And The Writer Is...with Ross Golan - The Realest Conversation About Songwriting In 2026 | Gino The Ghost | Patreon Exclusive

Episode Date: June 8, 2026

Today's guest is a multi-Latin-Grammy-winning songwriter and producer with a wall of platinum records — and one of the few people in music willing to say the quiet part out loud. He came up as an actor and a rapper, moved to LA broke, stumbled into songwriting, and turned it into the kind of career most writers spend a lifetime chasing. He's also built one of the sharpest voices in the room as the host of his own show, Good Luck With Gino.This is one of the most honest conversations we've had about how the music business actually works in 2026 — not the clean version, the real one. Why roughly 75% of working writers now survive on K-pop. How the pitch song quietly died and took the professional songwriter down with it. Artists taking songwriting credit on songs they didn't write — and exactly how labels split the writers up to play them against each other and shave points. Gino lays out the one rule every songwriter needs before their next cut, when it's worth standing on business, and when you "roll over like a dog" because the record's too big to lose.And The Writer Is... Gino The Ghost!In this episode of And The Writer Is, we go deep on:• How he came up — actor, rapper, broke in LA, then stumbled into songwriting• Treating every podcast episode like an album of singles• Why ~75% of working writers now live off K-pop• What pitch records used to be — Clive Davis, Barry Manilow & the lost art of outside songs• The death of the professional songwriter (and why talent-show winners get nothing now)• Artists taking credit for songs they didn't write — and how to combat it• The "$15K buy-me-out" story & when to stand on business vs. roll over• The split shakedown — how labels pit writers against each other, and the rule that beats it• Why generosity makes you more money than being a prickAnd much more...🔓 This is only part of the conversation. The full extended, exclusive interview is on our Patreon — where Gino goes even further:• The Bryan Cranston mindset that changed everything for him: "I don't need this role"• The craziest stories he's ever had in the studio (the fight, the NDA, the booth writer)• Drugs, weed, and vices — and why the "it makes me more creative" thing is a myth• His no-apologies case for AI in music — and why he calls the backlash performative• The synesthesia call-out nobody else will make• How you actually break in (it's not the biggest rooms)• Why songwriters deserve points and fees — and the fight to make it happenGet the full uncut episode and every extended conversation at www.patreon.com/andthewriteris.Hit subscribe and turn on notifications. Every week, we go deep with the most interesting creatives in music.Follow us on socials: @andthewriterisFINAL CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS (YouTube — public cut)0:00 "Have you had to learn to be fearless?" — actor, rapper, broke in LA0:39 Building the podcast — and why they resisted video for 200 episodes2:35 The clip era: treating every episode like an album of singles4:10 Music Monday–Friday, podcast at night — and learning Spanish for Latin music5:15 Sessions in 2026: "I only do stuff I'm having fun doing"5:42 Why ~75% of working writers now live off K-pop7:19 What pitch records used to be — Clive Davis, Barry Manilow & outside songs8:14 The death of the professional songwriter (and why talent-show winners get nothing)10:24 Why artists should collaborate with professional writers11:43 Artists taking credit for songs they didn't write — how to combat it12:06 "Buy me out" — the $15K publishing story & when to stand on business13:41 The split shakedown: how labels pit writers against each other14:46 The rule every songwriter needs: talk first, start a chain16:13 Why generosity beats being a prick once everyone's good17:11 The craziest studio stories… (continued on Patreon) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Have you had to learn to be fearless or is it something that comes natural? No, I've always, I've had to learn how to narrow my focus of fearless. Does that make sense? Yeah. I was, I think, coming up, I mean, I was an actor and a rapper. That's how I got to L.A. And then I was just broke as fuck. And then I was just trying to figure it out for a while.

