And The Writer Is...with Ross Golan - Ep. 117: Jeremy Zucker

Episode Date: February 15, 2021

Growing up in suburban New Jersey, this singer, songwriter, and producer has always been surrounded by music. In 2015, he released his first EP as a freshman at Colorado College pursuing a degree in Molecular Biology, and by 2017 he had signed a major label record deal with Republic Records. Since then, he has released four EP’s with breakthrough singles, such as Gold Certified singles, “talk is overrated” featuring blackbear and “all the kids are depressed,” and his biggest song to date, “comethru,” which is Platinum Certified and has surpassed over one billion streams. In 2019, he collaborated with Chelsea Cutler on ‘brent’ and their Platinum-Certified global viral hit, “you were good to me.” Last spring, he released his long-awaited debut album, ‘love is not dying,’  to praise from critics and fans alike, as he recently crossed over a staggering 3.2 billion total streams across his catalogue with his latest single, "supercuts." Most recently, he and Chelsea Cutler released their new single “this is how you fall in love” and EP, ‘brent ii.’ And The Writer Is… Jeremy Zucker!Artwork: Michael Richey White Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey guys, welcome to Ann the writer is. I'm your host, Ross Golan. I've written with hundreds of artists and writers over the years, and my favorite part of each session is the first hour when we catch up about life, the industry, politics, composition, whatever. So this is a journey of learning why people write songs, how people write songs, and most importantly, who the people are who write the songs.

I'm producing this with the Great Joe London, big deal music publishing, and mega house music management. If you want to listen to the songs we discuss in this podcast, follow us on our socials, find out about special live events, or buy that merch, aka that hat I always wear, go to our website www. and the writer is.com. For a little bit of context,

we just wanted you to know that a lot of these were recorded before quarantine. And as we know, a lot has changed in 2020. So again, please stay safe out there. and enjoy the new episodes of And The Writer Is. Welcome to And The Writer Is. I am your host, Ross Golan. We're excited to highlight and introduce one of the industry's most promising artists. And today's guest has been racking up hundreds of millions of streams.

He is the next up in a world of quote bedroom pop stars with a few platinum plaques in tow. This do-yourself artist managed to maintain control of his copyrights while still procuring a record deal with the biggest label in the business. Without further ado, let's get to know this guest all the way in Brooklyn via Zoom. Well, actually, I think it's LA via Zoom. And the writer is Jeremy Zucker. Thanks for having me. Yeah, man. So wait, are you in, you're usually in Brooklyn, but you're in L.A. right now? Is that what's going on? That's correct. Yeah. What are you doing in L.A.? It's kind of a good question. I normally work pretty much alone out of my studio in Brooklyn.

And every once in a while, it gets really stuffy, and I need to just, like, get out and work with people. So, like, half the time out here, I'm just sort of enjoying the weather as New York starts to get sort of shitty, but also, like, seeing a couple friends and working with a couple people. Yeah. Let's sort of start from the beginning. You're young, so it won't be too long of a story to at least how it started, you know?

You're from New Jersey, yeah? I'm from New Jersey, yeah. Cool, cool. Who are your parents? My dad is a lawyer. They actually both just retired. But, yeah, my dad's a lawyer. and my mom was a guidance counselor,

and they both actually just moved to South Jersey after they retired. But I grew up in like a very normal, like upper middle class suburb in North Jersey. And it was very preppy, very conforming. So I feel like I sort of had music my whole life as like an escape or like a way to like, because I always felt different than everyone, you know.

I didn't feel like I was going to I was the kid like playing football or lacrosse um that was going to go and like be in finance or whatever the hell like most of the kids I grew up with are doing um so yeah that was sort of like my mindset growing up was like I I feel lucky because I had like a lot of friends and um you know like I wasn't like an outcast in school but I did deep down always sort of just feel different. And music was sort of always there for me in my personal life. What music did your parents listen to? What music did you listen to growing up?

Growing up, I have such a fond memory of like pool parties and counting crows. Counting crows is like my mom's favorite band. So I grew up a lot on that. my dad was very into Van Morrison. I heard a lot of that around the house growing up. Yeah, it was like a pretty, it was like mostly pop music that I was hearing growing up. I think that's sort of what like developed my pop sensibility. But as I got into middle school, I have two older brothers and they were listening to like

my chemical romance, Blinkin 82, all of those like, pop punk things coming out, like, what, mid-2000s? Or, yeah. And so, like, that's when I sort of, like, found my own listening experience and, like, stop listening to, like, what I was just hearing. And I, like, I remember the first artist that I truly liked and truly did a deep dive into every song was Linkland A-2. Like, I was going back into their live albums and stuff.

I think I was downloading songs on Lime Wire. And I just, like, clicked every single one that I saw at the time. did you like how did you get into the actually making music um i mean when was your honestly what was your first effort so my parents like made me take i say made me take piano lessons when i was like five or six years old and i hated it and so i stuck with it for like three or four years until i really started listening to blink one eighty two and like all these pop punk bands and i was like i want to play guitar because i want to i want to i want to learn how to play these songs.

