Jess Kinn One Fiinix Live

‘IT’S IMPORTANT FOR PEOPLE TO BE THEIR AUTHENTIC SELVES’

Jess Kinn was the first hire at agent Jon Ollier’s new live music agency, One Fiinix Live. Here, the former Paradigm agent tells MBUK about her career, working on livestream events for Dua Lipa and Gorillaz and how her family inspired her to pursue a career in the live industry...

Jess Kinn’s family musical legacy is something to behold. The Londonbased live agent’s grandad was Maurice Kinn, the influential promoter and British industry figure who founded the NME in 1952, which published the first UK Singles Chart in November of that year. Kinn’s dad, an avid record collector, had an entire room dedicated to vinyl, which she says she “raided” to DJ around London as a teenager using garage, soul and freakbeat 45s from his collection. He also taught her how to tell the difference between US and UK vinyl pressings just by holding them.

“I grew up with my dad literally giving me music quizzes every day,” says Kinn. She adds that her grandad’s musical legacy, and the knowledge that her dad instilled in her, made her and her sister, Martha Kinn (Director at YMU Music in London and manager of Years & Years, MNEK), determined to make it in the music industry. Kinn’s live music career started at The Leighton Pope Organisation before joining Coda Agency (which would later become Paradigm following a merger with the latter US firm). Starting on the reception desk and later working as an assistant with Nick Matthews and Dave Blackgrove, Kinn worked her way up to agent, spending nine years in total at Paradigm. “There was no set path for me becoming an agent and I would work late, be at every show and always be putting my hand up to do more,” she recalls. “Live [music] and the music industry is heavily male[dominated] and I was usually one of the only females in the room, especially in the early days.”

She adds: “Unfortunately that’s still the case now. I saw music industry football teams hardly had any women in them so I decided to start my own mixed football team every Wednesday at Paradigm and it was great. We played during our lunch

break, which was so good for our mental health, and [we] won trophies.”

After leaving Paradigm at the start of 2020, Kinn headed up events for live streaming firm LIVENow, where, during live music’s enforced and prolonged hiatus due to the pandemic, she worked on livestreamed concerts for the likes of Gorillaz and the record breaking Dua Lipa Studio 2054 event. In early 2021, she joined Londonbased live music agency One Fiinix Live, launched by award-winning British agent Jon Ollier, following nearly six years at Creative Artists Agency (CAA). Emma Davis, Ollier’s long-time colleague at CAA also joined the new company, whose roster of superstar clients include the likes of Ed Sheeran, Anne-Marie and Lauv. At Paradigm, Kinn’s acts included Mallrat, Years & Years, Cat Burns, Tessa Violet, Rebecca Garton. All have now joined her at One Fiinix Live. Other acts on Kinn’s roster include Beka, Lava La Rue, George Moir, Ellie Dixon, and Michael Aldag & The Stickmen. “It’s very humbling that they’ve decided to come on this journey with me,” she says. “I’m so excited to be a part of something from the beginning and helping to create a forward-thinking, safe and supportive working environment.”

She continues: “I love the fact that my roster is so diverse and predominantly female, and that my artists are out there pushing boundaries and being so creative. Years & Years and Elton John’s surprise performance at the Brits was absolutely outstanding and a beautiful celebration of queer culture. I’m so excited to go and watch Lava La Rue in August and Beka in October. Both shows are going to be really special.” Looking back over the events of the past 18 months, Kinn tells MBUK that “the pandemic has given us all time to reflect, sit with ourselves and realise what’s important in life”. She also explains that “there were definitely times in the pandemic that I wanted to leave live [music] and do something else, especially with everything going on and the fear we all felt”. Kinn says however, that she’s “been doing this for over 10 years and I can’t seem to leave!”. She concludes: “Nothing can replace that feeling when you watch a live show.” Here, Kinn discusses how she moved from live music to livestreaming to navigate her way through the pandemic, and why she decided to join Ollier at his new venture.

Elton John and Olly Alexander at the BRITs 2021

As a live music professional, tell us about how things were for you going from the end of 2019 into the pandemic in early 2020?

I had a crazy end to 2019 and I thought, ‘2020 has got to be better. This is my year’. And then the pandemic hit and it was all so overwhelming on people’s mental health. The [music] industry isn’t just somewhere you work. You put your whole life into [your work]. To see it all just fall away so quickly was very difficult.

All the changes, all the redundancies and everything going on made me reassess a lot of things in my life and made me realise what’s important. I thought, I need a minute to re-think and re-group, and I decided that I didn’t just want to sit around and wait. I ended up moving across to a live streaming platform [LIVENow] and I did that for six months. That gave me something to sink my teeth into and gave me a new skill. I learned everything there is to know about streaming, which has come in really handy (referring to myself as the stream queen!).

