Trading Secrets - 290. How Two Friends Used Free Mixes to Build a Multimillion-Dollar Career

Episode Date: April 13, 2026

This week, Jason is joined by Matt Halper and Eli Sones — the duo behind Two Friends, for a conversation on how they turned a college hobby into one of the most successful independent DJ brands in the world.Starting as best friends making music for fun in middle school and college, Matt and Eli share how they took a leap after graduation with no real income, betting on themselves in an industry dominated by record labels. What began as small gigs paying a few thousand dollars quickly evolved into a global touring business but not without years of uncertainty, financial risk, and reinvestment.They break down the real business of being a DJ today,  revealing why the majority of their revenue doesn’t come from music, but from live shows, brand partnerships, and building an experience-driven brand. From early days barely breaking even to landing six-figure deals and major residencies in Las Vegas, they explain how they scaled strategically while staying independent.They also dive into the viral success of their Big Booty Mixes and why, despite millions of listeners, they’ve never made a dollar directly from them. Instead, they reveal how free content became their most powerful marketing engine, driving ticket sales, brand deals, and a loyal fanbase around the world.Jason and the guys also explore the future of music and technology, including how AI is changing the creative process and lowering the barrier to entry for new artists and what that means for the next generation of creators.Matt and Eli reveal all this and so much more in another episode you can’t afford to miss!

This message comes from Capital One Commercial Bank. Your business requires commercial banking solutions that prioritize your long-term success. With Capital One, get a full suite of financial products and services tailored to meet your needs today and goals for tomorrow. Learn more at Capital One.com slash Commercial, member FDIC. Welcome back to another episode of Trading Secrets. Today we are joined by one of the most successful independent DJ duos in the world. Two friends.

Matt Helper and Eli Sones built their brand before college to house parties into a global touring act. From their viral big booty mixes, I know you guys at home know all about those, to sold out tours, major festival stages. They've turned remixes and mashups into a scalable business.

But behind the music, there's something even more interesting. They've built a, highly profitable, independent operation in an industry that's totally dominated by labels. It's nothing like we've seen on the podcast yet. Matt and Eli, welcome to Traying Secrets. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Yeah, you know, obviously there was a lot of business talk, but last time I saw you guys,

you were taking the Crown Championship at Art Basel at the Celsius Padel tournament. Who'd you guys beat in the finals? It was us versus Dwight Howard and Diplow. When you guys won that, do you want any money for that or no? It was for charity. Okay, I love it. That's good stuff. You're getting paid by Celsius to be there. Do you have a partnership with Celsius?

We did. Yeah, at the time it was part of like a big year-long thing where there was a bunch of different, you know, fun shows and pop-ups and events. Yeah, we love them. And Celsius is great. And it's fun when, like, brands are like collaborative and like, you know, try to lean into what you do. So like, obviously for us, whether it's DJing, interesting, unique events,

like we've done like workout classes with them. Which has been cool. Yeah. That's how we, like, met, who was actually, I think, we defeated him in it. He was good. He was good. Tyler Cameron. Yeah.

He was good in the tournament. But like stuff like that, we're like, you know, he's like leading the class and we're DJing. So it's cool when brands kind of try to like lean into something that actually works rather than, I don't know. A million artificial things that don't really feel like it's, you know, anyone's getting it, especially their audience is getting anything. For sure. I feel like what you guys have done is like built this spider web. and whether it's DJing workout classes with massive brands or it's national tours or it's partnering with artists, creating your own music, DJing from colleges to massive venues like you're going to Atlantic City and Palm Tree. Like you guys, it feels like you've been able to create revenue streams and like a multitude of categories. Is that accurate?

Yeah, definitely. I think it's funny looking back when you first like rewind to 2011, it all started just, hey, we like music. We kind of had a, different complementary skill set each. And we're like, all right, we're hanging out. We're best friends in middle school and high school. We're hanging out all the time. Let's mess around with some music production software. That early on, you're not thinking big picture, all these other avenues you're going to get involved with.

You're kind of just like, let's mess around and have some fun making music. But then I think what was fun and exciting is you kind of quickly learn how like entrepreneurial the whole business is. Some of it definitely is overwhelming. and there's a lot of times where we're like, oh my God, I want to turn my phone off. I just want to drown out the noise and finally be able to work on music. Sometimes it's like, am I still a musician? Yeah, there's so many moving.

But the flip side is it's fun. It's exciting. It's like you're kind of controlling your own destiny in a lot of ways. I love it. We'll get into the weeds of the specifics today. I do want to start a little bit back in time of where it started. Before I go there, just because we're on this topic of conversation, it feels like in the DJ space, you got to have your skill set, but it's a lot of marketing.

It's a lot of branding. And someone asked me the other day about DJ Polly D. Like, how's he doing? I'm like, I've read articles. I've talked to some people that know him. He's killing him. Like what I've seen things about what he might get paid per set, 50K plus, and that's moving in the plus plus direction per set.

You know, someone like DJ Pauly D, I mean, am I wrong in saying, sure, he's good at what he does, but he has a following. He has a community. He has a brand. Let's put him on that platform that's hot right now, and let's build a business around that. Is that accurate?

We've never met him, but you got to respect the hustle. Hell, yeah. He's killing it. He parlayed a moment into a career. He's still extremely relevant in the DJ world, at least, and I don't even know how long go Jersey Shore, like, hit. 15 years ago. Yeah, whatever it was.

