Welcome to Episode 78 of the Bandhive Podcast.

It is time for another episode of the Bandhive podcast. My name is James Cross and I'm not here with Matt Hoos of Alive in Barcelona. Unfortunately, he couldn't join us today, but I have a very special guest Chad call, How are you doing today, man?

Pretty good about yourself. Glad to hear that. And I'm doing well. Thanks so much for joining us today. It's going to be a really fun episode, I think because you do something that is kind of like a hidden gem of the music industry called Top lining, which is something that I didn't really know about until I heard you started doing it. And now it's like, well there's this whole industry here that a lot of people don't even think about if they're in a band, so I think that's really going to be something interesting for our listeners to hear about from you.

Of course. Well, I mean, me personally like growing up listening to primarily bands that was kind of like the setup because you know, you either had friends in high school that you that you knew that play different instruments and you formed a band and you have bought a van, a trailer and you hit the road and that was kind of the the only thing that I knew and then a handful of years ago I um got introduced to this company is funny enough, have you spoken to Nino before I know of No, no, but I can't say I've ever spoken with him for those who might not know a good friend of mine.

Nino lucarelli, he's another singer songwriter thats from pretty much the same area as me. We grew up playing local shows together in different bands and stuff and when I was just kind of trying to I don't know, explore different avenues and checked everything's out, I had heard what he was doing and he was working with this company out of the Netherlands, that's like this talent agency called Vocal Kitchen and basically their whole M. O is to take the songs that singer songwriters right? Like the top lines which like the vocals, you know, And shop them to different DJs because as we've seen over the past like 10, 15 years, especially a lot of DJs collaborate with vocalists and so it gives us kind of a unique chance to get our songs placed and get them heard.

And it's pretty much the complete invert of being in a band, I haven't played a show in like five years and I miss it, I miss it a lot, but there's definitely aspects that I think I prefer with this sort of lifestyle. Yeah, it seems like also, you know, for a while I love touring, I was on the road for about three years and then I met a girl and was like, I don't want to be on the road all the time anymore, like, I want to stay home, like, so I can definitely see how, depending on how different people feel about being away from home all the time, like maybe top lining is the way to go.

You can still make music and express yourself, but you don't have that grueling touring schedule all the time. Like that seems like a huge advantage. Yeah, it's definitely an advantage. I feel like it just kinda depends on what you're kind of goal is for this, this whole thing. There's people that love to be songwriters and not even sing and they don't even care if their names on certain things, they just want to like get paid and and that's it and then there's people that want to be the star and want to be, you know, in the spotlight, I feel like I live somewhere kind of in the middle because understand understanding my experience of what it was like to be in a band that's inevitably going to probably stick with me the rest of my life and kind of inform the choices I make to some degree for better for worse and then being able to write a song in my studio in phoenix and have some guy in Tokyo working on it is like such a cool experience of just like, you know from us listening to different bands and artists around the world, like there's a different flavor, different cultures and this, this and that, and it's really a fun, exciting thing to see like how they adapt what you wrote, you know?

Well, so that brings me to a question which I want to go down the rabbit hole of top lining more because I think there's so much to talk about their, but just before we jump into that, you mentioned that you grew up with Nino in the phoenix area and you're both in bands, what really got you started in music, like what piqued that interest? So there's one of my best friends to this day still his name's Adam Garrity, he lived down the street from me and we, you know, we've grown up together, we've been friends since we were like five and he had a drum set at his house and it was like, at the time it was like the holy grail of drum sets, like every piece of it was like the best symbols you could get the best heads.

The best pedals was just amazing kit and he would never let us play it. And so I think I waited until he went to the bathroom one time or like he left to go do something and I went in there real quick and I was just like trying to like mess around on it. And I didn't really have any interest in playing musical instruments until that sort of that time. Like, my dad played drums, you know, growing up and stuff. So I think that was kind of a little bit, maybe like uh in the blood a little bit.

But yeah, after I played on this kid, I was just kinda like, maybe I should get a, you know, a drum set and kind of explore this and see what's up and, you know, it kind of evolved from, remember I had this beat up? It was so punk, like the kid nothing was playable on it, the heads were dented in, looked like somebody used it as like a shield in battle or something, It was just dented and messed up, but I messed around a little bit on that.

