"We made some mistakes. We had some managers we didn't like and had to get rid of, and that cost some money. Stuff like that. But overall, we did really well"

A seasoned artist is taking stock, not by polishing the past but by acknowledging the mess that accompanies real achievement. The tone is frank, almost offhand, revealing how success in a creative enterprise is as much about managing relationships and correcting course as it is about making great music. Admitting to “mistakes” normalizes error as a cost of doing business rather than a moral failing. The mention of managers they “didn’t like” points to a deeper truth: fit and trust are priceless in a team whose product depends on chemistry. When that alignment breaks, the decisive remedy, parting ways, brings legal fees, buyouts, and lost momentum, but it also restores clarity.

“Stuff like that” compresses turmoil into a shrug, signaling emotional distance and resilience. There’s no melodrama, no elaborate blame. The subtext is experience: problems arise, they’re handled, and the work goes on. Money lost becomes tuition, an investment in better judgment. The music business is notoriously fraught with power imbalances and conflicting incentives; prioritizing autonomy over short-term savings can be the difference between staying viable and eroding from within.

The final pivot, “overall, we did really well”, reframes the narrative from a ledger of missteps to a balance sheet that still shows a profit in the broad sense. It’s a lesson in zooming out. Isolated setbacks don’t invalidate a trajectory; they are accounted for within it. The perspective is neither naïve nor cynical. It’s pragmatic optimism: accept imperfections, act decisively when misalignment appears, and keep the long view.

For any collaborative venture, the takeaway is clear. Success is not the absence of friction but the capacity to respond to it without losing momentum or poisoning the culture. Pay the necessary costs, protect the core mission, and refuse to let short-term turbulence rewrite the long-term story.