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GORDON DANIELS

Musician Jamie Kent is using a network of friends to help him get started in a recording and performance career. He stands atop the Hotel Northampton this week.

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GORDON DANIELS

Musician Jamie Kent, standing atop the Hotel Northampton, is raising money for his career through an informal network of friends.

NORTHAMPTON - When you're trying to make it in the dog-eat-dog world of popular music, having a degree in entrepreneurship can't hurt. Northampton native Jamie Kent, 23, who graduated last year from Babson College, is drawing on every one of his talents to further his burgeoning music career.

Part and parcel to this is his launch of the Collective, a community of his most loyal fans who purchase a "partnership" in return for free music, free shows, free merchandise and a voice in major decisions he makes.

This enables the singer/songwriter to support himself playing gigs, while getting his name out. He's gathered around $5,000 so far.

"I'm really convinced that fan loyalty is what makes or breaks artists," said Kent. "That's the truck we're hooking up to."

Partners can hear exclusive music and vote on big questions like "what should the order of my album be?" or "where should I tour?"

With his CD release party scheduled for April 2 at the A.P.E. Gallery in Northampton, Jamie Kent is lining up the legions.

Kent is the son of Brenda and Chris Kent of Florence, who have always backed his dreams, he says, though he imagines them going, "Uh-oh, what crazy idea is this kid coming up with next?"

A star athlete at Northampton High, leading both his swimming and soccer teams to western Mass titles, Kent says that the competitive nature of the music industry brings out his best. "I'm incredibly motivated; I learned that in sports. When everyone's working hard to beat you, you have to have a huge amount of straight persistence."

He knew he had something, performance-wise, when he won the lead in Hamp High's "Pippin" as a 15-year-old. "Here I was, this little squirrelly freshman with braces, and I got the lead. So unexpected. That's when I said, 'Hmmm ....'"

It wouldn't be the last time he'd use that word.

Listen to Jamie Kent's "Isabella" (if you lack a plug-in to hear the audio, right-click here to download it as an mp3 file)

Other performances by Jamie Kent to download:
"Good Sex, Bad Conversation" | "Mama Sing"

He sang with the school's a cappella sensations The Northamptones and was a drama production stalwart.

He played solo gigs all through his Babson years and fronted a 16-piece orchestra there, convincing them that they needed a snappy, silky-smooth front man who could croon like Sinatra.

Then came commencement.

With voices all around him telling him to land a corporate job to pay off those student loans, Kent said to himself, "Man, I really want to play music."

In his senior year at Babson, Kent hit it off with the school's new president, Leonard Schlesinger, who advised him to look at his career as a business.

"What are you willing to invest - time, money, capital?" Schlesinger asked rhetorically, in an interview. "In the entrepreneurial arena, this is known as a syndicate risk. What each person is putting in is not super-meaningful, but as a collective, it enables an artist to keep it going."

If Kent's talent was mediocre, Schlesinger would never given him that advice, he says. "Somebody's got to tell you that you're not going to have an audience. With Jamie, I thought he had a shot."

Kent looked at a number of existing funding models, spent three months researching, embracing one piece of somebody's puzzle, discarding the next.

Recording artist Jill Sobule's success with raising nearly $100,000 through fan donations to produce and distribute her latest album was one such model scrutinized. "But getting fans to fund one album is only going halfway," said Kent. "Why not get people involved in your entire career?''

Birth of The Options

When Kent came home last summer he approached Northampton record producer Wes Talbot with the idea of the Collective. "OK, but do you have the tunes to support it?" asked the wily pro.

"He made an eight-song demo, we picked four, then kind of looked at each other, and said, this is pretty good," said Talbot. "Let's get some professional musicians on this."

In came some seasoned chopsters like guitarist Joe Boyle, bassist Bob Laramie and drummer Rich Adelson.

"I sent him the mixes," said Talbot. 'Wow! That's us?' It informed his songwriting, I think, when he saw what that band could do. It gave the Collective a jumpstart."

Jamie Kent and the Options was born.

"I've got some good artillery, some amazing musicians," said Kent. All are a bit older than the front man, including bassist John O'Boyle and the silver-maned Bill Holloman, who's recorded with Springsteen, Paul Simon and the B52s. Holloman's licks can be heard all through the new album, including the scorching variety that closes out "Mama Sing."