And then for that christmas, that christmas of that year, I got my first kid and then I got the next one that I would use when I started touring and then I have my SJC kit, which I still have behind me, but uh yeah, it's just been that was kind of the kickoff point and then kind of throughout doing more touring and then, you know, kind of the way that that band was, We always had such a hard time landing a vocalist, It was just such a, such a task for us to have somebody that worked and I what I was, you know, kind of coming up a little bit, I played in a metal band that had a screamer and our singer left.

And so it was kind of one of those moments where like, we kind of just pass the mic around the room, whoever had like, the voice that people liked the best was the one that was gonna be the clean vocalist for that band. And so I ended up, you know, doing the clean vocals for that band, tucked in the back for a couple of years while I was doing, you know, Farewell My Love, and then ended up kind of getting to the position to where I was, you know, fully singing for that band.

And yeah, it's been a great learning experience. Nice. Well, you know, I mentioned earlier before the interview that I have a bit of a nerdy question, which was you're the drummer and the clean vocalist, Did you have a different drummer for your live shows or were you singing wild drumming? Well, for a while of doing farewell, I I did only like harmonies and like backups and stuff, so I would sing and do that because, I mean, I think one of my biggest inspirations growing up was Aaron Gillespie from Under Oath, and that was always his like, staple thing he did.

So that was a big inspiration, but when it came time to, for me to sing, we did have to have a different drummer live for many obvious reasons, I think, was that Phil Collins or something? Like they put his kit at the front of the stage. And so like I mentioned it to people and be like, why don't you just do the fill cons thing and just like push your kids? Like I love the whole, like being up in people's face and like walking on the crowd and doing the whole like, you know, experience. Yeah.

The reason I say it's an early question is the sound engineering me is like, that's really difficult to do, you know, like getting the lead vocals to cut through a mix with drums. Like I've seen a couple bands pull it off, you know, Phil Collins obviously is one of genesis, but I've seen some smaller like punk bands was one from Montreal, I can remember their name and a local band as well, but they're like a reggae band, the local band, so it's like not super loud, like a metal band would be playing so that the nerd and me wanted to know.

I also, when I was researching questions, there was a music video where I was watching him, like, you never see the drummers face, he's always cleverly hidden behind you or something else, or all that. I have the feeling he didn't play drums live. We went through so many lineup changes that at that point, when we were finally like, okay, I'm gonna sing for the band, this is going to be how it kind of moves forward. Like it got to the point where everyone we had played drums for us, we were like, really good friends with at that point.

So it wasn't like we were like, let's tuck them away, it was more so like we've had so many changes. This four is the four that this band is going to continue with. And there's no point in us trying to, like, brand another person and stuff like that. So, that was kind of more of the approach. But yeah, that would that would be hard thing. And so you have the vocals trying to cut them with the symbols. Exactly, especially for cleans. Like, it would get so messy in the mix.

But anyway, that's not what we're here to talk about today, as much as I'd love to turn out about audio and mixing for an hour, that's not what this episode's about. So, just to go through the basics of top lining for people who haven't heard of it before, you know, you mentioned that you are providing the vocals to a DJ when they need a vocalist. What's the process? Like, You know, if you could go from a dizzy on top lining. So there's a couple different processes as far as like the way that we work.

One of those is the owner of the company, Alan he's just developed a really big network of people that he's met throughout the course of time and they submit their instrumentals to the company and then the company then sends them to us and says, hey, this person is looking for this sort of thing. And usually what it comes with is there's like two different sort of links that we have, we have the links to the tracks and then we have a link that's like uh this sheet that usually has like, let's say for instance that somebody is like a progressive house DJ and they really want to have a song like Calvin Harris or something, then they would put in the reference tracks some songs that they wanted to sound like.

Or if they want a male or female or you know, if they want us to avoid certain lyrics that are, you know, more this or more that sort of topics. So there's that way of getting the tracks, writing lyrics and a vocal melody over the, over the top of it, then recording that and then sending it back into vocal kitchen and then they pitch it to the client or there's the method of just kind of doing it very grassroots and either starting with an acoustic guitar or basic piano part and coming up with kind of the bare bones idea of what the song is going to be and then just kind of sending that in and then they could kind of, you know, based off of whatever sort of leaning that it has.

Like, for instance, if I write a song that's at 150 bpm, like that's way too fast for progressive house music. Maybe they'd want to shop that to like clients that do hard style or clients that do hip hop or like a modern pop sort of stuff. So those are the two sort of methods that we do. And I think switching back and forth between the two makes it kind of a fun and sort of freeing process for me when you're describing the second version, where you start with just the basics, you're not writing with any specific song or beaten mind.

