CADENCE WEAPON ’ S
Hard-Earned Lessons for Life in Music
In his new book , Bedroom Rapper , Rollie Pemberton ( a . k . a . Cadence Weapon ) dishes on the highs & lows of his years in the music business , from being a teenager stuck in a terrible label contract to finding huge success on his own terms .
BY MICHAEL RAINE
Now 36 years old , and just a year removed from winning the Polaris Music Prize , Rollie Pemberton ( better known as Cadence Weapon ) is able to reflect on the significant highs and lows he ’ s had in his career . From a rap-obsessed Black kid i n Edmonton who shared lyrics on early internet message boards , to a teenager making critically-acclaimed albums but stuck in an exploitive label deal , to an entrepreneurial independent artist navigating the business on his own terms , Pemberton has lived multiple lives in the music industry and has the lessons to prove it . He shares his story and all the lessons learned along the way in his new book , Bedroom Rapper . It ’ s both an illuminating memoir and a guidebook to the music business for independent artists .
Here , Pemberton chats with Canadian Musician about his career , and our interview is followed by a short excerpt from his book . If you ’ d like to hear our full conversation with Pemberton , listen to the Sept . 7 , 2022 , episode of the Canadian Musician Podcast .
CM : In the last couple years , you ’ ve been more open about your time signed to Canadian indie label , Upper Class Recordings , which released your first three LPs . You said that after a decade of critically-acclaimed albums and constant touring , you still had no money because of how much the label was taking . So , what was the nature of that contract , and at what point did you start to question it ?
38 CANADIAN MUSICIAN
Rollie Pemberton : Well , I think from the beginning we had issues with it , but I was just a teenager from Edmonton trying to be a rapper and I didn ’ t really have a lot of leverage , and so it ’ s basically like “ take it or leave it .” Basically , the idea of the contract was pretty standard , I think , for the time . I think it would have been a bit of an overreach for an indie label back then , it seemed more like a major label-style contract . But yes , the idea that , basically , I would have to recoup all the recording costs and everything , and then after that would happen , we would split things 50 / 50 . That was the working idea of it , but as time went on , it felt like I was playing a lot of shows , felt like I was bringing in some kind of income , but it would just never balance out . Years would go by and the only money I would get would be my half of publishing , and I also had a publishing deal with them despite the fact that they never functioned as a real publisher to me . They never got me any of the good things that you get when you have a publisher , but to this day , they still get 50 % of my publishing on all those old records .
So , it was just very restrictive . And then it started becoming this thing where they began taking money from things that had nothing to do with music . Like the $ 10,000 for being [ Edmonton ’ s ] poet laureate , that went to Upper Class . As a result , I would have all these other jobs at the same time . I ’ d be working at Holt Renfrew in the shipping department . So , it was just really stressful because it just felt like it was something that was insurmountable .
CM : Did you think that ’ s just how the industry operates ? At a certain point , did you start asking questions of other artists and figuring out how your contract and situation compared ?
Pemberton : That was the thing is I just thought that was the way it went , or whatever . I was just like , “ Oh , it ’ ll balance out eventually ,” just being loyal and being patient . And also , at that time , I didn ’ t even know that I could , for example , fire my management . Because of the nature of our relationship , they were like my parents . They had a fiduciary duty to me . They were kind of like caretakers for me because I was underage when I first signed the deal . I ’ d be playing shows in the U . S . and I wouldn ’ t be old enough to be in the bars and stuff . So , I really trusted them a lot .
So , it really was when I talked to people like Owen Pallett and asked , “ What ’ s your deal like ?” and then I was just like , “ Oh , wait a minute .” Like , “ Oh , you actually get the money from your shows ?” And that ’ s the primary source of income for artists ? Why am I not getting that ? Why am I always sending show money to them , and just nothing comes back ? Or I ’ m sending the merch money to them , and just nothing comes back . I think it ’ s just the nature of being in a 360 deal .
Obviously , I was an outsider artist making off-the-wall rap music , and it wasn ’ t this thing about making a ton of money or selling a lot of records . So , for me , I was just like , “ Well , yeah , maybe it isn ’ t balancing out .” But I started just doing the math and thinking about how much I ’ m actually spending and how much I ’ m making out of it and was just like , this isn ’ t adding up .
CM : When you were signing that deal , did you have anyone in your corner , like a lawyer or parents or someone to read the fine print ?
Pemberton : Yeah , my mom works at a law