And so I let me do that and I stopped doing piano and I started doing guitar. And like as soon as I started like learning Blinkwinate two songs on the guitar, I was like, I can write these. It's just like power chords, C, G, A, F. And I like probably just stole the chords. Actually the first song that I wrote, do you know the song in the general? Sure. I like took that whole corporation. just stole it and then like wrote a completely different song and it was about like I wanted

this teacher with my family and my brother was like really afraid of of the heights and so I wrote the song of my brother being afraid of heights and I was in fifth grade that was like the first time I wrote a song how did this how did this melody go I'm not going to sing the word because I don't because it exists online and I don't think I can take it down so I'm not going to say like the word of the chorus but I'll sing you the melody I guess. Okay. So like the chords are, the progression is like,

this is going to sound horrible, but just so you get it in your mind, I know you'll be able to hear it. Like, dun, da, dunna, dunna, dunna,

dunna, dunna, dunna, dunna, yeah, that's like the general, but the melody is like, dun da,

da, da, da, da, da, da, da na, da na,

na, da na, da na, da na, da na, da, da, It was really catchy.

It was like really catchy at the time. For like a fifth grader. Yeah. I mean, did you go to school and play for people? I mean, were you already wanting to share it with people? Did your family were they like, hey, good job? Or were they like, oh my God, you're like a world class talent? So like they didn't know until I played it with my two friends at our fifth grade talent show.

And it was me and my two best friends at the time. And it was I was playing guitar and singing. my other friend was playing guitar and singing and our other friend was playing drums and there was no kick pedal on the drum so he was literally kicking it with his foot like we had no idea how to play instruments

I was thinking he's like a march literally like it was on the ground he was just kicking it with his foot and it sounded horrible but the song like came through you know we for sure sounded like kids like trying to play music but the song came through and my parents were, I think, really, really surprised.

I mean, I'm almost so surprised she, like, put it on YouTube and told all our friends about it. But, yeah, like, that's when my parents say that they knew that I could write. So that's, I mean, that's fifth grade. You still had a lot of time ahead of you. How do you develop between fifth grade and the end of, let's say, high school? I mean, when do you start joining a band? When do you start? playing do you ever play at rival you know high schools or parties or anything like that or was it all

just i'm going to write at home in my bedroom it was a healthy mix of both and there were some periods where i wasn't doing anything on my own and i was only playing in bands and there are some periods where i wasn't doing anything with anyone and i was just like in my own room like making stuff But middle school hit, and I met one of my best friends now at Temple. I'm Jewish. We met at Hebrew school. And he came out to me one day. He was like, hey, you're Jeremy, right?

Like, I guess I don't know if I was releasing music. I think I made a song with my classmates in sixth grade about our, like, math teacher, and we showed it to her in class, and we thought it was, like, the funniest thing ever. And, like, I was on garage band recording everyone. And, like, I, like, arranged the song. And I guess this kid heard about it His name's Danny And he was like

You're Jeremy right Like you guys You and Brett and Evan Like you guys made this song For Miss Rogers And I was like yeah He's like dude like I really want to make music Like we should make music

I was like sure I had him over And so at the time I was like I Actually this is this is crazy Do you know I don't even know I don't even know to say his last name

Jeremy Doesouay Kinetics. Uh-huh. Do you know Kinetics in One Love? Yeah, sure, of course. Like Tim. Yeah, morning.

So, actually my friend's Brett Nevin, who I was, like, doing this super early, like, horrible music with, they, like, were huge fans of Connecticutics and One Love, and they showed me their stuff, and they were like, these guys make music on garage band. Like, we have garage band. We can do this if we want to. And that was sort of, like, the moment when it clicked to my head when I was like, I guess you don't need a record dealer. You don't need a fancy stuff.

studio, you just need a laptop and garage band. And so I took that mindset and I started making music and trying to make music and putting together loops. And I got like a little MIDI keyboard. And this is literally middle school. And so my friend Danny came over and we're just messing around a garage band and we write a song. I think it was called Broken. And it was super catchy just like out of nowhere. And we like showed it to all of our friends at school. And the girls loved it and we were like let's do this so we started like a little group made a Facebook page and just started making a bunch of songs and that was like the first time I felt like I was an artist sort of and it was for sure really bad and people definitely made fun of us um we did this in middle

school but like those people who made fun of you so we did this all in middle school and nobody really knew and then when we got to high school it was like residual and and I don't know like people weren't like mean to us. They were just like, ha ha, like this is the name of, it was called like flow beats was our thing. And they were like,

ha, flow beats. And it was like a stupid name. But, yeah, I don't know. So during that phase, like,

I was also like playing with bands, playing in bands with random kids in middle school and like every year doing this like battle of the bands thing. So I was like simultaneously. figuring out how to make music on a computer while like playing covers and bands. And I didn't start like writing songs with a band until high school. And that was a really interesting experience because like we, I would go in with this other kid, Nate, and he was also like a writer, but also wanted to play covers.

We were like doing some covers and doing some writing together. And I really just like let him take the lead. because I had no experience like writing with another person and the band was cool it was like Dave Matthews inspired a little bit sort of like acoustic rock vibes

and I don't know I was in this band for like maybe two or three years and we like won our school talent show we were like really excited and it was a lot of fun and towards the end of it I was like really trying to like push the direction of the band like writing wise i was like i had it in my head who we are and i was like i would go on my computer and like produce out a song like i would write a song by myself produce it out and make it

sound like a band and bring it to the band and be like let's learn this song and then we would play it and then i did that a couple times before i realized like why am i doing all this myself and then taking it to a band to like learn it where we're not going to be able to play as good as it sounds in the recording. Why am I in a band? And that was like the first realization I had where I was like, I don't really need to be like your friends

working with anyone. You guys were in that band, you know, you like grew up with those guys. You know, was it a weird thing to be like, hey, I'm going to go and do some music solo? No, not really. So like it's really interesting. It's like I view like musically I had like two sort of lives.

