9 | MIKE POSNER - Grammy-Nominated singer & songwriter

First Text with Cory Levy

This week, Cory speaks to singer-songwriter and record producer Mike Posner, who is best known for having multiple Billboard Top 100 hits while also writing chart-topping songs for other artists such as Justin Bieber, Maroon 5, Pharrell Williams and more. In this weeks episode, Mike tells us details on how he got started and what he did early on to become a success, what new artists should focus on when creating a project, how music distribution has changed and how up and coming artists should decide to release their music.

“DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME TRYING TO BE POPULAR. SPEND YOUR TIME TRYING TO BE GOOD OR GET BETTER.”

Singer-songwriter Mike Posner (@MikePosner) knows that nothing worth doing is easy–you have to keep working at it. But when he signed his first record deal, he thought things would change. “I really thought that when I got that record deal, that my experience of life would change, that I would be happier and I’d be in the ‘promise land’, that just my experience of life would be exponentially better and I wouldn’t have, really, problems anymore,” says Mike.

“It didn’t make my life worse or make me more sad and more happy, it just was overwhelmingly the same. That was disappointing and disillusioning because I really thought, before, it was going to solve all my problems, and it just didn’t.” Mike then thought, “maybe I just need a big hit song or something’, and I set about acquiring that, and I did.” In 2010, Posner’s single Cooler Than Me finished #19 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the year and was RIAA Certified 2x Platinum.

Mike Posner talked with Cory Levy on OFF RCRD about his start as an artist, getting signed to a record deal, lessons learned from Big Sean, and much more.