You're winning the hearts of the program director, the assistant program director, all the mix show people, all the radio personalities. That takes time, effort, and it requires a budget. You have to buy alcohol, food. You may have to rent out the venue.  How are they gonna get there? Uber, car service. What are we gonna do? Who are we gonna talk to? And that's just one thing. We need to do that in another market. So this is all deducted in the budget. Even if we have it at the studio. What's up, what's up, what's up? I'm Brandon Shawn. I'm Cory. We are back with another episode of No Labels Necessary Podcast. You can catch us every Tuesday, every Thursday on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, whatever you stream your podcast here at the intersection of creativity and currency.  Today we have yet another special guest for y'all. None other than Ferrari Simmons. He's a local legend. I would like to call it in the Atlanta streets for sure. For sure if y'all don't know the name. But he's also director of lifestyle and mix show at Warner Records. Now, I ain't gonna lie, I don't know what that means. So I'm so excited to hear you first break that down. What does that mean? But he's done a lot of things y'all, but like let's start by understanding what that means. So I'll do the mix show part. So we all know that DJs mix on air. So you have your morning mix on a morning show. You have your afternoon mix. That's like the five o'clock.  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then you had the nighttime mix and I believe it's the midday mix which is like a lunchtime mix. So those are DJs who work at radio stations who provide their mixes. So when we have priorities at the label, my job is to communicate with them our priorities, make sure they have them, clean versions, extended versions, all those type of versions and of course nighttime is the lifestyle segment. So I do clubs and I curate events. So I do that for the label, for the artist that's on the label. And myself too, to build relationships with DJs and the markets that I'm in charge with which is national. So it's all markets. Gotcha. So it's like an extension of the marketing department. Yeah. So think of a car salesman a little bit selling, you know, different versions of Mercedes when you come to the lot. Oh man, I have this, this and this for your needs. You know what I'm saying? So I'm that of, I'm that person at the label with the priorities at the label.  My job is to make sure I communicate with the DJs at each radio station which there are a lot of radio stations that they have your record. So this way, when you go into the market, nine times out of 10, you're gonna hear your song on the radio. Gotcha. I'm the first line of defense to go out. And after that, if it starts getting better and growing, now my boss speaks to the radio station boss, the PD, the APD, music directors and stuff like that. So, yeah.  We literally just had a conversation because we saw a clip from Ryan Teter. You know Ryan Teter? I believe he's one half of the chain smokers. It's a pretty big one. Oh, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's one of those guys. I hope I said his group, right? But, No, it's chain smokers. Yeah, okay. But he was talking about why artists focus on the radio even still to this day, many artists in his particular position, he said because the radio pays way more money. So outside of the discovery of what we look at the internet, he was just like, well, those performance world, he said come from your record, going off on radio pays so much more. He didn't really get into the details, but one, do you have any insight on how much more it might pay versus streaming? I don't have the exact numbers on that part. You have to get more like a lawyer to kind of break that down. People who focus on the law on the breakdown, but I will say radio gives you a good gauge on if a song is really a hit record or not. So artists tend to, the ones who shy away from radio may not understand it enough to know that radio might be still in my personal opinion, one of the most important platforms for artists to be discovered. Why? Number one, it's free. So let's put that out there. Apple Music Spotify, you paying for that. And of course we have playlists, but in the beginning when that was a thing, but now I'm pretty sure you have a playlist, you have a playlist. My guy right here doing the sound has a playlist. I have a playlist. It's so many different playlists now, but guess what? It's not too many radio stations popping up. They're still there. And the big ones in the big markets are still the big ones in the big markets. You need those to get a good gauge on, oh, this record is good. That's why you'll go to Cincinnati, New York, Miami, Chicago, LA and hear kind of the same song if it's truly a hit record. It's gonna play on all those songs.  Just an example. So it's not just a buyout of all these stations that's happening and now we push the button and now this song is blasted out to all these other places. There's so many different things to put into it. So you don't wanna say, I wouldn't say buyout. I would say what the trend is, right? So it's so many different ways now. So you have TikTok. Yeah, so you got your social media aspect, right? You have the playlisting. You have your streaming. Then you have radio. Then you have the lifestyle part. You have the clubs. You have people outside. And you got DJs that are live DJing at night. If the song passes all five of those, nine times out of 10, that's a real hit record. But if we're all wondering why songs don't last long, it's because it's probably popping in one particular thing and not in all. So if we see some shit that's, if we see something popping on TikTok and it maybe goes to radio, it may not last long only because it's just a TikTok song. And if we see that TikToker perform, it may not translate all the way. But if we see someone who has it everywhere, like Coco Jones, her song is really, really popping for real. It's everywhere. Once it's everywhere, that's a good gauge to let you know, okay, this is a real hit record. Yes, so how long does it usually take to gauge that? What makes me ask is, we had a client maybe like last year who had a song go really viral on TikTok and he got a chance to take it to radio. And I think he maybe let us down right over like three, four months or so. And then he kind of fell back and was like, it didn't really feel worth it to me. But even without us being super and ready, it felt like four months. It depends. Everything is a song by song scenario. Works for one song will not or maybe work for another song. So I hate to say, I hate to compare songs, but the one thing I can say, for example, look at that dirt record, that was fast. He just dropped that, but everything checked out, right? It was a good feature, J. Cole. He had the kids on the hook, got the kids. You know what I'm saying? There's so many things that it passed the test. That's what I'm trying to say. It passed all the checks and balances. If it just goes one way, that's a good gauge of saying, okay, this may not sustain as long as you want to. So to answer your question, it depends on how good the song is. I'd say a healthy song goes everywhere for about five to six months, for real, for real. You should hear that song. And if it's a real true hit song, it never goes off the radio. It just goes from power to sub-power and then recurrent. You'll always hear it, you know what I'm saying? Depending on the region you're in too. So like, for example, we'll hear in Atlanta Lil Baby Freestyle. That song was like five years old. You know what I'm saying? Four or five years old. You may not hear that in other markets, but that song was so good. It was playing everywhere for a long time, right? But then as he started dropping newer records, it's still on a recurrent song in Atlanta, meaning it really does what it's supposed to do. So it just depends. It's song by song basis, man. It's very hard to gauge now. There's so many