The Unstarving Musician

LA based producer Lars Deutsch shares his thoughts on artist development and the typical struggles of emerging artists. We're acquainted by way of mutual friends at SoundStorming, the musician/fan collaboration app for iPhone. At the time of our conversation in February of this year 2021, Lars was excited about an artist he'd been working with. That artist is Amiena. Our conversation was well time...

In this episode I speak with David Franz, founder at Underground Sun, about career advice for musicians, productivity shame, how to best market yourself as a musician, and staying creative in crazy times like these. We also mention his biz partner Justin Paul, who will be featured in an upcoming episode of this podcast. David is also an instructor/content manager for LinkedIn Music Education (form...

British guitarist and composer Timothy Reid found a creative outlet in online collaboration during the pandemic. He found this podcast on his daily train commute in Osaka Japan. Lucky me (and you). He and I share the common threads of Kompoz.com and Peter Rand, who is a prolific member of the collaboration website Kompoz. Like me, Timothy was drawn to one of Peter's compositions and has since reco...

Helene Jæger has an intriguing outlook on writing music and lyrics relying on the conscious and unconscious awareness plus intuition. She leans on stream of consciousness writing methods to create music under the moniker of Holy Boy. Helene was born and raised in Norway, completed much of her education in England and has been based in Los Angeles since 2016. At the time of this conversation, she h...

Multifaceted drummer Mike Dawson has refocused his career on studio work, teaching, visual arts and of course drum gear. Prior to the pandemic, he was a gigging machine, managing editor at Modern Drummer Magazine, and co host of the Modern Drummer Podcast With Mike And Mike. He's more recently become Chief Creative Officer at Drum Factory Direct, which as the name might imply is all about drum gea...

Create, cultivate and connect are words that carry special meaning for Joy Ike. They are the basis for a music coaching and mentoring program she calls Cultivators. Her professional background in PR and marketing enables Joy to offer unique perspective to the emerging artists with whom she works. She's also a freelance writer, which includes articles and blog posts for Bandzoogle. We recorded this...

Michael Gilbride somewhat recently released his debut EP 'my name is not kaiser' and the single 'Say Hello,' from that EP. The animated video for 'Say Hello,' which you can find at telcomusic.com or the show notes for this episode, is amazing. Michael and I discuss the animators behind the 'Say Hello' video, the stories behind the telco project, his biggest challenges writing and recording the EP,...

Brian Wolff returns to the Unstarving Musician to discuss his transition from performing with a high energy rock band into live streaming as a solo artist, plus the changes that have brought him to a new chapter of his music career. We also discuss his live streaming setup, Patreon, nurturing his creativity through writing things down more often, the terrifying moment of doing his first live strea...

Sylvia Rose Novak joins me for a round-two conversation from the great outdoors of Alabama. There are lots of birds and nature sounds in the background, which I think add to the experience of our chat. We recorded back in November of last year 2020. I asked about her then latest release Bad Luck , but she was hard at work on her next release. We talk about the forthcoming album too. In this conver...

Since 1990 Reverend Raven has opened for B.B King, Gatemouth Brown, Pinetop Perkins, the Koko Taylor Band, Junior Wells, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, Tommy Castro among many others. He and I are acquainted by way of mutual friend The Worldwide West Side Guitar Man Johnny Burgin. Reverend and Johnny have been pals since '99. We recorded our conversation in November of 2020, during which time I had as...

At the center of collaboration and music discovery is Trackd Music and Grant Tilbury-Jaiswal. Grant is head of Artist Relations and A&R for Trident Cloud Limited and Trackd Music. Trackd is a recording and collaborative platform for iPhone that is changing the way many musicians create and share music. In this conversation, Grant shares his thoughts on the latest version of Trackd, the art of attr...

Abe is extremely committed to the experience of recording records and playing live shows, because he loves connecting with people in the flesh. This is how he gets his music out into the world.  In this second appearance for the podcast, Abe and I discuss pandemic driven changes in music, painting, the release of his latest single, what a good gig looks like to Abe, why performing live is so impor...

