The People That Pick The Songs in the Movies: A Conversation with Jordan Young

As the head of Fort Clearington, Jordan Young takes movies and TV shows to the next level by picking the songs that soundtrack them. This week he tells me how he built a career in this cool industry

People frequently tell me who I should try to interview. And I almost never listen. Until this week. Over the summer my sisters, my girlfriend, and my girlfriend’s sister incessantly watched the dating show Love Island: USA. Anytime I was in the room while it was on, I’d hear them raving about how good the song selection was during the series. They said I should talk to whoever was selecting these songs. So, I did.

Jordan Young runs Fort Clearington, a boutique sync licensing and music supervision firm based in Los Angeles, California. As a sync agent, he is getting artists’ songs placed in movies and TV shows. As a music supervisor, he is choosing the songs that appear in movies and TV shows, including Love Island: USA, among many others. Over an hour, Young and I talked about the delicate balance between financial and creative considerations when picking music for a project, how you end up with this very cool job, if AI is going to disrupt the space, and so much more.

A Conversation with Jordan Young

You founded and run Fort Clearington, “a boutique sync licensing and music supervision company.” In many ways, this sounds like the coolest job possible. You get to work with great musicians and get their music placed in movies and television shows. You also get to work with movies and television shows and find songs to make that visual art all the more powerful. To start, how did you end up in this field? It’s not really something you can go to college for.

Back when I first discovered this, there was no college program for it. Fast forward to today, there are actually programs for music supervision and stuff like that. Anyway, I’m originally from Iowa. As you can imagine, there isn’t much music supervision work in Iowa. So, I sort of had to start from the bottom in my journey. For me, the best way into the music industry was through college radio. I started as a DJ and then became a director of our station. That’s where I learned that there are many promoters and labels that pitch their music to stations. I soon moved to Minneapolis to do an internship promoting music to college radio. They eventually hired me. That was my way into the industry.

From there, I built up relationships and began learning about other parts of the business, like publishing and music supervision. With that knowledge, I started my own licensing company and tried to pitch to music supervisors for sync opportunities. It was a lot of self-taught, though. I would read books, follow music supervisors on Twitter, and do whatever I could to learn more about this part of the business.

Where were you able to land your first syncs for your clients?

Reality TV. Those productions tended to be more accessible because they have lower budgets and are willing to work with boutique sync agencies and independent artists. After getting some syncs and building rapport with music supervisors, I decided it was time to move to Los Angeles. That’s where the industry lives. Since I’ve been here, I’ve continued to do sync licensing, but I’ve also crossed over to the other side and been a full-blown supervisor for shows.

Jordan Young, sync agent and music supervisor who runs the firm Fort Clearington

Anytime I speak to someone in the music industry, I’m always struck by how much of their career is just based on relationship management.

Totally. This is a relationships industry. Of course, it also matters what you know and if you’re talented, but who you know is very important. It also just helps to be nice.

I know they are deeply related, but I want to pick apart some of the differences between your sync work and your supervision work.

I can break down a few fundamentals for anyone who might not understand. In this world, there are two sides to the equation: the licensor and the licensee. The licensee would be a television show, a movie, or anyone seeking to use music that isn’t their own. When I work as a music supervisor, I am working as a licensee. I need to procure rights to songs, or get permission to use songs, for productions that I am working on.

As a sync agent, I am working on the side of the licensor. I am representing artists to pitch their music to music supervisors working in TV and film. On this side, you need to understand the music, what the artist wants, and how their music will feel on screen. Some artists, for example, don’t want their songs associated with sex and drugs. Some don’t care. They just tell me to get whatever syncs I can. Others have financial rules, like they won’t accept a sync unless they get at least $5,000. Other artists are willing to get paid even a few hundred dollars.

One of your clients is the artist Conrad Clifton. Can you talk to me specifically about what you do for him as his sync agent?

Conrad Clifton is actually someone who I know from my radio days. I promoted his album to college radio eight or nine years ago. It's been a long time. I built a relationship with him through that and we’ve kept in touch ever since. When I started my licensing company, I felt like his music would be a good fit. I liked his songs, and they didn’t involve samples, which can complicate things.

Are you doing things for him and your other clients every day? Or are you more just waiting for the right opportunity to arise?

It varies. There are many companies that are happy to put something on their roster and just sit back and wait to see if an opportunity comes their way. That’s very common if a publishing company only owns a very tiny portion of a song. They have such a small stake that they won’t prioritize it. My approach is a bit more active. I treat new clients and new releases like a targeted marketing campaign. I want to send personalized messages about the music to each person in my network where I’ll highlight anything notable about the project, along with some analytics and what I think it would work for.

Young’s company, Fort Clearington

One other unique thing about Fort Clearington is that I only work with commercial artists. What I mean by that is that I will only work with people who are publicly releasing music for general consumption and trying to establish themselves as artists in multiple facets of the industry. They’re active on social media. They’re touring. They’re getting press and radio airplay. They have a career outside of sync opportunities. Some companies might just represent artists and producers who make music semi-anonymously for the purpose of trying to sync it in film and television. Because I generally don’t represent people like that, it’s easier for me to add a human touch to my pitches.

