[00:00:00] James: Welcome to episode 193 of the Bandhive Podcast. It is time for another episode of the Bandhive Podcast. My name is James Cross and I help independent artists tour smart. This week on the show we have a very special guest, Elijah from Father Before Me. How's it going today, Elijah?

[00:00:15] Elijah: hey, what's up, man? Thank you for having me. Such an honor to finally be on the show

[00:00:19] James: Oh, it's my pleasure to have you here and you know, a couple weeks ago, you might have seen these clips already. I had Nick Mischko on the podcast and we're talking about the power of networking through TikTok. And we were trying to figure out before the show how we know each other.

[00:00:30] James: It's from the Internet somehow, and we came to the conclusion that it's TikTok.

[00:00:34] Elijah: It is tiktok

[00:00:35] James: It really is so true that you can make connections via the internet, but TikTok is especially useful for finding people in your niche.

[00:00:42] James: not only are we both in the music world, but we're both kind of in, like, the Warped Tour pop punk world. So it's not like we're totally opposite on the spectrum, one of us does punk and the other one's, like, country or something. It's like, no, we're both in the scene, before we jump in though, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and father before me? what got you to where you are now.

[00:00:59] Elijah: i'll [00:01:00] give you the short and sweet version. i'm elijah. I'm from queens, new york i've been playing music for longer than I care to remember Father For Me is, a passion project of mine that I started, a little bit before COVID, it was in the falling out of my old band that I'd been in for, almost a decade.

[00:01:15] Elijah: at the moment when that band broke up, I thought, like, music was done for me. Not that I wanted to give up, but I thought, like, I'll never have another chance to, like, get that kind of lightning in a bottle again. it was great because this project, something I was just like, I just, I have this itch to play music and I started recording all these songs and just put it out.

[00:01:33] Elijah: And like a breath of fresh air for me. It's almost like the second shot to like do something that I thought really meant a lot to me. I record everything myself. I write everything myself. And I recorded a recording studio in Shout out to Carson Slovak and Grant McFarland.

[00:01:50] Elijah: You guys are amazing and yeah, I just started getting things together and just thinking like, you know, why let anything hold you back and it's basically was my [00:02:00] motivation behind it all and COVID kind of helped because I had a lot of time to sit at home and think and just kind of get together with it and three years later, it's Starting to become like one of my main Sources of income almost.

[00:02:11] Elijah: And it's just hard to believe that just a few songs that were sitting on my Mac book have become so meaningful to me and, people around the world, which is the crazy part about, like you were saying with TikTok, like I have people who will hit me up from like Malaysia or like Canada.

[00:02:25] Elijah: And I'm just like, wow, it's just nice to like, play music again. That's kind of where it's at.

[00:02:29] James: Yeah, that's fantastic And you know, we're here to talk about building healthy habits, which is really important But before we jump in and I'm not gonna ask you specific numbers But with your income like where are you seeing the greatest? Inflo, is that from streaming, or social media, or merch sales?

[00:02:47] James: what are you focusing on to bring in that income?

[00:02:49] Elijah: I've worked every job in the world like you name it. I've done it everything but a hairdresser that and obviously doctors But with income it's just like I always worked at a cafe mainly was a barista and [00:03:00] like that's your main job it was like your main source of income, but there'd be times where I was fired from that job and I was just like Oh shit, what am I gonna do?

[00:03:06] Elijah: Like, I just lost all my income. How am I gonna get money again? Like, we're not playing a show for like, two months so I learned that you have to kind of like have your hand in a bunch of different pockets. So not twitch is my number one yeah, twitch is my number one income right now streaming on twitch whether it be music production like create music on the spot or me playing through my songs or me Just talking about new stuff twitch has been kind of the big income And then it's merchandise.

[00:03:35] Elijah: I have an independent company epic merch store Shout out to those guys amazing ray from drunk tank. Thank you so much they are independent print on demand shop from Amsterdam and they have a bunch of like these punk bands like they have Chaser and Cigar Belvedere Wilhelm scream they have all these guys on their site and like They put me on their site and it's print on demand and cool because it's like punk rock print on demand and basically [00:04:00] They have all my merch on there.

[00:04:01] Elijah: Really really good quality like best quality I've seen in a very long time clothing and stuff Every so often like they'll send me a check hey This is what you sold this quarter and this is kind of probably obvious but streaming is the least amount of money I get.

[00:04:12] Elijah: But It is nice that i'm on like a hundred different sites through cd baby Just the other day I started noticing i'm getting tiktok sales People putting it in a reel or maybe it's me putting it in a reel or it's someone using it in the reel it's not a lot.

[00:04:25] Elijah: It's like, you know 50 cents here 50 cents there But it's I wasn't making money off tik tok a year ago. So that's another you know admin so it's kind of just I always say with music, music's like a wave. You can only ride a wave for so long before you got to kind of like bail out wait for the next one.

[00:04:39] Elijah: And the wave with music is kind of like your releases. And I guess that's why, the new thing with music is, you know, albums are dead unless you're a collector. People, it's all about singles, singles, singles, singles, because everyone's putting out singles now. And I guess it's easier because now you're, you're not riding such much more of a bigger wave, but you're riding a more consistent wave.

[00:04:57] Elijah: And they're coming in more often, you'll ride a [00:05:00] wave, and you'll build momentum, you'll make a bunch of money because of sales, and then it just slowly drifts off, and drifts off, and drifts off. So like, at the moment, I'm at that drift off, because my last single came out in… end of 2021, so. I've been sitting on a new record for a while, but I'm getting all George Lucas with it, where I'm like, I need to make a special edition, Or like, just a lot of re recording stuff. So I've been sitting on it for a bit, and it's, Finally I just booked the music video for the first single in August, so.

[00:05:27] James: Yeah, so it's all coming together. And it is a process. I mean, if you look at any major act, you're probably gonna have two to three years at least between albums.

[00:05:33] Elijah: Oh, for sure, yeah,

[00:05:35] James: it takes a long time to get that all together, especially when you're dealing with, marketing agencies, PR agencies, all that stuff.

[00:05:41] James: It all adds up so much.

[00:05:43] Elijah: Oh, for sure, man.

[00:05:44] James: let's jump into the topic that we were discussing because healthy habits are really important in our day to day lives, whether it's related to music or just our life in general. can help so much for mental health. It helps so much for productivity, all that [00:06:00] kind of stuff.

[00:06:00] James: So. Going at it from a slightly different angle is, what made you realize that it was time to put these healthy habits into place and start working on it actively, rather than just kind of passively doing whatever?