So, you know, respect to him. And there's a lot of people these days that, you know, you get like a moment or something, and you got to, it's so stressful. You got to figure out how to, like, make it into a career because it goes quick. But, yeah, for someone like him, like, he probably had the technical side down, and he knew what he was doing. But yeah, then it's all brand. He is a brand. His face is a brand. Like, that's his logo half the time, you know? That's a hard thing to do. I think that's a good transition as far as like that was his platform. Right. Reality TV show had some skill set,

brought it to the main stage. It brought it to Vegas and everywhere else. You guys, buddies in middle school, high school, you're into this DJ thing. You're into making music. What'd you study in school? When you went to Vanderbilt, you like, what did you study? I majored in human and organizational development. Okay. What did you expect your career to be after school. If it wasn't going to be music, hopefully it would have been some other, like, semi-entrepreneurial startup-y type thing, because that was definitely interesting to me. What did you study back? Product design. It was, like, creative and a little engineering, but like, honestly, I think

what for me was good was obviously meeting friends, network and stuff. It's just like pushing you to do stuff you don't know how to do, learn things. Because like in the end, for all of this and so many other creative things, most of the time, no one's teaching you anything. You're just like jumping in, figuring it out. And every year that changes what that makes. means. Like back then, it was YouTube tutorials or like really trying to like listen and experiment, trial and error. Now it's like chat CBT can tell you how to make a sound. Like you literally say, how do I make the sound? And they try their best, you know? It's changed so much, right? But also when you guys, like you guys graduate, right? And the idea of being, or you're in college, let's call it,

the idea of being a DJ is not what it is today, right? It's very prevalent today. The market is huge. It's moving and growing, right? Depending on like the way people are consuming alcohol and AI's factor. So we'll talk about that. But back then, when you went until mom, dad, brother, sister, cousin, I'm going to go do this DJ thing. They had to look at you like he had foreheads. Are they not? Luckily, it was like right when this stuff was just becoming mainstream. So like, our friends, like, knew a couple DJs. But like, if we did it three years earlier, I'd be like, I literally don't know what you're talking about. I have no idea. But you guys did it. When did you start to see like money come into what you were producing? When we graduated college in 2015, we went right into it.

Like, we never really had other jobs. And even then, we were definitely not making money. In fact, we were probably losing money. But I think what was pushing us was like the trajectory felt good. So even if we were not making much, it was still growing. What was growing? People listening online, the amount of emails we'd get asking us to perform shows, even if the budgets were low, the amount of managers that were asking us if we had representation.

So it's almost like a feeling, you know what I mean? And we never really put like a firm. deadline or anything. But we kind of were like, all right, we're trying this after college, 100%. This is what we're excited about, passionate about, and we need to, like, give this a real try. In my head, I would say maybe it was like, if two or three years went by and it was really like nothing changed, we may have had to have had a talk of like... How long were you guys operating in a loss? So it was about like a year and a half after graduating was when we're like, all right, we're now, we're like making some money.

Probably still at a loss. But we're not in a loss, but like, not enough. We still live What were your expenses, though? I would say our expenses actually were not that high. It was more that we weren't making that. Yeah, we would do a lot. We would say yes to pretty much every show. At that time, what were you getting paid per show? $1,500 to $3,000 probably.

We would try to not lose money on the flights and everything. But sometimes that. Right, because when you, in the DJ game, right, when they give you that $3K or $1,500, that's gross. You have to pay everything. Sometimes every show is different, but those, I would say traditionally, yeah, you're like paying for flights hotels often. millions of monthly listeners.

You two plus million followers altogether, touring all over, working with big artists. If I had your manager in here right now, I'm like, all right, you're pitching him at 1,500 now. What are you pitching him at now? What would he say?

Right. Prices these days, it's hard to answer, and we're not trying to dodge the question, but it really, like, varies so much. We'll have a buddy. Someone will hit us and be like, hey, I know some blah, blah, blah, wants to book you. What should I tell them?

And it's like, we can't even answer because it just really, really is a case-by-case basis. There are some shows still to this day that we'll do pretty much at break-even or even lose because it's like we want to, we want this new experience that we were never going to get. By the way, that could be like the highest offer we're getting, and it's just we need to bring so much production,

but it's such a big look, like you have to do it. You know what I mean? Like we did Lala last summer. We brought 60 crew people because we had a drone show and building all this stuff, and it's just like, you know. For that show all in, we probably spent, what, close to half a million dollars. Let's just say you're paid a half million bucks on that. You guys are thinking, we got to spend a half million to make this just epic, right?

And you're thinking content and your experience is that accurate that you might break even at that or even lose money knowing you're investing into it? In general, yes. Like we look at each year, we kind of need to pick some of the highlight moments where we're like, okay, obviously we can't lose money every show or break even on every show. Otherwise, you never make any money. Or someone's not getting paid. Yeah. But we're like, all right. And so sometimes that's one specific show or festival.

Sometimes that means it's a whole tour where you're gone for eight weeks on a bus. And overall, that's kind of like your highlight tape that sets the tone. And this is a lesson that our agent, we give him a lot of credit to this day because it was 2017, just a couple years into it where he sat us down. And he was like, look, guys, there's a lot of your peers that, you know, you could get booked at the clubs. You can get booked at basically they call it soft ticket events where it's, you're going to go to a place where, you're going to go to a place where, people are probably already going to these type of clubs. It's a nightclub. People are going out.

They're having fun. They don't necessarily care who the DJ is. It might help, you know, certain nights do better than others, but versus the other route, more of like a hard ticket route, means you're going into these empty rooms that are basically traditional concert venues. No one's just going to this venue without checking who, you know, they're buying a ticket. So they're not just going to, like, be there. They need to buy a ticket for two friends.

And he was telling us, he's like, look, that is the, that's the two paths. One is you, you know, it's a little easier. You kind of just show up, plug in your USB, get your paycheck. But it's really hard to grow that way. You really need to do something special or different to like stand out that way versus this other path is more expensive. You're going to not make as much in those specific shows. But what that does is it allows you to grow. And yes, you don't make any money here.

But now all of a sudden, that same club, instead of offering you the same exact price to come back, you just doubled it. Because you said, hey, nope, you can't, you know, I'm not charging that anymore because I just sold 500 tickets. And now when, if you do book me for your club, you know, you could charge higher ticket prices or it's going to sell out faster. People are going to buy more tables. Whatever it is. And the funny, I mean, not funny, but just like the thing about his speech was like, it worked. We started in L.A. and there's a venue on the sunset trip. called the Roxy.

Okay. And it's 500 people capacity. And we're from L.A. We were living there still. We have friends and families. Like, guys, Roxy, 500 people. What do we think? Do you think, you know, blast it to all your friends and family.

Market it online. Like, do we think we could sell 500 tickets? And we're like, I don't know. I hope so. We'll try our best. And we luckily, we did. We sold it out. And then all of a sudden, there's an offer for the net, you know, a size up.

