Sam May Juneman

Cohort 11, Master of Communication in Digital Media (MCDM)
Senior Vice President, Iconic Artists Group – Azoff Co.
LinkedIn Profile: Sam May Juneman on LinkedIn

To start, if I approached you at a picnic and asked what you were up and enjoying these days, how would you answer?

Bringing life into evergreen brands. The artists I work with now, at this stage of their career, their legacy is so much bigger than one or two songs. They are maintaining, and constantly modernizing, a brand and a community. The challenge is to continually anchor that feeling into our lives – and for years to come at that. We just went through an incredible run with our artists, Wu-Tang Clan, and their performance at the Nicks game in NYC. Their performance was so much bigger than a halftime show, it stemmed into a movement, fan engagement, social chatter, custom merch lines, experiential partnerships, even a collectible vinyl drop! I love getting to be a part of magic moments like that, and I’m lucky to be able to breathe life into moments like that.

The Summer 2026 alumni newsletter theme is exploring cities through the eyes of Comm Leaders and where they call home. You are currently in Los Angeles, a polyglot city in Southern California. Can you share with us a bit about your current hometown: how long it’s been home for you, and what you would describe as the personality of the city.

I’ve had a few different stints in Los Angeles, one after Seattle and the last one that is still carrying on was in 2020 by way of Brooklyn NY. LA is easy to hate, it absolutely has a stereotype – but the best parts of this city are not surface level by any means. I’m in south LA – and I LOVE the history and the community our neighborhood cherishes. The community events around every culture are endless, the dedication to craftsmanship on display on every corner (Food! Art! Collectibles!), this is an inspired and determined city. Say what you will about the flashy parts, but when LA needs to come together around something – it is a force to be reckoned with. In the last 6 years, my husband and I have experienced COVID, ICE Raids and Protests, and the 2025 fires. All of it was scary, but certainly not lonely. I’ve never seen communities rally together so efficiently, so passionately, and so selflessly. That melting pot mentality comes with a side of loyalty that is so passionate in times like these. It’s really something special and I’ve felt so grateful and privileged to witness it and also participate in it.

Can you share a bit more about your work at iconic, and if possible, showcase elements or your work or iconic as a company that are particularly informed by its LA location?

A lot of our artists came from this beautiful time capsule of the 1970s Laurel Canyon era. There’s something about the ethos of that music that feels timeless yet physically rooted right on a hill north of our offices (I can see it from my window!). It’s humbling to work with these artists that are so rooted in California history. We also can see this but get to experience how far this magic has spread all over the world. We recently celebrated a huge moment with The Beach Boys and the 60th anniversary of Pet Sounds. One of the greatest albums of all time – there’s little to no argument there. We co hosted a Beach Boys wellness day in Santa Monica that included a 5K run, Santa Monica city dedication, and community events. One of the best parts about that day was getting to meet a contest winner who flew in from northern Ireland. He was a longtime fan who grew up listening to The Beach Boys in his bedroom to drown out the sounds of the civil unrest outside. Those Beach Boys records were his mental escape to safety and peace, and that’s a connection we hear over and over again – we have it ourselves too. We have those personal connections to the music and we’re highly protective of those experiences. Our artists have historic and global careers, but there’s something special about being rooted in a place like Los Angeles where so many magical and creative moments were born out of the lifestyle that these communities created.

LA looms large in the imagination of many—for good reason—but what is something that you have to live there to understand that you can share with our readership? 

You think of traffic in LA as problematic, but you truly don’t understand the pain of having to go from a meeting in Santa Monica to a dinner downtown on the same day until you experience it. One of the things that people don’t understand is how large Los Angeles actually is. When people think of the size of major cities like Manhattan or Nashville, most people don’t realize that some of those cities could fit into just ONE of our neighborhoods. It’s truly remarkable that we have a city this large. It’s diverse, it’s expansive, there’s completely different ecosystems on one side of town vs the other. Everything you could want from a city, you can get different aspects from different neighborhoods. I think that’s why this city is so creative as well. To me, good food and good music go hand in hand and Los Angeles is one of the best collections of those things in one place. I truly feel like my expectations on food have been set impossibly high by even the most basic restaurants here. The food is that good! I can have a smoothie at the beach in the morning, an authentic Italian deli sandwich in mid-city for lunch, and a top tier Korean BBQ dinner in K-town, and still end the night with a show and an impossibly good freshly baked donut by midnight. Tell me that’s not a perfect day! It comes with its challenges, but what city doesn’t?

Finally, we always like to ask: what’s a favorite piece of content—anything goes!—you’ve been hooked on lately you think Comm Lead alumni might enjoy?

I’m obsessed with The Messy Parts Podcast by Maryam Banikarim. Maryam is a C-Suite Veteran who brings inspiring people to her couch and talks about all the messy things they’ve endured. These conversations are actually so comforting to me, especially when I’m having a bad day at work or I’m feeling particularly hard on myself. She has such a great way of getting to the real honest parts of someone’s journey and pulling out the familiar and relatable aspects of those experiences. What you start to realize is how similar these situations start to sound, and how familiar it feels. It’s honestly nice to hear legendary creatives and execs talk about the time they got fired when they were 27 because they were too creative for the company they were at. It’s messy and real and empowering. There’s no corporate bullshit in this podcast, it feels more like a brutally honest human approach to all that corporate friction that people have experienced and somehow survived. Listening to this podcast has helped me accept the messy parts of my life and celebrate them too. I think it’s so important to not lose sight of your humanity like that, especially when you work in corporately “creative” spaces.