[00:06:10] Elijah: So it's kind of something that's always been there and I've ignored. I'm a high school dropout. I didn't like high school, didn't like school. Partly because, My parents were always very sick growing up and my mom had cancer. And I, you know, it wasn't like I came from a broken home, but There was always something at home that like, It's kind of fucked up.

[00:06:26] Elijah: Like I had a very loving childhood. I had very loving parents, but you know, sadly to say passed away But so I was just fucking around in school like where I was just like kind of questioning like do I even really want to Do this both my parents college degrees went to school got all this stuff done It's just like well, it was a eye opener to see like You did all this stuff and you're just gonna die like everybody else.

[00:06:45] Elijah: So it's kind of like a wake up call. Like what do I want to do? i'm probably gonna end up in the same boat one day but I was always fucking around in school I was like, no, I don't need to focus on school.

[00:06:54] Elijah: I don't need to focus on, different friendships I don't need to focus on a job. I just need to focus on playing [00:07:00] music which as a 16 year old kid sounds fucking awesome but I had this one teacher who hated me, and I hated him. I think it was just strong seated, What the fuck are you doing, kind of thing.

[00:07:10] Elijah: And, it's this one thing that stuck with me forever. he basically called me out on it too. He was like, I just want you to know that what you do in one section of your life will echo out through all sections of your life. If you're late and you slack off with your job, Or your relationship or your health, you're going to suffer with your art too, because it all echoes and you need to balance that.

[00:07:30] Elijah: it's like a cluttered room is a cluttered mind. it's really crazy how that works because if you're in a cluttered room, like my room's a little, cleaned it up recently and it does help when you start putting in these little things that seem pointless, like, Waking up at a certain hour every day you know, making your bed, because it's like if you just did one thing that day, you at least made your bed and that's kind of where the habit thing came from I kind of never implemented it for the longest time, but the last few years I did because I was just like, okay, when people get lazy, we go back to our habits.

[00:07:58] Elijah: So when you go back to your [00:08:00] habit, make sure it's a good habit, because then you'll always be doing it. and, in retrospect, something I started doing was, healthy habits are, like, the first thing I do when I wake up I drink, like, a whole big bottle of water. you know what I mean?

[00:08:11] Elijah: Like, even if I'm not thirsty, Another habit I try and do is, when I wake up, okay, no matter how tired I am, like, I gotta work out. So I was like, okay, I'll do five crunches in the morning well five crunches.

[00:08:20] Elijah: What is that going to do? It's like it's not about how many i'm doing It's about the fact that I got down threw a pillow down got on my my back and I started doing it Whether I did five or five hundred did that and then the same with music this is all echoing like little things throughout your life trying to cut down a certain type of food or try to eat a certain way or a certain time like but with music it was like January 1st of this year.

[00:08:40] Elijah: I was like, I'm going to post a reel every day for 365 days. I've had friends that were like, Oh dude, like you know, you're not going to get any growth with that. I'm like, it's not about the growth, whether people like it or not, or I grow from it or get follows.

[00:08:53] Elijah: That's irrelevant. That's just a side thing. That's just a by product of the habit I'm trying to create. even if I'm lazy that day and [00:09:00] I don't feel like picking up my guitar, I don't feel like, answering an email at that moment, or you don't feel like being on social media, at the very least, I posted a piece of content that day that maybe one person sees, or maybe a million people see.

[00:09:13] Elijah: And what it does is it keeps this habit of you're always working towards it. And it's funny because didn't expect the data to be positive and very high, but it's actually been like the most growth I've ever had in my entire career.

[00:09:25] Elijah: it's crazy.

[00:09:25] Elijah: Cause what I'll do is I'll take the one video, I'll format it for every platform. And I just go YouTube reels, Instagram reels, Facebook reels, TikTok. Everywhere, it's the same video, just clicking it everywhere. And, Instagram, just in six months, I went up like 400 follows, which is the most I've ever gone up.

[00:09:40] Elijah: I haven't even done it in a year. And then the same with, YouTube Shorts, I was at like 100 150 subscribers at the beginning of the year. And now I'm at like 550, and it's just I wasn't paying attention to that. But just weird how habits can echo throughout your life it'll, Impact everything else around you I

[00:09:55] James: I think that's a great point and, first of all I want to say, I'm sorry that you had such a tough childhood [00:10:00] with losing both your parents. That sounds

[00:10:02] Elijah: mean it is and it isn't I always use that phrase It's a double edged sword. Like yeah, my parents weren't like abusive to me. They were very loving we weren't rich, but we weren't poor but it's part of where father before me comes from actually a quick little snippet.

[00:10:13] Elijah: My mom was very sick her whole life in our whole childhood so when she passed away when we were 18 we kind of like We were more relieved than sad because it was like dude You saw this woman suffering for eight years where like finally she can be at peace And she taught me how to play guitar it's funny two years into it I like went like Like she's like now you're teaching me kind of thing I was like 17, 18 when my mom died, my dad could have been like, fuck you guys, I'm out, you're an adult, But no, he stuck around, and like, helped us, talked to us, and I like, fought with him, and we, cried together, and we like, almost beat the shit out of each other a couple times, he no longer was my father at that moment, he was almost like a brother to me, in a sense, because One, I was kind of more of an adult and we kind of saw eye to eye on things, but at the same time, he was a lot more honest with me just because things were more serious.

[00:10:55] Elijah: And it was just a very respectful thing. I always admired about him. Like I always admired my [00:11:00] father, very hardworking guy, but he was opera singer and fucking dude, best opera singer I've ever heard. Not just saying that because he was like my dad, but my point is that I always used to say, I'm a musician like my father before me.

[00:11:11] Elijah: Because that was our line. And it, yeah, it's from Star Wars, but Star Wars was what brought us together. And we never had a funeral for my dad. Because we couldn't afford it. we just got him cremated. Brought the ashes home in a box. Not even like an urn, just a box. me pursuing music where he left off and never got to do is kind of like my way of one paying it forward Two being true to myself and three kind of giving my father like proper send off if that makes sense and it's for everybody in that sense, too Father for me is those before us those with us and those yet to come

[00:11:40] James: to me, it's making sense now, like, you come from a musical family.

[00:11:43] James: that brings you back into the musical world, and I'm sure they taught you when you were a kid, like, hey, practice every day, even if it's just a few minutes,

[00:11:50] Elijah: yeah. And that comes back to habits where people are like, Oh man, I haven't played guitar in six months. Let me just jam out seven hours in one day. It's like, no dude, you're more better off playing five [00:12:00] minutes a day for seven days than playing two hours in one day, because the way our minds work is your mind resets every time you put something back down.