One was this like revolving door. One was this revolving door of live music, which was like, you know, like the, I guess the two kids I like played with in fifth grade. And then that morphed into like a handful of other kids in middle school. And that morphed into a handful of other kids in high school. And completely separate from that was my friend Danny. And then in high school, it was my friend's Danny and Ben.

and that was like the electronic music side of things where I was like on my laptop producing and in the middle of it all is me like on my computer like figuring out what I want to do when I want to do it and yeah so this band like I realized that it wasn't really my thing but at the same time it was we were already sort of like falling apart like one of the kids was a year older and he was going to graduate

and so yeah it just like naturally fell apart So I didn't ever have to be like, ever have to be like, yo, I'm doing this on my own. So it worked out in that way. But at the same time, like, so that was one side, like this revolving door of like bandmates and bands. And the other side is like my friend, my friend Danny like really pushing me into like make music on the computer and like make beats and stuff. And his friend at the time, Ben, who I then became good friends with, was rapping. And they were just like,

yo, like, you're so sick. You're so good. Like, make music. Like, what are you doing? Why are you messing around with these bands? Like, make beats for us. Like, let's have fun. And that was like,

they really pushed me to, like, try to be a producer. And Danny in high school became Vine famous. He was doing, like, really short, like, six-second raps. And I was, like, helping him out and producing songs for him and, like,

really taking that seriously. And I was also producing songs for Ben. This is towards the end of high school. And I like just didn't, I wasn't even thinking about like my expression. I was just like, how can we make this song as dope as it can be? Let's do this.

And then towards the end of high school, they were, they pushed me again and they were like, yeah, why aren't you like making stuff for yourself? I was like, I don't know. And at the end of how, high school, I had like a really intense relationship that, like, followed through into my college

years. And I went to school in Colorado. So I basically flew from New Jersey to Colorado. And, yeah. So this relationship carried over. And it was like a classic long distance, like slowly getting messier and messier until it falls apart, high school to college relationship. Like, so many kids are going through that, I'm sure. And that breakup, like, struck a chord in me. That was a horrible pun. I'm sorry. But like, it made it. Yeah. So it like, that was the first time that like I felt like a real like hole inside me that I needed to like face and deal with because it like was my first year in college. I was like in this completely new environment and I had this like, I don't want to say trauma, but like intense pain, you know.

And I had no way to deal with it except for writing music. And that was when sort of like all of the stars aligned for me internally because I had eight plus years of songwriting experience and I had played with bands. I have like decent production chops for my friends like, pushing me to do that. And I was in college, like, sort of alone. I had friends, but, like, I had no friends to do music with. So I was just in my room, in my dorm room, on my computer, like, expressing myself and, like, feeling this very, very personal relationship to, like, the music that I was making, and it felt very me. And that was the first time that I released music

under my name, and that was on SoundCloud. You said earlier when you were talking about your friends were, you know, accountants and working in all these other things, but you went to school for pre-med. It's not like you went to school to be a musician. You know, some part of you was questioning whether or not you could do that as a career, even though that's what you were doing in high school. Why did you choose to study something other than music? And what was it like to be doing music while studying something like pre-year?

pre-med. Every part of me was questioning whether I could do music as a career. And is that the only time I really, you know, like was that a cultural thing? Is that, do you question, you know, I grew up in a similar sounding family of sorts. Um, I study music, but I study music business. Because you grew up in a culture that, you know, where your dad's a lawyer and you're, you know what I mean? So, um, were you getting pushed to not do music professionally or was it just where was that where was that fear coming from i really wasn't getting pushed by any like external sources you know my dad was very successful but he never put any pressure on me to be successful he in my family it was it was very much like do what you want to do do what you love

and be happy in that way. But I had it in my head that I had to be successful. So, I mean, that's why I chose to study pre-med and molecular biology because I knew that if I worked hard enough that I could be successful at it and that there was nothing actually holding me back except for myself. And I viewed music as I could be the most talented writer, artist in the world. and and I could just, it could just not happen. Like it's a very, there's like this notion that it's like hit or miss and like it doesn't matter how good you are.

Sometimes it just doesn't happen. And I don't really believe that now because of the internet. I think if you have something special that deserves to be heard, it's going to get heard. But I don't know. It's like I like just knew in my, the only thing. time I really thought I could make it as an artist was like in middle school when I was messing around with like with Danny and we were like making stuff and we're like this is so cool we could be artists like we could do it and in my head I'm like I want to be famous you know and then high school

hit and I was like that's not how the world works and college hit and I wasn't making music to like to be a big artist I was making music because it really helped me and I loved it and I felt like I was doing something special. And people, you know, weren't even listening that early. But I just like kept working and kept, I had such an intense connection that I wanted to like, to chase that feeling. And I kept writing better songs and I kept getting better production. And slowly but surely people started listening.

