New music discovery platform, Andrson, is an app that will help artists get heard and discovered from their ‘front room’ and also enable A&R executives to connect directly with the artists they need to fill their rosters—without ever having to step into a gig. Andrson has been designed to reimagine the digital A&R process. Rather than focusing on passive metrics like listening behavior and social media popularity, Andrson’s technology uses AI and machine learning to produce unbiased analyses of users’ music, which makes it easier for musicians to be discovered by their unique sound and for industry professionals to quickly find the sound they’re searching for. Andrson also helps musicians connect with other artists for collaborations.
Andrson launched on 27th April 2020, with artists poised to sign up across Ireland, the UK, and the US, and a goal to be a truly global platform in the next year. Andrson will be offering all artists a premium free trial for the rest of 2020 – given that digital connections are becoming more important — if not essential and necessary — right now. This extended free trial and access allows artists to upload as many tracks as they want for analysis, as well as allows them to have industry visibility (which is gated for free users). To get their music listed for industry search, all musicians have to do is sign up for the premium free trial.
Andrson completed a seed round of €550k and was recently named as part of enterprise Ireland’s HPSU (high potential start up) class of 2020 which also delivered an additional €250k of match funding. The platform is co-founded by Zach Miller-Frankel and Neil Dunne, who came up with the idea for Andrson whilst they were at university in Dublin. Both experienced and passionate music industry professionals, Andrson was born out of their own pain-point for inefficiencies working in music discovery and A&R – and a passion and purpose for helping new musicians having the chance to be better discovered and heard. With $4.5 billion spent on music discovery each year globally and over $2 billion worldwide – Zach and Neil created Andrson to close the gap between new talent and A&R executives.
How It Works:
Once musicians sign
up, they can immediately access the platform and view all the features, and are
encouraged to create their own profile, showcasing themselves, their music,
video and influences. Andrson’s technology will digitally fingerprint their
music and video uploads, and compare it against a database of thousands of
songs from top artists to rising stars, creating search reference points based
on their results.
On the other side, record labels and A&R executives also register and can
then search the platform for music types or profiles that their roster needs
but can’t find. As music executives search for the sound they need, Andrson
serves them results in seconds through the use of audio AI and predictive
analytics. For example, if Andrson says an act sounds 70% like Beyonce and a
label searches for that, the artists who match that criteria will be returned
in the search results, and the label can listen to the artists and reach out
directly to any musician of interest—all done in-app. Andrson exists to give musicians the
opportunity to be discovered by the top A&R teams, bookers, promoters and
producers. At the same time the platform’s proprietary algorithm enables rapid
discovery for labels to help them fill specific gaps on their roster and
successfully monetise new music.
Other key features:
- An interactive user dashboard (home screen) provides meaningful account data: user specific analysis detailing who’s listened and from where; who is a connection and how many and frequency of searches artists have appeared in as well as any deals secured.
- Musicians receive ‘LinkedIn-style’ notifications when a professional interacts with their profile (i.e. “someone from XX label just listened to X” or “Joe Bloggs from XX just sent you a message”)
- For 2020 all users will be able to use the premium service which gives them visibility to industry engaging with their music, network with other artists and full audio analysis. Free users (2021 onwards) can network with other artists and receive limited audio analysis.
Ken Allen, Founder at Faction Records says: “Andrson is a really interesting concept, the nature of how we discover artists is changing and having a platform like Andrson would be hugely helpful to our A&R process.”
Zach Miller-Frankel, Co-Founder at Andrson comments: “At Andrson we are passionate about new music discovery and using technology to help talent get discovered by the music industry and vice versa. Based on our own experiences in A&R, we believe that a new way of doing business is required within the music industry. Whilst there will always be a place for on-the-ground discovery, our proprietary algorithm leverages the power of tech to help save time and money for the music industry – as well as enable discovery whilst we’re socially distancing.”
Neil Dunne, Co-Founder at Andrson adds: “We want to help music acts get heard and discovered, after all they deserve their talent to be showcased as well as to make meaningful connections with other artists. Andrson is an online platform from where new talent can be discovered from their ‘front room’.”
