HEADS on TV Turns 1 🎉 Building a community with founder Marilyn Moser
Photos by Stephanie Lemus
Written by Crystal Larsen
Marketer. Musician. Singer. Songwriter. Entrepreneur. Marilyn Moser wears a variety of hats — but this confluence of experience is what’s perfectly positioned her to carve her own path as the Founder of HEADS on TV — a go-to online resource for the up-and-coming artist. On the heels of HEADS on TV’s first anniversary — which was Aug. 3, 2021 — I had the opportunity to sit down (virtually) with Marilyn—donning a sleeveless Lady Gaga T-shirt and a fabulous shade of seafoam green hair—to talk about how it all began.
“Honestly, I think I’m still a little bit in shock,” she said, sitting in front of a bold purple-colored wall adorned with a neon HEADS on TV sign — a testament to Marilyn’s knack for being on-brand, always. “I knew I had a strong idea for what I wanted HEADS on TV to be, but I really didn’t expect so quickly, in just a year, for such a strong community to emerge.”
In less than a year, HEADS on TV has already amassed a following of more than 15,000 on TikTok. But what’s more impressive than the numbers is how dedicated the HEADS on TV following is. Real-life networking, from artist to artist, is happening in the comments section of HEADS on TV’s posts—something Marilyn never could have expected to happen.
“When I started the project, I wasn't sure if I was only going to be speaking to the independent artists or other artists who have reached different levels of success,” she says. “What I’ve discovered is it’s all over the place. From independent artists and young budding singers/songwriters in their hometowns to artists with hundreds of thousands of TikTok followers. But what I started to notice is how they offer each other advice in my comments section. I think that was that moment I knew I was growing this community in the right direction. To think that my commentary is bringing that type of community around HEADS on TV is very mind-blowing for me, and also gives me a renewed sense of responsibility in what I'm doing. It’s been really cool to find my audience.”
Like any true artist, creative or business owner, Marilyn takes her audience very seriously. “The cool thing about my audience is their ability to come in and offer up their own experiences. There was a time when I was talking about a type of content that I’d normally shy away from if you're a new artist, and a well-known indie artist came into the comments and respectfully said, ‘Hey, I just want to say that this particular thing worked really well for me. I know what you're getting at, but I think there's still also value in the fact that it did work for some artists.’ That was a fantastic learning moment for me. I'm really fortunate to have a unique background, but there are still many pieces that haven't happened yet that others can inform me about. I always look at the comments to see if there are questions, or ways for me to amend my content, which is so cool.”
Marilyn live at the Troubadour, Hollywood, CA. Photo by Shion Uza
Lady Gaga and the road to New York City
Anyone who knows Marilyn Moser knows her appreciation and admiration for Lady Gaga. It’s no surprise since, similar to Gaga, Marilyn has always done things her own way. In fact, the HEADS on TV founder credits the Grammy-winning artist for giving her the confidence to truly be who she wanted to be.
“For me at that time, I was always the misfit kid,” Marilyn recalls. “I grew up in a random New England town. None of my family was even from there, I was just this complete weird black sheep and felt it. I was in awe of someone who was so eccentric and out there.”
When she was just 17, Marilyn recalls finally getting the courage to perform in front of people. She’d been performing in her home music room, put together by her dad, since she was young, but this was the first time she would stand up in front of an audience and sing. The song? A mashup of Lady Gaga’s “Speechless” and a Beatles song.
“It was such a pivotal moment because it was the very first memory I have of someone telling me I could do this for a career. Someone came up after the show and said, ‘Man, you should probably do that for a career.’ I hadn't even considered it. I wasn't one of those kids who grew up initially dreaming of being a musician, even though I was just always around music. That was the first moment where I was like, ‘I guess it is kind of like a skillset to do that.’ Lady Gaga really ended up contributing to so much of my music career trajectory.”
Inspired by Lady Gaga, Marilyn ended up moving to Manhattan for a year to go to school, and she credits the Big Apple for “bringing out a lot of the weirdness” in her. New York was the first place she ever dyed her hair blue, and it’s where she discovered that a career in music was ultimately what she wanted to pursue.
From corporate music career to entrepreneurship
Shortly after moving west from New York, Marilyn landed her first job in digital marketing, managing socials for a casino in Nevada. Following that gig, she landed a role in artist relations, content, and social media working for a major music brand in Los Angeles. Working on the corporate side of music, while trying to pursue her own career as a musician and singer/songwriter, perfectly positioned Marilyn for what her next pursuit would be. She credits this time as the moment she really started to see the gaps and holes that existed for new artists trying to make it in the business.
“It honestly taught me everything,” Moser says of working on the business side of the industry. “As a kid growing up in New England, I had my guitar and I had the dream. Back then you watched ‘American Idol’ and everyone was aspiring to be something. To do something big. I'm really proud of myself that I got out there and did it at a young age—I got myself to L.A. and I was in the mix. But, in my first job in digital marketing in the music industry, something really clicked. It became the impetus for this project. I hadn’t met many people who can say they've been on both sides. I have worked on the corporate end with labels and bigger machines, and I've also been the kid trying to make it as an artist.”