It's 800 people now in L.A. And then it's 1,200. And then all of a sudden, year by year, we're like, oh, my God, we just did the Kia Forum in L.A. And you kind of take that mindset for a lot of different cities around the U.S., and it's just like, it works. A lot of people stack supplements and optimized routines, but forget the basics. Gut health is the foundation that supports nutrient absorption, energy, mood, recovery, and momentous fiber plus was built to address that missing link in a way most fiber products do not. I'll tell you, as I'm getting older, my doctor keeps in stressing the importance to me of fiber, fiber,

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motivator here. It's building longevity and brand, which you guys have done extremely well. When was that first moment though that you got a call from your manager? and like, wait, how much? Like, when was that first moment that you're like, shit? Like, yeah, I get it that for the Roxy, we're selling out 500, that 800. But when was that one, like, holy shit moment? For Atlantic City and Florida, there was, like, a club that had spots in both. Yeah.

And it was like an eight show thing. And it was just like, I remember he sent it. It was like late at night. I'm like, oh, my God. First of all, the offer was, like, for that time, high. And then also it was like a lot of shows at once. I'm like, wow, good work. The offer before was like,

literally half of it, and this was like eight shows and like double. I'm going to, wow. Give me an idea of what that is. I don't even know. Probably, what, 40? I don't know, yeah. Okay, or somewhere around there. The reason I ask is like, let's just say it's 40 times eight and you do the math, right?

People listen at this, right? This was a hobby. You decided to take it seriously. And within a two, three year time period of going all in, you're getting, you know, a nice six-figure deal. And I think whether it's DJing or whatever it is, someone could listen to this. And maybe it's that wake-up call. Maybe it's like, whatever it is that you really are, passionate about you really dive in.

The reason I asked those money questions, because I think it serves as motivation and inspiration for those that like, go fucking do it. Everything is in perspective because, do you remember we did a boarding school show? Well, we were still in college and we got booked to do a high school boarding school, like end-a-year party. And I'll never forget the fee was $3,000. And at the time, that was like, oh, my God, $3,000 for us to go, like, DJ at a party where they're going to like, you know, take care of us, take us out to dinner, and we get paid $3,000.

That was like, I can't believe someone is going to pay $3,000 whole dollars for this party. Then by the end, like of the flights and everything, you probably break even anyway, but just the concept. Because what I was used to hearing was like stories from my older brother where it's like a bar would pay him 50 bucks and a case of beer. Yeah. And it's like, wait, this is like money. You don't forget those deals, right? Now, when I think about your branding, I think obviously. obviously big booty mix is a big part of that, right?

But the question I have before we get into branding is with the big booty mix, that's where you guys start. Everyone here listening has heard your big booty mixes, whether you know it or not you have. How does the like, how do you actually make money off that? And are there any licensing issues, right? Because in that what you're doing is essentially taking music that currently exists. You're mashing it up to make it more entertaining and fun. Do you have to deal with like paying people out using the, how did that work?

The short answer is we have never made a dollar from big booty music. Yeah, yeah. that they have been a vehicle to then, hey, come see us out of a show, hey, buy our merch, hey, you know, buy into the two friends world. That's almost like a good metaphor for like spend money to make money type. You know, spend effort to like, you know, build another avenue. Like, I mean, a good direct avenue is like we have these like big booty land shows, which are the premiere that makes us. And like those ones are, you know, some of our biggest shows every year. Like we do one or two now more like one just because it's too hard to.

to do but like we'll put so much time effort massive show massive production um and like go all out to you know build something in person around something you know like a mix but yeah music tech is going crazy right now like yeah there's this new startup every day and it's hard to see like what's you know sustainable but like things like apple music they are trying to figure that out where it's like the licensing of a DJ mix if people listen you know if there's 50 artists like will they split up the royalties. And that's what we want. Yeah, we want that.

All we want is for our mix is to be, to live online easily and not get taken down sometimes. And so, but like we can't, we're like, pay everyone, but we don't, it's,

it's too complicated legally for us to be the ones doing it. So we're kind of just like, but it is a layup for, for the music industry to make more money. Sure. We're kind of waiting for the day when, when they're like, okay,

anything goes, everyone will get. Just rip it. Your creative genius is saying, we're going to see the masters. And then we're, we're going to put these brilliant masters together like no one else can do. And that's going to be part of the brand.

That's going to be part of the hook. And then when you're buying a ticket to see two friends and you're going to the club, you're buying a table or whatever the experience it is, it's based on the branding experience, not the fact. I mean, you guys write your own music, but it feels like it's more of an experience brand than it is like an actual Taylor Swift fan who's going to consume her lyrics and sit there and connect with it. Is that a deep?

The DJ world in general leans live. You know what I mean? It's like because that is what DJing is. A lot of time it's playing other people's music. So obviously we're playing our own. We're playing pieces of big booty mixes. We're playing our original. We're playing remixes.

But like in general, you are building a story, but your story is like the experience. Yeah. Like that could be, I don't know, a night out at a club that you'll never forget. That was, you know, great set, great energy, whatever. Or it could be the biggest show in the world where you have every production trick in the back.

and, you know, it's just like a concert. Let's pause there. This is a softball and a nice little promotional pitch. Anyone listening here that hasn't been to one of your shows. What is the experience, the things that people can expect if they do come to one of your shows that they won't get anywhere else? I'm going to flip the question and do the opposite because this is a funny thing that our tour manager said the other day. Okay.

He said, if you come to a two friends show and you don't like it, then you're just an asshole. Wow, I love that. The reason he said that's like, that's a great sales move right there. That right there may be like, I'm my five-dickness, I got it. You know, I think we are, it's hard to answer because it really has become kind of just this like amalgamation of so many things where it's, you're going to hear some of our original music. You're going to hear parts of the big booty mixes. You're going to hear our saxophonist that we tore with. He's going to come out and just crush it on sax.

We're going to, you know, some of our bigger shows will bring out the drummers. We'll bring out live singers. We'll, you know, we'll have the special effects and the production value. You're going to hear sing-alongs that are nostalgic from when you were growing up. You're going to high energy. You're going to dance. You're going to sweat. You're going to cry.

It's beautiful. In a lot of ways, it goes back to, yeah, it's an experience. I would say we're pretty damn tactical with it. Inflation is moving fast. So if you're looking for a side hustle, listen up. If you're selling online or out of a storefront, full time or just as a side hustle, you already know the challenge. You're hoping for people to find your listing and you're waiting for them to walk in. Well, What Not will flip that.