[00:12:07] Elijah: So like you play for five, 10 minutes. Put it down your mind's gonna process that information next day You're gonna pick it up your mind's gonna process that information it gets it in a I don't know the scientific word for it. wife's a scientist. I'm not but have you ever heard the story about the the two wood choppers or the two The two guys who cut wood for a living.

[00:12:24] Elijah: So there's two guys that The lumberjacks wow, we're wearing flannels. I I promote that's it. We gotta get I gotta get rid of my flannel I lose my flannel card There are two lumberjacks out in the um wild And they go out the same time every day they cut for the same amount of hours every day And they go back home every day but there's one thing the one guy At one point leaves for an hour The other guy doesn't know where he goes.

[00:12:46] Elijah: He's like, where are you going, man? He's like, don't worry about it. He comes back and he's chopping wood. He's back from his hour. But every day the guy who leaves for an hour chops three times more wood than him. So this guy's like, what the fuck? I'm here all day. How are you chopping three times the wood?

[00:12:58] Elijah: And the guy's like, because [00:13:00] I go home to sharpen my axe.

[00:13:01] Elijah: very simple little analogy, but it's like it's very important, you have to remember to sharpen your axe and the things that make up your axe are like your habits in your patterns Tricking yourself because the mind is a powerful thing man.

[00:13:13] Elijah: You can trick yourself into believing or doing anything

[00:13:15] James: And I think that's such a good tip, too, because Axe's guitars.

[00:13:19] James: It's very fitting.

[00:13:20] Elijah: I gotta

[00:13:21] James: it really is

[00:13:21] Elijah: my axe, bro

[00:13:22] James: Yeah. Then you like, get cut on your uh, strings. You're all sliced up.

[00:13:26] Elijah: no

[00:13:26] James: not that way! But, yeah, what I do is, this corner of the room is my studio area for podcast and mixing.

[00:13:34] James: And then right behind my computer is my chill area where I have

[00:13:37] Elijah: Oh, cool.

[00:13:38] James: and a TV. And on the wall above my couch, I have my two acoustics. And so I'll be watching TV, and I just put the subtitles on, and play guitar while I'm watching TV, and that's how, like, even at the end of a long day, I'm just exhausted, I'm like, I'm gonna play for like 10 15 minutes while I'm watching this episode of whatever I'm watching.

[00:13:54] James: Because, as much as I love all these guitars behind me, I have to get them down, I have to plug them in, [00:14:00] I have to turn on my amp sim, it's a process. And it's super fun to play. But it's a process, that acoustic guitar up on the wall, I just literally pick it up, grab a pick and start playing.

[00:14:10] James: There's

[00:14:10] Elijah: No, yeah,

[00:14:11] James: I do need to get into the habit of cleaning it down, like just like wiping it down when I'm done. Cause I do that for all these, but the acoustic, I'm just like, yeah, it's whatever. And like the neck's all greasy and slimy. I'm just like, I shouldn't clean that,

[00:14:23] Elijah: Yeah. I'm a guilty

[00:14:24] James: all points aside. and you have the one guitar, like you have a very nice guitar. I have multiple cheap guitars. So.

[00:14:30] Elijah: I, be, be surprised man. Guitars are, are as as as meaningful as they are to you or as, nice as they are. Doesn't matter if it's $200 or $20,000, like.

[00:14:38] James: we were talking about that a little bit before the episode, but like, that's the first guitar I got. I love that guitar. it's an Epiphone, so even with a perfect setup, it's not perfect. But then these ASATs, which are like, actually cheaper than the Epiphone was, I set them up and they're close to perfect.

[00:14:52] James: And then, this is also an Epiphone, and that I need to do fret work on, like we were discussing. But point being, with any of these, I'm in the habit of taking care of them. [00:15:00] And that ultimately is going to make those instruments last longer. The Les Paul is 12 years old now. I've had that thing for 12

[00:15:06] Elijah: Oh wow.

[00:15:06] James: to college with me. It's been back. There's a chip here and there. It has some belt rash. Whatever, that happens. I now started playing like the old Billy Joe style where I move my belt buckle over to the side.

[00:15:16] Elijah: that's smart. I've usually always had like the pick guard on the back of the guitar that gets all fucked up but that way I don't scratch the wood on my guitar.

[00:15:22] James: Yeah, that is also a great solution which I wish Epiphone had done that.

[00:15:26] James: yeah, getting back to habits. Sharpening your axe, that makes total sense, and it's really true, you're in that habit of posting to social media every day, which I used to hate, found ways

[00:15:37] Elijah: I fucking hate it.

[00:15:38] James: It's so bad. It's so bad. first I was just posting daily, was doing videos for that. And I said, wait, I have a podcast. I can just cut out clips. This is gonna be so much easier. Why don't I do that? Then, I started scheduling the clips. And this was at a time where Instagram would post automatically and TikTok would send a notification and I would have to go into TikTok and, finalize it.

[00:15:59] James: And [00:16:00] for the most part, I got that every single day. There would be some days that I just had a really busy day or I was traveling or something, I'd miss it. Whatever. Now… So as of like a week ago, so the end of June, because this episode is coming out a month after we record it, TikTok and the publishing app I use, Publr, have connected via a better API where it posts automatically.

[00:16:19] James: So I literally, the last few videos on TikTok, I haven't done anything except check the comments.

[00:16:23] Elijah: Oh, that's so cool. Is this specifically for your app?

[00:16:27] James: I think other apps can do it now, because TikTok they expanded the API. But I'm a huge fan of Publr. I've been using that for about three years. It's by far the best scheduling tool I've used.

[00:16:36] James: I've also used Buffer. I've used Hootsuite. I hate Hootsuite so much.

[00:16:40] James: Buffer's not bad. But Publr is amazing.

[00:16:42] Elijah: I don't use any scheduling I just wake up like

[00:16:44] James: That's so painful.

[00:16:46] Elijah: it is but it's like It's really building a core to myself and I feel like

[00:16:51] Elijah: success is elusive, but it's whatever you think of successful. So whenever I say like the, if I say the word successful, don't think, I mean like, I'm gonna be the next Iron [00:17:00] Maiden.