And it was like really, really, really slow in the beginning. And I even still view it as slow because it's been six years since I really, least a song under my name. And like, it's been a completely like steady upward trajectory, starting from like a hundred streams on SoundCloud, like per song. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, it's a slow process, even if you have a million streams and then you're expecting 10 million streams, you know, it's all just sort of expectations and meeting expectations. when you have no expectations is one thing. If you want to be famous and you're only seeing 100 streams,

I imagine that seems slow. Do you think that a lot of the lyrics talk about depression and internal battles and relationships in a, sometimes in a toxic way? You know? I always assume that, that, you know, when you write a song a certain way, that that, you know, if you're the artist, like most people, when you listen to an artist singing those songs, and that means

that they actually feel that way. Why are all the kids depressed? That one, it's weird. Like, that's the one song that I didn't, and I did write that a bit from my perspective. So, like, the thing, the thing that inspired that song is I was living in a house, my junior and senior year in college. And in my junior year, I had three roommates, and two of them were on antidepressants. And it was just like this crazy realization.

Like a lot of it had to do with just the climate at my school where it was very, very accepted to talk about mental illness and very accepted to talk about what medication you were on if you were. So I just like became hyper aware of all of these kids. that were like really really struggling that looked really really normal and appeared and acted very very normal and it like it shook me because i was like i never like identified as somebody with depression or anxiety until i started thinking about like how many people are affected and then i started thinking myself well like is the way i feel normal like i know i'm not like

the happiest person ever, but I can get out of bed in the morning. And I just started thinking of like, well, maybe I have nothing to compare my experience to, you know, just because I'm not, just because, like, I'm functional, it doesn't mean I'm not dealing with something that's valid. So, so, yeah, it was like that realization, and I was like, when I wrote the song, people weren't really talking, it was like the beginning of this movement of people starting to talk about. like depression and anxiety and music and I don't know I just like there I had no reason to not be

completely honest and literal about everything that I was saying like I was just exhausted by these people that like are pretending to be so happy all the time and I was like this is not real life you are not actually this happy all the time and is it unique to this generation or was it not diagnosed in other generations? I don't think it's unique to this generation. I think it's part of the human condition. I think of it in like

I'm such a nerd. I think of it from an evolutionary perspective. Whenever I think about anything in people, like the way we act, the way we behave, like all of those are mechanisms that were evolved for because they were beneficial

10,000 years ago when we were like hunter-gatherers and tribes and like trying to trust each other and and like trying to care for children and stuff. So I think about like happiness isn't necessary for us to survive. You just have to be happy enough, you know? So that's just one perspective, one way of looking at it. Did you read Sapiens? I didn't know. Oh, that book is bananas. You'll love that. Sapiens?

Yeah. Is it about that whole thing? Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, it's about the history of the human race. But it's generally about that. It's sort of how humans evolved from hunters and gatherers to agriculturists. Agriculturalists. And then, you know, through how that creates, you know, the ability to stay home instead of roam around. And the idea of this is mine and this is, it starts.

to get into you know, territory once you start realizing we can grow wheat here then this becomes ours and, you know, we're... And that created wealth and then wealth created power

and then power created society. Yeah, exactly. I mean, that whole concept of even as a musician, like what's the purpose of us telling stories through a song? It's still like, it's based in the idea of telling stories

and trying to allow the rest of the tribe to relate or discuss and it helps them tell their offspring, you know, whatever, because they can sing that concept. I really think as cliche as this is, like it's bringing people closer. Like that was something that was so important in evolutionists, like the family and caring for another and altruism and like raising your kids and keeping people close, keeping people, keeping people trusting each other. And music, one million percent brings us closer.

Like, yeah, on so many levels. You know, not to keep going down this rabbit hole, but, you know, you're doing, you have to do so much social media. And being a young musician who's getting their music out there now, you know, the conversations all the labels have are like, what's their TikTok presence? How many millions of followers? What's their engagement?

Yeah, what's their engagement? And it's all about, you know, one human, you have 14 million monthly listeners or something like that on Spotify, which is an unnatural thing because you're supposed to be singing just your tribe of 200 people. Do you find that pressure to create music

that all 14 million people can enjoy, does that weigh on you? Or is it sort of, no, I'm still writing for my 250 people and other people are listening to it? So, I think the way I view that in terms of making music is like, am I making music for myself or am I making it for everyone else? Because if I'm making music for myself, I'm not obviously not going to care what people think. And, but the truth is, if I'm truly in love with what I'm making and it's for myself, a lot of times a lot of people love it because I think that's just the way that my taste aligns with like the general consumers of music. If I'm being completely honest, like my mind state, it goes back and forth between who am I

writing this for? Am I doing this for me? Am I doing this for everyone else? And I think... What? Who are you doing it for? the longer I do this, like I'm doing it for me. I can't like stomach the idea of making something that I'm not in love with because I think other people are going to love it. And that also just doesn't make sense to me. Right. You know?

But I've always like had this weird balance with my releases where I'll have like a couple crab pleasers on a project or on an owl. album and the rest of the songs will be like really really for me and the way that I've been able to like be okay with that I guess is still being very very proud of these crowd pleasers of these songs that I know are going to do really well because they're so like easy and digestible but like fresh and attractive and like and different so that's always been the hardest balance for me

is like I know that everything that I do 100% of the time that I'm doing for me isn't going to be for everyone but I know that I have like the ability to write a song that is for everyone I just if I'm going to do that it has to be in a way that it's also for me It's for all of us.

Did you get to tour much at all before quarantine? I mean, so much of the success has happened in the last, you know, year and a half, two years. You know, how much touring have you been able to do before the pandemic? I've done a fair amount, but it doesn't feel like enough, especially because it's been so long without a tour. But I did a full tour. So while I was in college, my senior year, I was able to take like a couple weeks off. and I opened for Lave in Europe. And I opened for a couple of dates in the U.S. with him.