different platforms to blow on. Now, just to get a little bit more specific in that category too, so a Dirk, he's already a certain size artist, and that probably helps to speed at times. Of course, he has fans. So you're doing what you do. Do you guys ever use radio to test for fairly newer artists? And if so, what does that typical path look like in terms of is it being tested in one market, then two, or is it like five markets at first? What's the path you take? Well, I wouldn't say test. I would say, okay, I would say test, but that would be more so clubs, nightclubs, with real DJs that give you real feedback. And we have this thing called a feedback form for people who really are into this providing feedback for a record. Because if we're testing it, I need as much information on, all right, if this works and we're gonna put invest money into it, the label's gonna invest money into it, or if it's an indie label, we're gonna invest money into it. We want as much feedback as possible. So if we put it to 20 DJs and 19 DJs say this is not the song, if 13 DJs say this is not, they don't like the song, but if 13 DJs say, yes, I like the song, I love this song, it's a good gauge of saying, okay, let's invest more into the record. So that's what I would do, I would do nightclubs, DJs, and then I would provide feedback forms for them to do a gauge. I will also do a playback, which is a DJ listening session, and I would invite the most important people in there, and then I would get feedback, because you want that real live feedback, but you want experts in the building. You just don't want your regular Joe blows. You want experts to give you an expert professional opinion, which is why Future will call me in Flag Ad-D.C. Two chains will call me in Flag Ad-D.C. GZ will have me come to his crib, and I will listen to the whole project months before it comes out, because he's getting a professional opinion, they are getting a professional opinion on something before they say, okay, here, everybody, this is what I've been doing, this is what I've been working on. So I want to do as much research as possible, man. Before, because radio is such a big. Yeah, radio is not the first stop that you should make. It's, to me, I think it's like almost last. Okay. So you said radio is one amazing, because it's free, right? But then, we always hear online, especially people, let's say Coach K, I believe he said it costs at least $250K to be on radio. What do people mean when they say something like that? You have to market your record. So marketing your record could be promotions around the area, and paying PRs. And keep in mind, PR and the marketing department is not the same. You have a marketing department? You have a PR department? Yeah. You have appearances. You need to make sure we have a DJ playback. So for example, if I was smart, let's just say Coach K, for example, he has a record with the artist in said Atlanta. I would want to make sure I put together a dope playback where it's very intimate with the who's, who's of Atlanta in that building so they can all hear the record. That's not free. Okay.  What exactly is a playback? A playback is a DJ listening session. But if you make it more intimate, it's called a playback. So I'm playing all the records. So that's a single EP. You usually want to promote one single and then have an EP, right? EP is like anything less than 10 songs. Anything 10 or over is an album. Got it. So that's why you see anything less than 10, they'll be like, oh, yes, my new EP is out. You know what I'm saying? It's just a sample of something that's going to be bigger, which is an album or a mixtape, right? These, all these things require a budget. You have to buy alcohol, food. If it's a female artist, hair, makeup. If it's an artist that may be a street artist, you're going to have to provide security. Security for the venue. You may have to rent out the venue. You're going to do multiple things. How are they going to get there? Uber, car service. What are we going to do? Who are we going to talk to? Each person is probably going to cost, maybe $75 to $100 a plate, because we don't want to take out a McDonald's. You know what I'm saying? This has got to be at something nice. If we go on all out, we're going to go all out. So this is all deducted in the budget. Even if we have it at the studio, we still want to provide a good ambiance of things. And that's just one thing. We need to do that in another market. Right. Now, and think about this. Urban, right? Urban music? Think about the black cities. You got Chicago. You got Atlanta. You have Washington, DC.  You're winning the hearts of the program director, the APD, the assistant program director, all the mix show people, all the radio personalities. That takes time, effort, and it requires a budget. So it's not necessarily paying. What you saying, Payola? Right, it's not that, right? Well, legally, I can't speak on that because I actually work for a record label. So legally, I'm not allowed to speak on that. Does that happen? Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does. But corporate, I work for a corporate. I work for a Fortune 500 company. So I'm not allowed to speak on that. I've had training on that. Like you get fired and go to jail on that. Just speaking on a topic? Not for speaking on a topic, but for going into depth of how it works and what people do and how it gets done. Me personally, and I can say this for real, for I've never participated in that. Receiving or distributing. It makes sense though, because I know, I mean, even other corporations, there's a lot of things. No, yeah, it's a, I mean, before I even started my job, they put you in a sensitivity training about that. They don't play. I remember. Yeah, they don't play. They don't play. Yeah, it does make sense though. I remember trying to interview somebody. Does it happen? Yes, I can say that. Does it happen with me or anybody around me? No. But the part that's clearly legal per se though, more around what you described in terms of these listening sessions and things like that. That's promotions. Which is a real cost or it does promotion. And it's more so, which of course is why it's sales I'm promoting. I'm trying to persuade people like, cause it does make a difference for me to not just have you in McDonald's versus having you in this nice experience. If it doesn't influence whether you want to actually support the song, right? Exactly. Yeah, okay. You want a proper presentation. You want to be impressed. If you two guys, if three of you guys are coming to an event that I'm at, you're going to be impressed. We're not going to be at no rinky dink place that got fried chicken and french fries. If it's there, it's going to be the best fried chicken and french fries you've ever had in your life. You know what I'm saying? You can be like, what is this? You know what I'm saying? I curate events like that. That's the lifestyle part of me. Got it. Got it. Okay, if you're listening to this and you're looking to grow your music career, boost your streams and your fan base, me, J.R. McKee and Jacory are looking for 60 artists to meet with us in person so we can help them in this limited environment, this one-time opportunity personally to build your music career. So on August 12th, in Atlanta, like Sean said, it's going to be a super exclusive event. We're going to be giving out information that we haven't really been able to share anywhere else. And we want to make sure that you're one of those people that gets to walk away with this game. So if you want to get your tickets, go to knowlabelsnecessary.com or check the link in the description if you're watching this on YouTube. Like I said, we're not doing 61. We're not doing 62. Just a hard 60. And we want to make sure that those 60 people are the best quality people that will actually use this game. So hopefully- The venue is literally at capacity at that number. Like no more than that. So be one of those 60. If you're serious, come dab us up, make sure that we're real. And