Humble is not always the word that best describes many musicians or singers, but it perfectly describes Twin Cities producer and songwriter Landon Conrath. When speaking to the unassuming 23-year-old Bethel University of Lino Lakes, you wouldn’t guess he has nearly a million monthly listeners on Spotify.
Conrath released his first song “Pieces” in January 2020. The song was picked up by some Spotify algorithmic playlists like Discover Weekly and Release Radar which present listeners with new music based on what is already in their playlists . But her monthly listener count grew exponentially when her song “Acetone” was added to Spotify’s editorial Good Vibes playlist, which has 2 million listeners.
At first, Conrath found it hard to transition (or even feel) that success into real life. He and his band haven’t played any shows (due to the pandemic) and Conrath has only had a small presence on Instagram and other social media platforms. Were people actually listening to music from him or just browsing curated Spotify playlists?
“It was this weird dissociation between like, am I really doing well? Or did I just get really, really, really lucky?” said Conrath. “It was weird going back and forth – I haven’t really done much and I’m not very successful, but people seem to see my internet presence as successful, which doesn’t feel right.”
While numbers mean a lot in the music industry, it’s not the numbers that drive Conrath. In fact, he seems to shy away from his Spotify success, as if his long list of monthly listeners is illegitimate and untransferable to his day-to-day reality, even though he has built a passionate local listener base.
Regardless of where he’s cultivating his audience, Conrath’s breezy indie pop songs are catchy and ultimately uplifting, while staying true to his personal style.
“It’s like the most clichéd story to start my songwriting career ever. I just wrote a song about a stupid breakup like everyone else does,” Conrath said of his song “Pieces”. He’s getting married next year and jokes that, luckily, he’d have to find something new to write about. Lately, he’s been spending time writing about mental health and his experiences with lockdown over the past few years. Their debut album, “Nothing Matters Anyway”, is about dealing with the unknown and finding a hopeful optimism despite its nihilistic title.
“We’re all dealing with a lot of the same things, like, it’s not bad when you’re struggling and you have big lows in your life. This is normal. Things are going to be fine at the end of the day,” said Conrath. “There is some camaraderie.”
Conrath tries to be involved in the production process of his music as much as he can, even working alongside Jake Luppen of Hippo Campus on the fan favorite “Trader Joe’s”. During the tour, he was music and production director for fellow Minnesota songwriter Ber. As he is predominantly a drummer, any guitar he plays in his songs is straightforward. But Conrath doesn’t care about that.
“It also kind of comes out of a need. Like, I don’t know how to produce really clean pop music,” said Conrath. “I probably wouldn’t be able to do this if someone hired me… so I kind of keep my guns a little bit.”
But for an artist striving to make music that feels like him, it works.
“The more artists get involved with their own music, the more it sounds like them, just because it’s them,” he said.
Like every other Minnesota artist, Conrath dreams of playing in the main room on First Avenue one day with his bandmates and “best friends in all the earth”. He hopes to be able to use the platform he gained from his success on Spotify to highlight the Minneapolis music scene and give back to the community.
“Part of me has this weird pride in staying in Minneapolis and wanting to see the city become a music hub,” said Conrath. “I just want to stay here and do as much as I can to legitimize Minneapolis… the more music we can happen here, the more people will finally realize what a great city it is.”
See Landon Conrath perform on 7th St. Entry on December 30th. Ber, Creeping Charlie, TYSM! and DJ Qani are opening.
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