[00:17:00] Elijah: Like, no, no. I mean like for, for Elijah, this is what success means. but having the discipline to just be like, okay, I have to get up and post this thing, even if I'm hungover, we were actually by Kung Fu Necktie, I don't know if you've heard of that venue, a nice punk rock venue Philly, and cousin doesn't live that far from there, but we went to his house for like a 4th July party, we went to bed like five in the morning.

[00:17:17] Elijah: feel hungover from that day and it's not even just an age thing like oh, I'm getting old like dude. I the next day. I don't know how I drove home. But I woke up that day and I was sleeping on his couch and I woke up at like 10 in the morning. I was like, I got a post. I was like, think of a video that's another thing. That's really helped is keep a log of all my stuff on my phone. And So I can go back and repost old content, I try not to post it, too much, like, if it's been, like, a month or two, it's pretty fair game, but if I posted it just within that month, I try to leave it alone, it helps when you're feeling a little lazy, but the point is, I was feeling lazy or tired and I, still posted a video because it's just in my head, I gotta wake up, I gotta post this video,

[00:17:55] James: And that's the way to do it. You have a consistent time every day where you post. that's that habit.

[00:17:59] Elijah: [00:18:00] Yeah, and it's cool because I try to do it by noon I don't know if that's a good time or not, but it's just kind of what we're experimenting with now I'm always experimenting with earlier times and later times. I eventually would like to post twice a day But especially for what I'm doing I feel like because you do advice on music marketing and music promotion music all that So there's a lot and that makes sense.

[00:18:17] Elijah: But like for someone like me where it's just a band. It's just something I have to figure out but like how many different things can I post? Without going into a different subject like I do some music production tips Like i'm not the greatest engineer in the world i'm good enough to demo and stuff like that But I still hire somebody to do my stuff

[00:18:32] James: And honestly, I'm a strong advocate for even if somebody's the best producer in the world, hire another producer to get that third party view. Because that can make such a big difference.

[00:18:41] Elijah: Oh for sure

[00:18:42] James: of hearing the same songs over and over again for months, They might just say, Hey, change that one note from a half step to a full step, and then it just clicks.

[00:18:49] James: And that's the song, boom. There we go. That's what it needed.

[00:18:52] James: so as far as these habits, what were the first ones that you kind of developed when you made that decision to say, Hey, like, I'm going to [00:19:00] start working on this. I need to do this.

[00:19:01] Elijah: you'll probably think this is crazy. You're like, how the fuck did you do that? Like, why would you do that? Not how, why? At first I was filming every day, a new video, every day, wake up, film a video, post it, literally editing it like 10 minutes before I have to post it.

[00:19:16] Elijah: It was a mix of things I really wanted to talk about, but I think I'd been seeing a lot.

[00:19:19] Elijah: I saw like something you had posted. I saw something someone else posted. I was like, you know what? It's a new year. I'm gonna give you like five pieces of advice that'll like, help you with your brand. Not so much your band or your music career, just like your brand, what you're trying to focus on. I don't even remember what the videos were about to be honest, but I thought they were so stupid and I was just like i'm not this guy like maybe I need more work, but it goes to show you you never know What's gonna be gold what you think is trash is like complete gem to someone else and recently Someone actually came up to me and was like, Listen dude, your videos are really cool And like just one video in particular really helped me getting mind set straight And I was just like, What?

[00:19:57] James: That's the best

[00:19:57] Elijah: you But like, yeah, I'm just like, I'm not [00:20:00] expecting to have that kind of response It's truly humbling and truly like Very appreciative of it But it's just kind of crazy like you never know Kind of what's going to spark and that's kind of what got me to make the habit easier to achieve because it was just anything is content at that point I don't just post the post but There is always a little bit of meaning whether it's hey, this is one of our songs something of that sort, but it's just It started with the videos, of posting one every day, And it was extremely, extremely annoying Like, waking up and posting a video is one thing, Waking up, making the video, editing the video, and then I got a nice camera, So it started even getting harder, Because I started using, like, iMovie and stuff, To edit the pieces together and put the music in, Now what I do is, I pick two days a week, And I just do a bunch of them.

[00:20:43] Elijah: And it's, I batch it as much as I can. Sometimes I run out and I didn't, it's like, Oh fuck, I forgot to make the donuts this morning. So now we gotta make a new video. thing that's hard with me is I don't have a lot going on this last year because we've kind of been in limbo where, you know, we just moved out to a house and we got a house for very, very [00:21:00] cheap.

[00:21:00] Elijah: But it is a fixer upper. it's not a quicker fixer picker upper. It's like a fixer upper. You know, working in oh that's thunder.

[00:21:10] James: no way. I was just looking out the window here, too, because we're having a big storm. No thunder yet, I love, like, summer storms. It's my

[00:21:16] Elijah: Oh yeah, they're really, especially when you're like home, I'm off today, we're like, but, ah, what the fuck was I saying?

[00:21:21] James: you bought a house. It's, uh,

[00:21:22] Elijah: oh yeah, so, because I've worked many jobs, I knew a little bit about sheetrock, I knew a little bit about flooring, and cabinets.

[00:21:28] Elijah: So we've been fixing it up, so like a lot of renovations happened this year, and then, just everything that could go wrong with the house went, just dealing with a lot of that and like settling in in the new place and doing re recordings. So like, I haven't really had a lot to post musically because I've been so busy with my other part of my life, my personal life, that I'm finally catching up with things.

[00:21:48] Elijah: So now I have more to, I'm gonna have more content now, but the cool thing is, is circling this back around is, now that I have that habit of just wake up, post the video. Just do the thing like this like get into [00:22:00] that habit because at the very end of the day It's like hey, man, I didn't sell any merch today or you know, my Spotify streams actually decreased But guess what?

[00:22:08] Elijah: I posted content today.

[00:22:09] James: that's a good example of a leading indicator. It's something that you have control of. You can say, I have done this. Whereas lagging indicators are things like, you do something, and then if it's working, you get that lagging indicator. So like, you put out a video every day, and your followers go up.

[00:22:26] James: And when you're setting goals, you always want to base them on your leading indicators. And you can have secondary goals. let's say How many TikTok followers do you have right now, roughly?

[00:22:35] Elijah: three thousand I think

[00:22:37] James: So you have 3, 000, and some people might just say, I want 6, 000 by the end of the year. That gives me 6 months.

[00:22:42] James: It's July 4th today. Happy 4th, by the way. some people would just say, okay, I want another 3, 000 by the end of the year. I want to double that. why not make your goal to post a video every single day, which is exactly what you're doing, and then say, if I do this, the secondary goal is to double that amount of followers by the end of the year.