yeah, we'll see you there. Knowlabelsnecessary.com Speaking a little bit more on the lifestyle, actually, what does that look like in terms of getting artists in those clubs? Is it, I guess a better way to say it is, like how do you select clubs? Well, do you work with more than one genre of artists? Not necessarily. I think my strength is hip hop. Okay. I've definitely worked with some R&B before, but I know my strengths. So I kind of stay in the hip hop lane, in particular pain and trap. I kind of have a really good gauge of what I think is gonna work in those particular fields. The lifestyle part is, this is all relationship-based. So when you're a lifestyle guy, people lean on you to provide a service. And that service is access. So let's just say you guys were to hire me for something. You're hiring me because I know everybody. And I can put important people in the room for you. And all you guys gotta do is just show up. Gotcha. And I do those things by keeping my relationships well with these people. I do things where we do things together. So I have a group chat with, I'd say 20 of the most important DJs in Atlanta. And we all talk about everything. Talk about personal life business. And that's my way of staying in tune with my brothers who currently do the same thing I do. Each person may, some people in there are millionaires, some people are 100,000aires. Some people are hungry and starving and trying to figure it out. But they're all equally important in that group chat. And we support each other. So that's the lifestyle part of me. And I just know everybody, man. I've been on the radio for 10 years. And I've interviewed damn near everybody as you can think of. Big, small. My main focus is the newer artists. But I've interviewed pretty much everybody you can think of in the hip hop genre. You actually made me think of something. So you were early on interviewing people like the baby, little baby. And I saw a quote somewhere that the directors were mad that you brought them on so early or something like that. Yeah, so again, radio, I think what I did different was myself in Fly Got DC. I could never leave Fly Got DC out because he was my partner in crime. I don't follow rules. So let me just put that out there. If that's my job description, I'm probably not gonna do anything within that job description. I'm gonna push it. I always believe I don't give 100%, I give 120%. That 20% is my job. So if you want hot artists on the radio, I'm the guy to hire because I'm gonna go find them. At the particular time, this 2017, I could remember in April, little babe, nobody even knew who he was. But I knew he was because I was always out in the streets. I'm always out in the clubs. If I'm not working, I'm going to the club and I'm like, yo, who is this? If I can't find it on my Shazam, I'm gonna be a weasel and figure out who they are, where they're from, because I love it. So I just applied that on the radio. And I was, myself from Flaggat DC, just took a picture out of Greg Street's book and was trying our best to break artists on the radio. But you can't really do that, right? Because when you think about radio, what do you think about radio? Radio is selling the songs that record labels are promoting. Yeah. And if they're not signed, they shouldn't be on the air. So the program director does exactly what they're supposed to do. They program music. So they're putting the songs in. Songs that are trending, songs that they have an agreement with the label like, yes, this song is good. I'm gonna put it on my show. Oh, I'm gonna put it on the radio. It's doing really good. It's trending everywhere. You know what? I like it. I'm gonna play it three, four times a day. That's when you see these things happen. Me, I would take the songs out and play the new artists. So that's how I would start getting in trouble. Because I did that with Lil Baby. I did that with The Baby. I did that with Megan Thee Stallion. We did that with Roddy Rich. We did that with Jack Harlow. So I started doing it with all these artists that nobody even knew who they were at the time. And I started getting in trouble. I got suspended, no pay. And I was, I didn't lie, I was scared. I was nervous. But at the end of the day, I took a chance on something. And very rarely do people do that. You think about it even now. When's the last time you see somebody saying, you know what, I'm gonna get in trouble. Fly Got DC, Ferrari Simmons, we will literally play a song on the radio 15 times in a row. And deal with the read because I remember one time my boss came in there, stormed in there and told us to get off the radio. It was that bad. And when we walked outside, it was paperwork for us to sign that we got written up. Shout out to Solo, man. That's my guy now. We cool now, you know what I'm saying? But at the time we were giving him a bad time. We was getting on his nerves, man. And I didn't care, but that was made, that's a synopsis of the whole story of what I did. I just was like, man, I'm gonna take all this music out. That was programmed by my bosses and play Lil Baby over and over and over. But that's how Complex heard about it, called me. And I was like, yeah, he's fired. Lil Baby is fired. And that's how I got verified before everybody was paying 9.99 for it. This was back in 2018, you know what I'm saying? Or 20, I can't remember when I got verified. But it was when the article came out. And I remember I posted it on my Instagram and the next day I was verified. And I was like, oh man, this is fire. So yeah. That's interesting, man. Cause I feel like radio tends to get a bad rep from let's say indie artists because they want their attention, they want the discovery method from it. But like you're saying, like we're literally, our hands are locked, you know what I'm saying? To an end of the degree, we can't do that. So what's the compromise for the radio personnel that care about helping new artists break? Like how do you kind of manage, like the hands being tied in one area but still wanting to help these new artists you see coming up? You improvised. So DC and the Hikai suspended and we were not allowed to interview anybody at the radio station for about six months. So I said, okay. No interviews, we can't break records on radio. Bet we gonna start doing content. This is before content was popular. This is end of 2018. And I want to say maybe beginning of the 19, TUSI, perfect example. We did a contest, it was like, hey man, if you want to come up and do an on camera interview, you know, we just altered what we did, right? Since we couldn't do it on air. I was like, okay, we'll just do it on camera. This is before content became, now everyone's doing content, right? Look at you guys, we're doing content right here. We were doing this before, and it wasn't even mic'd in, we didn't even have a sound board. It was just literally a camera and you hear us talking from way over there, whatever microphone was on that camera. That's how we did it. Because we didn't know nothing. We was just like, all right, well, the artist just gotta, if we do a video of them at the station, that's just as good. So we was doing that. And it's on our YouTube page. Them four four boys, we had an interview with Tusi and it blew up. It blew up. So I think these days, radio personalities, should they get hip? You know, if you can't interview artists online on air or play the song on air, at least give them some content where they can come up to the station and do an on camera interview, kind of like how you guys interview with me. Any personality should be doing these type of things. Because guess what? The radio station now has a YouTube page. The radio station now has an Instagram page, a TikTok page, and all these little bits of content can go on all these platforms. So you don't have to just talk on air. And guess what? It can last longer because on air can just be regional. So let's just say, this is just an Atlanta thing because we're on the radio, but you can say something crazy on the content piece and it goes everywhere. Yeah, you know. Now, you can have a million views versus, you know, 500,000 listens. And but it's currently, you can have a million views with 100,000 shares. And these are people that are all over the country. And I learned that from working with, oh, and see, I forgot, I work for Ball Alert. I work for Ball Alert because I do my podcasts. I have two podcasts. I do the cheat code and I do the Ball Alert podcast. So yeah, I would just say content, man. Content is king right now. I don't think that's ever gonna leave now. It's here.  