That's just a general thing that they will then go and see if there's a fit, they'll pitch it, but you're not writing it knowing like I'm writing it for this person to consider sometimes that's the case because sometimes DJs rather than approaching him and saying, hey, here's an instrumental. Like there might be somebody that's like, hey, I'm looking for some folk inspired stuff. Do you guys have any folk inspired songs? And then he'll either say yes, we do and, and compile a list together for him and send it over or he would approach us and be like, hey, they're looking for something that's kind of in this sort of vein.

Let's try to see if we can make this for them. So it's a couple different ways. We try to be as open as we can because like, music is so interesting in the way that it works. It's, it's this sort of thing where I always say it is until it isn't, that's like my, my quote, that I say all the time because I'm just like, nobody cares about pop punk in the mainstream until they do, right? And then nobody cares about emo music and live guitars and live drums until they do.

And that's just like how things have been over the course of time. And so I try to just keep in mind like the song writing structuring of like the way that things go. Keep in mind just different aspects to like what makes a song a good song and like be PMS and things like that. But I have this thing that I feel like is I'm like pretty married to as far as like any song that I write and it's I feel like I have to put my stamp on it and find some way to disrupt the peace if I'm writing a pop song, that's 1 28 you know, it's got the kind of four on the floor kick.

I'm like, where can I put some interesting lyrics in here that are kind of like very, you know, kind of different because I just think that it's especially when you're writing something that's going to be kind of left behind, you know, for the end of time, I feel like it's I I owe it to people to be as, uh, at my best, which I believe is being fully creative and, you know, injecting as much of myself into the songs I write as possible. Yeah. Kind of break up the monotony, I guess.

Like, you don't want to write just another regular pop song that a team of songwriters could have written for, who knows what artist you want to stand out and be unique. Yeah, absolutely. Because the thing that I've not necessarily struggled with this whole time, but it's been definitely a key thing about me is, you know, I didn't grow up listening to just one genre of music. Like I, my mom was very into Michael Jackson and my dad was very into rock music, like journey and stuff of that nature.

And so I grew up around that and then, you know, I was heavily, heavily inspired by, I guess the quote unquote emo bands like my cam or the used, I wouldn't put a f I in that category, but nonetheless, you know, bands like that, so it bleeds into my riding and it bleeds into my singing because like, this is what I grew up loving. So, for a while there, I felt like I was almost having to kind of diminish it a little bit because I'm like, oh, well, this isn't what, you know, Justin Bieber this person would do.

And I'm like, well, again, it is until it isn't like, maybe like some of the stuff that's on Bieber's new album, like the guitars and stuff, I'm like, you would not catch him doing that stuff like a couple of years ago, but now he is, you know, and if you if you're constantly fixated on writing music that sounds like what's out right now and that's it, it's going to make stuff obsolete. So I just try to like, I don't know, just follow what my gut tells me to do and just trust that.

That's the way. Yeah, I think that's a great point. Like right now, you know, M. G. K. S pop punk album came out what about six months ago? And there's been such an influx of local artists who are trying to sound exactly like M. G. K. It's like well if you like that, do something similar but put your own twist on it. If you just rip it off entirely that's no one's gonna listen to you because they can listen to the real thing. They can go listen to M. G. K. And that happens like you know 10 years ago.

It was or maybe not even 10 years ago, five years ago. Everyone was trying to rip off the black keys like there's every time there's a big new sound everyone tries to do that and no one does it as well as the original, anytime that Bring Me the Horizon tries to do anything. The thing I always said was I was like when Bring Me The Horizon drops an album the entire scene changes every single time. Even Architect that one that one got me like I love the new Bring Me stuff more than their old stuff.

But when architects went from the brutal sounds that they had on lost Forever, Lost Together, and then they put out a song that sounds like New Bring Me. I just like really? It's that kind of thing though. We're like, that's what's sort of hard is that like, how do you as a band decide if that's gonna work for you, if you're gonna be the band that's going to be able to make that work and uh, sound sonically different or if it's just not going to connect well, like, I think under oath on their recent record, I love that album.

I thought it was so good. It did such a good job in my opinion of sort of marrying the radio rock sort of world with kind of where they came from. But ted or miss, you know. Yeah, it is kind of the thing that any of the bands that are still around from the mid two thousands, like the used has done it. Silverstein has done it. I mean, a beautiful place to drown was one of the top albums of the year. It came back in november 2019 or 2020 but I love that album, like, that's a great album, and it sounds so different, but it's amazing, you know?