[00:22:59] James: no [00:23:00] matter what, whether you hit that goal or not, You have full control about hitting your goal of posting every single day. And with that, you have that motivation. It's not going to be nearly as demoralizing when you get to the end of the year and you have, 5, 000 followers instead of 6, 000 or whatever amount it ends up being.

[00:23:14] Elijah: Yeah, like you still get somewhere any bit of progress is good progress

[00:23:18] James: exactly. And you have in the back of your mind that, hey, the goal that I was in control of, I hit. just framing all your goals in that way is so beneficial and that ties into the habits that you're doing let's say you're in sales and you want to close 100 sales and that's your goal.

[00:23:33] James: Well, make that your secondary goal in your primary goal is going to be cold call 10 people a day, which is totally a pain. but guess what? That's probably going to get you the 100 sales. If you have a good product,

[00:23:44] Elijah: Mm hmm or a good sales pitch

[00:23:46] James: Yeah, that too. Ideally both.

[00:23:47] Elijah: I've bought vector knives before they're complete shit, but they sold me on it like They were like, oh the sharpest thing in the world. I don't have them anymore. It was

[00:23:56] James: Yeah. They have the sharpest sales technique in the world.

[00:23:59] Elijah: Ah, [00:24:00] that's where the real Vector knives are the friendships we made along the way.

[00:24:02] James: Oh, there's an emo joke somewhere in there. I'm not going to say it on the podcast,

[00:24:06] Elijah: no, I was thinking of one that was, could be appropriate for,

[00:24:09] James: Hey, if you got one,

[00:24:10] Elijah: No, it's escaped me.

[00:24:12] James: Okay.

[00:24:12] Elijah: fate.

[00:24:13] James: I'm not the only one making band puns today. This is

[00:24:15] Elijah: Yeah,

[00:24:16] James: love it. So anyway, yeah, it's forming these habits. It takes work, because forming a habit in itself is work, but then once you have it, it's easy and you can basically put yourself on cruise control.

[00:24:26] James: For anybody wondering, yes, that is a reference to AFI's 1995 song, Cruise Control,

[00:24:32] Elijah: yeah, I was just like, yeah, I was I was like, is it, is it an AFI reference?

[00:24:34] James: Yes! You got

[00:24:35] Elijah: of my, yeah, one of my favorite bands of all fucking time and like, AFI is like, I got into them during like, Black Sails and Art of Drowning, and then got introduced to their older stuff, but I've always followed them and the song Medicaid I thought was like, Kind of a throwback to like, Sing the Sorrow, because they kind of went off for a bit they're always putting out something new and I'm like, I actually dig this, like I've always, I've always really loved AFI

[00:24:56] James: Yeah, oh wait, we're gonna have to talk about AFI after we record, [00:25:00] I love AFI, not as much as I used to,

[00:25:02] Elijah: No, yeah, I, I, Art of Drowning, Black Sails, and the Halloween EP, those three, like, if I can only have one, ugh, there's so many though.

[00:25:09] James: honestly Crash Love is my favorite,

[00:25:11] James: it's not a favorite for many people, they're

[00:25:13] Elijah: No, no.

[00:25:14] James: I love that one, the production is so good, and for me just being like a producer, I'm just like, oh my god, everything they did here, they didn't overproduce it, like with December Underground, the But it just sounds full and amazing

[00:25:25] Elijah: that's what Medicaid is on, right? that what medicaid? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, because I really liked what they did with that and I was just like okay jade's fucking shredding and shit again and it's got this powerful vibe and They brought a little bit of the hardcoreness back because these are screams in it and stuff.

[00:25:39] James: Yep. Adam's doing the triplets on the kick. Single pedal, by the way.

[00:25:43] Elijah: I think he's the one original member next to davy

[00:25:45] James: Yeah, Davey and Adam original. Jade is the second guitarist and Hunter's the third bassist. But the first bassist was in the band for like a year.

[00:25:52] Elijah: he's like i'm going to college

[00:25:54] James: Yeah. anyway, so when you were forming these habits, you know, we talked [00:26:00] about what inspired that, which was your teacher way back in the day, even if it took a while to get there.

[00:26:05] Elijah: who's someone like I hated too? no, I, I didn't hate him. I wish him the best. I've recently since hit him up and I even told him like, listen, that, that lesson, like, we didn't get along. We were just like, we did not like each other, but I'm in your class. And it's funny cause it was musical theater.

[00:26:19] James: No way.

[00:26:19] Elijah: yeah, he was just like he wanted me to be in these classes And I was stage manager for one of the plays we did by the end of it I got she got really into it because I used to think it was kind of lame because I went to a school where like had a very phenomenal music I didn't realize who our musical theater department used to be famous and like our neighborhood and stuff Ethel Merman actually came there and like named it.

[00:26:38] Elijah: I had no idea I found this out towards the end of it, but Yeah, stage manager, and I was just like, I saw how much fun everyone was having, and I saw the production that went into it, and I guess it's part of what passion for like, putting shows together, we built sets, and we, like, it, but, I was never credited as stage manager, though, like, I saved, like, so many different things, girls dress would rip, I'd be like, I got this, and sew it [00:27:00] up, I was like, controlling the dry ice, I don't know, I just, I guess it was kind of like, hey, I'll let you do this, but I'm not putting you on the fuckin bill.

[00:27:06] Elijah: My name wasn't in the little playbill thing that they got. Oh, it's alright. I was like Batman No one needs to know or spider man. No one needs to know my true identity. I know what I did.

[00:27:14] James: No, but I hear you, man. It's so much fun to do that behind the scenes stuff that no one ever sees or notices, like,

[00:27:19] Elijah: It's punk rock

[00:27:20] James: yeah, and it's fun. It's like, okay, this happened. How do we fix it? We have two minutes, MacGyver it, and this is totally unrelated, but the electrical panel for my house is in that closet behind that door right there.

[00:27:31] James: And a couple months ago, I just hear water and I'm like, that's not good. And I looked in there and it was right before a meeting. So I put a bucket under the electrical inlet because there's a underground. Conduit that comes from the road all the way down to the house, right? And there's just water coming out of it.

[00:27:46] James: So I put a bucket under there and After the one hour meeting, I looked and the bucket's flowing over. I'm like, There wasn't that much water. It must have just started. I couldn't figure it out. Dude, I kid you not, there was a hose in that room, and I got a funnel [00:28:00] from the kitchen and I gaff taped them together and put the hose in like this big storage bin, like, you know, like the giant storage bins that you get at, Big Lots or wherever, and I just put that in there, it's like, cool, I'm ready for my next meeting.