It's required now. Like, you're perfect to be on here because like that's everything you said was basically the no labels way of thinking. Like I'm gonna do whatever I do, go my path, regardless of what my current label is or what other people want to call me, right? And that makes me wonder, your natural talents. You have some pretty clear natural talents like air for music relationships. If you had the knowing what you know today and the natural talents that you know you have, would you pursue a career in radio to start? If you were young and coming up or would there be something else that you would tell the young you to do in this era? And what would that look like? Man, this is actually a blessing to say. I'm doing everything I dreamed about doing. I didn't dream that I would be working for a label, but as a kid my mom and my mom could attest to this.  I was in Florida and I didn't get hired in Florida. So I moved to Atlanta and everything that I dreamed about, I accomplished it. Was it easy? Heck no. It might have been the hardest thing I ever had to deal with because I've had kids and baby mamas along the way failed relationships, failed situationships. I've failed a lot on my way to accomplishing these super cool things. I feel like I've lost time with a lot of my older kids now because when my kids, a lot of my older kids was younger that I was outside. But my younger kids can benefit from it now because I'm a little bit more family oriented while my lot more family oriented now. But if anything, I would just say be a little bit more focused to my younger self in my early age because I was just wilding. I was wilding when I was hosting parties and that kind of makes you feel like you Superman a little bit when you're on the microphone at the biggest party at a young age and you tend to be a little bit irresponsible, not paying attention to your goals like that. So I would have been a lot more goal oriented with took care of my financials and took care of my credit a lot better. I didn't pay attention to my credit till I was like 30 something. I didn't pay attention to none of that. Think about, I wasted so much money making, I was making so much money at a young age. I didn't think about, I should have had a condo, could have sold my condo and made so much money because I remember in college of my rent, I was making money hosting parties and I lived in a super nice apartment. It was like $15 a month, that was so, and this was like 2006, 2007. Oh yeah, that's crazy. That's a lot back then, you know. And I'm over here like that was, now I'm thinking about, that was a mortgage. That was a mortgage. I could have had a nice condo or something somewhere and I could have sold it. I didn't think of none of that, but I'm first generation of my family going to college. I'm first generation of my family accomplishing my dreams. My parents didn't see that through. They worked a nine to five, that was success. Health benefits, that was success to them. They was like, I can't follow my dreams, but you can. So shout out to my parents, my mom and my dad. I grew up in separated households, but the love was there. My dad worked hard, my mom was an entrepreneur, she cleaned houses, I used to go with her to clean houses. That was a motivational thing is my dad moved up in the corporate and he was always like moving up. Every time I saw my dad, he had got a raise or a promotion. I just thought that was the coolest thing ever. My mom, she was, and they were separated. So my mom, she was cleaning houses. So she never had a real job. My mom literally made it happen every month. She didn't even know how she was gonna make it every month. So I would help her clean houses. That's why I'm like more of a neat freak and stuff like that in my personal life because I would help my mom clean houses. But we would clean these big old houses. I'm from West Palm Beach, but I'm from West Palm Beach. I'm not from Palm Beach, what Donald Trump didn't from. So we would literally go clean houses with a catwalk where you would walk from one side to the house to the other side of the house. And I was like, yo, I gotta have something like this when I get older. This was the craziest thing ever to walk. It's like, I will call it a bridge. It's called a catwalk. It's a bridge to walk from one side of your house to the other and you can literally see your whole house. I just thought that that was the craziest thing ever because I grew up, five people to a three bedroom house. We sharing bedrooms, sharing bathrooms. So yeah, bro, I have a story for real. Like I come from, I wouldn't say nothing. I would say lower middle class. So it's Christmases that, hey man, we ain't got it this year. You know what I'm saying? Well, Christmas might be cool, but just cool though. Like you get one present, my boy, you know what I'm saying? So you get one pair of shoes, you know what I'm saying? Like you gotta make them shoes last. That's why I have a room full of Jordans.  Cause I was like, I was taught to keep my shoes clean. This is it. And you're gonna get cracked on.  Like, so I would have to keep my shoes clean. I would have that dingy white t-shirt, but I would make sure I wash it, use bleach every night or whatever, you know what I'm saying? And make sure I have a nice little crease, crease in my pants and my shoes. They'll be old, but they'll be smooth, you know what I'm saying? And then my mom let me work. I started cutting grass and I started making some money. Yeah. It's a wrap from there. It was a wrap from there. And I started making some money. You know, I tried selling weed. That wasn't good. Like the criminal lifestyle was not for me. That's not, that wasn't a path for mine. Okay. I'm kind of glad that it wasn't. How'd you learn that it wasn't a path for you? Because you would have to like, it was dangerous. And I didn't want to die or get robbed. I would literally see people die or get robbed. And I was like, nah, I'm cool. And I would play sports. So it was like, you know, and then once I got to high school, I made varsity in my freshman year of football. So I was like, all right, cool. I'm short and small, but I'm one of the fastest people on the team. So I'm just like, you know what? Let me just, let me just take the sports, man. And let me cut some grass, make me a little $20 per lawn.  What was it like going through that then coming to Atlanta, basically starting from ground zero? I'm assuming you didn't have many relationships or did you have relationships when you came to Atlanta? Zero, discouraging. One time for Bitty Barnes, DJ Holiday. Ray Daniels. I was Ray Daniels' intern. He didn't even know it. What's that mean? You know, like I just, I was hosting parties in college and throwing parties in college. So I had graduated college. And when you run track, if you're not running Olympic time, it's a wrap. You know what I'm saying?  