And um, they were definitely inspired by Bring Me The Horizon, I think, but it wasn't a straight rip off of Bring Me and that's what I think. To me, it was like, hey, I like to bring the record. This sounds kind of like it, but it also still sounds like Silverstein like meeting in the middle, kind of, But before I take us way off topic here, turning out about music, is there a big difference between writing songs for your own band versus writing for top lining, assuming you're, you know, starting from scratch rather than your writing over someone else's beat.

There's definitely less of a brand because when you, when you're in a band, like, let's say, I don't know, I'm just say f because they're on the brain. So, you have a f i you say the name, you get immediately a visual, you get nearly impossible to play bass parts, you get jades, you know, very tasteful and jangly guitar parts, you know, with his, with his leads and his effects and stuff, and you have out, I'm just so solid. And then you have Davey with his 1000 ISMs, but with a band, you have such a tight brand that, like, that's why you see so often times, like fans, they will be like, this band sold out of this band change, or this is that, like, there's there's less leeway with what you can do, especially the deeper you get in your career I believe.

So with me like being in the band like our band was like we called ourselves the theatrical rock band so that was kind of our M. O. So like we're not going to go in there and write like a dan and Shay song because that doesn't fit the brand and even if it was a great song, like you wouldn't catch us writing that because it doesn't fit the brand in doing things like that sometimes I don't know that you're always making the best choices like when you when you're trying to fit like a narrative and that's one of the things I love about this is like I love to listen to dan and Shay song, I also want to go listen to like Kanye West or you know something that's totally the invert and I think this allows me to kind of express myself to the fullest degree and not have to worry about the specifics of it because although my name is on these songs and like I might even sing on them and have like a featuring credit, our main artist credit.

Like it's not, it's just not the same, it's just not the same sort of processes. Like if it was just my name on it yeah, it's kind of like it gives you more creative freedom to go do what feels right for the song rather than what feels right for the brand I guess. Right. Exactly, absolutely. The thing we always say is that the song is king. one of the things I struggled with a lot over the course of me writing songs was you know, I don't drink, I don't do drugs, I'm married.

Like I just, there's just so many things that like, it doesn't really supply for this like crazy lyric. I'm like, I watched, I watched goose bumps, I eat popcorn, I put with my dog and I'm married and I don't, I don't party. Like it's just, it's not this crazy thing, you know? So I was like, I think it was last year when I was really taking another look at my song writing in my lyric writing and I was like, kind of saying I was kind of inspired by like Elton john or somebody like that.

It's like such a storyteller, even bob Dylan, like somebody that like that and I was like, I don't have to always tell my story. Even if I'm singing it. Like the most you're going to get is some guy some troll online on like Youtube being like, why is he saying that he's getting, you know, messed up on alcohol if he doesn't drink? I'm like, I'm just telling somebody's story because that's the thing about songwriting that I believe that I owe people the most as a songwriter is if I wrote only lyrics that resonated with me and that's it, I'm only hitting one specific person, whereas maybe I would write a song that's like about, you know, relapsing on drugs or doing something like that or partying too hard or things like that and somebody hears that and they're like, damn, that's me, I can relate with that.

And so I found a lot of freedom and power in that and just realizing that like, if I'm telling a story in these lyrics and it's not mine, it's okay. Like let people judge you if they may about being the one that's singing the words that you can't necessarily relate with. But I don't know, I see myself as kind of a little bit of a filter. You know what I mean? A filter for um for the public to kind of just take my discography and rip it apart and kind of see what parts fit them and hopefully I can help some people out there. Yeah.

You know, I think that's a great tip for songwriters. Um that brings two examples to mind. One is around here, we have a great local artist by the name of Troy Mallette. He writes a lot of songs and he's he'll joke about it all day long. He's also hilarious on stage, but uh, he'll joke about the fact that like, half his songs are about girls, he just imagined like they're not actual people in any way. And he's just like, you know, what could have been like, and he'll write a song about that or he'll write a song about like the time he and his best friend started beating each other up in like their college quad because they were fake wrestling.

And then one of them punch the other one too hard. And he turned it into his song about his hometown, like stuff like that. And you know, you can base it on real things, but you don't have to be literal about it. You know, it's not like you're writing a book report, you're writing a song, you can be creative, which leads me to um Better Man by Pearl Jam. Is it any better? I think is their singer? Better Man was about his childhood, but he changed it so much.