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that was my Grammy moment? I mean, that's a good question. For tours, we go pretty heavy. I'm like, really, you know, it takes months for us. Like, we have Google sheets. Every single columns, like a new category. And you're trying to fit the perfect thing. You're creating these moments.

You're spending hours, like editing these songs, making custom transitions, buildups. A good example is, like, you know, we played Coachella a couple of years ago. And, like, the set time's 45 minutes. But, like, that's, like, hard, like, really hard to, like, fit, you know, your best show. And to do that, like, I think we ended up, you know, you're making Google sheets. you're doing math, you're like figuring it out, you're like doing test sets, you're trying things.

So it's definitely not just like, let's try this, let's try that. But you use the word moment. I think that's a word we use a lot when we're talking about our show. We literally, I know it's kind of,

maybe sounds a little cornyer nowadays, it gets a little overuse, but we literally, when we plan a show and we're like, okay, we're going on tour, it's going to be a 90-minute show every night. What are the moments of the show?

And, you know, we literally try, we're like, the intro is a moment. Then the midpoint. then the end and then a few sprinkled in. But like... And what does that mean to you? Yeah, it's like, how do you make something?

Okay, if we're going to play this song, any DJ can play this song. It exists. How do we... Well, not always. Obviously, you're making... I mean, almost nothing we're playing. No, no, well, that's my point. Is it if we are...

Okay, like, for example, careless whisper, the sax... You know, do to do... So, like, I'm saying any DJ can play Careless Whisper, but what can we do? Okay, we have our live saxophones. We're going to go to silence. The venue's going to get dark. A cone made of lasers is going to create a circle that he appears in with fog, haze coming up.

He's going to play that by himself, no music. We're hidden. And then all of a sudden, at a certain point that we've kind of built up, we're going to hit play. And a huge backing beat is going to come in. Flames are going to go in the air. And lasers are going to come. And it's like, we can't take full ownership, obviously. It's not our song.

But like that moment, we now. bring to every show and it's a highlight every night. You can just tell when, you know, everyone has their cell phone up. Yeah, you can see it. You can feel like, you know it. There's some that are more like music-focused moments, but then we also have fun with it. And again, we're like, you know, we don't want to take ourselves so seriously. So we have these other, like, moments in the middle of a show where they're fun for us,

but then they're also hopefully weird enough and memorable enough that if you see it. Like a DJ show, like, I wouldn't expect that. So, like, here's an example. At the end of the show, we say, hey, guys, we want to take a picture with you, but we need one person from the crowd who wants to be in this picture. And everyone, you know, oh, me, me. Yeah, yeah. And we pick someone.

They come on stage and we're like, all right, we didn't tell you something. We're going to send you back to your seat unless you can make this basketball shot blindfolded. We bring out a mini hoop, give them a ball and blindfold them. They're like 20 feet away. And we're like, I'm not going to make this. No, no, try your best. And when we put on the blindfold on the screen, it says, go crazy.

Like, they're going to miss it. Go crazy. I love it. And so they put on the blindfold, they shoot, they airball. smoke blasters go out everyone goes crazy they start jumping up and down and we're like oh my God

like get in the picture you did it yeah that's great stuff like that you know you try to like stand out FaceTime our mom's on the screen we've done so much stuff yeah we've done a lot of fun stuff but basically you know just trying to stand out

or like you know make it memorable take take little pieces from other genres that you know that's a good branding trading secret for anyone no matter what you're doing or how you're doing it make it memorable do it different and think outside the box. And like the basketball example and the FaceTime example,

I know you guys have talked a lot about putting costs into things, which is great. Those things don't cost much, right? Like sometimes the best creativity hits don't cost much no matter what you are doing. Have you ever had,

we've talked a lot of this about success. A lot of speakers have come on this show and a lot of comedians and actors and even TV personalities or anchors. And I'll be like, I'm curious about the one moment they might remember

where they completely flop. Do you have that memory? The horse. said one. Well, we'll try to think of a real one, but a metaphor is like, not everything works. Of course. We tried, like, at the end of one. This is a little, like, trivial, but we had this idea that was kind of similar

to the basketball idea, but it was that we were going to do a cap shuffle like you'd do at a baseball game where, like, it hot, on the screen, it hides a ball behind the hats, they shuffle and you have to say where the ball ended up. And somehow we just overcomplicated this idea. We bought a

like a rubber horsehead mask. You know those, like, masks? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. That was supposed to be so that they couldn't see the screen. Like, it was just so bad that, like, it wasn't. We tried like the first two shows and I was like. And our crew was like, wait, what's trivial about that? Well, more than it.

It wasn't like, we were trying to trick the person, but they couldn't get that thing on. This is in front of thousands of people. And it's just like, it just didn't land. Well, it's like, you're like conducting this like magician trick. I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. And they're like, why? Yeah, it's chaos. But basically, I think, but more like big pictures.

Lesson is pivot when you. Pivot, the show goes on. Yes. The show goes on. Okay, now, like, more, like, more legit. I mean, there's been... I mean, I would say the story of our career has been, like, there's obviously wins, but there's not, like, one thing, like, overnight that you're like, holy shit, like, that made it.

I almost have felt like that with, like, the losses, too. Like, nothing too big, nothing too ball. Steady, steady, steady goes, you know what I mean? I think some of the biggest frustrating ones have been when something just ends up taking so much effort and attention from ourselves and also from the whole team. And then it ends up feeling like that was not worth the squeeze. How much went into it. Even if, you know, even if it was financially appealing.

We did this awesome show, sick show at Fortnite. This was a couple of years ago. Honestly, it was a great experience. And the show was actually, like, really fun. And we made an amazing trip. And it was in Denmark. But one thing we learned from an experience like that is, like, it was a huge offer. it was great.

Everything was great. And honestly, they were great to work with. But it ended up being what we've seen. It was our team was on meetings for like three months every week. And they were texting, like, there was just a constant drag on one show. Like, as in the resources were just getting drained. And like no one could focus on other things. And this is just one show.