You know, when you running track, because I ran track, if Puma, Nike, or none of these folks ain't picking you up, it's over. So what do you do? You get a job. You be a coach or something like that. But I just love music. I moved to Atlanta because I couldn't get hired on a radio in Tampa. And I just felt the way I was like, man, I'm really good. Because I went viral before the word viral was invented in college. I had my radio show. I had a young man say that this girl gave him an STD. And everyone was talking about it on campus. So the girl came on my show and said, nope. He gave it to me first. And he went to the cafeteria and just, you know, it was very disrespectful to her. I'm like, I can't say what we in the church, man. So I can't say what he said to her. She lied, said that he hit her. He got kicked off the football team. And this is a USF in Tampa. The president at the time was like, what is going on and who interviewed these people? And it was me, you know what I'm saying? So I'm over here like, yo, I could do this. Like I could really do this, you know what I'm saying? So I tried to apply to the local radio station. I didn't get hired. They all knew who I was because I was hosting parties locally. And I was young, man. I was 21. And I was like, all right, cool. And then I tried to sell, you know, try to sell a little weed back then. And that didn't work. Then I moved to Orlando for a year and tried to do the same thing over there. Tried to get on the radio, didn't work. I said, man, I'm just gonna move to Atlanta. I had came up to Atlanta and heard Greg Street on the radio. And I saw people that looked like me and Ferraris and nice cars. I was just like, I gotta move up here. And I just said, I'm just gonna move up here and introduce myself to everybody. I walked around and introduced myself to everybody. I said, I host parties. I was hosted parties for 75 bucks. Sometimes the promoters wouldn't even want to pay me. Will leave, I would get frustrated. But I had a day job. Most people didn't know that. I had a day job. I was leasing apartments and I got 30% off my rent. And then I also worked part-time at finish line. That's how I was able to get my shoes. So my, but I was at the finish line in Alpharetta. So you couldn't see me. So unless you, so I would drive so far just to get my 30% off my dish. So I had 30% off my rent. So my rent, I was living in a nice area in Midtown and I had a roommate. So he would pay. So my rent was like 300 bucks and I stayed in the city. And then guess what? I would work at finish line and then I would get the shoes 30% off. So now I'm getting all the joiners when they come out. Now I'm making some money and I'm hosting parties. I'm not getting no sleep. It's 2009, 2010, 2011. I'm not getting no sleep because I wanted it. I would literally get off work, go do the other job and then go host a party. $75 now and I would literally do that for like two years before a radio station even acknowledged me. So now I'm like 27 ish and Streets 945 is a brand new station because I'm trying to get on V, trying to get on hot and nobody giving me nothing. At this particular time, social media ain't even heavy yet. It's just Twitter. Instagram is a thing, but not really. Remember Instagram? It was just pictures of nice things. It was to be a picture of these leaves on the wall. That's cool. This is before it was video, before it was anything. It was just pictures.  You know what I'm saying? Still, yeah. And Atlanta only had two urban radio stations. Now Atlanta has four urban radio stations. That's a lot. And we're talking about cities that have one urban radio station with three rhythmic stations, which is the nine urban stations. We're here to top 40, the rhythmic, the country, all that. They got stations for all different things. And urban gets the short end of the stick. So usually it's just one. Atlanta has four. So you can imagine the competition level and that. But back then, you know, I just, man bro, I introduced my, or both of y'all, I introduced myself to everybody and it was discouraging. I almost quit a few times and almost moved back to Florida and just said, I'm just gonna get a job and be a dad. I left my daughter, she was one. I talked about this on my cheat code episode and I cried on camera. It's on my page. And I talk about it. I was like, man, I felt bad because I left her. Me and her mom went together. I moved to Atlanta. She was one. I don't know nobody who would have done that, but I would literally be driving back to Florida, broke, to visit her. My dad would literally meet me halfway with her. I made like the ultimate sacrifice. Like, yo, like this is gonna work. Plan B is not, plan B is to make sure plan A works. It goes off. Ain't no plan B. So to tell you, to answer that, I try to be short-winded as much as possible, but there is no short-winded answer. You know what I'm saying? Like I literally just trusted the process. I prayed a lot. I definitely was depressed and I wasn't eating. I was small as heck. Like, it was bad. My relationships were all rocky. I was like, you know, I was just a bad person, bro. Like I was just moody and, you know what I'm saying? I wasn't a nice person. Like I was just all over the place because I was cranky.  I'm pretty sure there's a barometer that you say their podcast is dope, but they ain't better than mine. I was. We're dope too. You know what I'm saying? The brain sometimes like it can kick in where you be like, not on some hater stuff, but on some, man, when is it gonna come? When is our opportunity gonna happen? You know what I'm saying? And I was dealing with that every day because I was like, I'm finna move back home because I miss my kid. You know what I'm saying? And I ain't making no money. I'm tired. I'm sleeping on the air mattress with my homeboy's crib. This is before I moved on location. So when I first moved to Atlanta, man, I was living with my friends and I was sleeping in the living room. And I would literally be never home because I would always be at work or doing something. So yeah, it was discouraging, but you gotta fight through it. That's why I'm like the perfect person to give people motivation.  I ain't been through it for real. I've been through it, bro. I've been through it and it's probably gonna, my version is probably gonna be worse than your version. Cause some, most people are kind of cool. Yeah. I wasn't cool. I wasn't cool. And then I was on child support and I couldn't even pay it. So then they suspended, like I had a lot going on. I had to go to court. They suspended my, they held my, what was it, your passport? Couldn't leave the country, not that I would. It was bad, bro. Like I was bad. Boy, I'll messed up. But you gotta do that to go, to get where you are, right? Do you feel like, do you feel like there could have been a better way to still accomplish the same thing?  And that's why for me, I try to mentor as much people as I want, like as I can. Shout out to me, Ravish. I wouldn't call you flag of DC my mentee. I would say he's like my brother. BT, like my brother. But I would share my transgressions with these people just so they don't make the same mistakes I did. I was careless with my baby mom, as you know what I'm saying? Like, I wasn't paying attention. I know I wasn't ready to be a father, but I was being careless. I love my kids though.  But I wasn't, I knew I wasn't ready. But I wasn't paying attention. So my conversation with people is able to pay attention. It's not a mistake. It's a alternate route. But if you can stay focused and you can save as much money, because kids are expensive. Keep in mind within eight weeks. In eight weeks, I gotta figure out what I'm gonna do. Because in eight weeks, I had to go back to work. My baby mom had to go back to work. It's this thing called daycare. It's $200 a week. I'm over here like, how am I gonna pay this? And it makes you want to do bad things or do illegal things to get money. But for me, I started hosting parties. I started getting back to it and I started branding myself. When you get time, hashtag Ferrari Simmons T's. This is back, this is one of my buzzes starting to grow. And I had all these little super pretty girls and t-shirts. And people were like, dawg, how are you getting these women in your t-shirt? But whatever they get the conversation going. And that was the first part of me being a lifestyle guy. Getting people to wear my hat. Getting people to wear my t-shirts. So that's what I was gonna ask. How did you brand yourself? I just looked at things I thought that was cool. Look at you guys, what you're wearing. That's dope. Do your version of it. Your version of it can be dope too. And then you don't have to sell it to strangers, sell it to the people you know. I would literally walk up to my friends and say, give me $20 for this hat and wear it. That's how I paid my rent. At the time my rent was like 900. At this particular moment, I'm living by myself. I'm skipping a couple of steps, but I'm living by myself. But I'm paying my rent every month by selling merchandise to my friends. I would literally say, okay, I need to sell 50 hats this week or this month. Bet. I know 50 people. I'm gonna get 50 people who give me $25. Do the math. I'll do it for you right now. I'll do it for you right now. 50 people times 25. 