Like three quarters of the song stuff that never actually happened, but it was inspired by his childhood. And um, you know, I saw like a 10 minute documentary on the song last week, so I'll put that in the show notes, That band, I've got rocks slash 78. If anyone else wants to go watch that, I definitely recommend it. It's a great little Youtube documentary, but I think that's a great example of what you're saying is like, you can go out there and write a song and, you know, at any point, correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm not a songwriter, This is just what I'm hearing from, like, other artists, but you can go out there and write a song and it doesn't have to be something that's happened to you.

Like, it can be whatever you want it to be, because that's creative freedom. Like, you know, I don't think Van Gogh actually saw the stars in starting night that way. He just said, hey, I'm going to paint it this way. Like you can do that with a song. The thing that it kind of goes back to is a really big issue that the world has in general is feeling like the things we create or the ways that we dress to, the ways that we look, you know, just anything that's involving like something personal from us, we feel like we need to get somebody else's stamp of approval on it in order to go forward with it and it's this horrible, horrible flaw in the way that we are and everybody is guilty of it.

So I'm not speaking from this position to being like, oh, that's not me. I feel sorry for these people, like that's totally me. You know, like before you post something on instagram, you're like, how many, like this is going to get like, what sort of caption should this have and you know, when you let that influence your art, you're just diminishing it. I actually had a thought today when I was at the gym, I was like thinking about songwriting and I was like, you know, imagine you write this song that you love and everybody you show just loves it.

Like this is a great song, you know, for whatever reason, maybe the lyrics are good, the melodies good. Maybe it just all connects you show some other guy and he says, this is awful. You should do something more like this or less like this, all this sucks. So you're then put in a position to where you either cater to that or you stick to what you're doing because the same reasons why somebody might hate, you might be the same reasons why another might love you. And it's a really big decision that you have to make as an artist, you know, when you're writing songs and stuff because like the top lining businesses, like any other business, especially within the entertainment industry where, you know, you're having a bunch of highs and everything's going really great, then maybe have a little bit of a low time, Maybe it's mediocre that it's the biggest point you've ever had and then you're back down again.

It's kind of like this. And I believe that during those times is when you're really, really tested your, your will of what you're going to commit to and what ideals that you're going to believe in. And uh yeah, I mean, I would just say to anybody out there creating art, like I said the other day, I said, artists ask yourself do you want to change the scene or do you want to blend in with it? Because it's a big point. You know, there's not really necessarily a wrong answer.

It's just kind of, what do you want? Like what's your intention? Yeah, I definitely agree with that. But I also want to push back on it just a little bit. Because if you think about the bands who have made it like, you know, my Chemical Romance or A F. I. They changed the scene, they didn't blend in, they went above and beyond and changed it and that's why they are, who they are. You know, like there's tons of other bands. I love like um you know, Bayside great band and amazingly talented.

But I would say that nothing that they have ever done would really be considered a groundbreaking, like they're amazing. But there's nothing really super unique about them aside from maybe Anthony's vocalist, like he has a voice like no one else and you know, they have achieved success, but not on the level that A. F. I or my cam or even the used has. And I think that's like a good example of you can still make a living with music by doing what other people do if you put in the work.

But I think it's really difficult to Get like #1 on the Billboard charts. You know, not that people even really care about that so much anymore. It's cool, you know, it's awesome. Like it when people do it, but it's not like it was 15 years ago when that actually meant like, dude, you're huge now, it's like, oh cool. Like you had a bunch of people streaming you like nice, you got a few cents. The time when we had a december Underground is like a that was a number one album, right, if I remember correctly.

Or was it two on the billboard? 200 yeah, I think it hit number one. People you speak to nowadays have no fathomable idea of just how batshit crazy that is. Yeah. First of all, like I think things are changing a little bit, so I think we're going to see, you know, bands having more success, especially with, you know, artists like M. G. K. Kind of leading the charge with the sound and stuff. But I remember seeing that there was such a cool time because you flip on VH1, you'd watch Promiscuous by nelly Furtado and then you'd watch Miss Murder.

They were sandwiched, there was no mercy with like trying to adhere to a certain crowd. It was Beyonce and then it was gerard way. You know, it was just these things that are just so oppositional, but just like we're sandwiched together. So I think it's a it should give everyone a lot of hope, I think especially if you're out there trying to grind it out on the road and do the whole band thing that like there is potential for the genre still, you just cannot adhere to the rules because that's the thing that I think both bands and artists struggle with a lot of the time is thinking that we have any sort of play in what happens with our career.