I graduated, did a full headline U.S. tour. A couple months later, did a full headline Europe tour, did a couple festivals in Europe over the summer. And then I did a full headline Asia tour, which was crazy. So basically, like, I did the whole world except for, well, like the whole, like, easy touring world, except for Australia. And I was gearing up to basically do all of that again this year.

Does the pandemic help you build your brand because you're able to just focus on songwriting and just focus on social media engagement? Not really, because I felt like I had so much work to do in the live setting and on the road. And everything that I've been doing, has been like the social media stuff, the making music at home. They're like developing my craft like in the comfort of my own space.

And going on tour was like very, very new for me, very different for me. I'm not like a super outgoing person. So like learning how to perform and how I want to express my music on stage was a massive challenge. And I feel like I only got like halfway there with this first round of touring. Do you think yourself as an introvert? For sure. Yeah. I'm in my head all the time. I mean, we all are. But like, I, yeah, it's not, I'm not super outgoing. Like, it's not super easy for me to, like, meet new people and, like, be myself in front of a completely new person. But I do love meeting people and I do love making friends. It's just, it doesn't feel like, like, natural to me. Like, I'm for, yeah, I'm not an extrovert at all. When you learn how to do production in your bedroom, then dorm room, how does somebody learn how to be a producer without somebody hands on showing you, well, this is how you EQ this and this is how you compress this? I mean, did you just go on YouTube or is it just trial and error?

Or how do you learn how to be a producer? That's the thing. Yeah, I never had a mentor to teach me stuff. and I always wish that I did. But YouTube helped me a lot. I literally, yeah, I looked everything up online. And the biggest thing is like listening to songs and things that you like and thinking to yourself, well, how do I think this person did this?

And yeah, it's really, it's all about like sound selection and like making sure that like there's conscious thought put into the selection of each track, each sound, each thing that gets added on, there's a purpose to it. And the hardest thing is just learning how to use your ears, I think. Because if you've never produced before, you'll realize how often your ears fool you and how things aren't what they sound like. It's just a weird disconnect. You really have to practice listening. And the only way to really practice listening is to be like creating, I think. Yeah. And then it also ends up changing. It's like everyone around you who knows you well, once you start getting into listening to things,

it's like you can't be at a restaurant with a record going, you know, in the background without listening to that snare sound of it. Yeah. There's sound fire. And trying to like under the table of reminding yourself to look up that song or whatever so you can get that same. Literally. For real.

I remember being like, and like super young in fifth grade, like in the car of my mom, we'd be listening to a song. And like I discovered like the equalizer on. iTunes and I would be doing wonky stuff with it. And I realized I could bring out like the drum, like the high hats and the symbols and the drums by doing this thing. And then I realized that like music was all these different parts. Like that was a realization for me. That was split. I'd be like, mom, like, do you hear like the hi hat? Do you hear the snare? She'd be like, what are you talking about? Like I just hear the song. Right. Yeah, typical. Wait, so you get you, you know, out of college,

you start, people start noticing your music and you start getting, you know, sound clouds doing what it does, and then you start releasing music kind of formally, at least on your own. How soon was it that you release music to when, you know, you start getting introductions to record labels and you start getting introductions to the rest of the music industry? So it was like 2015, I start releasing music on SoundCloud. It's getting a couple hundred, a couple of thousand streams, mostly just word them out at college and friends. 2016, I release more music on SoundCloud and then put that music on Spotify.

and then I do this thing where I made music, like released a new song every week for a whole month. And like I made that a thing and I was telling everyone I was doing it. It was all like all over my pages online. And at the end of the month, I had five songs and I put that into an EP and put that on Spotify. And it took like two or three weeks, but like people start like online. blogs started to sort of like catch wind of it like super small independent blogs and they'd be like oh he's releasing a song every week so then every week i'll get coverage then every week i'll get a little

more coverage and like these youtube pages would repost would like post the songs on youtube that had like 10,000 subscribers and then it was like 100,000 subscribers and then this one blog called swaggy tracks started posting those songs and they had like a couple hundred thousand and then i was getting like really cool numbers. Like they would translate to SoundCloud and I'd be getting like 10,000 plays in the song and I'd be like, this is insane. And at the same time,

Spotify's Discover Weekly algorithm was like putting my music into people's Discover Weekly playlists. And that's like actually how my career started was Spotify and Discover Weekly. People were just finding me through Spotify. Like mostly. SoundCloud became a

relevant for me as soon as Spotify started putting my songs into the algorithm. That was 2016. And then the summer of 2017, I was going into my junior year of college and I put out my project motions and that was like, this is where I am musically. Like everything has led up to this moment. This is going to be my best project so far. I'm ready for a record deal. It's like what I thought in my head. And at the same time, my friend Danny, who had been helping me throughout this whole process, literally since we were in sixth grade,

he was interning for, because he was studying music business at Syracuse, and he was interning for looking for an internship at a record label, and he reached out to Tyler Arnold, at Republic Records, who's my now, A&R. He was like trying to get an internship from him,

and he sent him my music. He's like, this is what I'm listening to, and he sent a couple of different stuff, and I was one of them. And I think Tyler didn't answer. And then, like, when I released this project motions, he sent him motions. And Tyler was like, who is this kid? What's his deal? Let's talk. And a couple months later, he flew out to visit me at Colorado to, like, take me at the dinner.

