Last year, Fiverr launched The Big Hook, challenging musicians everywhere to create the ultimate song hook. After reviewing 1,000 entries, our judges found their winner in Los Angeles based songwriter Lola Rhodes (formerly known as Lonna Marie). As a Top Rated Seller on Fiverr, Lola has written over 1,200 songs and continues to push creative boundaries.
For winning first place, Fiverr and Songspace flew Lola to Nashville, TN to embark on an all expenses paid, music career makeover. Here’s Lola in her own words, reflecting on the journey through Nashville.
Thinking about those four whirlwind days in Nashville brings the biggest smile to my face. The experience exceeded my expectations ten fold and really pushed me into the driver’s seat of my career. Four days might not seem like enough time to really take in an experience, but Fiver and Songspace really brought their A game with this grand prize. My journey began with taking a red-eye from Los Angeles, and landing in Nashville at 6am. Just a few hours later, my back-to-back meetings with various industry executives began. I had the pleasure of meeting Caine O’Rear, head editor at American Songwriter Magazine, Penny Gattis, writer/relations at BMI, Katie Jelen, A&R at Secret Roads and Robby Towns of Nesta Music and Spotify. Not only was everyone super nice and welcoming, they were also highly relevant to who I am as an artist and my specific genre. It was a joy to pick their brains and learn new insights about the business. Meeting Katie Jelen was definitely a highlight, too, because her company represents Ingrid Michelson, whose career and music I’ve admired for a while now.
After a margarita and some yummy Mexican food, as we said our goodbyes she gave me a piece of advice that I had actually been pondering over for a few months; changing my artist name. I decided to jump on this advice, and officially changed my artist name to Lola Rhodes when I arrived back in Los Angeles. This was a big leap in my music career, and I can credit my meeting with Katie for helping inspire this decision.
Day two of my Nashville experience was the one I was most nervous for – the co-writes! I’ve been writing in my own little vacuum for 6 years now and had yet to co-write with someone else. Not so much on purpose, it’s just an easier and more natural way for me to write. And with selling on Fiverr, I’ve learned to become an expert in cranking out quality songs at a rapid pace.
My first co-writing session was with a lovely singer songwriter named Louisa Wendorff, one of The Big Hook judges and someone who recently got recognized by Taylor Swift for her YouTube mashup of ‘Blank Space’. No big deal, right? The session started with what seemed like therapy, hashing out our current life and relationship situations and landing on a really beautiful theme. The song that we wrote is so incredibly moving and as my first co-songwriter, she was very easy to work with and we had really great chemistry. Since my Nashville trip, I’ve met up with Louisa again in Los Angeles for another co-writing session and we created another song I’m truly proud of.
The second co-writing session was with two Nashville based songwriters named Daphne Willis and Justin Halprin. They had been writing together for a while now so I was definitely nervous to go into their well-oiled machine. The session went so well that we ended up writing not one, but two new songs that both originated from choruses I had already written. Each song came out so different than I ever originally imagined, so it was a thrill to hear the final results! Daphne and Justin also made me feel very welcomed when I had insight or direction for the songs. Overall I couldn’t have asked for a better first go at co-writes, as both sessions were so unique and impactful. Since Nashville, I’ve been bitten by the co-write bug and that’s all I want to be doing now!
The last two days of Nashville were dedicated to my favorite aspect of being a songwriter – studio time. Fiverr and Songspace booked me time at Electric Thunder Studios, and it was incredible to watch some of the best musicians in Nashville create magic around your songs. I had the wonderful opportunity to work with producer Bobby Campbell, who I had heard is the best kept secret (but not for long) in town. As a songwriter, my favorite thing to do is to hand over a tune to a producer and see how it inspires them. Bobby’s interpretation of all 3 tracks seriously blew my mind. Even just the pre-production tracks we did in his home studio, I thought, were a hit.
There was so much talent in the studio and they all came together to bring my songs to life. Needless to say, it was so inspiring to watch and be a part of. I’ve already released one of the tracks, Marina del Rey, with the other two coming later this year!
Between changing my artist name, learning how to co-write, professionally recording 3 new songs and meeting with some of the brightest minds in the industry, this Nashville experience has helped take my music career to the next level. I’m grateful for winning The Big Hook, and look forward to seeing where it all takes me in 2016.
Check out highlights from my Nashville experience in the video below!
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