Brian Wolff returns to the Unstarving Musician to participate in the Unstarving Musician survey, in which I ask some of the best independent musicians I know questions about creativity, social media, live streaming, community building and more. This is Brian's third appearance on the podcast, and I have a fourth interview with him in the can, so to speak. That interview will drop in late April or...

Alyssa Trahan recently participated in a survey for the forthcoming second edition of The Unstarving Musician's Guide to Getting Paid Gigs. I decided to conduct the surveys by phone and to make an episode of this particular conversation, because Alyssa's responses are so insightful and inspiring. As a side note, Alyssa is is now an official two-timer, this being her second conversation with me for...

Steven Keene says his songwriting routine has never resembled work. To the contrary, he's always written in the moment and as inspiration strikes. Yet he's had a consistent and prolific songwriting career. Steven grew up in Brooklyn New York, and honed his skills in the Greenwich Village scene of the late 80s, early 90s alongside Beck and other noteworthies. The day we spoke, he had a new single o...

Johnnie Gilmore is a songwriter and bass player of virtuoso caliber. He honed his chops and stage craft in part as a street performer in his hometown of Boston. L.A. is now home for Johnnie. He has a great EP out called When You Come Home . In this episode we talk about how the EP came together amidst the pandemic. Johnnie was brought to my attention by Zoe Sonnenberg (featured in episode 180 ). A...

This episode features a conversation with singer-songwriter Lara Price. In this experimental episode, Lara interviews me about the release of On Top Of The World (out today, Friday January 8, 2021). Lara is an amazing singer, performer and songwriter, making this conversation a big honor for me. We met in San Jose, California some 18 years ago. Lara is currently based in Austin, Texas. Our convers...

In this episode, Ezra Vancil interviews me about my forthcoming debut single On Top Of The World . We cover the history and process of my songwriting, using public proclamation as a source of accountability, various technical challenges I faced in writing and recording the song, the players involved, and the forthcoming video. On Top Of The World drops January 8th, 2021. Download it for free at Ro...

My guest for this episode is multi-instrumentalist and studio engineer Chris Raspante. Prolific and in-demand as both performer and sound engineer, Chris is regularly solicited for hire on various music projects. In this conversation we discuss his return to performing live, the logistics of recording remotely, our work together on my song On Top Of The World, and why he thinks his phone is always...

Dave Cool of Bandzoogle returns for a second time on the Unstarving Musician. The last time he was on was episode 142 , recorded on March 20th of this year at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dave is VP of Business Development at Bandzoogle. In this follow-up conversation we discuss a wide range of topics, including: The newish partnership between CD Baby and Bandzoogle Ways musicians around t...

My guest for this episode is Garret Laver of the trio Lucid Phase. The band's music style falls somewhere between roots, reggae, dub, jam, blues and world. He and his bandmates met at the Savannah College of Art & Design, Georgia, where they collectively studied film and sound design. They've put their studies to work for producing & marketing their music. Garret and I spoke on the heels of their...

Blues guitarist, singer-songwriter Brian Young is a member of the Unstarving Musician community–the list. A while back, he reached out to check in with me. I'm always asking the community and you listeners how you're doing. Like Ezra said last episode, music is a collaborative experience between community and musician and I feel that extends into what I'm doing here. Brian took time out to thank m...

Ezra Vancil joins me for his second feature on the podcast. I first spoke with him back in March of 2018 for episode 42 of the Unstarving Musician. Listen to Ezra's first appearance on the podcast This conversation was sparked by an email exchange we had where Ezra mentioned an arduous trip to Florida for a festival he was performing during the onset of the pandemic. In that email, he also said he...

Singer, songwriter and producer Otto just released the new single Tell Me Something, produced by Dave Stewart. If that last name sounds familiar it might be because you know Stewart's work with the Eurythmics or another of his high profile projects. Otto is based in Wales, but English by birth. I learned about him while researching the collaboration app Trackd. This was for  an article  I publishe...

Zoë Sonnenberg is a lifelong singer, frequent baker and a writer with a passion for supporting the performing arts. Relevant to this episode, she is also a PR professional with the agency Sacks & Co. Zoë represents musicians and other types of artists. She and I have worked together to book some of her clients on this podcast, including Danielle Eva Schwob (Ep 147) and Evangeline Gentle (Ep 171)....