And this was months in advance. So it almost felt like things weren't getting done that maybe would move the needle more. you know, and it felt like after that show we're like, well, what about this, this, this, this, this? And it's like, ah, they didn't really get the legwork done when we needed to. Because their efforts are just all deployed. That comes into entrepreneurship and that's when you have to not be a DJ

and you've got to be a CEO, right? CEO would be like, yo, this is saying too much, less resources here. Focus on this. And it's honestly, that's like something we're like always learning on, especially the last couple of years. It's hard. One thing that no one tells you about hiring globally is how unclear the cost can be. It literally looks simple at first and the fees just start stacking.

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But another trend we're seeing, especially with Gen Z, is the lack of alcohol consumption. Because people are drinking less. Like, there's studies, they're spending less on clubs. They're not buying tables, what they did. is that impacting your financial success as a duo? It's hard to say. You can't control alcohol consumption, right? So I'm an uncontrollable how that impacts your industry.

It's an indirect impact, so it's almost would be hard for us to know. You know what I mean? Here's almost an example is like when we play in Vegas, for example, you, any, you may think, oh, they booked us on a Friday night during this busy week, it's going to crush. And on the opposite side, oh, they booked us on a Wednesday night, on a slow week, it's going to be tough. you never know what's going to happen because all it takes is this one person decides

it's their birthday and they're spending $300,000 on crazy magnum-sized bottles and then all of a sudden that's like it was a great night wow two friends crushed it

and we just got lucky with this one guy a lot of a lot of like club owners and promoters and stuff do they dictate your success based on alcohol spend I would say in our deal long term it probably is relevant

like are they making their money or no. Day to day, usually the offers aren't really tied. Maybe there's bonuses, but long term, yeah,

for sure. I mean, if people are, you know, spending, and there's two different sides of it. Like, there are the people, like, you know,

maybe people are not drinking as much. Maybe they don't want to spend $25, $30 on a drink in Vegas, whatever it is. On the table side, I don't know. I think tables are still pretty strong. And I think that's actually

like really, Vegas, like where they're really breaking it. They need that because... That pays the bills. That pays the bills. The GA does not pay the bill. But that's the balance is like the GA is like, who's giving you more than energy? Yes, right?

And I think there's a true, like if I was a business manager of a DJ, I think there's a true argument to say that person spent 350,000, right? But maybe if they didn't have the vibe, the GA going nuts, there's the guys or girls that come to their table. Oh, yeah. They're spending 100, right? In that scenario. So there that connects to you.

You need both. Do you guys get like, will you, do you ask your managers? Do they report to you guys like alcohol sales? Is that a thing you'll ask? For Vegas, specifically because the deal is very centered on like stuff like that. I think we've really, that's so cool to know that. We just started year four at the win encore. And we're like, I mean, again, it's probably part of just, we're interested in this stuff.

And we want to always be, you know, improving and growing. We want everyone to win. We are very involved. We asked for reports. Not only that, but we ask for like, we're like, what you tell us, what should we do? We want your club to do well. We both win. So we're like, you know, if you want us to sometimes we'll go later, you know, we're only supposed to go till here.

But if you think there's some good people that you want us to keep going later, we're happy to. If you think, oh, we do like a cheers where we say, everyone go grab a drink and do that. Like little, you know, they're not like hacks, but we're like, you know. It's a reality. I don't know if they work on us. Yeah. But we're just like, look, we want it to be that, like, no, team player, though. Yeah, team player.

No leaf is unturned. We're trying. And, you know, if we did everything we can and you're still, whatever, the finances are not there, what there's only. Try our best. The only thing we can do at that point is just have a hit single and trust us, we're trying. You know that we try. What's, I was curious now. Like, what's the craziest amount you've ever seen someone spend out of bottle?

Service. Like a table. Honestly, it's hard for us to know the exact amounts. But it is funny. Like, we have had people where, you know, like, our. our dude in Vegas or like, you know, the top promoter, liaisons who are like kind of dealing with us.

They'll just like whisper in here and be like, this guy is just buying bottles, like just hang out with them. Bring them up. Yeah, they're like, meet and greet. There's one dude. I don't, I don't know what he was spending. I don't remember his name,

but I remember it was like two years ago. We played for so long. What is, like, is someone who doesn't know the DJ game, so long means what? Vegas is usually longer than normal. Like Vegas, well, at least in our kind of subgenre, but two hours is Vegas standard. And then, and we were usually on at 1 a.m. So it's late.

So we're usually ending at 3 a.m. But this one was like, all right, it's 245. Our tour manager kind of nudges us. He gives us like a phone sign and says like, hey, you know, these guys over there are like really spending. Sean, our Vegas guy says, you know, asks if you can keep going. I'm like, yeah, sure, no problem. Whatever. like we do 15 more minutes

he does another phone he's like dude they just bought like five more bottles and we're like fine whatever let's just keep going it ends up being like maybe three 45 or three three hours in like 40 minutes and we're like

oh I have no music laugh yeah you're like and then finally the guy starts like not buying as much and we're like all right all right time to rough it up wow you know like we're you know you got to you got to make everyone happy and try to do your thing. And obviously it's fun. It's obviously late too. But that's, I mean, it's so cool to hear some of

this stuff. A question if I have for you then on the when you're DJing, obviously we're talking about like the alcohol, the impact of the industry and stuff. Do you guys, like, do you ever drink when you're DJing? Like, how do you control that? Because like, obviously, you're a good question. We have a healthy relationship. Some of it also is like nerves. There's a lot of people that, you know, they start as like bedroom producers. They're, they're not really the like life of the party. Okay, we're putting you on this stage and entertain this event for two hours. So I think that's how it starts for a lot of people is like calming their nerves. They want to, you know, get a little, maybe not like wasted, but you know, get a little

but, you know, get a little buzz, yeah. But I think when you get to a point where you don't need that, then all of a sudden, you're like, I feel so much better when I... But we will drink, sure. But like a drink, like one drink. Sure, you have to go out of drinks or whatever, yeah. And plenty of shows where it's zero. Yeah.

And then plenty of shows where it's like... I don't know. Like, you just can't drink. There's just no way. It's just no way. And we want it. We like, like, in our, like, in our, like, normal lives, we go to bed early, we wake up early, we want to like work out.

Yeah, it's hard to have a real life. I mean, I think to answer your question with like exactly like, I think we just each had a couple experiences where like I cannot do this again. Yeah, you know, you have a show Friday Saturday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Like Friday night, like, you know, you drink and then you have a six-am flight. And it's like, I am so hungover. This is the worst feeling existing ever, like ever. Like ever.

