Boston Podcast "Music You're Missing" Features Up-And-Coming Artists
New music can be hard to find. For as many personalized Spotify playlists and recommendations from friends you receive, it still feels like there are so many songs out there you’ve never heard of, from artists with unseen potential. That’s where Brendan Jeannetti and Devon O’Heron come in.
Jeannetti and O’Heron, both based in the Boston area, created “Music You’re Missing,” a podcast that spotlights up-and-coming artists who have not yet hit the mainstream in hopes of exposing their music to new audiences and learning more about them.
When searching for musicians to talk to, O’Heron’s sister suggested they talk to JESSIA, a Vancouver-based pop artist who gained traction on TikTok. JESSIA created a song with musician and producer Elijah Woods, and O’Heron wanted to get an interview with her before her music went viral.
“We had our interview, and then the next day, when we released it, she was signed to Republic, one of the world’s biggest record labels, working with Ryan Tedder,” O’Heron said.
Moments like their interview preceding JESSIA’s rise to fame are what the two strive to accomplish with “Music You’re Missing.”
“That is the definition of what we want for the podcast—we gave them the music before it blew up. Now, the song has 28 million streams, and it just came out, too. It was on Today’s Top Hits, which has 27 million followers; it’s the most followed playlist in the world. ”
O’Heron and Jeannetti first met while they were working for iHeartRadio during college. Jeannetti also worked as a marketing representative for Sony during his junior year at UMass Amherst, marketing music for Kesha, Maren Morris, Khalid, Camila Cabello and more. He also went to live shows to analyze the crowd dynamics. Post-graduation, he worked with Country 102.5 radio until he was laid off during COVID. O’Heron was a marketing and PR intern for Live Nation, and also worked with their VIP Nation branch, where she went along on artists’ tours to run their VIP experiences. Like Jeannetti, O’Heron was unable to continue working last March, leaving them both with an abundance of free time.
“I’ve always known I wanted to work with Devon,” Jeannetti said. “Then we had all this free time, so we were like, ‘let’s send it.’”
Jeannetti had his own solo version of “Music You’re Missing” prior to working with O’Heron. It ended up getting attention from Apple and Spotify’s home pages, and gained over 700 followers on the playlist, so Jeannetti knew he wanted to build off of that following, as well as his and O’Heron’s connections within the music industry. Reviving “Music You’re Missing” combined all of the pair’s interests and goals, leading to their first interview with the musician Badly in October.
The two have a variety of ways to get ideas for artists, from O’Heron’s sister’s list of names on a spreadsheet, to TikTok and Instagram, to messages from managers, and more. While there aren’t definitive characteristics the artists need to have, Jeannetti said all of their artists tend to fall into a similar category.
“We have an unspoken genre,” he said. “We’ve never necessarily defined the sound that we promote, but they somehow all kind of fit within that world of bedroom pop or R&B, or maybe it sounds super mainstream, but it only has 20 streams.”
Finding a balance between artists they personally like but will also be good for their business is essential to the podcast’s success.
“When picking artists, we need to do it from a business perspective, of course. That being said, just because you have a lot of followers, that’s not it. We have to like the music, and it has to fit the vibe we’re going for.”
Once they have selected their artist for an episode, they do their research to curate the interview as specifically to the person as possible. Sometimes, Jeannetti said, the artists will comment on how much he and O’Heron know about them and their music.
Jeannetti is currently receiving his master’s degree in Music Business and Management from the Berklee College of Music, so he is better able to market their project, primarily using Instagram and TikTok. In addition to the podcast, the two have a playlist on Spotify and Apple Music, also named “Music You’re Missing”. Jeannetti finds that marketing the playlist, especially on TikTok, is more accessible to users since they’ll be more likely to listen to a playlist than listen to a podcast episode.
“We’ve been doing these TikToks where we just showcase clips of songs that are on the playlist, and it’s crazy, it ended up getting us 300 or 400 followers so far,” he said.
Now, O’Heron and Jeannetti are in the process of finalizing a deal with a management company. Since the two are currently doing everything independently, this deal will help them to focus on other endeavors within the “Music You’re Missing” project. It would also help to make a more professional sound, as they’re currently filming out of Jeannetti’s Brighton apartment.
“They’re giving us a team, merch, graphic design, everything we need. We’re in control and still doing what we’re doing, but we have that monetary support,” Jeannetti said. “We’re legitimizing it, and as we grow, they’re growing.”
Other than finalizing this deal, the two also hope to continue growing their platform in the near future.
“We want 10,000 of something, whether it’s views, or TikTok likes, or followers on the playlist, and then we’re going to get lip tattoos,” O’Heron said, laughing.
Jeannetti added that he has goals for specific artists they want to interview before their music goes viral, such as Bruno Major and Qveen Herby. They also want to eventually branch out to working with artists in different capacities, such as booking and managing.
“Our numbers may have been small to start, but the people we were reaching were really influential within music. The curator of Lorem, the huge alternative Spotify playlist, follows us now. We’re getting the right people looking at us, so now we have to step up our game, while remaining our careless, dumbass selves.”
You can check out the “Music You’re Missing” playlist on Spotify and Apple Music, and follow them at @musicyouremissing on Instagram and @musicyouremissingpodcast on TikTok.