I stumbled into songwriting. My old manager and good friend of mine, Adam Small, got me into songwriting. And in that time, I was trying to scratch the itch of being an actor and the itch of being just a funny, outgoing guy. And I was always like going viral on the internet, but I didn't know how to like narrow it in. And then the podcast was kind of a way to retain and build a platform, as I'm sure you know. You know, you're like, I have all these people and I know all these people and I'm so good at talking about it. And da-da-da-da-da. How do I build a platform on what I already do?

pretty naturally, right? And so... When did you start the podcast? Two and a half years ago. Yeah. Just about, yeah, I'm on episode 148. What are you on? 250 or something like that.

I mean, you know, we're almost 10 years. Crazy. And we've now gone into the sort of weekly thing. But when we started this, it was, you know, the first 200 episodes are audio. And we resisted doing... video not because we weren't even we were even filming some of it but we weren't

editing it we weren't putting it out I think if there was any resistance to it it was that we had a good thing going and we were part of the podcast generation of like the it feels like the first second round of it yeah you know I mean when you're talking about 10 years ago

like there weren't there were just in the songwriting world there was zero and there were in the music world there were a few but, you know, we were, it was more just to document and archive generations of songwriters than it was about building a platform. Totally. Once, as it's gone on, and especially once we went to video, you realize the support that it's had. And more importantly, just how robust our community really is.

That's the thing for me is it has allowed me to build a community. community like video like you know I have a I have a long form every week I put out a full episode every Monday but I've found today that most and this is something we can talk about with music most people are looking for the snackable bites and they all come for the clips and I cannot tell you how many comments I get because I'll post a clip every day from the week's episode and I'll get a comment at least one to two every day that's like dude you got to start a podcast yeah right I'm like, this is the podcast. What do you think is from the podcast?

Yeah, yeah. You're watching it. So they'll treat the clips like the podcast. Do you find that you have to create content, you start creating content knowing what's more clickable than others? Yeah. Well, I segment out my whole show. So I have everything segmented in the mind of this will be a clip. This will be a clip.

This will be a clip. This will be a clip. And I, I definitely will catch myself. Dude, the parallels with music are crazy because it's like, we come from the album era and people want singles. And so you then have to approach your album every week with the singles in mind. And I will have to literally like segment it out. This is going to be a viral clip. So I have to hit these notes.

And if I am doing it and I like catch myself not hitting it how I got to hit it because I'm an actor, I will, I'll like find a way to recite it again. in a way that's like, you know, we come from the album era. And so when you approach an album every week, you know, you got to, and I'll do it like that, you know, and so. Yeah. Do you like doing the podcast? I love it. It's my favorite thing. Why are you in sessions?

Because I love that too. And I want to do both. Los dos. You can do both? I can do both. I don't all, like, weekdays are music, Monday through Friday. I don't touch the podcast other than editing a clip at night. I don't even do anything.

Do you have time to do anything outside of these things? It seems like that's a lot of work. How do you do that? You want to go through my schedule? Basically, wake up in the morning, work out, as you can see. And then I have Spanish like twice a week. Why are you taking Spanish? Because I write a lot in Latin music.

And I just want to learn a language. It's tight. Learning is cool, guys. How fluent are you now? A little. I have a professor in Ecuador and I have class two, three days per semester in the computer. So. Yeah, that sounds good.

Yeah, that's fine. We've got work to do. But, so, yeah. And then I'll have a session like, it's probably like three to four times a week. I've been more selective now. What are sessions like in 2026? Oh, man. I only do stuff that I'm having fun doing.

I will not do a session that's like, So I have fun every day. How are you doing five sessions a week if you're only doing ones that are fun? Is it because you just enjoy your days? I'm popping, baby. Yeah. I get to be selective. So what are your sessions like?

What are you doing? Sorry shit. I, if I'm doing pitch. You're doing pitch songs? Yeah, and if I'm doing pitches with friends, I will not do blind day pitch. I won't do it. If I'm doing so. Who's cutting pitch songs is this?

Only K-pop. pretty much like 90% K-pop artists. It's one of the things that we talk a lot with the Grammys is how important it is to move, to make sure that the Grammys represent Asia as well. It's done a really good job at

working with Laris and Latin music. But the amount of even from the perspective of being based in the United States, the amount of American writers that are

are solely making a living off of Asian music. The Grammys is not caught up yet because I don't think that everybody realizes that, and I don't mean like the committees and, you know, the boards you're on, but the actual, like, the community and the awards and the fans of the Grammys and the people that watch the Grammys, and really, honestly, the entire music community has not caught on that writers and producers are doing 75% K-pop.