Was live streaming something that you were taking seriously before the pandemic?

Look, we all know that [livestreaming] can never replace live music. It can never be a replacement for an actual feeling of going to a gig. But, as the pandemic hit, and as things carried on into the second lockdown, it was like, this is the only way you’re going to be able to see any live music.

The live streams that worked were the ones that offered something completely different and something that you can’t see live, like a hybrid between a gig and a music video.

Going forward, it can really be used as an amazing tool. Not necessarily just streaming a gig if you can’t travel to shows, but actually offering something personal to fans, like seeing the artist [backstage] before the show. But it can never replace an actual live show.

You worked on Dua Lipa’s live stream event. How challenging was that to get off the ground?

It took a lot to get it announced and to even get it to happen, because they all had to be put into different COVID bubbles. That was a really big challenge. The same with the Gorillaz [livestream concert]. That was a great example of something you can never see live. It obviously had so many special effects and the production that was built [meant that] you could never actually see it live.

Do you think live streaming will form part of the events experience post-pandemic?

It can definitely be used as a tool, but I don’t think every gig is going to be live streamed, because it’s very expensive to put cameras in for the live stream and to do that in every venue. and believe in what we’re doing, then it just seems to work. We’re on this journey together.

What do you think were the biggest challenges facing live music before the pandemic?

Something that it’s probably facing even now, which is saturation. A lot of artists were out touring and trying to get slots at festivals. Trying to get venue availability is really hard. Even trying to find exciting and interesting venues was hard at that time. Now, there are venues that are closing and there are so many artists that are going to tour now and next year. It’s going to be really difficult for fans who might have to choose what shows they go to. That’s why it’s important that, as agents, we try and be creative in the process with the manager, with the artist and say, ‘What is this? What can we offer fans that’s different and personal to them as the artist?’ Give someone that different experience, rather just going to a show; provide something that’s new and exciting for them.

Let’s go back to the beginning. How did you get into music and then start working in the live music industry?

I grew up with my dad literally giving me music quizzes every day. Our living room has a wall dedicated to records and I would help out on my Dad’s record stall in Camden Market, he would make me feel the vinyl to tell him if it was an American or British pressing. Music was always spoken about in our family and [because] that all happened, I started DJing. I would raid my dad’s vinyl collection and go around London, and play sixties soul, garage, freakbeat and funk. It’s also kind of in my blood. My granddad founded the NME in the fifties. [Maurice Kinn retained Percy Dickins and Ray Sonin to help re-launch the title.] He was instrumental in publishing a (Official Singles] chart and put on concerts with the Rolling Stones and The Beatles on the same bill. He was the first and only person to bring Billie Holiday over in the

After LIVENow you started working with Jon Ollier. Why did you want to work with him and what’s it like working at One Fiinix?

I saw that all these changes were being made across agencies and saw that Jon had started the company. I was really excited to see what he was doing. I didn’t know him or anything, but I heard really good things about him in the industry. I called him up and said, ‘Look, do you want to have a catch-up?’ We had this really great conversation on the first phone call. We went on this long lunch and spoke about music, what we wanted for the ethos of the company, the strategy etc., and it just made sense to come out of the live streaming world and get back into doing what I love, which is obviously live music. We just really vibe together on strategy and the music. He’s very straight talking, which I like. We both really have this passion for the artists. It’s great that we can both bounce ideas off each other. Emma [Davis], who also works with us on the team, is amazing. There’s [other] things [we want to do], like we want to banish the word ‘assistant’. We want to use something like ‘business support’ instead. We’re all together as a team, and we want the same thing, so that’s really important.

Do you have any other goals for the first few months?

We’re looking at things like sustainable touring. We’re looking at building and growing [the business] when the time is right. And then, we’re also focusing on the artists and on the music and signing some really great acts. [We’re] getting ready for when it does all turn on again. [We want] to be ready to celebrate this incredible moment, when it all happens.

“You can’t be afraid to stand your ground, trust your instincts and know you’ll have knock backs.” With the artists that I’m working with, I feel very lucky that they’re really amazing people; they stand for something. The managers I’m working with are also amazing. So that’s where we’re at: we’re blocking out the noise around us and focusing on the artists and on the music.

How challenging has it been to find new acts to work with over the past few months of the pandemic?

I don’t know if it’s been challenging, but there’s just so much music and so many artists out there. It’s hard without being able to say to them, ‘Look, this is what we can do.’ We can [only] say, ‘This is what we hope we can do.’ But, for me, if I hear something and it’s undeniable and I feel like I can add something to it, I’m just like, ‘I want to work with you guys’. If they believe in me

Lava La Rue Jess Kinn worked on Dua Lipa’s Studio 2054 livestream event, which pulled in over 5 million viewers in December 2020

fifties, which was super cool. He’s got this incredible legacy, but he passed away when I was 10 years old, so that was in 2000.