[00:28:11] James: And then I checked afterwards and the bin's like halfway filled up, so it was probably like 8 gallons of water, 10 gallons of water. It was a lot in an

[00:28:18] Elijah: oh Shit, I mean, hopefully nothing got damaged

[00:28:21] James: No, no, it was fine. stuck a dehumidifier in there

[00:28:24] Elijah: I hate water damage.

[00:28:25] James: Oh, it's the worst. yeah, but just, being able to MacGyver stuff in like the 20 minutes between meetings saved my day.

[00:28:31] James: Otherwise I would've had to cancel that meeting and been like, yo, I gotta keep emptying this out.

[00:28:34] James: Well, as we kind of start to wrap this conversation up about healthy habits, were there any resources that you looked to that helped you in forming these habits in, an easier or more formal, more organized way?

[00:28:48] Elijah: I guess just seeing it from a third person perspective, seeing yourself and someone else and seeing someone say the same shit that you would say, like, I love movies, like I'm a big movie buff.

[00:28:59] Elijah: And, I [00:29:00] grew up watching Rocky with my dad. My dad always loved Rocky, you know, he's the underdog, whatever, and stuff. Not my favorite movie all the time, but one of my favorite quotes is when like, Rocky's really old and he's talking to his son, and he's like, Don't get mad you're not where you're And blame it on other people. don't say like, Oh, I'm not here because of this person, or I'm not this because of that, you are 120 million percent, responsible for why you are not where you want to be. And it's, a harsh truth.

[00:29:23] Elijah: And like, I'm not talking about like mental health I'm talking about things that are very achievable and you're like, oh, well i'm not there because of this and it's like even with health too. I can comfortably say this that if you've ever heard the story of jason becker, One of the best guitar players to ever live and no one's ever heard of him.

[00:29:39] Elijah: Just go look up jason becker Anyone out there who's listening to this look up jason becker he was probably one of the world's best guitar players at 21 years old and then he got Lou Gehrin's disease Can't move all he can do is move his eyes and move his jaw And he's put out three albums since then he's put out guitar music his dad helped him where he can move his finger Move the mouse.

[00:29:58] Elijah: He created sign language with his [00:30:00] eyes It's like morse code and then he would use his jaw to click and he put an album together he put three albums together note for note and it's just like This man can't move, speak, can't even breathe on his own, and he's accomplishing crazy things, and he's not like on like major crazy label or anything, like yeah, he was really famous in the 80s and stuff, but, it's just kind of inspiring, like obviously, sure, if you're dying of a disease, there's always an exception, but my point is, you are in control of the things you're not doing like your habits like, why isn't my band, doing this? It's like, well, you don't post enough. Or it's like, why isn't my, band doing this? Well, you don't write enough songs and I had to come to the realization.

[00:30:38] Elijah: I have a lot of that. And I started seeing patterns and all these different friends of, you know, You kind of see it yourself and you're like that's what I sound like No disrespect to anyone at all, but it's just Sometimes you're biased towards your own self. You're like now I'll get to it later I can do this But like when you see it in yourself You're like, okay, wow, like I need to make some changes.

[00:30:56] Elijah: for the most part things like why didn't you post today? It's like well, you [00:31:00] know this happened.

[00:31:00] Elijah: It's like well really cuz The whole time, you were complaining about it you could have just posted or something, you know and done something and it's like Sure, it may not work out, but it's like you don't know. certain videos I put hours into. Hours! Get like a hundred views.

[00:31:13] Elijah: And then videos I'll just like, throw away. Like, me being stupid, being like, We got sticks! And I just get a big bag of sticks and it falls everywhere. And it's yeah, that's funny. But it's just like, it took three seconds. I got over like 2, 000 views on it, on like certain platforms. So it really…

[00:31:29] Elijah: depends it's kind of like lottery man Like you can't win the lottery unless you have a ticket and every day being exposed to someone is your ticket man. And like a rough business. It's not forgiving It's not kind the people in it are kind but The whole system of it is not very kind and forgiving so you have to be More accountable for your own actions in it it helps you stay afloat a little more in the same with your habits and know that it is okay to fail like, you know, anyone out there who's like, oh man Like I can't do this because I fucking fail at it.

[00:31:56] Elijah: It's like dude you only fail when you give up [00:32:00] you can fail a million times, but you're not failing as long as you keep going It's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to not have it, right? And it sucks because the, you know, we were talking about this earlier, but the music industry is very ageist you're like, Oh man, like I feel like a German shepherd, like, I'm 12 years old, but in like dog years, that's a hundred, and like, you got to kind of lose that mindset.

[00:32:18] Elijah: And I feel that's a helpful thing with social media is it's now becoming less ages where you have all these older people who are. Setting the bar for like, you don't need to be like a 19 year old kid to like make it in music anymore. Like you can be 91

[00:32:31] James: Absolutely. And makes such a difference. see creators now who are like in their 40s and probably even 60s, they're doing the thing. 10 years ago, it would have been like, no way.

[00:32:41] James: And one thing that I do want to throw out there is say, Yes, do not give up.

[00:32:45] James: But if it's not working, change it in some way. always be testing.

[00:32:50] Elijah: Yes, yeah, I always have to try something new.

[00:32:52] James: working, that's why it's not working. But

[00:32:55] Elijah: literally the definition of insanity. you're doing the same thing and expecting a different result. if it works, use [00:33:00] it. But I do that all the time where I'm like, let me try different avenues. you tried new things and it works And if it doesn't work, you move on. don't beat yourself up about it. people only advertise their wins sometimes. And I feel like that's why this is becoming more like prevalent in social media that it's okay to fail.

[00:33:14] Elijah: It's okay to do this like because people are Broadcasting their their losses. That's why like I try not to do too much Like yeah, I have like a good camera and it hasn't always been like that there are flaws the flaws are what make it unique and make the journey Again, it's okay to not have it all figured out but baby steps, man, another analogy is two animals lost in the woods, and he's like, oh, I can't see, I can't see that the fog is too, gloomy and stuff.

[00:33:37] Elijah: It's like, well, can you see a foot in front of you? They're like, yeah, I was like, well, just, do that, take a step, baby steps, you'd be surprised every little step when you create these habits, they add to those steps, then.