How many bands have said we're going to change this scene that we're gonna be the biggest band in the world and I've actually done it and it's it's not it's not just to slant that mindsets. I think that mindset is wonderful, it's it's a great driving force, but bands like My Camera they used and stuff man, those are just like four or five guys in a garage that were just unique individuals and how they saw the world and the music that they made was undeniable. And it's it's one of those things where it irritates us as creatives when, when we want to, we want to recreate that magic.

We want to, we want to have that moment for ourselves. But the thing we got to realize is the only way to improve our chances with putting a stamp on this world is to just be ourselves to the fullest degree. Yeah, I want to add to that. But real quick I looked up december underground. It debuted at number one with 100 and 82,000 copies. 182,000 copies in the first week. That's so good. I was one of those kids dude, I had no idea how how, how things worked back then, like, for whatever reason, I wasn't on the internet a whole lot.

And so I remember I got my wisdom teeth pulled out and I was sitting on the couch and they had the making of Miss Murder on all day long. It was just over and over and over and over. So I was just sitting watching this, and that's how I discovered them. And I was like, okay, cool, the making of videos on VH one, so the album must be out, right? And so I went to Best Buy, and I was like, do you guys have this album? Like, this doesn't come out for like a month.

Remember I came out on 666? So that was really tight. Yeah, it's amazing. Like, if I was so regular with three years, three months between albums for the longest time, and then they broke that now. It's been like four years, five years. It's like, no, no, it got worse. You should have been releasing more music. But anyway, you know, I think what you were saying a second ago before I brought up the stats there is really interesting because it's that magic of making music that's unique, but that people connect with.

So on last episode number 77 we had brian Mazaheri of I fight Dragons on the show. If anyone wants to hear that great interview, I definitely recommend it. It's at band, I've got rocks slash 77. And one of the things that he said was when he was first starting out with his music career, he was making the music that he wanted to make, that he thought was going to, you know, blow up and he wanted to really push his music. But then as soon as he realized that if he made music that people want while still staying true to what he wanted to do, that's when things started taking off for them.

It was that shift of you make the music you want to make, but you don't set your goals to change the world. You set your goals to change people's lives. That's essentially what he was saying. And like that's how a band takes off. And you know, I Fight Dragons isn't as big as they used or any of those bands, But they have consistently been putting out albums that are entirely funded by their fans. Like, you know, they're not full time artists, but they can dump 40 grand into an album and be like, yeah, our fans paid for all this.

Like we didn't have to pay anything out of pocket. And to me like that's better than like a major label advance in most cases because like, a lot of times the smaller artists, if you get a major label deal, it'll be like, oh, you know, here's like 10-K. To record. And it's like, okay, that covered half our costs. Yeah, now we have to pay the other half out of pocket and you own the masters to the album. Like, ouch, nowadays, especially with like how massive Soundcloud and like, all those rappers that came out of that sort of scene are.

Like, I don't think fans care anymore. I mean, I feel like back in the day, like when even I was doing the band thing, it was like such a, like a street cred like stamp of approval to be like, like my bands on Fearless or my bands on Rise, or like there's just a handful of of those labels that were kind of the, the labels that, you know, with the tent at warped tour that you kind of just looked at, and you were just like, striving to kind of be like that.

And again, it's not a slant to any of that, because that's still a great, great route for a lot of great artists out there. But I think that it's not necessarily a necessity anymore, especially if you can find some funding. Yeah. That makes me think of another example that I used last week, which is the main, and I think they're from phoenix to, aren't they? Oh my God, yes, they do. They they're like, that band is such a mystery to me, because they consistently get more independent and bigger, and I'm just like, trying to figure out like, what's going on, because because again, we, like, we can't accept it.

Like, maybe it's just like, meant to be, you know? Yeah. Now I'll tell you, the number one thing is they're smart and the number two thing is they work hard. They were out there on warped tour and I've told this story on the podcast a bunch, but they were playing I think was 2016, They were on the main stage of Warped tour and they were out in the lines before Gates opened every single day. I did not see any other major label bands or main stage bands doing that.

They'd send out, you know the merch guy or the merch girl and they'd sell Cds, but the band would not be out in lines selling their own cities, signing stuff for their fans that's hustle. And then for the smart aspect for the album that came out two or three years ago, I can't remember which one it was, but they actually had the opportunity for every single one of their fans to get their name in the liner notes of the deluxe version of the album. Oh yeah, yes, I remember that.