Yeah, yeah. It's the only thing that pays right now. They're the only people, accepting pitch, really. All these other, like, huge artists, I mean, I would love to work on that duo album. I would love to sit down with my dear friend Ed Shearin, you know, you're friends of the pod and work on that album. But they're just not taking records like that like they used to. And all the camps are super Tate McCrae and Sabrina.

And they're all just working with this fucking, that fucking Ryan Tedder's got out. He's got them all in a chokehold right now, you know, and Amy Allen and John Bellion. But this is what, this is, it's, to give an idea of what pitch records used to be, the golden age. The words A&R stand for artists and repertoire. You'd have somebody who would sign an artist and they would find their repertoire. You know, the greatest A&R guy of all time, Clive Davis would go and take Barry Manilow, who was the Justin Bieber of his era. and Barry's a very good songwriter, might even be in the Hall of Fame, has been an icon at BMI Awards,

and his biggest songs were not written by him. You know, he would do 10 of the 12 songs on his album, and the last 12, the deal was he would at least, you know, Clive negotiated that he would get to pick the outside songs. And outside songs are written by professional songwriters where that's essentially all they do. And there was this, you know, in many ways when I was,

first coming up, there was still the vestige way of being a professional songwriter as your own as your main vocation. You didn't have to subsidize it by also releasing music or podcast or publishing companies or record companies or whatever was. You could make a living just by being a songwriter because there were so many avenues for people to take outside songs, especially when there was, you know, American Idol where that when the judges weren't as famous or more famous than the singers. Same thing with the voice. You know, these were, uh, X Factor. These were all vehicles for songs to just move in English. Um, and now it's like so many of those things have dried up that even when you win those shows, you know, these poor singers who think that they're

going to win and get a record deal, like that's something you can do as spot on. Like, these poorest souls, like, they can't, they don't even get record deals when they win. They get an option. that nobody picks up and then it's like then they're they're stuck being a former winner that didn't that didn't work versus somebody who was like hey great congrats on winning you do now need to go viral though yeah yeah right and then we'll give you a deal yeah maybe yeah maybe it doesn't well but there is no they correct it's like if you know an uh american idol had 19 entertainment which may or may not be there anymore i don't know who's doing the american idol deals but um you know the voice has no,

there's no record company attached to the voice right now. Yeah. You know, each winner has to bring their winners to shop them around. Yeah. To try to get them a deal. But the point is that those were all vehicles for outside songs.

And as those have dried up, everyone's looking for who will take outside songs. And, you know, one is any record label that can find the singers who want to take outside songs will probably end up with albums of phenomenal songs. Any, any, it's, it's so crazy that all artists feel like they need to also write their songs.

Because Ross. Yeah. I like that you call me by my name. You like that? They're not great. You're the only person I think who calls me. You like that? Yeah.

I'm the only one that's going to say this too. They're not great being what, who's the day? They're not great writers, a lot of them, artists. Oh. Some of them are. Of course. They're on tour. They're doing other things.

And they haven't written fucking 3,000 songs in four years. They, it's, it is a, there are the best writers I've ever worked with, the best artists I've ever worked with, work with writers. Why would you not? Why would you not want to collaborate with people that their livelihood depends on creating hit records? I understand and respect the artist who says, you know, I want to write 100% of my songs or I write it with. these people because that's what they want to do. And some of them may or may not be hit writers. I don't know.

And some of them are known as, you know, in a way, writers first. But the kinds of what it does, what this era has done the last 20 years. And I think there are specific artists who really enabled this practice. But the idea of taking songwriting credit, even when they don't. write this song. Don't get me fucking started, please. No, that's why you're here. I literally want to get you started on this.