On top of just sending pitches, I’ll often get briefs from music supervisors who are soliciting music for a new show. For example, an email might say, “Hey, I’ve got this new reality show we are working on. We want to use a bunch of up-and-coming hip-hop artists for it. If you have anything that fits, please send it my way.” It can also be even more specific. Sometimes you’ll get an email looking for music for a specific scene. They’ll send the scene with some temp music, and they want you to send back a song that could replace that music. In both of those cases, if I have something that fits from the catalogs that I represent, I’ll send it along.

Sync licensing is an interesting balance between creative and legal considerations. Let’s talk about some of the legal-side. If you are trying to get a song in a television show, who do you need permission from and what needs to be negotiated?

Without getting too deep in the weeds, there are two copyrights that need to be cleared: the publishing copyright — which is the composition — and the master copyright, which is the recording of the composition. For smaller artists, it’s likely they own both the publishing and the master. But for larger artists, it’s likely that the label owns the master and a publisher owns the publishing. In the former case, I’m really just working with one person. In the latter, I have to deal with multiple parties.

More specifically, it often depends what the artist wants. Some artists are hungry for syncs and will give me permission to accept any opportunity that comes my way. Others want to approve or deny each request. Others say that I have to send them a request, but if they don’t respond in 48 hours, then I can go forward with the sync. That last case is more common than you think given how slow some artists can be at responding to emails.

Are you ever less keen to work with an artist because they heavily use samples or work with a stable of songwriters? I assume that makes clearance more complex.

Absolutely. I came up working with hip-hop licensing. Because hip-hop is so sample-heavy, it’s one of the most challenging genres to clear. On a typical hip-hop album, it’s common for every song to have a different producer and a few side artists. Something like that is a headache to clear compared to a singer-songwriter who is working alone. A big part of my job as a sync agent is vetting an artist and their music for these things. If I’m going to be working with an artist, I need to know if their music contains samples and if all of those samples were cleared.

Honestly, if I could give one piece of advice to someone trying to sync music it’s that you should never under any circumstances try to sync something that you don’t have full clearance to use. That leads to big problems for everyone.

Credits for the first three songs on rapper Travis Scott’s 2023 album Utopia [Credit: Tidal]

There are also some grey areas in the sync world. Let’s say you use samples from a platform like Splice. Technically those are royalty free, but some supervisors will be weary of syncing a song with them for fear that someone might try to claim that a beat or instrumental is theirs. As a sync agent and music supervisor, I fall more on the cautious side of that landscape.

When I told some people I would be speaking with you, the main question they had was about how much artists and songwriters are getting paid for a sync. I know those ranges can be huge. I’m sure syncing The Beatles requires hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars, whereas some no-name, indie artist requires much less. Can you talk a bit about the range of payments?

Your question gets at the gist of the answer. Every deal is different. You honestly can’t even give a general answer for what syncing a song will cost. There’s so much additional information necessary. First, you need to know the media something is getting cleared for and in what territories it will be available. Is it a movie in Turkey? A TV show in the United States? That matters. Second, you need to know how term the sync is for. Is it for a week? Is it forever? Additionally, you need to know how the media will be available. Is it a streaming-only TV show? Is a movie that will be in theaters? All of that is going to dictate costs.

The most common deals you see these days are for all media, excluding theatrical, worldwide in perpetuity. Something like that is going to cost more than if it were just a North American TV show for one year. To keep costs down, some productions will try to carve out rights that they don’t need. The most common carve out for a television show is theatrical rights. Like you know that your television show will never be shown in a movie theater, so you can cut costs by excluding that right.

It’s interesting you mention these carve outs. Not too long ago, I was watching an episode of Cheers and they mention how Rebecca’s favorite song is “Unchained Melody” by The Righteous Brothers, but then when they play the supposed song in the show, you hear “You’ve Lost that Lovin' Feeling” by The Righteous Brothers. I’m guessing they couldn’t get clearance when the show came to streaming.

That’s funny and probably what happened. Back then, you might have a show sync a popular song but only pay for limited rights. Then when the DVD box set came out in the 2000s, they couldn’t clear the song and they had to substitute something else in. I think nowadays licensees have a more long-term perspective given how the media landscape has evolved over the years.

All those considerations aside, could you provide any broad view on costs?

Reality shows are cheaper. You might pay as little as $500 for master and publishing for all media, excluding theatrical, worldwide in perpetuity. Scripted television and feature films can be much higher. For a boutique agency like mine, a sync in a mid-level scripted television show might fetch anywhere from $2,000 to $7,000 all-in.

Interestingly, the syncs that pay the most are for advertisements and trailers because you are trying to sell a product. Artists want to be paid more for that, and brands usually have money to do it. If you’re licensing a song from a major publisher for a big television or film production, you’re probably getting at least $30,000 to $40,000. That can also go higher if it’s for main titles or end credits. And, yeah, if you’re a legacy artist, like The Beatles, you can fetch millions in some cases.

Is that all upfront payment? Or are there royalties paid as a show, film, or ad is shown more?

Those are all upfront fees. But there will be performance royalties paid out to songwriters when a performance of their song is broadcast on a show. That’s a different thing, though. They are paid out through performance rights organizations, like ASCAP or BMI.

Do you think we will see music supervisors try to use AI-generated music to save on having to actually pay artists?