[00:33:47] Elijah: You know, by doing these habits, you actually will start learning things about yourself you never knew, certain little quirks that you have, or certain little things you're like, oh man, like, that's an issue I have, that's something I need to work on, because it's not about like, oh, I want to be like [00:34:00] this guy, he's got this, and that, and this, and he's doing this, it's like, no, I just want to be better than the guy in the mirror. Just want to be better than who I was yesterday. It's always about just bettering yourself And you know when it comes to social media that i'm always trying to create a habit that's going to make it one easier for me because I always believe in smarter not harder. And It's hard work to even get there because you got to figure out how can you work smarter?

[00:34:22] Elijah: Like how can you reinvent the wheel of your? Whole ecosystem of what you do. how can you create something that's just gonna like make things easier and Starting with habits, you'd be surprised. You never realize how important they are that in itself is a bad habit.

[00:34:35] James: And it all adds up. Every bad habit adds up, and every good habit adds up. if you're doing, like, 15 good habits a day of just being consistent on social media, brushing your teeth, flossing, all that stuff adds

[00:34:50] Elijah: teeth

[00:34:50] James: to have. Mm

[00:34:51] Elijah: They're all fake

[00:34:52] James: Oh, man.

[00:34:53] Elijah: You can't even tell, which is crazy. these four right here, not these two. Root canals on all, they have caps on all four of them.[00:35:00] um, No! I fell asleep. I was in the chair for three and a half hours. Root canals are virtually painless now. one

[00:35:07] James: they like, put you out, fall asleep? Or you just passed out?

[00:35:10] Elijah: local anesthetic. They put on a movie for me and I'm hanging out and he's like we're gonna do all four in one day I was just like, oh god, I've never had a root canal done. You know, what was hurt more? I had a filling done like about two weeks ago that hurt worse than any root canal I've ever had done But teeth take care of your teeth because your teeth are your gateway to your fucking health.

[00:35:27] Elijah: the bridge It's the moat. It's got to stop so much

[00:35:30] James: Teeth are so important.

[00:35:31] Elijah: Yeah, now I've realized that and I've finally fixed up all my teeth shit so now I I have like Two implants to do, and then I just gotta get Invisalign, and I'll be chillin Never took care of my teeth as a kid, and it wasn't that, like, I didn't care.

[00:35:43] Elijah: It was more just, like, I was always either, like, trying to tour somewhere, or sleeping somewhere, and I just would forget. Or, like, I'd be like, oh man, I'm about to eat, I shouldn't brush my teeth yet. I feel like it's better to maybe brush my teeth after I eat, but I don't know, basically brushing your teeth doesn't clean your teeth, it gets rid of all the, the plaque buildup, that's all it really does, and that's the shit that [00:36:00] kills your teeth, sorry to get off subject, but that's a good habit your teeth are healthy, you're gonna live longer, they've even done research where like, bad teeth, heart disease, and dying young.

[00:36:08] Elijah: Thank

[00:36:08] James: Yeah, it's all connected. body literally knows, even if your brain doesn't know what's going on, your body knows and it's all connected.

[00:36:15] Elijah: Yeah, it'll be like, hey, wake up, bro. Like we're on fire. Can you help? even with habits and here's a cool thing. Some habits I think are impossible to do, like working out. when I moved to a new place, I gained 50 pounds. I went from 175 to like 220 something. And now I'm down to like 200 pounds.

[00:36:31] Elijah: So I'm like trying to get into the habit of lose weight and like, not lose weight to just look good, but like for health, Just all this stuff is cohesive to it, but um, starting the habit with posting every day, it started echoing into other habits in my life, one habit I've always had is whenever I, I have food, most of my career has been restaurants, I have a habit of after I'm done eating, clean up as I go when I'm cooking, basically is what I'm saying.

[00:36:52] Elijah: So I've always been used to that. So I've tried to implement those into other, habits I have. And your habits echo into each other. [00:37:00] And I started noticing like, hey, I'm, I'm going to bed every night at like a good time. Or I'm waking up at like a good time. Or, cigarettes is my worst habit.

[00:37:08] Elijah: kind of like the final boss of like habit building is, Destroying a habit and rewiring it. So, the habit that's bad is I smoke cigarettes. The good habit I've tried to instill is… 20 more minutes. Ah, I want a cigarette.

[00:37:22] Elijah: Wait 20 minutes. Ah, Don't have it right now. Wait 20 minutes. Cause either way, if you wait or not, you're still gonna feel relief that you smoked a cigarette. So like, for me, it's like, wake up, have coffee, have a cigarette. Get in the car, drive the missus to work, have a cigarette in the car, have a cigarette when I come back home.

[00:37:36] Elijah: So I'm like, okay, let me cut out one of those cigarettes. So I cut out the first cigarette and I only have the cigarette in the car. And I don't have the cigarette on the way back. So it's like two cigarettes I've cut out. Like, even when I get back to my house, like 20 minutes later, I'm like, damn, I really want one.

[00:37:48] Elijah: And I'm like, okay, just 20 more minutes. even still, like, I'll say an impossible thing, like, wait an hour. And it's like, oh man, like an hour, like, I've wanted one for the last hour already, and it's just like, you won't make it to that hour, but at the very least, you've pushed it [00:38:00] back.

[00:38:00] Elijah: I went from like a pack a day to about a pack will last me three days now because of that,

[00:38:04] James: a fantastic change.

[00:38:05] Elijah: Yeah, for any bad habit you have of doing something, like, if you drink a lot, or like, if you do something a lot that's unhealthy, like junk food, Try to be like, I'll eat that tomorrow or like I'll eat that later.

[00:38:16] Elijah: There's thunder again

[00:38:17] James: Yeah. fun. Well, pivoting back here,

[00:38:21] James: you had mentioned earlier that there's a record on the way, so I'm guessing we've already kind of covered this, but what is next for Father Before Me?

[00:38:28] Elijah: yeah, so I started recording a new EP. I've been doing EPs, records EPs just they're easier to digest. It's easier for me to make, cheaper for me to make, while still putting out good product. I've been sitting on these songs for about a year now and we, we are putting out as the new EP is called Sapphire and the first single is going to be dropping this September around our actual first debut show.

[00:38:48] Elijah: we're playing our first debut show September 23rd. We're in the New York Long Island area. September 23rd. I'm very excited August 19th. I'm going and working with a videographer that I know very well, Alex of [00:39:00] Black Wolf Imaging.

[00:39:00] Elijah: I'm going to be throwing up a lot of BTS about it. that's the one thing that's cool is like for content, like doing something like that. weeks of content, just the music video creation alone. it's a four song EP, I'm doing two singles, first single will come out in September, and the second single will come out Thanksgiving, before Christmas, cause you should never release music around Christmas, if it's two weeks, three weeks before, sure, you're fine, but not the week of

[00:39:24] James: that's a uh, tough time frame.

