If you read this blog regularly, you’ll know I’m a big fan of Pusha T’s work (exhibit 1, 2, 3). To me, Push is one of the few artists still focused on quality and on developing his category. 

Push isn’t afraid to sell fewer records; that doesn’t mean he’s making any less money, which is a particularly important aspect in the competitive game of hip-hop. Push raps on “Millions,” “My record sales ain’t much as theirs, and we still drive the same coupes.” I was curious: How was this possible?

That’s what I explored in my most recently published article, which covers Pusha T’s career for one of my favorite newsletters, Dan Runcie’s Trapital. Some really cool things I learned:

• Push’s career has been tumultuous, to say the least. As half of Clipse, he’d been blocked from releasing music by the record label, and had to get creative around this constraint (which he did with free mixtapes, monetizing through touring and creating his own brand and products)
• How Push’s experiences with his Play Cloths brand (which he and his brother, Clipse bandmate Malice conceived of as a separate business endeavor from their music business), and how he was able to leverage it into a multi-year, multi-million, deal with Adidas
• How Push and his manager Steven Victor focus on creative elevation and timelessness, rather than on chasing streaming numbers and relevance

It was honestly inspiring to write this one, peeling back the layers of the challenges of Push as a creator and how he responded to this one. I found it really relatable and it gave me a lot of ideas and energy for how to move forward in my own business.

And to think, this opportunity wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t start writing every day, and publishing my blog posts at Twitter.

Dan recently became a father. Congratulations! 

It’s a big week for releases this week (see yesterday’s post on a recent podcast appearance)!