Taxiride’s Jason Singh: “How many artists are missing out because they don’t fit the social media mould?”

“Can you imagine how many artists are going by the by because they don’t fit the social media mould?”

Singer-songwriter and Taxiride frontman Jason Singh has addressed the modern-day challenges Australian artists are facing in the music industry.

On the Life As We Know It podcast hosted by Gold 104.3’s Toni Tenaglia, Lisa Cameron and Steph Zaharakis, Singh discusses the rise and influence of social media when it comes to Australian music, saying thesedays, it’s not necessarily about how much talent you have, but how many followers you have.

Singh also laments that today’s music business is lacking, well … music people.

“There would be great people at labels who would go ‘You’ve got something. Here’s a studio, go and write songs for two years, and we’ll develop you.”

“Now, it’s ‘Oh, you’ve only got 10,000 Instagram followers. Maybe come back when you’ve got 100,000.”

In the Australian entertainment business, it’s known as Tall Poppy Syndrome.

“I don’t know what it is, but we’re just not designed to pick people up in this country,” says Singh, who has spent a lot of time in the US and says the opposite is true there.

“You see Eminem put 50 Cent ahead of himself. It’s not about ‘me.’ They have this way of lifting each other up.”

“I just don’t see it here. I see a lot of dog acts that happen in this country.”

“Where did everyone go? Australia was like the king. In the nineties, when Taxiride came out, there were so many bands … Powderfinger, silverchair, INXS, Savage Garden, Killing Heidi, Bachelor Girl, Grinspoon – there were dozens of us.”

Toni also notes that today’s radio landscape has fewer announcers, in the traditional sense.

Singh jokes maybe it’s because he’s viewing it all through the lens of a bloke who’s now in his fifties.

I wonder what’s next? he ponders.