12, $1,250. That was my rent and my utilities. Swear. I would do that every month, bro. And I have friends that can vouch to say, Jabar Cash, I would literally, a lot of my friends never got any of my merch for free. They paid me for it because I'd be like, hey bro, this how I need to pay my rent. Give me $25 for this hat. You have it. If you guys became my friends, I'm not wearing my hat right now. Hey man, you got $20 here. It's my hat, wear it. Give me 20 bucks.  It was in COVID. Hey, everyone I knew. Hey bro, give me $20. You got $20. You have $20. You have $20. You have $20 and you have $20. That's $60 for three face masks in here right now. My daughter would make $60 out of you two. And then I'll put it in another 20, that's 80. So you were teaching her the same thing? Yeah. But that's me because I'm over here like, everyone, everything in here is money. Everything, everything costs money and everything can make me money. How can I make money? And it wasn't gonna come to me and nobody was, I really thought people just didn't like me for a long time. I felt people was blocking me. I felt people was a rocket with me. But I realized I'm just do everything myself. I see Kenny Burns, one time for Kenny Burns. I would literally be around him. I think my privileges was I was allowed to be in the space of people who made a, who were successful off of their name. So that was the first thing I did. Kenny Burns always said his name, right? Okay, bet. I don't even like my name, Sean Simmons. That's cool. How can I make it more, a Ferrari Simmons? That's my favorite car. I don't own one yet. That sounded cool when I said Ferrari Simmons. I was just saying on my cheat code podcast, my first name was Lambo Simmons. Yeah, that don't hit the same. It don't hit the same though. Because Ferrari Simmons, you can give me another nickname.  That's it. Ferrari Simmons is five syllables, but guess what? Rory. It was crazy. So you could have been both. Both Simmons, Lambo. I mean, listen, but if my, one time I shot up my guy, Walker Flaka, man. If Walker Flaka can brand that. Cause think about where you were at when you first heard that. You be like, what is that? Walker Flaka? He branded it though. Anything can be branded, bro. If you put it in people's face enough, they gonna crack. You can tell me no all day. It's gonna, I'm gonna put something in your face cause you can be like, not bad. Okay. Cool. I'm the trial and error guy. Like I'm gonna try something multiple times until I get it right. I love perfecting a formula. So it was just a lot, man.  Like I really had a lot to figure out. And once I figured it out, that's when you just go. At that particular moment, you just hit them. You hit them every time and you don't stop. You cannot stop.  I'm a momentum person. I quit radio in 2000, in November, 2023, 22.  Boom, hit them. I'm at a label. Not only am I a label, I'm an executive at a label. I ain't need you time to breathe. I ain't need you no time to breathe. So you always just gotta think. I'm always thinking 10 steps ahead. Where does that come from? There's no time to breathe. I don't wanna fail. I'm addicted to not failing. Like I smell it. And then I was telling Wendy Day, I'm a shark, bro. Everyone has their spirit animals or animal you can relate to.  I'm the shark you wanna leave alone, like the hammerhead. Or the hammerhead shark is really unproblematic. You don't really see hammerhead sharks attacking people. But when provoked, you bite the heck out of me and it's gonna hurt. So I just feel like I'm a shark. That's the animal to me that describes me. But I'm the one that's calm and relaxed. And I just gotta stay on it. They're just always looking for something to eat. They're always moving around. You ever seen a shark moving around? You don't ever see a shark sitting still, bro. You almost wonder, damn, when did they sleep? You ever seen a shark sleep? No. You almost have to look it up on YouTube. When I say you saw a shark sleeping. I don't think they do. That's what I'm saying. You know what I'm saying? That's me, I'm a shark. I'm not the one that's gonna stab you in the back. I'm the one that is aggressive, respectful, and that's one thing my grandma, one time for my grandma and my mom, they had a lot of honor with them. And my dad, my dad is a really good guy. My dad might be the nicest person I've ever met. Like he's so nice. I don't know anybody that don't like my dad. I don't know anybody that does not like my dad. And I always said, okay, there's a couple of people that may not like me, but it ain't my fault. It's they fault. I'm just being honest. Cause I might always be truthful to you.  I'm not gonna play both sides. You know, so I just stand on those type of morals and principles, but it's hard. It's definitely hard. Cause it's opportunities for you to want to curse somebody out. I want to spaz, but you know, it's a lot. It's a lot. And as you guys elevate as well, you will be like me and Ferraro just talked about this. It's just higher the level, higher that you know what. Yeah. More money, you make the more problems, more situations. I don't want to say, I don't want to call them problems. More challenges. More challenges. Yeah. It's a lot, bro. It's a lot. What do you think it takes to be successful specifically in music? What makes, what's your music? In music as an exact or anything in anything in music? What do you mean? Let's go with an exact first. You gotta have tough skiing. It's a lot.  People are using you, but you have to be content with that. But also use people back. But learn how it benefits both people, right? Music execs are, I think, it could be positive or negative with a music exec. A good music exec knows how to use their relationships to benefit them and the person that's in that relationship.  And unfortunately that's the nature of the beast. But we are in an industry where people will smile on your face and rob you by. They'll be like, hey, man, how you doing, bro? You good? Wow, 20 bands. And you literally sign paperwork and be stuck in a contract with them for whatever it is. Yeah, that's the business that you're in, or that we're in. And you just gotta learn how to navigate through it. Yeah. Well, I was just gonna say, I like the point you said, right? I know people are trying to use me, but let me figure out how to at least make this beneficial. I want to try to quote a song that was like, everybody gets used, right? You don't want to get misused, you know what I'm saying? Nah, yeah, facts. We're all using each other for something. You guys have me here for a reason, right? I'm the king of, okay, let me do a favor for y'all. Y'all gonna owe me a favor later, right? But it's gonna be beneficial though. It ain't gonna be none. I came here on y'all podcast. I may have a playback where I need some people's ear. And I'm gonna need y'all to pull up. I'm gonna need all three of y'all to pull up. Because I'm gonna need your opinion. Because when I send my report back to the label, I'm gonna say, oh, I had such and such in the building. They got a super dope podcast, XYZ. So we always want to use each other, but we want to use each other in the right way. And I'm king favor. I'll give you 10 favors. Because I'm gonna know I'm gonna need one big one later. And I'm gonna cash in on my favor. I don't know if you gonna cash in on yours. I'm gonna cash in on mine. That's my camera. I'm cashing in on my favor. I'm gonna come collect one way or another on my favor. I'm gonna give you 10 good ones. Anybody ever not let you cash in? And you feel away about it? Yeah, all the time. It happens all the time, man. But you know, I have mentors for that. On time for Corey, Sparks, Ron, Stu, Kenny Burns.  