Like, how am I supposed to go through this airport, hung over, get on the flight, go get in an Uber, go to the hotel, do all this stuff, and like, and then go play a show? It's like, no, like eventually it'll fail. So, you know, we had a couple of those. There's a lot of peers that burn out because of that. Or stop drinking completely. Yeah, yeah, I feel like you got to do one or the other. One follow-up question on the win. I was thinking about the win, you do a residency.

You don't have those expenses, right? Because they have the club. They have the production. so then how did those deals get structured? Those are kind of the shows where it's like, you know, you're still bringing a show. Like you got to, you got to like bring your A game, but at the same time, there's not the same overhead.

So, you know, you don't have to bring a lot of people. We have a few people bring our saxophonist, our tour manager, and our videographer, compared to something where you have to bring like 20 people or whatever it is. So those are the ones where you can end up making money. I'll be honest with you. I got some crazy travel coming up in this time,

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That's quince.com slash trading secrets. When you say four years, are those renewed or do they sign you for four years? No, no. Every deal is different, but we've, been doing single deals. Single deals. Yeah, yeah. Who would you say

is your biggest competition? It's almost like, in a weird way, this is not a cop-out, but it's almost like other forms of entertainment are the competition. Like in Vegas,

it's like, yes, you could choose another DJ, but it's also like, are you going to the clubs at all, or are you going to the magic show and then going to bed? So like, we don't really ever think of like

that artist, well, we want him to quit. Die. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I think it's more like, you're up against different. people at different orders every day.

Like you're never going to hit the same person. It's surprisingly like supportive in the sense that like when other DJs do well, that's good for like the whole scene. For the most part, I think. Yeah, that makes sense. There are some, so I own a talent agency and what we'll do is a lot of digital sponsored deals for creators, celebrities, et cetera. And their goal amongst agents right now is they're trying to get a million dollar deal for one post. That's there. And they're getting pretty close.

They're getting up there. with the talent that they work with. What is your million dollar proposed? What's your, what's your financial? You're like, I'm really, I want to get paid this per set or this amount of year. Like, what's the money connected to your finance dream right now? The live touring side has been such a majority of our revenue that the goal,

and again, it's like, you know, you can always control this, a little bit of luck, a little bit of timing. And obviously, yeah, I'm going to do our best. But like, if you get on the original music side, If you get the hit and the follow-up hit and the follow-up hit, all of a sudden, that side of your business can really, really come into play and also be self-perpetuating because you're getting royalties on it for the rest of your life. So whereas us, music has been, some of our songs have done very well, but like it's kind of just been part of the toolbox. Again, that like goes into, hey, come to a show. Come to a show.

Come buy tickets. You like our songs. You like two friends. Come to a show. the deals we're getting are not like massive. On the music side. We are spending a lot of money ourselves. Like right now we don't have a label.

So it's like we're like, all right, you know, we want to do a music video. We don't have to, but we want to because it's going to help the song. Okay, who's paying for that? We are. We want to do a radio campaign. Who's paying for that? We are. We don't have to, but like we're trying to make the metal, you know, spend money to make money type of thing.

One day when it's like the offer is too good to refuse and they will cover all of that, it would be nice. And then looking long term, like, and you see in the news, like these iconic artists old and new are selling catalogs. Like you want to be in a position to be able to do that and have a catalog worth selling. And in DJ World, it's happened. It's definitely happening, especially that, you know, like Calvin, like Calvin Harris, Dead Mouse just did a huge one with his label. How much he sold for? Well, it's not his music only. It was like hundreds.

It's his whole label from like 20 years, like 100. But it was like 50 million. Wow. And it would be awesome to have that revenue stream because at some point you stop touring. You know what I mean? Or you tour less. Because the revenue stream from the music has come from originals. That stream just doesn't really stop.

You know what I mean? Touring is extremely like, you know, you can't scale it. You are doing exactly. You got to be there. That side is. is a more scalable and then be forever in a way. Almost feels like if you take a few months off and you don't do shows, like how quickly does it just like it's all apart?

I know. I know. I was to say, I think anyone on social media that has a brand connected to digital feels like that. And so you almost like you want to feel like you cross that threshold where you're such like a, almost like a legacy act where even if you went a couple of years without releasing a song, you're still selling tickets because people know your name so well that you don't need to be like so hot and current.

Right. And keeping up with all, you know. Back then, there was not as many acts that really, like Rolling Stones. They don't have to release a song. No, I mean, they're good. Exactly. We'll see where that, you know, now there's billions of artists. Like, not billions, but hundreds of millions.

Yeah, 100%. But I think, you know, like, this is just such a random example. But from when I was in college, like, a guy like Afrojack. If I ask my friends, like, oh, you want to go see Afrojack at this festival? It's like, they probably couldn't name a single. song, but they were like, oh yeah, Afrojackie's great, like, of course. And it's like, again, that kind of goes into like

the brand and each art, you know, you have having your thing that's like... That lives on. Yeah. Yeah. With your originals, like, you make like hundreds of thousands, you make tens of thousands. How much you make off originals? It's a great question. I mean, it's definitely... Because it doesn't sound like it's a big part of your

business. It sounds like it's a piece of the brand, but it's not a big piece of the revenue. It's not nothing at all. It's not insignificant. It's not insignificant, but it's, I would say, if the avenues are like, and these are guesses, I actually don't know, but like merch, touring, music, brand, I would say touring and brand is at 90.

Yeah, which makes sense. And then those other areas create and those, but it's kind of like the gasoline to those engines, right? Yeah. It gets you the new show, it gets you the new content, gets you the brand deal. You can't do the other without no music, you know what I mean? And then you can go to a show

and you can go to brands and pitch, this is how many people will be here, there's how many eyeballs, plus level of social, you can be the headline sponsor of that, right? And I got to imagine that is actually will bring in more revenue than sometimes even the fee to be there.

100%. Right, and that's the power of digital with your branding, which is brilliant. And I think that's what you guys have done so different, right? We're learning on the job. It feels like every day,

the world changes. Like, it's not like when we started. So, you know, there's new places to stuff about your music. There's new social media platforms. There's new trends. And it's like, you know, you got to, it's so hard to stay up with it, whether it's learning yourself, hiring the right people.

