A manager is the artist's business partner and its first phone call. The role is broad by design: everything nobody else owns ends up here.
What the job covers
- Strategy: what to release, when to tour, what to turn down
- Hiring and firing the team: agent, label, publicist, lawyer, accountant
- Budgets, cash flow and paying people
- Deals: recording, publishing, sync and brand work
- Keeping the artist working while the artist is making things
How managers are paid
15 to 20 percent is the European norm, taken on the artist's income rather than on live work alone. Some deduct tour costs first, some do not. Sunset clauses matter: after the deal ends, commission usually tapers over two to three years on work signed during the term.
Manager and agent
Different jobs. The manager sets the plan and the Booking agent sells the dates inside it. A manager who books the shows is common early on and rarely permanent.