Kent cites Talking Heads' David Byrne as one of his heroes, and calls his own music a mix of jazz, pop, folk and reggae, "like what would happen if Jack Johnson and Frank Sinatra hooked up and met Bob Marley."

But there's some Ray Davies of the Kinks in there and a little Freedy Johnston, a sprinkle of Roger Salloom and a quirky yet heartfelt way with a lyric. "Don't give me no good sex and bad conversation," sings the unabashed romantic on the 2-minute, 39-second rave-up of the same name.

The album is called "Neoteny," a word he discovered while studying marine biology in the Caribbean during his junior year. "It's an organism that, while physically mature, retains adolescent characteristics."

This would describe Kent to a T, or certain columnists, for that matter.

His autobiographical track "Mischief Man" pretty much says it all.

He writes these numbers late at night, either on guitar or ukulele (another thing he picked up in the Caribbean), the melody coming first. Then he does what he's been doing since he wowed theatergoers back at Little Theater: he creates personalities.

With an authentic voice that often evokes the moaning grooveness of Chicago's Bobby Lamm, he's got nice range and a certain fearlessness. But he's got that other intangible, too. On one of the album's best tracks, "Isabella," recorded with the full band, Kent imagines what it would be like if he worked in an office all day and had to pass the time. Fantasizing about the young, nameless lady in the next cubicle seems just about right, he figures, but, curiously, on the YouTube version, where it's just him strumming and crooning to a girl from a New York rooftop, his seen-this-all-before charisma comes through, giving an inkling what his live shows are about.

"The best thing he does is perform and sing," said Talbot. "He really controls the band."

He's been gigging steadily for several months, often spending 10 hours a day lining up dates. His latest tour takes him to Boston's Midway Café this Saturday, to Florence's Side Street Café on March 22 and on to New York's iconic The Bitter End April 17.

One of his goals is to get signed by a label, but his main ambition is to keep the Collective going.

A fan's view

Fellow 2005 Hamp High grad Ian Palmer of Boston, who graduated from Boston College last year, is a member of the Collective and has seen Kent perform at least 10 times, most recently at Wellesley College last month. "The first time I was just going to support a friend, but the music is really good," said Palmer. "Ever since he graduated he's been going at it full steam. His band is pretty legit - I can't believe he got that sax player."

As for song selection on "Neoteny," Palmer says he likes the way the ukulele sounds on "Games," but that the best songs are right in the middle. "It just flows better, I think. And I love how the CD fades out with 'Mama Sing.' Great stuff."

His old friend also thinks Kent's got something else up his sleeve with the Collective, something that might spread. "I think the preliminary ideal is to use himself as a template, then get other up and coming bands to join," said Palmer.

But for now, Palmer enjoys his founding-partner status.

"It's cool being able to get into shows," said Palmer. "If he gets popular, things like that will get more beneficial."

It all makes sense to Talbot, who's been fighting the music industry fight for 40 years.

"The music business right now is the wild, wild West," said Talbot. "It's not even desirable to sign with a big label; you can do a lot of that yourself."

The only reason to record a CD, says Talbot, other than having something to sell at shows, is to get your stuff on online music sites like Pandora, which requires an actual CD to exist before posting your music. According to Talbot, this venue has the potential to provide more exposure than a record company.

"In the old days you had to impress five people," said Talbot, "the five presidents of the record companies, the five tastemakers. No wonder everything in the '70s sounded alike. Now the tastemakers are the public. If his content catches on with the public, he won't need the A&R guy."

"People are excited," said Talbot. "Two of my friend's daughters joined Jamie's collective based on the four-song ELP."

"When you're passionate about something, people are really willing to help," Kent said of the response to the Collective, which can be accessed through his Web site.

There's no set minimum for membership.

"I wanted to make it possible for friends to do it, who don't have much money," he said.

The recent incarnation of The Northamptones is set to open Kent's April 2 Northampton gig, with proceeds going to the Northampton Education Foundation, a nonprofit dear to the young troubadour's heart.

"I thrived in both sports and the arts in high school, much of it made possible by the NEF," said Kent.

At that show, artists Chris Millette and Lea Chiara plan to sculpt a giant onstage work out of found objects, all in response to the energy in the room, then break it all down afterwards and hand out pieces to audience members as mementos. Talk about a collective.

"He's doing what he needs to be doing to build a constituency," said Schlesinger, Babson College's president. "Whether it happens or not, if he didn't try, he go through life like he missed something. The biggest commodity he's investing right now is time."