But I have a collection of OGs. I speak to Ray Daniels, Wendy Day, Kingpin, my wife. These are people, and I may name some more later. But these people I call when I get frustrated. And they talk me off the cliff, not literally. Just off of like, man, I don't wanna spaz on these folks.  Cause everything come back full circle, always. And the timing you don't wanna bother is his timing. His timing will make things come back full circle at the appropriate time.  You just hit him with the, what Kanye said? Gotcha. Like, you just hit him with that. That's just how I go, man.  You're at the end of the day and this industry is your name. Your name is your brand. Your brand is your name and it's everything. And can you guys put 30 of the most influential people in one room? Can you do that? If you can, there's a value for you somewhere. Can you guys consistently put out dope content with big people on your podcast? If you can, there's some monetary value for you somewhere. Someone's gonna find you, but if someone doesn't, you continuously stay consistent and stay at it. Look at the cheat code, right? I don't know if you guys watch my podcast, the cheat code, but we haven't made $1 from it yet. We've been doing it for a year consistently. We just have faith in the process. We do other things to make money, but am I banking on cheat code to be my retirement plan?  So, you know. Well, I wanna ask you about the cheat code. Well, first, based on something you touched on it, maybe you wanna make me think, right? You hear a lot of people coming to the music industry talking about how fake it is and dealing with so many different types of people. What do you recommend for someone coming into it in terms of how to deal with, like maybe the shock and the idea of- The fakeness. The fakeness being used one way or another, how you navigate those waters. You gotta deal with it quick. It don't get no more drier than that. And I can go on a tangent for with all the reasons where you have to deal with, but the main reason is, and it depends on what you're getting in there for. If you're an artist, a songwriter, or an exec, it's gonna be moments where people need to use you for something. You have to be willing to say, okay, how can I make this benefit me? I would just say go in there with the openness of that. People are going to use you because you have a skill set. And if you're coming in there on something, you have a skill set that's tangible. You have to figure out how benefits you, right? That's the best thing I can say. Because if not, then you, then they're just gonna find somebody else.  You wanna be here? Cool, you gotta eat the crow until you can become the boss and then you can teach a better way. Again, shout out to Corey, Spark, shout out to Ron, Stu. They're teaching me something different because they were eating the crow with their previous people. They were a lot more aggressively taught. With me, they're a little bit more, they're aggressive, but it's a little bit more, all right, man, listen. This is how you do it. And shout out to my PDs, one time for good PDs, Louis V, Devon Steel, Solo, Mrs. Somebody, Reggie Rouse, each PD at a radio station has a completely different style. One PD may say, oh yeah, you can record from the house, you got all the equipment.  I don't care what you got going on, I don't care if you got the same equipment that we got in the studio. I want to know that you're here and I want to see you at work every day. It's different styles. So you have to learn the style of your superior, learn how to adjust on the fly, have a short memory. It's almost like playing cornerback. I don't know if you guys like football, cornerback, the person who sticks the wide receiver. The wide receiver may catch a 55-yard bomb on your butt and it's a touchdown, but you may be able to get the game-winning interception and win the game because you had a short memory, short-term memory on, I think I said a short temper earlier. You had a short-term memory on the mistake you made earlier. You have to put that and itemize it and learn how to not repeat yourself, repeat your mistakes as much as possible. So limit the mistakes, have a short-term memory and build on your strengths, maximize your strengths and focus on your weaknesses. If I can give anybody advice, focus on the weaknesses and make them your strengths. So this way you can just be a monster because that's who survives, the monsters and the sharks. Because you're going into a pool and it's going to be you're going to be food or you're going to be the person eating. Are you either going to be food or the other side? Which side are you going to be on? Because people quit every day. Let's put it this way. People will quit and it's okay. Just do something else. Maybe you're destined to be a lawyer or a doctor, something to go do that. Are you coming over here? It's how I go. It's how I go, man. It's cutthroat, man. They don't care. They don't care about you, man. When made you start the cheat code podcast? It was simple. It was a conversation. Me and Wendy were a light flex. Slick Rick has some sneakers for me. And I met Wendy Day to get them. And we just started talking like, how many of you guys are talking? And I said, yo, this is a podcast. And then she was looking at me like, what? Whatever. And then I drove home and I had an artist call me and was like, yeah, man, I really need to work with you Ferrari. I got 100,000 streams on Spotify. All right, so I said, so what's your album music looking like? Oh, I don't know, I don't know. I said, I need, okay. So I called Kingpin. Kingpin is a weasel extraordinaire. He can look at your numbers and everything.  And I wasn't too fond of how he was talking to me by his numbers, do a little deep dive for me. He said, Ferrari, where is he from? He's from such and such. And he's getting a lot of streams from Italy. He's getting a lot of streams from India. So Kingpin says comically on the phone, unless he's doing pro-boros in Italy and in India, in Indonesia, these streams are bought, my boy. I said, oh, this is a podcast, this is a podcast. I said, I gotta put him in Wendy in the same room. This would be great. And so I had an idea and I presented it to both of them and they was like, all right, that's why episode, if you go all the way to episode one, the first episode was 45 minutes. It's so long, cause we didn't know what we was doing. We was like, let's just talk. And that's what we did. We just talked. We didn't plan it out. We didn't have no structure. And that's why episode one to this day is still the best episode. That's why I be trying to tell them, like, yo, we should just talk. If we just talk, it's easier. Cause I started doing topics and we started making it kind of showy. But if we just make it a conversation, it kind of flows a better.  So I think those episodes are a little bit more organic. So yeah, man, that's literally how it went. It was just a conversation that I was like, people need to hear this. People need to hear it. And then think about it. There's nothing really educational out. Like artists, if you're in a jam or if you don't know what's going on and you need to learn how this works, come here. What other podcast is it? We have other podcasts where people are saying, don't do this, don't do that. That's cool. But what other podcasts are educating you on the process saying, hey, this is not exactly how you do it, but this is why we do it. This is how we did it. Here's some tips. You know what I'm saying? It's all, don't do this, don't do that. This person got robbed, that person got robbed with their money, da, da, da, da. This is an industry that's like this, this is an industry like that. But what are the steps that you need to take? How is it? Like, how do you get a manager? What's publishing deal? What is a, how does a songwriter get song placements? How does a DJ brand themselves? Like, these are things that are on there that you can literally scroll through the topic line and say, oh, I want to watch this episode. So it literally became a conversation that I just did.  