When I asked Marilyn where she gets her entrepreneurial spirit from — because it really takes a special kind of person to launch their own business and, one year later, to be as passionate about it as ever — she told me it's largely a part of who she is and who she's always been. Marilyn also comes from a long line of entrepreneurs. Her great, great grandfather owned his own general store in the late 1800s in New York (how cool is that?) and her paternal grandfather owned his own antique shop in Harvard Square, just outside Harvard University. Additionally, her mom (who also currently works as a self-employed voice actor) grew up in a house with an attached funeral home, and Marilyn’s dad also ran his own online business.
During our conversation, Marilyn also recalled a chance meeting with singer/songwriter Angela Parrish (whose voice can be heard on the La La Land soundtrack). After they both performed at a showcase in Hollywood, Parrish encouraged her by pointing out the unique spot Marilyn was in.
Marilyn recalls, "I always thank her for that conversation. She really was the first person to ever put that piece together for me—the idea that embracing both sides of my passion were what could set me apart."
And then the unexpected happened — the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020.
"I set out to create the resource that I wish I had when I was 18. It's really important to me that I speak to the young, up-and-coming artist as an audience, because I know how difficult it is to navigate the music industry.”
The great shift of 2020
By the time the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Marilyn had been working at her corporate music job in artist relations for well over four years. When the music industry was forced into temporary hibernation, Marilyn was let go amid a round of pandemic-related layoffs. Almost immediately, Marilyn’s network of artist friends began reaching out to her, asking for help with digital media. Most artists suddenly had no shows, no tours, no opportunity to connect with their audience live and promote their music. Faced with this influx of artists asking for help, as well as newfound free time, she felt that what was missing was a specific resource to point them to. With the music industry changing at a more rapid pace than ever before, Marilyn decided to start a mini blog series in April of 2020, offering artists some tools and tips on what they can do to continue to promote their projects without being able to connect with fans in person. From making the most of a livestream, to how artists can continue to elevate their career in this new era of the industry, the blogs were catching on, and she realized she’s struck a nerve.
"Everything was changing so quickly," she recalls. "There needed to be a central spot with free resources that could adapt to the changing music landscape in real-time. I felt the need for it everywhere, and that's when I knew I may be crazy enough to be the one to create it. HEADS on TV was born from that: a sort of big bang of the pandemic and musicians feeling being stuck. All of them at once, asking 'What do we do?'
The music industry has changed—for good
Marilyn remembers the tagline for HEADS on TV — "the music industry has changed for good" — coming to her very naturally. She wanted to make it clear that HEADS on TV would be an industry-focused project, not just focused on the heavily-subjective world of creating music. She knew, from her combination of corporate music industry experience and as the young 23-year-old singer/songwriter who moved to L.A. to make it big, that the music industry was undergoing a massive transformation in real-time.
"If you think back to the '50s, there were only a few major labels that had actual pull in radio," says Marilyn. "There were songwriters that were hired to work a 9–5 with a suit and a briefcase and they would write these massive songs that would end up all over the radio. It was a clearly defined business back then. Fast forward to today, and there's way more interest in the artist regaining the power that traditionally fell in the hands of major music companies. Before social media, there wasn't a place where an artist sitting in the middle of Kansas City with a guitar could put their music unless they were signed to a label."
Over the last 20 years or so, there's been a massive shift in who holds the power in the music industry, and social media sealed the deal on it. "It's incredible," says Marilyn. "It's putting the power back in the hands of the artists. This is a good change."
The advent of social media, particularly TikTok, has largely implicated what the music industry looks like today. It has created the ability for an artist to go on TikTok, post a song and have it hit 1 million people in nearly no time at all. If you look back even 30 years ago, that wasn’t possible. In today's music industry, artists can do so much on their own. They don't necessarily have to be partnered with a major distributor to get their music heard.
"You don't have to feel that way anymore," says Marilyn. "And to me, that's just an overwhelmingly positive step. There's still a lot to fix, but there's also so much potential for growth in song ownership and career longevity. With HEADS on TV, I really want to continue talking about how we can make the music industry that much better, because there are way more possibilities now than ever before. In the '50s you couldn't have had this conversation. So let's have it. Let's involve as many voices as we can."
Why artists follow HEADS on TV
When Marilyn Moser first launched HEADS on TV on Aug. 3, 2020, it was out of necessity. A reaction to all of the questions she was getting from artists who were suddenly stripped of their means to share music and connect with fans when the music stopped, so to speak, and venues shut down. But Marilyn knew the music didn't have to stop. She started posting blogs — including interviews with artists and music venues, feature stories on music history, and educational pieces that answered many of the questions she was getting from artists — and, in December 2020, she officially went live with her first TikTok video. Now, Marilyn says, the feedback she gets from her dedicated following on TikTok is what largely influences the content she shares today.
