Steve Gordon on the Rise of Circle Talent Agency

Steve Gordon on Circle Talent

The spectrum of agency standards and culture varies immensely from company to company probably just as much as each company’s roster. Some more independent agencies prefer a more laxed approach, providing a nurturing team environment allowing a new hire to blossom in a controlled, comfortable fashion. While other more major agencies boast a faster paced, higher intensity work environment which they feel inevitably leads to unrivaled success.

However, despite the differing practices and beliefs on how to run a successful agency a handful of vital overall principles have always stayed true. A seasoned,successful agent must always be fully charged, ready to pitch, unphased by failure and know that no opportunity is too small. Additionally, a stand out agent must be well researched possessing a firm perception and understanding of their market and contact network enabling them to make the impossible,possible. All characteristics that Steve Gordon of Circle Talent met to the fullest.

Gordon’s budding agent was apparent from the begging through his dedication to the risky,frustrating and deeply challenging sport of inline skating.Soon after a couple of X-Games tryouts,Gordon had an epiphany which led him towards the world of promoting. Gordon began booking his own hip hop shows in Baltimore but soon transitioned over to the dance world once he saw the club scene regaining steam. However, promotion was not fullfilling enough for Gordon and he wanted out.

Fortunately for Gordon, he had drum n bass legend Dieselboy on his team. Dieselboy linked Gordon with Kevin Gimble,founder of Circle talent agency who he knew previously from the 90’s drum n bass scene and scored Gordon an interview. Gordon successfully pitched himself to Gimble and was initiated into Circle under a couple of circumstances. Gordon would initially work for free, and would begin with a roster of harder to book clients. Gordon reminised that he took on the challenge in strides and said looked at it as : “Im an agent now”, and went all out.

Gordon also performed himself on the side. His side DJ gigs enabled him to crawl inside the club world and discover the emerging energy of dubstep. The music’s power was simply infectious, clubber’s were constantly boasting about sold out dub wars shows they were seeing and fighting to be the first to share with Gordon the next dub track that he should spin during his sets.

During Gordon’s dubstep immersion he came across an Excision record, instantaneously he contacted and acquired Excision to his roster, and like wildfire with Excision came Flux Pavilion, Datsik, Doctor P and Cookie Monsta .Gordon then proceeded to aid the expansion of the genre by routing tours for his clients in hard ticket venues, bringing optimal revenue to Circle.Though these business acquisitions were second nature to a talent shark like Gordon, through his effortless moves he was creating the foundation for the dubstep culture in the United States that still holds true today.

Gordon then utilized the momentum of his first business plan to face his next challenge, diversifying his client roster. In 2011, Circle merged with another agency, The Collective who mutually wanted to grow their client list as well. With the expansion brought on a relocation to Los Angeles and a wave of new hires. Gradually, Circle began growing recognition which peaked upon their signing of DJ Carnage. After the signing Gordon commented that “Carnage was a huge moment for us. People saw what I can do with that level of talent when given the tools that I need. Working with his manager and him, they really know what they’re doing — we made him into a superstar. Fast.”

Despite the success, after a year Circle split from the Collective and navigated beyond the world of exclusively DJ’s. Gordon’s rationale for the exit was to parallel the strategy and insight he gleaned from the dance world on tools like social media and stage production and apply them to live acts. These fresh tactics of Gordon’s would enable acts to maximize their potential and mold them into superstars.

Gordon’s newly engineered plan timed perfectly with industry happenings, subsequently Dan Rozenblum left United Talent Agency and decided to join Circle, bringing with him all forty of his rock clients.With the young agency’s rapid establishment everyone wanted to join forces and be at the forefront of Gordon’s brilliant business planning. Gordon became so well respected that he could pitch and sign a client in just a phonecall. In recent years Circle has accumulated the Kenmore agency and acts like Marshmello. But despite the success of his endeavors Gordon still bases his company off of one main ideology to his new hires aspiring to become agents,” “The proof is in the pudding. If you f–king kill it, your ass will have a seat.”

H/T Billboard