There are a lot of artists who take credit on songs that they didn't write, and, you know, how do you combat that? How bad do you want the record? Because that's really it. I won't say who recently a big artist, a friend of mine, has a song with a big artist, and she wanted even splits on the record. The artist was like, I want even splits on the record. And everybody was like, okay. And she was like, nah, fuck that.

Buy it out. Buy me out. Give me 15K for the publishing. Because you're reducing my publishing. Yeah. Did you do it? Give me 15K. Yeah, yeah.

And none of the other writers got paid, but she did. So you have to ask, A, B, yeah, it depends like the hill you're willing to die on. If I'd do a song with Beyonce, Beyonce, Beyonce, didn't work on it and they're like, Beyonce's taking a cut of this, or it's not coming out, I'm going to probably roll over like a dog. But if it's an artist where I feel like I have leverage or I don't give, I don't care. Because again, you just don't make, you have to decide where, when you want to stand on business, like when it makes sense to stand on business, um, because there are moments where in your career, you've built up and up leverage and you can look at a, you can look at a release

practically and decide, is this going to even make me that much money? Maybe, but probably not. If it's not a single especially, if it's just going to be on Spotify, is it worth bending over, for lack of a better word, and taking something that isn't fair?

If it's not a huge artist, then I don't care. Then, no, I'll give the song to somebody else, or, like, I don't care. I think it's good to, there are two things to that. One is I think it's the responsibility of the producer and the manager of the producer who negotiates that when the artists and the label say like, well, they're going to want a percentage of the publishing, that first and foremost, there should be always a chain, a text chain of all the writers to say, okay, this is what they're coming at. What do we want to do and respond collectively? Yeah. So even if we agree to the splits that we say we collectively agree to the splits really throws them off guard. you know, because then they're like, oh, the way they, it works is they can separate the writers and say, well, it's only 5%.

When it's really, you know, you have 25%, and they're like, well, reduce it to 20. It's only 5%. You're like, no, you don't understand how math works. That's 20% of my share. And what they'll do, what the labels will do oftentimes. This has happened to me a couple of times and I'm going through it right now, and I won't say what to. They will approach different writers separately, get them to approve their share with. without even telling them, either without telling them the full split or, you know, whatever.

And then they'll approach the last writer and be like, hey, so everyone's agreed. So you're the last one. This is important. Every songwriter who watches this. Yeah. Whenever a cut happens, the original writers need to talk first. You need to start a chain and everyone needs to agree because the first person who gets hit up, they're going to use you guys against each other. Yeah.

And I'm the guy who's always like, I'm sorry, but I'm not agreeing to it. And if they say, well, that's me. You know, they're going to, you know, the other people agree to it already. It's like, that's fine, but I'm not going to do that. Also, as a producer, you know, there was a recent situation where the artist wants a percentage. And I said, okay, well, the non-performing, non-producing writer on this is not going to give you this percentage. unless you pay that person and you give them a point. And that's not going to come out of my point as the producer.

I feel like I am obligated to do that as an often just songwriter. But it was nice to call the writer and the manager of the writer and say, hey, they want this, but this is what I got in, Attorney. You're going to get a check. Can you call every producer that I know? But we can set precedent. That's the whole point in these conversations. It's like,

your songwriters will be loyal to you. You should be generous, everybody, with your collaborators. First of all, I obviously believe in even splits for like 95% of the time. What the fuck are we even talking about? But in general, in negotiations, a couple percentage here, a point here will make you so much more money than being a prick. Because like, when you get to a certain level in music, everybody's good. Like, everyone's good enough and pretty good

where you can get a hit for the most part. There's a threshold. Once you break through a certain tier, it's just like, everybody's good. And you're only going to work with people you enjoy being around and people that do good business. Much of, in my experience, songwriting and producing is being a businessman

and being like being smart with your, relationships and your business. And I've got more work just by people enjoying my company than, and also have turned down working with certain people that are great because I don't like them because they're assholes. Or they've tried to fuck over me or a friend or talk crazy to the engineer or whatever, you know? What's the craziest story you've ever had in this studio? Oh, God. I bet a few.