That's genius. As you know what, anyone who has their name in there who entered is gonna be like, oh now I got to buy it and make sure they actually put me in there. So if they get 10,000 fans to sign up for that, guess what? They just told 10,000 extra coffees, like those little things that, first of all giving fans the opportunity to be in the liner notes. That's huge. Like that's one of the things I fight Dragons does. If you support them on Patreon at the right level, they'll put you in the liner notes.

And so the main made it free knowing that hey, if we do this, people are going to go buy it. Like those little things that had so much value to a fan's life, because who wouldn't want to be in their favorite bands liner notes, piece of history. Yeah, exactly, and it's something that costs practically nothing to set up and print, like, you might have to print a few extra pages of a booklet that cost you, you know, Let's say an extra 20 cents per copy, but you sell an extra 10,000 copies, like, dude, that's amazing.

So just having artists like that who are so conscious of what they do, I think is amazing. And also is making me realize how much bigger the phoenix music scene is that I realized like you have jimmy world, you have the main, you're there, there's so many bands out of phoenix, which I feel like it's almost like a sleeper city. Like everyone thinks of L A. Nashville new york, sometimes Chicago, and then there's phoenix, like there's big bands coming out of there, and that was probably like, why, another reason why, you know, I would want to form a van in the first place because like, like there was there was waves, right?

There's waves of like different eras because that we had, you know, Jimmy World Chester Bennington was from phoenix. Oh, no way. He had a local band called Gray Days that my dad like saw it like a mall one time. So we had that sort of era and then when I was coming up, we had sort of two different things happening at the same time. We had bless the Fall, Greeley Estates, the word Alive, Like that side of like metal job for a cowboy knights of the Abyss, And then we had the other side which was the total in vert, which is like the Somerset, the main, the format, which you know, a couple of those numbers ended up becoming fun to anybody who is curious.

But yeah, it's just it's was such a change of pace was another big one. But yeah, we um, we had it going on for a good minute. There's there's definitely probably still bands out there killing it and coming up and stuff. But my radar is just a little off. But yeah, it was a cool time to be coming up and playing shows and yeah, just a really great local scene, man. Yeah, that sounds amazing. And you know, as much as I said, I didn't want to sidetrack noting out about music.

Let's do it. Here. I am having sidetracked us so much. But it's like, it's all still good information. You know, like what you're saying about the split in the scenes, what that makes me think of is people talk about like, oh, you know, like the X. Y. Z. City music scene sucks, but there's like 20 different scenes in your local scene. Like just because you know, the eighties hardcore punk scene might be dead. Doesn't mean that, you know, the pop scene is dead. Like maybe you're just in the wrong city for the type of music you play?

Like there's a scene for most genres out there. It just depends on finding it totally, man. Well, and that that's people tend to be really dramatic and they're like, I want to play this like crust punk stuff and it doesn't exist. So this scene sucks. You know I mean? Dude, like when my band was first coming up in the scene, everybody hated us as far as like, like the local scene because we weren't metal, we weren't wearing the basketball shorts and the V necks and we weren't pop.

You know what I mean? Like we looked like black veil, brides are motley Crue or something. You had branding. I know, God forbid, right? But no, it's uh it's one of those things where if the scene isn't what you wish for it to be like, if anything that's tight, like build it yourself because like the e mo like punk rock, post hardcore scene that warped tour ended up becoming so infamous for like kind of housing that started by handfuls of bands. There's so many podcasts I listen to and I realized that like, there's so many hubs like these bands, like we're friends and they came up together and stuff and just like what these guys know each other and they are from the same place and it's I don't know man, like a lot of talent out there, there's a lot of potential to push uh push new genres out there.

So. Absolutely. And I think that's also what you're mentioning there is that when the artists come up, they bring along the people that they know like and trust that's how to make connections, you don't necessarily have to make the best music. You have to make good music and you have to be trustworthy and be friends with the right people. Like and I'm not saying be fake friends. I'm saying like you genuinely have to befriend the right people, you can't fake it. Like people can smell that a mile away and if you do it right and you befriend the right people genuinely then that's great.