And Danny came out, too. He was, like, pseudo-managing me at the time. And he's like, I love what you're doing. We want to sign you. and I was like holy crap. And at that point, like in 2016, when I was like doing all this SoundCloud, like a song a week stuff, that got enough attention that like small publishing companies were reaching out to like sign me as a songwriter.

Like APG reached, well, I guess they're not small, but like boutique. APG reached out to sign me as a writer. I was like, I'm not a writer. I'm an artist. A couple months later, they reached out to sign me as an artist. I was like, I don't think I'm ready for this situation. and then Republic reached out and I sort of like

yeah that was like my little tiny bidding war like I for sure wasn't in the industry but I signed and then we announced it going into my senior year and I just finished that last year of college and graduated. Do you define now can you define the difference between you as a writer versus you as an artist or are they still the same? They're very much the same.

Unless like you put me in a writing session for someone else. Like I would be a writer in that moment. But I feel like everything that I do is very like cohesive and together. Why did you not end up doing a publishing deal? Every time I'd read through a contract, I'd be like, this is a lot. You know? And I knew that if I didn't that like, because I was getting like offered publishing deals before I was making money from publishing.

And I think a big factor is my dad's a lawyer. And so he would look through it and be like, this is ridiculous. Like this term is insane. You don't want to commit to this. And I was like, I was a little upset because I was like, dad, like, this is my shot. This is my only shot. But it obviously wasn't my only shot. I just held out.

Like it never felt like the right thing to do. And when I signed a record deal, I was like, damn, I'm signing away like ownership. of my master's and that's a big deal and the only real thing I have ownership with in my songs is the publishing and the songwriting and why would I like I need to have ownership of that like I need like this is me the music is me like I need ownership of something yeah I think so you know the other side tends to be that you know it it and all depends on who your publisher is they would become you know they can either become that mentor that that you were saying with production that you didn't have,

you know, that you could have on the songwriting side, or they can help connect dots with, you know, especially as you get into other collaborations and stuff, Republic is amazing, but also, you know,

in theory, they would help set up sessions and do all that kind of stuff. It's a little different because you write a lot of 100% songs. But, you know, and maybe, and they can help you with, you know, licensing and things like that, which is still something that publishers do best in that world.

Obviously, there are third-party people who can do it. But that's sort of the argument. There are always shitty deals everywhere, you know, no matter what it is. So I'm definitely not advocating going to all publishers, no matter what the deal is. Your dad's not wrong. Is your dad your music attorney? Or is he just? He's not.

No, we have a. music attorney, but he's very involved. And he has a very good, unbiased perspective. Sure. Yeah. It's weird when outside attorneys look at the music industry, because the music industry sort of precedents are not crazy. Are pretty crazy. So there's always getting that opinion.

What do you think of for you? What is the next step for you? What is success to you? You've had a platinum record. you know, you have another, a couple other songs that are going to become platinum soon. You know, it's still pretty early on. What do you think is success?

I mean, I look at it in two different ways. I feel like I'm so, I feel like I'm deeply conflicted about that because on one hand, like, I'm always looking at my numbers, and I'm like, I want to be doing more and I want to be bigger. But at the same time, I'm like, do I want to like do I really want to be bigger or do I just like it's like it's like a hit it's like a

hit of dopamine you know I'm like I want to feel better like every time I see more numbers it feels better so why wouldn't I want to keep seeing more and more but there's obviously like a cap to that and I don't know I'm like I know that I'm the happiest when I'm making things that I love and so as cliche as this sounds like I I I just want I'll feel successful when I'm extremely proud of what I've done and what I've released. And I really don't want to feel dependent. I don't want to feel like my success depends on the response to everyone. Because on paper, I'm extremely successful.

And I think it's so natural for everyone to like want more and want more and want more. And I don't want to feel that way. I don't want to feel like I'm always wanting more. I want to be like happy and content and like happy where I am and I'm always like oh if I do this one thing like I'll be content but it's like a never-ending cycle of wanting more so yeah I don't know like right now it's like I've like it's weird because like I feel like my success got like fuck i mean everything got fucked up by the pandemic but like i was about to do like real tours off of my debut album and that was going to be a moment where i was going to be like this is insane this is crazy

like how far i've come and instead i'm locked in my apartment for months and i'm like i feel like i'm starting over it because i put out an album and then i'm like well the only other thing i can do is read another album and I missed out on so much closure. Like that first album, Love is Not Dying, was so special to me. Like, when, like, I cried my eyes out when it came out. Like, now it was just in my room alone because we were doing like Zoom parties and stuff. And all the fan events and everything, like all just all online. So, yeah, like, I needed like real closure to like move on from that part of my life and

Tor really does that because you get to look at fans in the eyes and be like, I see how this song has touched you and I see how this has affected you. And it's just a whirlwind of like emotions and craziness. Then you get home and you're like, wow, life is so much different now. And then you have so much to talk about and you have so much new perspective. And so like I put out this album and then like I missed out in a whole like moment of closure and like I'm, trying to write again. And I mean, I'm not going to lie. Like, it's, I'm like, I'm like so intense emotionally with writing and production and

everything that it's like exhausting. And that's something that I'm like personally working through. But yeah, it was really hard. I mean, isn't that where a lot of great music comes from? Why even try to suppress that? At least for me, it's, it's a little exhausting because like, I sometimes I care so much. I mean, a lot of times I care so much that it like stifles me creatively.