Maybe that's like been the hardest thing for us. Growing pains the last couple of years is like knowing what to do yourself or like verse being like, you know what, dude, I don't want to do this. I don't know how to do this. Let's get someone who can learn. And that's hard. Let's end with this topic because it's one you've got to talk about. It's just AI impact on music.

What do you assume that has to be some form of threat to your business? Is it a threat? Is it not a threat? How does it impact the DJ duo to friends? Well, like we're saying, like our world is so much more, like our day to day is so much more than just music. Like, you're managing a business. So we can talk to the music side, but also on the other side, like, in a lot of ways, it's made things way more efficient. You know, instead, like, I will do things as easy as now. Instead of writing a massive list of my thoughts on, you know, whether things from merch to notes on a music video to, like, strategy things that I think people need to be doing, I'll just, like, put it into Gemini or chat, GBT, I'm like, please make this a lot clear. And it's like, you know, stuff like that

is actual real productivity savers. And so I think there's obviously great, great ways to utilize things. On the actual, like, art side, I think it's, on the music side, I mean, people are doing crazy shit already. I think it'll be inevitably a tool, 100% and people already are using it and I think in a lot of ways parts of it are inevitable, but

I am interested. I think the next year is going to, if you asked me this in one year, I think we'd already like know an answer in a way. You know what I mean? Of like, you know, things are getting so much better so quick that it's, that it's exponential. Like you can, you know, I'm

getting Instagram ads constantly. It's like, all right, just sing like a bad melody without autotune, like into your phone. It's like the perfect saxophone sounding thing with all like the grace notes and everything. I'm like, damn, you know how long that would have taken me to do that in MIDI, which is like, you know, for a synth. It would have been impossible, actually impossible. To try to get our saxophones to do it. Well, we have to go potentially you have to rent a studio and try to describe it. And that's kind of how we've gone about things, um, most of our career. we have so many like amazing people that we can rely on but especially if you're like just starting it's like damn you can't like afford it so like the bear's entry are getting lower and lower and it's

almost i mean inevitably the skill will switch like how coders are you know now the best coders are they have such a deep knowledge of code but they also know how to use claude like perfectly yeah like how to use it true to you know i think inevitably music at least in electronic music like i mean other music too like people are going to going to figure out how to use it in a way that complements them rather than takes anything over. One thing that no one tells you about hiring globally is how unclear the cost can be. It literally looks simple at first and the fees just start stacking. Pebble will actually help bring clarity with upfront all-in-one hiring costs and enables you

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like a marshmallow vibe. Yeah. Who has hits on the radio and Spotify. And then it's going to come out that there was never even a human. It's just a fraud. It was a robot. It was an animatronic robot. And the whole thing was no humans involved.

I love it. That's good stuff. All right, well, we're going to wrap with your trading secret. Before we wrap with your trading secret, one contract you'll never forget. It could be the lowest amount, the biggest amount. It could just be a cool brand you like. Give me a contract you'll never forget in your career. So the first Vegas shows we ever did were way, we're like 2015, 2016.

And it was at a, it was at the Link Hotel, which doesn't have a real, like, club in it, especially a day club. It has like the pool, the hotel pool. for the guests. And they set up a DJ booth. And that was their version of like a day party. And they booked us for three shows. Each were $6,000. So it was $18,000.

And at the time, those were the days we were talking about earlier where it was like, you know, $3,000. So it was double per show. And I'll just, we were so stoked. We're like, Vegas, baby. I love that. They're paying us double. This is big time.

You made it, baby. And then I remember the guy, the liaison guy, meeting us in the lobby and be like, I'm so excited. We got you guys. Like, you know, we got you at such a steal. I can't believe only $6,000. And we're like, oh, my God. You're like, it's even better.

I love it. Obviously, tax arrangement. Hey, he said, yeah, get on it. Negotiate better. That's awesome. I love it. Trading secret. You've given us a lot, but just like kind of a masterclass to your life.

It could be personally. It could be financially, professionally. It could be branding, marketing. It could be something you just live by. I'll give some examples, but the overall theme is... Better said eloquently. The overall message is there's no rules. And here are some examples.

Maybe these don't sound like revolutionary, but early on especially, it came into play where like, you're not going to wait around for other people to give you golden opportunities. It just doesn't happen. Maybe some people, they're so once in a generation that, okay, everyone's knocking on their door. but I think an example is like

when we were starting doing shows and we had a college audience there's no rules so what we would do is we would copy and paste a message and DM it to we'd look at the colleges in the area you know you got Tufts which is 30 minutes out of the city you have Harvard which is in Cambridge

you have BU you have BC we go on their Instagram you search the name of that plus other Greek letters A pie A5 Sigma Chi blah blah Then, okay, you, then you, you want to make them feel special. Sorry if anyone's listening, you got this message and you thought it's only thing there.

But, you know, you say, hey, we, we love have, you know, we were in fraternities. We love having all the fraternity kids out there. We want to, we want to hook. Specifically, we love having, you know. We love having a Sigma news. You guys are awesome. We would love to, you know, we'd love to have you at the show. If you think there's enough people, we could try to get a group discount for you.

And you, the social chair that's reading this message, we'll hook it up for you. You'll be on our guest list. So that guy now is like, oh, I should take this seriously. I'll get like, backstage. And then, okay, then you do all the frats, and you're like, you know what?

Let's swim team, lacrosse team, women's softball team. Okay, you're done with that. Now you do music club, pre-law, pre-med. And then we'd be like, why are you, I'm pre-med, why are you messaging it? I don't know.

We love having the pre-med. Just in case. Just in case someone gets sick. You know, that may sound like silly, but like, That ends up. This guy was like, oh, yeah, sign us up for 100 tickets. Sign us up for 40 tickets.

Sign us up for 350 tickets. I got all my friends to do it. All of a sudden, the show is sold out. And I think that was an example where it's like maybe now, you know, everyone's so smart and they're hacking things. But like, for us, it was like, no one, no one was like, oh, we have a marketing plan. We're going to attack the college demographic. We're just like, all right, we're doing it.

