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Brianna Agyemang and Jamila Thomas—the organizers behind the recently formed #TheShowMustBePaused music industry initiative—sat down with Billboard for a new interview about the movement. Agyemang, a senior artist campaign manager at the Apple-owned artist services company Platoon, and Thomas, senior director of marketing at Atlantic Records, said their planned day of rest and discussions “came from pure emotion, anger and sadness at what was happening in the world,” and explained they had no intention for their proposed music business blackout to morph into what became “Blackout Tuesday” on June 2.
“At some point between Monday night and Tuesday morning, people thought that a plain black box was supposed to be posted with the Black Lives Matter tag. That caused confusion because it was also pushing down vital information for the Black Lives Matter movement. That was never our intent, never any part of our directives,” said Agyemang. “The goal was not to mute ourselves. The goal was to take a break from your daily nine-to-five duties to refocus and recenter. And that meant that you could take a pause and just breathe. Or take a moment to think or use that time to focus on what you could do within your community to make a change and help make progress as well.”
Numerous major music companies, including the Big Three major record labels, participated in #TheShowMustBePaused, putting a hold on their day-to-day operations to give employees a day to reflect and participate in workshops and discussions. Agyemang and Thomas said that the next phase of their initiative will be rolled out as soon as possible. “There are some immediate, concrete actions that we would like to have happen sooner rather than later,” Thomas said. “This is an election year, and it’s so important to address voting.”
Thomas said they are also formalizing two branches of their new organization. One will “focus on social justice and systemic racism… from the boardroom to the boulevard,” while the other will focus on “restructuring the organization within music industry companies to gain more room for growth opportunities for black people.”
She continued later on in the interview, “This isn’t an ego thing. We didn’t put our names on the original graphic because it’s not about us. It’s about a movement for all of us. We’re humbled by all the support but we’re also not afraid. We’re assuming this leadership role, honored that people trust us to lead them to the next steps, working together as a community.” Read the full interview here.