You know, and I want to feel there are two sides. It's like on one side, songwriting is so, so fun. And like you're in a room in a session and like you're vibing and you don't really like, you're excited on the song and then you listen to it later and you're like, oh, this is shit. And then you feel shitty. Like I like I have such high standards for myself and the things that I create that I get upset when like something isn't up to my standards which are unreasonably high.

So that's like the process that's hard on me when I'm so emotionally invested in what I'm doing. And so yeah, lately I've just been really trying to like go way easier myself and take my time. And like, yeah, because I'm making like a lot of things that I'm really excited about. It's just like the idea of like a whole album. and like how incredible I wanted to be. I think, yeah. There's also such a pressure for time in this generation. There used to be, I mean, the Beatles were releasing two albums a year,

but they were in the beginning, but they were also doing covers on half their albums, you know, in the beginning, you know? It's like there's now this weird pressure that you're supposed to create your best work very fast. And that's sort of an unnatural thing versus the idea of, you know, the pet sounds that takes a whole year to just record it, you know, which you've done an album. And a year goes by pretty fast. But when you're trying to release a second album, you know, when you just released one in quarantine, it's a lot of pressure. Do you find co-writing? I mean, I know you've worked with Ricard and Rami and shout out to those.

guys, those are good friends. But you're doing some co-writing. Do you find that that helps to have other people in the room and help you digest certain ideas? 100%. Yeah. It's it's really fun working with people. Except I always, I feel like I can't get in touch with like the part, like the most honest part of me when I'm in a room. And a lot of times I'll have to like take what we did and and go home with it and like feel it out without any sort of other distraction. But yeah, it's really nice for like getting me out of my head and like having fun with it and like forgetting like I just need to like to like my mind is very like overactive in terms of like worrying about. I just like I just like want to be so.

good. You know, like I'm like I'm just extremely competitive with myself, I think is what it is. So yeah, but it's a lot of fun. Um, working with producers and writers because everyone has their own really interesting way of looking at it and you get like such an interesting combination of like energies when you're working with people. Yeah, you're able to look at their skill set and their techniques and sometimes you can take from them and realize, oh, that's really interesting. That's how you do melodies. That's how you do lyrics. That's how you do. That's how you do. you know, obviously production.

Going to this next segment, I'm going to list a few of your collaborators so you can kind of tell me about them because we call this next section five for five. Let's start with Chelsea Cutler. Yeah.

You just want me to go? Go. Okay. Everything that I said about collaboration before doesn't apply with Chelsea in the sense of like I really feel like myself when I'm writing with Chelsea feel like myself musically we the first time we wrote a song together it was like our second or third time hanging out I'm in this cabin in Connecticut Chelsea pulls up on the last day it's like a little studio in there and she sits down picks up a guitar starts playing a riff I turn to

her I'm like what is that she's like I don't know I just made it. I was like, that's a song. Let's write it. And we wrote our song Better Off, which is like in both of our like top tens and one of my favorite songs overworked on. And the second time we hung out to make music was a year later at the same cabin. We decided to go together and like book out time there. And one of the first songs we wrote was, you were good to me. And she sat at the piano and just played that riff. And I was like, that's the song and we wrote it like it was it's so incredibly easy with her because she compliments everything that i feel like i'm not great at and she'll sit down and like just be completely

free and like play anything and like doesn't think about it and i get to be like the objective person in the background that's like that that that's special or that's not or that's not quite there change this a little bit. And we record it together. And I get to like zero in and do the thing that I think I do best, which is like being very precise with like production and writing and melody and like stitching it all together. And yeah, it's always a really fun process.

And so that was when we did Brent. And we actually just finished recording Brent too, which is we basically went out to a different cabin and did the same thing. except trying to do it way better. How did you guys become this weird sort of writing team? What is that? Like, where does that come from? Where did you guys meet?

It's funny. We met. I got, like, in college, when I was a sophomore, I got flown out to University, Connecticut to do, like, this frat party and perform. And at the time, I knew who she was because we were talking on SoundCloud because she was posting, like,

really cool acoustic covers. and I walk off stage and she's like back there and she's like, hey, she's like, hey, she's like, I'm Chelsea Cutler. I was like, whoa, sick. Like, nice to meet you. I had no idea she was going to be there. She didn't even go to University, Connecticut. She was visiting a friend and they ended up at this party and I just happened to be playing at this party on a random weekend when I should have been in school of Colorado. And that's how we met. At the time I was, like just starting talking to Jesse, who's my manager. He wasn't managing me yet.

And then a couple months later, she signed to him before I even signed to him. And I knew that I was going to sign to him. I just didn't know when it was going to happen. But yeah, we got signed on to the same management. And now we're on the same record label and we have the same ANR. It's funny because, like, we're so different. We're such different people. Our music tastes are so different.

our careers, like the type of music that we see ourselves making is pretty different. But when we get together and write music, it's like this completely different thing. Totally. Black Bear. Black Bear. I've never met him. I've still never even met Black Bear in person. Largely because I'm not.

I don't realize that when people feature on records, if you don't know the industry, a lot of times you're sending a track, they're in a studio, they'll feature on it. you know, and you'll email back and forth, but it doesn't mean that you meet them all the time. So do you guys have a good relationship, though? Yeah, he's super nice. He's super nice. It was a really, he was like one of my favorite artists in college and like definitely inspired my early stuff.

