Midnight Agency is Canada’s first new independent agency to launch since the music industry drastically changed, and they already boast a roster of more than 30 international artists across a wide array of genres. While live shows previously contributed to the majority of an artists’ revenue, Midnight’s approach includes a significant focus on online streaming and other technological ventures.

With Paley’s decades of experience as a talent agent and Middleton, a renowned electronic musician known for his work with The Funk Hunters, the agency aims to be more artist-friendly and vary their approach based on the individual creative visions of each member. The co-founders have been working together for more than a decade, ever since Paley first signed The Funk Hunters.

“The agency world is so correlated to live music. So when COVID hit, it really sent some shockwaves through the industry,” Middleton says. “But when there’s this big, dramatic moment, I always look at it on the flip side as a moment of opportunity.”

That opportunity manifested itself in the creation of a smaller agency, fostering creativity with closer artist relationships while encouraging a shift for touring acts to also occupy more space online and vice versa. The last year has revealed to many artists that that “normal” life was just scratching the surface of potential, exposing the financial rewards that come from engagement on Twitch and other online music streaming services. With that in mind, alongside musicians like Chali 2na, Too Many Zooz, and Five Alarm Funk, the Midnight roster has recruited several Twitch streamers, including ascendant DJs Jessu and Pyka.

“The numbers are just staggering online, and the engagement is incredible,” Middleton says. “Jessu streamed to one million unique people in the last year alone. When you think about the traditional touring world, and how long it would take to get in front of that many fans, you’d have to be playing Coachella every weekend.”