All right, that's a good one. Yeah, I'd give one. Like, if my training secret, anyone's listen, we'll keep this one on. Let's call it my theme of the week is like the way people treat you are the way that you condition them to treat you and like making sure that as you continue to grow and change, the expectations that you put on to other are being crystally clear. And I think like even another one is, you know,

especially at the company that I work with or if I'm even looking at myself to like get feedback on the podcast or if I'm doing a speaking event or I'm investing in something or it's creating content. I think with feedback, it's a very open word used in the business. space. You might use it with your managers, right? Or you might go to a venue and be like, guys, give me feedback. I think feedback's only as good as the way that you direct the question to get the feedback, because if you create an open forum, it's going to be too general. And I think, like,

the better questions you can ask to people, like when it comes to feedback, like, if I asked you on this episode, what did you think about, you know, I'm making this up on my questions, or my questions unique? Were they different? Did you think, like, I want specific feedback. I think you are the captain of receiving feedback based on the question you ask. Those are my like, those are great. Those are like my this week trading. I like that. All right.

I have a good one. Being able to have the difficult conversations like earlier rather than later. Because first of all, a lot of people are thinking the same thing, but like someone just needs to like say it or do it. And I think now two years ago, like three years ago, like we kind of just be like, you know what, I don't control that. I do this, this, this, this. But I feel like nowadays we're more like, you know, we kind of be like, this doesn't feel right. Like, let's just say this doesn't feel right or whatever. Let's say it.

And we're getting better at it always. But, you know, if someone's doing a great job, tell them. And if someone is not doing a great job, figure out how you're going to like either, A, why are they not doing a great job? Is it something I'm doing? Is it something the environment? is it a lack of passion or a change in the feeling? You know, you got to figure that stuff out and they're not like fun things to talk about,

like especially on the negative side. Like if someone feels like it could be your team, it could be a collaborator, it could be whatever. It's like, I don't think they're doing a good job. Like, that's a hard conversation to have. But I think you're only hurting yourself by not having it. Something's not feeling right. You don't want it to keep it a secret until it gets to the extreme of,

okay, it's over. It's like, all right, hey, just so you know, blah, blah, blah, let's try to fix this. You know, we like, we have a few more check-ins now with the whole team. We do more like goals calls. We do more of like, hey, here's what we're kind of expecting. And we're not trying to be like assholes. We're not trying to be dictators. But like, we know how much blood, sweat and tears.

And we, you know, this is 24-7 that, like, we have certain expectations. And, you know, even financially, we know how much certain commissions are, certain salaries are. We're like, yeah, like, you know, let's make sure everyone's feeling good. Yeah, and I feel like if you're got, well, actually, this is kind of a cool trading secret that connects to exactly what you're saying. You're saying is like, when you're, when you're feeling it, like, you're being proactive with these conversations, you're not sitting and waiting for an event to have. Like, you're just, like, diving in. It's like it sounds like you're like I'm the CEO now. Like we're making decisions.

And it also sounds like where you're saying when you're talking about like how you were so worried about the impact that I would have on your career is that you guys have learned that like it doesn't matter if there's management or someone you hire or someone you fire. No one controls your career but you. Yeah. In a lot of ways. Like you control that. Obviously, you know, we have a great team and everything now.

And you are always tinkering and trying things. But yeah, like in the end it's you. And it's funny because, you know, you're saying, like, you know, you're so scared to, like, make this move here and there. And, you know, we've, we've had these life experiences now. And we're like, you're still always scared to, like, damn, do I hire this person? It's expensive, whatever. But, like, I would say now we're at least very aware that, like, we have to at least have these conversations. You know what I mean?

We cannot just put it under the rug and be like, oh, I'm just going to make music on my laptop and assume everything's going to be okay. Because, like, in the end, it's just going to get either. worse or things will boil over in a way where it's, you know, it's not as productive. It's true. It's like bleeding doesn't stop until you put the stitches in or you put the band. That's how, that's what I should have said. That was good.

That's what you're going. All right. Well, guys, let's wrap with what's going out. Like, where can everyone find everything you have going on? The music where your next stops. Yeah. Talk to us. Where can we find everything?

Yeah. I mean, socially search two friends. You should find us. You know what to do. You know what to do. The two handsome men in the profile picture that says. on the road, we're pretty much on the road every single weekend.

Two Friendsmusic.com slash tour is where you'll see everything. But we got some big stuff camera. We got Red Rock soon. We got Big Bootyland, Chicago soon for the premiere volume 27. That's probably the biggest show of the year. We got some fun festivals.

We're kind of doing, we have a ton of music coming. Right now we're kind of like in our country era. That's why we're here in Nashville right now. And we release two of the, we're doing this like country. project, which is pretty sick. We're really pumped on it.

So we've released two of the songs. We have like a whole project come in. But we're doing some of these like big boot sets, which are, you know. Any artists you can tease? So we just released a bunch of like these like awesome like, I don't know. We've met like a lot of people lately because we've been doing this. But we just released a song with Jake Banfield, released a song with Chris Lane, both amazing dudes. We have a bunch of stuff we're working on coming up with, who do we got?

Who do we got? Dustin Lynch. Jessica Bio, we got Breeland, we got Tyler Braden. Like all these like awesome. I'm like, killing it.

I don't know. So many talented people here. It's like pretty, and they're all in national. But a lot of national. That's why we're here. Yeah. All right.

But yeah. Country genre. Here we come. Yeah. And then we got a bunch of stuff like this summer. Like we're not only country guys. We're a little bit about it. You guys do it all.

I feel like you do everything. And where can people find like your, when you're selling for whatever, like for your tour or the show, your next show. Where can people find tickets? Best place to Friendsmusic.com slash four. Do not get the stuff how bad and think, there you go. You're just going to pay triple and there's no reason.

Great plug there. That's a trading secret right there. Go direct. You're helping the artist. You're helping the small business. I mean, I'm just helping you out. And you're helping yourself out, right? Yeah, for real.

But yeah, we're stoked. We got a lot of cool stuff coming and then we're kind of planning in 2027. It starts now. It's crazy because it feels like 2026 just started. But we were on phone calls talking about what's the 2227 plan. I'm like, well, I don't even. know what I'm doing next week. You're like, what are you doing next week?

What am I doing for dinner? Well, to think it all started, you know, from middle school, high school and college and now. It's been cool to watch. It's been fun to be at your shows. I'll tell you, they're unbelievable. And guys, thank you for being on training secrets. Dude, thanks for having us. Let's go.

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