Behind the Music: A Conversation with Nael Atweh

Written by Ella Stillion Southard

Nael began his journey into the music management business because of his brother, Nasri Atweh, who is the lead singer of “Magic!” and half of the songwriter duo “the Messengers.” Nasri’s success in achieving his childhood dreams inspired Nael to fly to Los Angeles and try to make it on his own in the music industry. After being met with countless rejections and failures, Nael shifted his focus to helping other musicians with their careers; “I ended up helping so many people that everytime they would get an opportunity, or money, they would want me to manage it. I kinda fell into the position [of a manager] because I started off as ‘what do you need’...and then fell in love with being a manager and being able to help people and take their visions and bring them into fruition,” Nael explains. 

Although Nael finally got on his feet in Hollywood by being a music manager and creating Grass Fed in 2011, he still faced many challenges. “The hardest thing definitely was finding the right talent, and having the funding to be able to support them,” Nael answered when asked about the most strenuous difficulties at the dawn of Grass Fed Management. Managers are the ones who have to fund their clients before they become successful, so this involves paying for meals with new clients, paying the producers and musicians, paying venues, and the list goes on and on. In Nael’s case, he stretched his money from when he was growing up and when he had lived in Toronto, previous to L.A. This reckoning with money forced Nael “to process the difficulties of being in this business,” and pioneer a financially creative path that would allow him to sustain his career as a music artist manager. 

Nael’s money-savvy path proved itself somewhat effective, according to Nael, he “had a lot of success discovering songwriters and producers and getting them signed to publishing companies,” and for a few years he even developed several boy bands with his brother, Nasri. “But they failed. For three years we were opening different acts, and every one of them failed miserably,” Nael states bluntly. At this point Nael was thirty years-old, had $700 to his name, an uber successful music artist of a brother, several unhappy clients because he deserted them for the boy bands, and nowhere left to turn. Almost on cue, Sabrina Claudio emailed Nael, asking him to be her manager. In present day, Claudio is a well-known and successful pop and R&B artist, who headlined 2019 Coachella, accumulates over three million monthly listeners on Spotify, and is set to tour with The Weeknd in 2022. However, in 2014, Claudio was still an emerging artist who continuously got rejected by managers and producers because “nobody saw that she was unique, nobody saw that she was special, they thought that her music was too old for age,” but Nael did see all of those things. Nael explains that he didn’t do anything special when he began to manage Sabrina, he just listened to what she needed and wanted. “We did it her way, and we’ve continued to do it that way, that’s why she is as cultural[ly relevant] as she is,” Nael points out. 

Sabrina Claudio, however, was merely the launching pad for Grass Fed and Nael. Since then, Nael has signed Sad Money $(, Gavin Haley, Andy Schmidt, and many more, making Grass Fed an eight person team with a full-time staff and over 40 clients. Nael made sure to emphasize though, that none of the growth and success of Grass Fed could have been possible without “Sabrina sending me that email that day...she was really the beacon that stamped my name as a real cultural manager who understands how to make a difference with an artist,” Nael says. Sabrina wasn’t the only reason Grass Fed found new clients; Nael himself has trusting instincts and a process when deciding if he will sign a new artist. “My thought process is pretty simple, if I can’t stop thinking about you...and just constantly thinking about your music, and I have visions, then that’s all I need... I am also super open-minded and optimistic, but most of the things that I sign are just things that I connect to,” Nael explains. Nael is a listener just like the rest of us, so if he connects to the emotions in the music, he says anyone will. It’s not just as simple as that though -- sometimes there are discrepancies within the Grass Fed team on whether to sign a new artist. Nael discloses that sometimes he has to double down, and advocate for an artist he believes in to try to get the rest of the Grass Fed team on board.  “Sometimes I am wrong,” Nael admits, “but I would rather be wrong knowing I went with my instincts, than listening to facts or numbers.” Nael is along for his artists’ entire journey. If he only signed people based on how well their music was doing, or what they are worth, then, he concludes, “I would never care about it when they are not [successful].” Nael’s artist recruitment process is really boiled down to: do I like their music? 

Now that Nael’s business has grown with more clients, his responsibilities have also grown -- it’s not just Claudio he has to worry about now. When asked about his day-to-day responsibilities as a manager, he put it quite plainly, “there is no position in the music business that has to do more than a manager.” Even if the artist is signed with a record label, the manager is still communicating with every single department at the label, which includes the booking, public relations, touring, travel agents, accountant, business manager, lawyers, and the list goes on and on. In fact, as we were interviewing, Nael said his phone was blowing up with 300+ text messages and 100+ emails to respond to, because his job requires just that much of him. Not only do managers run every aspect of the business side, but according to Nael, they also have to take care of their artists on a more personal level. “Your manager is your confidant, your superhero, your mentor, your soldier, your dad, your everything, your best friend, your ride or die, that’s what they are there for,” Nael states. Although he made it clear that the manager’s job is incredibly demanding, Nael points out that “the manager gets the power, they get the relationships, they get the credit, and they get to work for themselves,” so it all balances out. 

Grass Fed is merely one part of Nael’s responsibilities, he also has a record label, called White Rabbit Records, and a consulting business. Grass Fed is also a company that breeds music managers like Nael to manage Grass Fed’s artist clients. Before these premature managers can begin managing the clients full-time though, they must understand “artist development” through Nael’s consulting business. Nael’s consulting company is not substantially different from Grass Fed, other than the fact that they are providing the artist with “a publicist that does everything, with marketing rollouts, plans and strategies, and A&Ring [artist and repertoire, basically talent scouting],” all the basics of artist development, Nael says. When asked about what “artist development” means to him, Nael answers, “it’s figuring out how to grow as an artist and a person at the same time. A lot of people focus on the artwork, the music, the song, the video... what it’s really about is how to become a better person in the eye of the public, how to grow with your fans so they fall in love with you.” Grasping the importance of artist development in the consulting business is essential before managing at Grass Fed because Nael wants to aid in the “organic growth” of their artists, meaning the artist grows their business how they want it, molded around who they are as an individual. 

For any artists who are hesitant to get a music manager, Nael wants you to know to “just judge based on the work. If this manager is just trying to get you to sign paperwork, but isn’t doing any work, then it could be two scenarios: one, it’s a big company, so you need to pay attention to that, that means that they are not in the position to work for you for free, or two, they don’t believe in you,” Nael says. On the upside, he notes, most managers do believe in the artist, but the upcoming artists should be wary of the managers that overwork them. He continues,  “if you’re a good manager, if you believe in the artist, you’re gonna help them regardless of them signing to you, because you got to think about karma, you got to think about ‘that client didn’t sign to me, didn’t believe in me, but I believed in them and I didn’t stop believing in them’ because otherwise, why am I a manager?” The bottom line is, there are genuine managers out there like Nael, who will take care of any new, ambitious artists. He wants to support every artist’s careerDon’t be afraid to take that step for your career!

For his parting words, Nael wants our readers to know that, “Grass Fed is always looking for new writers, producers, and artists...the door is wide open to anybody that wants to work with Grass Fed, intern with Grass Fed...I answer every email and DM, so don’t be shy!” Nael ends the interview by telling the artists out there to never give up on their dreams and protect their creative independence. 

Thank you again to Nael Atweh for providing music business wisdom to our Unfiltered readers!