"The most important definition of HEADS on TV, for me, is that it remains something malleable, moveable, I want it to grow and constantly have motion," says Marilyn. "It's a resource. I do work privately with clients on specific content strategies and campaigns, but the crux of HEADS on TV is providing the free, educational resources I wish I had when I was developing my own artist career. HEADS on TV hosts online content, videos, blogs, we have guest writers and interviews. It's important to me that it remains, no matter how it grows, a free resource. This is a place for content ideas, learning how to navigate the industry on your own, and how to utilize collaboration. It's a fully-digital educational resource."
"I want to make sure I'm always giving artists something to do,” she continues. Not everyone can afford to hire someone specifically for marketing or PR, and I love that there are artists on my page who wish they could and want that help and are seeking that help. If I can give you a couple of ideas for that week and you try one, that's so valuable to me.”
“Community-building is the core function of modern digital marketing. If you don't have community, there's no one to hear the song. There's no one to catch the message.”
What's next for HEADS on TV?
With a year into her venture with HEADS on TV, Marilyn Moser is already looking ahead to how she hopes to grow the project into 2022 and even over the next five years. She has plans to eventually grow her team, adding more voices into the HEADS on TV mix, especially female voices. While Marilyn notes how fortunate she is to have been raised in a supportive family who encouraged her to go after anything she wanted, as she's gone on in her career as a professional and as an artist, she's noticed a gap in female representation, having experienced being the only woman in the room at both high-power industry meetings and live music events.
"I was raised extremely independently by two wonderful parents," she says. "I will always thank them for that. I felt like I could take on the world. It wasn't until I started branching out of college, living in bigger cities where I had these wild dreams and I would start to think, I want to be the next Gaga, I want to be the head of a band, I want to do all of these things. I felt a gap — that in many situations I was the only woman involved. A major part of the music industry changing for good is a woman’s ability to say, I don’t necessarily need a label, or a manager to do what I aspire to. There's more space now for women to speak out and navigate the industry on their own. And I want to give them the space to do that through the guidance of HEADS on TV."
In addition, Moser has plans to take HEADS on TV out on the road to explore and document the history and change that's bubbling up in other major music cities. She's also interested in exploring how up-and-coming artists can find their own voice, team, and success without ever leaving their hometown.
"You don't always need to go on these massive tours and expensive marketing ventures, especially now," says Marilyn. "I think it's more about playing really great gigs and focusing on doing things locally — involving local studios and local venues. I'm seeing and hearing of so much more of this right now. Just from the simple fact that people are not as city-centered as they used to be."
“Community-building is the core function of modern digital marketing. If you don't have community, there's no one to hear the song. There's no one to catch the message.”
On creating her own music
I had to ask Marilyn about her own music, to which she responded yes. But her perspective has changed on it since she started.
"Making music has and always will be a part of me," she says. "But once I started to learn about the business side and how I'd have to give so much to try to make my music profitable — for me, personally, and I know this isn't true for everyone — it was going to take away the part I loved the most. Music is my escape and my creativity, and if I had to put it through the ringer to put food on the table, I don't know if I'd continue to do it. That's why I'm so open and honest in the HEADS on TV conversation about how serious of an industry it is. I’m working during the day to help other artists navigate the industry, and when you take that on as a day job, it can be exhausting at the end of each day to turn the tables and focus on that big marketing motion for yourself. I will always release music when I want to, I will never let anything ever stop me from that. But it’s been seriously rewarding helping others navigate the music industry separate from my own journey, and I want to continue to chase that feeling.”
Marilyn says she has new music in the works in collaboration with producers Neil Wogensen and Jordan Lawlor (former touring guitarist of M83), which she expects to tease by 2021’s end.
Music is a powerful thing. If you've got an idea, share it
As our conversation was coming to a close, Marilyn said something that really stuck with me. Music is such a powerful tool, and if you've got a talent or idea you want to share, you should share it, because you never know who it'll hit.
"The value of art in the world is so important," she says. "There's someone for everyone. That's why we need every artist to get out there, and there can't be any gatekeeping because you could be saving someone's life. Literally. That's why all art, it just has to get out."
At the end of the day, that's the reason behind HEADS on TV — Marilyn wants to help more artists get their art out there, in any way they can.
"I set out to create the resource that I wish I had when I was 18," she says. "It's really important to me that I speak to the young, up-and-coming artist as an audience because I know how difficult it is to navigate the music industry. I know that it changes so fast, which makes it 10x more intimidating, and I just wanted to create a space where artists could come to when questions arise. I am so incredibly fortunate to already have this community growing, and every time I make content for this project, I'm constantly thinking of them and what's helpful and how I can support them in their endeavors. Community-building is the core function of modern digital marketing. If you don't have community, there's no one to hear the song. There's no one to catch the message. That's always been the biggest piece for me."
Follow Marilyn’s personal social media accounts:
Meet the author of this article, Crystal Larsen: https://www.crystalmlarsen.com