Let's get the sound board with the microphones that get the microphones like this. Let's put it together. That's it. Dope, dope. Yeah, I mean, Shikori and I talk about that at length. Obviously we do educational content for artists as well, but a lot of people, we feel like we're just like yelling at artists for one. And a lot of people are, like you said, it's focused on the just to don't do, all right? And one, a lot of times that performs as well. So I can get why they do it. It does, it definitely does.  There's a lot of things like that. And it's always good to provide context. And I feel like you need, what I like about the podcast format is you can give context. With that said, unfortunately, it seems like a lot of artists still want it in that bite size. And you can give short answers, but the thing that the best is not listening to a cheat code clip. The best thing is to listen to the podcast because you get the context of how they were thinking. And I feel like the thinking is more important than that one tip, right? Of course. So, but I, one, I appreciate like there being like a more, a richer landscape of people giving out, like dope advice, me and like Wendy, I love her for just for a long time. Wendy's a walking cyclopedia. Walking human being of information. Right. Like for sure. Like for real, for real. So like that was how I first found out about the podcast and then getting to watch you guys is extremely valuable. Is it, is it something that you feel like isn't yet being appreciated about it? I don't know. I just, I just know that I would say the masses to the masses, I don't think it's appreciated as it should be, but I don't do it for that. I do it for the love of spreading information. And I don't want people to waste time like I did. Like I was saying earlier in the podcast, like I wasted a lot of time just not really paying attention or not really being knowledgeable, trying to seek knowledge. But if I felt like if there were things like this out there, maybe I wouldn't, I wouldn't have wasted as much time. I felt like I wasted like five years of just kind of just floating around. Sometimes I guess us as men, we do that in our 20s, but I'm just so goal oriented. I wish I would have known a lot of the information I know now sooner. I would have made a lot better, a lot more better choices, which is why I share my personal life because most people don't do that, right? I don't care to tell you, I had two very bad failed relationships that I had no business being in. You know what I'm saying? I was lying, cheating, all type of stuff. I say that because it's somebody right now going through that, that may not, I don't want them to make the same mistake. And I don't want to say mistake. I don't want you to make the same choice that I made or go down this way that I went and it wastes a lot of your time because now you have to play catch up. Because being a parent at a young age, in your 20s, and you're not really setting your goals yet, it weighs on you, man. Cause I remember my time holding my kids and my daughter just turned 15 not too long ago. I remember not seeing her until she was like, I didn't see her for real for real, often until she was like five. I saw her every other month. That ate me up. So I think if I knew information that I know now, coming back to your question, I think it would have just saved me so much time because I would have realized I was like, oh, okay. So I do it for people like whoever wants to hear the information. But we do have a good core fan base. We're almost at 10,000 subscribers on YouTube, but we have almost 10,000 real subscribers. These folks is tapped in for real. And they're very appreciative. And I see people all across the country. I was just in LA for BET Awards. People looked at me and was like, man, Chico, I love that show. And it's just random airport. Chico, I love that show. That's more than anything else that I do. And I do some big stuff. And the Chico is something that people really appreciate. So I would say 50, 50, I think 50, like my peers maybe don't appreciate it. But more so, I think the people who support it, they appreciate it. So I mean, I don't really know, honestly. I just try to provide as much positivity as possible. And that's something that I can, it's like my give back. You know what I'm saying? Like we gotta have some type of give back. Even y'all too. Y'all gotta have some type of give back. I'm very charitable. This is like a charitable podcast that can provide information and people are always lacking information. The reason you guys may not be the biggest podcast in the country is because people probably just don't know that you guys are doing this. That's just, they don't have the information on your podcast. But what if they had the information on your podcast? And they went through it and did a deep dive. Oh man, these guys are fire. This whole thing is fire. Check, boom. I've been here an hour and this is one of my favorite podcasts already. So now I'm gonna subscribe and tune in. Just based off of our conversation. Cause we can have a real conversation. This is cool. So now I wanna go back and listen to all your other podcasts. So you already won me over and you're interviewing me. They got me, other people you went over by just having a real in-depth conversation, man.  I can't remember his podcast, but the real estate guy, man, it's a real estate guy. He teaches you how to flip houses. But it's multiple versions of them, right? I got this one, this is one particular guy. Oh man, I'm failing me. I'm failing myself by not saying his name. He's just talking. It's just information. Spread information, man. How are you gonna spread information? That's my thing. How are you gonna spread it? I love that, man. I love that. Well, with that being said, man, appreciate your time. No, I mean, it's cool. Like, appreciate your transparency and just being willing to share. So of course, everybody, as y'all know, go check our guest site. We really try to bring people who have value. And if you haven't tuned in to the cheat code, you gotta check out the cheat code. We had Wendy on here already. Now we got- I'm gonna listen to her episode on my way when I leave. Oh yeah. It was a good episode. You already know everything that Wendy says is don't start. Yeah, but sometimes you can catch her and she can say something different that I haven't known. Wow, I didn't know that. Yeah, oh yeah. You know, so. Every time. Every time. But with that being said, folks, I'm Brandon Mancheon. And I'm Cory. And we out. Peace.


RIM of the Pacific is the world's largest maritime exercise, but it was a multinational team of ground troops who added the exclamation point at the end RIMPAC 2012 concluded in dramatic fashion demonstrating the interoperability of more than 2,200 personnel from nine different countries Starting aboard the USS Essex some of the force made its way ashore in amphibious assault vehicles Some flew in by helicopter Eventually they all were moving downrange to engage their targets It's a very complex Thing to come from the sea and do whatever mission you've been assigned Everybody's come together very well to include our interaction with the US Navy And we really need that platform to be able to project power ashore like you saw this morning The exercise demonstrated the land forces abilities to conduct amphibious operations Like to learn lessons in peacetime before you need them in a crisis and that's exactly what we've done out here this last month You know, we're not going to do anything unilaterally. So everything that we do out in the future We're going to do with our coalition partner and our allies for exercise RIM of the Pacific. I'm Corporal Ben Eberle