Andy, thank you very much for joining me. And I will chat to you again soon. I'm sure.

Andy  

Thank you, Will, it's been a pleasure.

Will:  

I hope that you enjoyed my chat with Andy. If you take one thing away from this, it's that unfortunately, all signs point to the fact that music licensing is going to become harder and more expensive, not easier for group fitness instructors as a whole. And this is something that's been going on for a while. I've said this before, but I created an entire group fitness solution based around people being able to use their own music because I have worked in the sector and industry. And I've seen the direction it's going and I know how tough it is. But the good news is that it doesn't have to become harder for you. No matter how you choose to teach. You, of course have the option to try and fly under the radar using your own music. But just like that speeding analogy that Andy used in our chat, eventually, you might get caught if you aren't following the rules. And this could have big consequences, especially if you're building a back catalogue that you want to rely on. So I recommend getting savvy with your music solution now. Now, here's the deal, there are a number of great options out there. And pure energy is just one of them. But what I do love about them. And why I decided to partner with them for shift is that they really do get the balance between cost, quality and ease of use, right. And they allow you to use the music for any purpose you need in fitness, which other providers do not do. You can teach in person, you can pre record you can live stream, and there are no restrictions. I really recommend that if you're using another solution, you check out what their rules are. Because this is a really unique proposition. I'm not going to give you the hard sell because I think this is a great product. But I do know that the less headaches the beta and knowing that you can use your music in any environment is super important. Now pure energy have just released a new app, pure energy go, and for a monthly subscription, you can access all of their music, that's everything they've ever created, including all of our shift playlists in one place. So you can build awesome playlists easily making your own choosing song by song, and remembering that all of the music has been designed exclusively for the fitness industry. And the most important part, as I've stressed so much during this is that no matter what happens with licensing agreements in the music industry, no matter what happens with those other big companies that buying out the right to use artists music all by themselves, these tracks are fully rights included for life. So this is a truly future-proof solution. This is why I'm banging on about it because I don't want you guys to lose access to any content that you have worked hard on. Now, if you are keen to sign up and again, please make your own mind up, you can go to the link in our show notes, which will take you to the sign up page for the pure energy go app. Now a special offer for listeners, not only will you get a free month, but if you sign up using the code SH1FTAPP, you'll get a further 10 pounds off your purchase of either a monthly or annual subscription. Now whether you go with pure energy go or another provider for your music, I want you to make sure that whatever solution you decide on is right for you, but is one that is future proof. Make sure that whatever content you create, you have the rights for life. Thank you for listening. If you're enjoying the show, don't forget to subscribe for all the latest episodes wherever you get your podcasts. And while you're there, please drop us a review. You can also get in touch with me at will@sh1ftfitness.com. I'm Will Brereton and you've been listening to Group Fitness Real Talk.