Rachel Hurley – Head Mistress
rachel@sweetheartpr.com
Home Town: Memphis, TN
Current Town: Austin, TX
Hi there.
My name is Rachel Hurley, and I don’t mean to brag – but I’ve done it all.
I grew up in the birthplace of rock and roll, Memphis, TN. My very first gig in the music industry was when I was 19 years old. My friend Ben and I started a “Smart Bar.” Basically, we traveled around working at raves, selling “smart drinks” (fruit juice with a big scoop of some vitamin powder we got at GNC ) to people rolling their asses off for $5 a pop – bringing in $500 to $1000 per party (Not bad for the early 90s).
I moved to New York in 1999 to work in television production at a fledgling cable station called MTV. I stuck around for almost five years, working for VH1, Broadway Video (they produce SNL), and a handful of movies, commercials, and other stuff I don’t remember. I worked as a PA, an assistant music supervisor, an associate producer, a talent coordinator, a production office coordinator
I returned to Memphis in 2003 and created one of the earliest music blogs, the award-winning Scenestars. It’s been written about in Spin, The Wall Street Journal, and Rolling Stone. This led to a weekly column in The Commerical Appeal called On the Record, and then to a position at legendary Ardent Studios as the queen of all things social media related. I created five podcasts, starting in 2006, which ran on Breakthru Radio and The Vinyl District, that were recorded at Ardent featuring bands such as The Posies, White Denim, Valerie June, Heartless Bastards, Langhorne Slim, Exene Cervenka, The Autumn Defense, J.J. Grey, Lydia Loveless, Lucero, Dawes, Ra Ra Riot, Austin Lucas, Cory Branan, The Milk Carton Kids and dozens more.
I also worked on the films Hustle & Flow and War of the Worlds at some point during this period—ask me about the surprise party I helped Dakota Fanning give Steven Spielberg!
I started my blog Rachelandthecity.com, a few months before I returned to Memphis (due to 9/11—but that’s a whole other story), and it went on to win Best Blog in Memphis three years in a row. I used my clout to bring dozens of Memphis bands to SXSW for three years for a party called 6 Degrees of Memphis (we released an album – you can find it on eBay!) that the Memphis Music Commission eventually took over.
While at Ardent Studios, I helped start a record label with local artists, and I did PR for this band named Big Star during their late aughts comeback before Alex Chilton died in 2010. I continued to manage their press and social media until I left Ardent under mysterious circumstances (saving that story for my book!) in 2012.
I started booking the legendary Poplar Lounge and went back to school to get a degree in Graphic Design. I also started my first company, Kangaroo (my partner and I chose that name because it was a Big Star song, AND a kangaroo can not walk backward!), where we did local promo for shows and managed three well-known local acts.
By 2016, I was burned out and moved to Denver to get a real job – but an old colleague reached out and brought me back into the fold when he hired me as a Senior Publicist and Director of Digital for Baby Robot Media. That was a great gig for three years until my assistant approached me with the idea of us starting our own agency.
I started Sweetheart Pub at the end of 2019, and since then, I’ve worked with dozens of musicians to help them promote their art. If you want to know how they feel about me, go check out my testimonials page.
During this period – WMOT also reached out to me to help them with their social strategy – and I ended up working directly with them for two years until the dreaded budget cuts that every NPR station has like clockwork.
Anyway – this is the very short version – mainly because I can’t recall the long version.