[00:39:26] Elijah: Yeah, no, I mean it'll probably be earlier than that actually it might actually even come out in like hoping like middle of november. It's a lot of it's not being on a label or anything I'm kind of in control of everything.

[00:39:35] James: Which is very

[00:39:36] Elijah: my fault. Yeah, it's nice. But it's like I said, I go back to this all day It's a double edged sword It can be good because i'm in control, but I don't have anyone to really hold me accountable other than myself

[00:39:44] James: It's nice when you use your good habits to do it on time.

[00:39:48] Elijah: Yeah, and lately I have been collecting that and now we're pushing and the video shoots booked and the show is booked So like things will start

[00:39:56] James: I would say, while we're here, shout it out. show is September 23rd, where [00:40:00] is it, where can

[00:40:00] Elijah: so we're

[00:40:01] James: more information?

[00:40:02] Elijah: Yeah, September 23rd, we are playing Munostock in Huntington Long Island. Show is 25 at the door, 20 in advance tickets, and I have discounted tickets, while they last. I will drive to you, too, or mail them to you.

[00:40:15] James: And so if people want to hit you up, fatherbeforeme. com or fatherbeforeme on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok. Wherever they can find you, it's fatherbeforeme, which is a very good thing. You have a name that no one else has.

[00:40:27] Elijah: That's kinda, how that happened. I, I looked it up and saw that no one had the band name, and literally a week later I trademarked it.

[00:40:33] James: that's the way to do it. get in there early, there's no confusion and

[00:40:36] Elijah: The same day I came The only thing I don't have is father before me at gmail. com. So if you have father before me at gmail. com, I will buy it off you. I have father before me banned at gmail. com.

[00:40:47] James: Well, you also have fatherbeforeme. com, so you could, pony up the six bucks a month for uh, Google Workspace and you know, Elijah at fatherbeforeme. com.

[00:40:55] Elijah: Ooh.

[00:40:56] James: Looks super pro for uh, 72 a year.

[00:40:59] Elijah: That's not [00:41:00] bad. I pay about that for Nintendo Switch Online, so I think it's worth

[00:41:03] James: There you go. And, hey, since you make money on this, you can probably write it off as a business expense. I'm not a tax advisor or anything like that. Talk to your CPA. But can probably write that off.

[00:41:12] Elijah: You'd be surprised like I'm the kind of person where like I have a good conscious where like I try not to write off things unless I really think they're deemed worthy to write off like you can write off going to a show which I think is kind of silly because you're just going to a show like sure you want to do it I'm not judging but me personally I don't feel comfortable doing it I can say that buying a video game I technically could get that written off because I can be like it's to inspire me I only write off, expenses, things that I had really had to pay, my guitar, recording video costs, don't fuck with the IRS, man,

[00:41:41] James: Bad idea. But something like a business email,

[00:41:45] Elijah: yeah, that would, something I would feel comfortable, but I've talked to some people who like, it's ridiculous what they get written off. I'm just like, how, how do you do that?

[00:41:53] James: know people who are like, a business lunch. I'm like, how so? It's like, oh, well I'm taking my business partner to lunch. I'm like,

[00:41:59] Elijah: That's your bandmate.[00:42:00] Yeah.

[00:42:04] James: you do, but I'm not your CPA and I'm not the one who's going to get in trouble, so have fun. some people just write off way too much.

[00:42:10] Elijah: Yeah. I read off literally like just things that like I can't do. Like if I bought a new guitar I need a new guitar. Yeah. I'm going to write the guitar off. cost of recording, I think the cheapest I get with it, like it feels illegal, but I know it's not, is like the mileage I drive to the studio is the only other thing I get, it makes sense, that's a big cost for me, it's not gas, and it's not like, I don't do food or anything like that, but like mileage, because that's the most expensive thing,

[00:42:33] James: absolutely.

[00:42:33] Elijah: why I bought a car, really, I don't really need, own a car other than for music purposes, we could take the train if we really needed to but

[00:42:39] James: Yeah. Well, man. Before I let you go, any parting thoughts, anything you want to share with the podcast, whether it's about you, about habits, about something cool you learned that you just want to get off your chest, anything?

[00:42:52] Elijah: just kind words. I have to say that like if you're in a place where you feel like It's not happening and it's not working and you feel stuck [00:43:00] and you feel like just trapped just know that those fleeting moments will pass and Just keep your head above water and then you're gonna be okay like no matter what happens to you you're gonna be okay, And you're gonna get through whatever you're going through, musically, personally, mentally, physically, like, at one point or another, no matter what it is, no matter what is happening, those things will eventually pass, whether it's in this lifetime or the next, we're spiritual beings having a physical experience, we're not physical beings having a spiritual experience, I might have said that backwards.

[00:43:32] James: I got what you

[00:43:33] Elijah: You know what? I mean, you

[00:43:33] James: Thor was agreeing,

[00:43:35] Elijah: The Lord was like, yeah, dude, like, you know, just like hang on your butts because I promise you like it's gonna be okay, man you may be in the thick of it and thinking my god, it's fucking sucks will be fine.

[00:43:44] James: It all works out eventually.

[00:43:45] Elijah: Yeah, maybe not to the way you wanted or maybe you thought it would but like the universe has a way Binding things and whatever Passion you have just keep doing it no matter what you may think that like you're barely alive because you're struggling with your [00:44:00] passion, but like that little bit of your passion you're actually doing is what's keeping you alive.

[00:44:03] Elijah: it's not the other way around. what little you do with your passion is the thing that's keeping you alive. And when you give up on it thinking like, oh, like it's killing me, it's like, no, it's actually the thing that is keeping you going. You're just in such a spot that you don't, really realize it.

[00:44:17] James: yeah, hands down. Great advice. Elijah, man, thank you so much for coming on the show.

[00:44:22] Elijah: Thank

[00:44:23] James: At father

[00:44:23] Elijah: is

[00:44:23] James: me. Oh, dude, my pleasure. Like this is such enlightening chat or eye opening chat And I think it's going to help a lot of people so i'm really

[00:44:30] Elijah: I hope so, man. Yeah.

[00:44:32] James: anything we mentioned any artists any links anything like that will be in the show notes at bandhive.

[00:44:38] James: rocks Slash 193. the number 193. So bandhive. rocks slash 193 Man again, thank you so much. And I hope you have an amazing day.

[00:44:46] Elijah: You as well man, thank you so much