Wit & Attitude Quote by Duncan Sheik

There is a hustler’s tenderness in Duncan Sheik’s advice: “play your stuff by hook or by crook and build up a grass roots following.” It’s not romantic about artistry; it’s romantic about persistence. The phrase “foolproof way” is almost a dare, because anyone who’s tried to break through knows there’s no such thing. That’s the point. Sheik is smuggling realism into encouragement, offering a method you can control when the industry is designed to make you feel powerless.

“By hook or by crook” carries a wink of scrappiness: not fraud, but rule-bending in the benign sense - taking the weird gig, crashing the bill, playing the coffee shop, self-releasing, emailing every booker twice. It captures a pre-streaming-to-streaming continuum where musicians are asked to be both artist and small business. The intent is pragmatic: don’t wait for permission, don’t wait for a label’s storyline about you, don’t wait to be “discovered” like a rare bird.

The subtext is about leverage. A “grass roots following” isn’t just validation; it’s bargaining power. Fans become proof of concept, the one metric that can’t be fully manufactured (even in an era of bots and pay-to-play playlisting). Sheik, who came up in the 90s alternative ecosystem and later moved through theater and songwriting, understands how quickly taste-makers move on. This line argues for building a base that stays when the spotlight swivels away - a career built less on a moment than on momentum.