But what it did was it made me and my sister [Martha Kinn, Director at YMU Music] be much more determined to go into [the music business], because we spoke about music so much and because of my dad instilling this music into us. [After DJing], I got into working at booking agency The Leighton Pope Organisation and did that for a year. I was a PA and then wanted to be more on the agents and booking side. I was also interning at some PR companies [at the time].

Then, I saw there was something going at Coda Agency and went for that. I didn’t get the job, but they were really impressed with my interview, so I got onto reception there and then just built myself up.

I worked on reception for two months, then started working with Nick and Dave. I worked across DJs and live acts, assisting, then booking, working solely with Nick and a couple of the partners, adding people to our team and carried on building my roster and career. I was there for nine years.

How would you advise young people to start a career working as an agent?

I was out and about talking to people, meeting people. I love people, I love music. Those are the two [reasons why] I thought [this career] made sense.

You can’t be afraid to stand your ground, trust your instincts and know you’re going to have knock backs and people that doubt you along the way. This job is so rewarding but it’s hard. It’s also [about] creativity, strategy, taking risks and showing that you’re willing to graft, stay late and go to a gig every night of the week. Make sure you keep and nurture good relationships with people and keep trying and keep pushing.

What other advice would you give to somebody who wanted to work in live music?

It’s important for people to be their authentic selves. You need to not listen to a lot of people telling you ‘No’ or telling you one thing. You really need to fight for it. What I’ve noticed is that artists and managers want people, on a human level, to really connect with them, and to be on their team and to be able to work with them [collaboratively]. That’s really important.

A lot of why we got into this industry [gets] lost and taking it back to actually being about the music and about the people is really important.

What’s one thing that you would change about the music industry and why?

It’s a big question. There’s a lot of things I would want to change, but I would definitely change the level of representation behind the scenes in the music industry. Even though we are seeing more upcoming artists from diverse backgrounds, when it comes to promoters, tour managers and agents, people from LGBTQ+ backgrounds, people with different gender identities and non-white people are still largely unrepresented, and that needs to change.

People’s mental health is also really important. People need to focus more on that. And, again, making it about the music and remembering why we all get up and do this every day. n

Every Picture Tells A Story

Date: June, 1989 Location: Wembley Arena, London

Bob was playing Wembley, and we decided to have a small affair backstage, 20 or so people, major retailers, the big people from radio, Champagne, nice things on sticks and everyone gets to meet Bob.

I said to Bob’s people, we just want to give him a Gold record, and then if he could spend 10 minutes with us, that would be great. Of course word came back: Bob does not do meet and greets.

Undeterred, I thought, I’ll get there early, I’ll find him and explain the situation, persuade him that this is something he should do.

I go to Bob’s dressing room, there’s no one there, I ask a security guy where he is and he says, ‘Oh, he’s down there, second door on the left.’

I knock, no answer, so I open the door and it’s basically a storage cupboard. Sitting on a fold-up chair was Bob, to his left was George Harrison, and to his left, sat on a huge keg of beer, was Ringo.

I said, ‘Sorry to interrupt, my name is Paul Russell, I run the record company here and Bob I was wondering…’ Before I’d even got half of it out: ‘I don’t do meet and greets, I don’t do album presentations.’

I tried again, I said the radio people have been very, very good to us, so have retail, it’s only about 20 people, no one’s going to jostle you, if you could just come by, we’ll give you the album, you could say a few words, it would mean so much to everyone…

Still no.

I’m about to launch into my third request, when suddenly Ringo says, ‘For fuck sake Bob, do as the fucking geezer asks, come on, don’t be a c**t.’

Bob looks at Ringo, and I sense my chance. I said, ‘Bob, I’ll tell you how we’re gonna do this. The room has two doors, you come in one door, I’ll be standing with the album, we’ll take a photograph, you go out the other door. You don’t even have to take the album with you, just smile at 20 people.’

At which point Ringo chimes in again: ‘For fuck sake Bob, do the guy a fucking favour.’

Bob looks at Ringo, looks back at me, ‘You promise I don’t even have to take the album?’

After the show, there we are, in our room, someone gives me the signal, Bob comes through the door, he won’t take the album, as you can see, but he puts his hand on my shoulder and manages as much of a smile as we were ever going to get. The photographer fires off two or three shots and Bob’s out the other door.

So, thanks to Ringo, we got him!

As part of a storied career, Paul Russell was the Chairman of Sony Music UK during much of the eighties and nineties.