GORDO says a $300,000 show is not what a DJ takes home

GORDO says a $300,000 DJ booking shrinks fast once everyone else is paid. The producer, who spent 14 years as Carnage, made the case in "GORDO GOES TO HARVARD," an Instagram series he posted in the days after he spoke at Harvard Business School on November 3.

"A DJ can book a $300,000 show and it sounds crazy," he wrote. Then come taxes, expenses, the manager, flights, hotels and the team's pay. "By the time it all clears, you're not walking away with what people think you are."

He used his own Carnage years as the example. "In 2016 and 2017 I was making serious money. And I still couldn't tell you where it went," he wrote.

Groups have it worse, by his maths. "Three DJs on one booking means one check split three ways, before the expenses hit," he wrote, and the staff still get paid whether the act is seven people or one.

His advice fits in a caption. "Gross is not net," he wrote, telling artists to set money aside for taxes, track every expense and know what they owe before the check lands. His last line: "Make money, but more importantly, keep it."

The Harvard post itself was about where he comes from. GORDO wrote that his family came to the US with nothing and built salons and restaurants with their own hands, and that he does his business through music. He summed up the trip as "from MySpace mixtapes to a harvard lecture hall."

He retired the Carnage name in May 2022. As GORDO he has produced for Drake, including "Sticky" from the 2022 album "Honestly, Nevermind."