But yeah, I like, he remixed one of my songs for his album, Digital Drug Lord. And then in the deal that we did for him, that, like, he basically made his own song to my instrumental, and the deal we did for that. I got him to feature on my song Talks Overrated. And, yeah, we just, like, kept him super loose touch since then. I feel like if I, like, was in L.A., normally, we would have hung out. But, yeah.

What about B. Miller? B. Miller is super sweet. Obviously, she's on the remix have come through. I'm trying to think we that was like a very label orchestrated thing as remixes

sort of tend to be you do a song it does well the label's like we want a remix boost stream numbers I'm like okay and then so we were thinking

of people thinking people and I was a really big fan of beat stuff and I just thought she would be perfect on it She was like really cool, like in the perfect lane to sort of like cross over from this like acoustic vibey pop song. So we brought her into the studio, wrote her part together. She crushed the vocals. Her voice is incredible.

And it came out. Super easy, super fun. Yeah. She's an incredibly cool person. Your most recent one, Claire Rosencrantz said that like kind of hop in. This is sort of opposite. I mean, the song has been killing it and now you're on it. What's that about?

Backyard boy. Really interesting story. So six months ago, my friend sends me a playlist and Backyard Boys on it. I'd never heard it before. It had very few streams. And I was just listening. It was funny. The playlist was all like super old, really weird music.

And I was listening through. And then this song comes on. I was like, this is hot. And I hit him up. I was like, what is this song? Like, I love it. And he's like, this is my cousin, Claire. And I was like, sick that she's your cousin.

That's awesome. This song is great. And about a month later, he hits me up and he's like, the song is starting to pop on TikTok. And his name's stage. He was like, you know, my cousin is starting to talk to labels. We know that you're on Republic. Like, would you want to talk to her and give her some. advice. And I basically talked her through what it was like being with Republic and being on a label

and like helped her sort of figure out what it is she wanted from a potential deal. And a couple weeks later, she signed with my label Republic. A couple weeks later, her team hits me up. They're like, hey, do you want to be in the remix? I was like, hell yeah, this is perfect. And the song is just so fun. And I'm like, I feel like I take myself so seriously. That's the point I've been trying to get across with all this mind games with me and music. It's like, I just want to take myself less seriously. I just want to have more fun. So, yeah.

And that was like a great opportunity to do that. And it was so much fun. Last collaborator, Republic Records. Oh, that's the collaborated label? Yeah. Republic's been awesome. They're so competitive. which works out very well for me.

I do my own thing. And then when we put it out, they just push it super hard. When I sign, it was really interesting because when I sign, like, I feel like normally when they sign artists, it's like, go, go, go. But when I signed, I still had a year left of college. And the plan was like, take your time, make music when you graduate, then we're ready to go. And it just worked out so perfectly. Um, yeah, they've been awesome so far.

They, like, internationally, my music has been really, really good. I mean, I was able to tour, like, Southeast Asia by myself for the first time. And I was doing, I did, like, 1,500 tickets in South Korea. And that was just, like, such a wild experience. Like, and I do, I do owe a lot of that to Republic and Universal and the international marketing department. Shows to Zoe. but yeah it's they're awesome um last question um do you have any personal life do you have any time to be somebody in their 20s that's not working on music um when it's not a pandemic 100%

but um yeah i mean i live with two of my best friends and we hang out a lot obviously obviously and we do fun stuff. I get to come out here every once in a while. I have a bunch of friends out here. We do fun things. I for sure have a personal life. And the deeper and deeper I get into the industry, the more necessary it is for me to have a fulfilling personal life.

Because, yeah, the more I do this, the more I realize, like, I don't want this to be my whole life. And I feel really, really lucky because there are so many other things that I'm interested in. And also, like, in the future, there's so many things I could see myself doing with my life and it's not just music. Like what? So, okay, well, I'm super into film.

I, like, sort of directed some of my videos. I could for sure see myself doing that. I could see myself doing creative direction for an artist. I could see myself being a mix engineer if I wanted to. Yeah, I wouldn't ever, like, it would be creative. I can never do something. I can never go back to science and, like, think about doing that. that would just, that would crush me.

Yeah. Well, thank you for doing this. You know, we talked before we even started this, that, you know, for, for me to get to interview somebody who listened to the podcast, you know, before they got, you know, before we even found out that they would want to do the podcast. Like, it's cool that, that, you see this full circle moment of why we do this. and so that's awesome on a personal level. But, you know, it's always really important for our industry to learn about who the next people are

if we're going to move our industry forward in any capacity and to communicate with each other and make the, you know, continue to extend a warm hand hug to all the, you know, the up and coming artists and it's hard to call somebody who's a platinum artist up and coming but I just know that you know the next time you are able to tour you're going to see how significant those albums have been and that they aren't just numbers and no numbers on your phone are going to make any difference when you're in front of it doesn't matter if it's 200 people or 20,000 people

all that's going to feel much more real and it'll give you an authentic taste of how successful you've already become. You just have to stay patient and get through it. And I'm excited to see what happens next for you. Thanks so much, Ross. Yeah, man. There you go. This was awesome.

Thanks for having me. Thanks for listening to this episode of And the Writer is. If you want to hear music from this songwriter I just interviewed, be sure to check out our Spotify playlist. Or visit our website and Anne the Writer. writer is.com. If you like what we're doing, please subscribe to us. You can also like us on Facebook and Twitter.

And The Writer Is is produced by Joe London and published by Big Deal Music. A special thanks to David Silberstein from Mega House Music and Michael White. Until next time, this is Ross Golan.