But if you don't it's gonna be a rough ride. Yeah, absolutely. If it even turns into a ride, yeah, you might get a flat tire leaving the driveway. Yeah, absolutely man. Yeah. Well, hey, I wanna pivot back to uh, top lining here because there's a couple more questions I want to get in and I would also, you know, I want to be respectful of your time. But one thing I think that is going to be on a lot of artists minds are, you know, hey, I'm in a band, but you know, we're not full time as a band yet.

Can I still do top lining as a side hustle? Yeah, absolutely. Well that question kind of really depends on the agency you're working with and the genre that you're in and what sort of deal that you sign like. So in this instance I'm exclusive of local kitchen. So they are my exclusive publisher. And that's a lot of that's where like 90 of my like time that I dedicate to this sort of stuff goes. But I mean, you can always do, like, there's different deals you can do where it's like a song to song basis or it's kind of like slightly dipping your foot in the water.

But it really just kind of comes down to the genre itself because I'm very familiar with top lining in the world that I'm in. But then there's probably a world of top lining. That's like a different genre music that I'm totally like, not as well versed in, but that's the thing that's so great about top lining is imagine if you were to try to be in like five bands, like that's that's a recipe for disaster. You know, a lot of what being in a band is, is being with the band in their local city and practicing with them and collaborating, like, in a real way.

Whereas with top lining you can do that. The options still there. I've done that before, and it's wonderful. But you're not limited to it. I mean, like, dude, during Covid, we had no choice but to do the zoom sessions. And up until that point, I had really only written with my great friends, Nino. And then Bryant Powell. I don't know if you were my friend Tyler Blin, but he's another another great friend of mine. But those were, I was like, kind of like my az crew of people that I'd write with.

And then after Covid, it was just only zoom. And I found myself writing with people from Germany and from, you know, the the UK and the Netherlands and just different places. And I'm like, dude, this kind of kicks ass, like there was this manager guy I was speaking to the other day and he was talking about how his clients like, or like I'm waiting to a covid over to do like any sessions because I don't want to do zoom and this and that. And I was like, dude, like, I've had such a good time, because here's the thing, it's so efficient, man, you call them up, you block out a specific amount of time, hour or two, you get the song done, you hop off and then a lot of the times I'll go record it right there and then start producing, so to loop back around, because I also got sidetracked if you're in a band and you want to do top lining on the side, you absolutely can do that.

It's just a matter of knowing what genre that you want to try to dip your feet into and just kind of doing the best to balance everything out and how much time you want to give to each thing. Yeah, first of all, just the remote sessions thing, That's amazing. And I've seen so many people do remote production for bands, like people in my community of engineers, it's truly amazing what you can do. People will be like working from Toronto, you know, and the producers in Nashville or vice versa, like stuff like that is amazing and it's something that we couldn't do 10 years ago because the internet was so slow and now it's like normal, unexpected.

There's a new technology, I feel like a dinosaur talking about like this, there's an app or something that exists now. I was watching an interview with Mark Hoppus and he was talking about how they're working on the new blank record with john Feldmann and how you can literally open a pro tools session and they're both in the exact same session writing at the same time. So, so john will be like, you know, hey, here's this guitar riff. And then Mark will be like, okay, let me track it real quick and then internet there it is in the pro tools session.

I'm like, dude, that is so game changing because 90 of the time what you're looking for is the studio, if you don't need the studio anymore, boom, If anything, this is the time where band should be the most stoked because like there's so many little hacks to like just so many aspects of these plug ins you can put on your guitars that like legitimately sound like Eddie van Halen, like AMP, you know what I mean? And it's just like, it's just a click away, you know, it's just about being open minded to it, I think. Yeah.

And you know, on that note, you mentioned that the manager didn't want to do any recording. I've seen so many artists who are saying, you know, while Covid is going on, it just doesn't seem right, you know, post on social media and put out content and this and that's like if you don't want to post, that's fine. But all the other artists who are posting and are putting out content, they're going to be 10 miles ahead of you by the time Covid is over because they've been working this whole time and you've been sitting home watching netflix, like, and you know, nothing wrong with that.

But if you want to sit home and watch netflix, then that's your career is sitting at home and watching netflix, that's what, that's what your career is gone anyway, as we wrap things up here. First of all, thank you so much for taking out the time to uh to talk about Vocal Kitchen and music in general, this has been such a blast. What advice would you give to a singer or songwriter who wants to get started with top lining, where should they start? Well, here comes the plug guys.

Here comes the plug. I mean if anybody's ever interested in doing anything in top lining, I believe that the company I'm with Vocal Kitchen does an amazing job at this. The amount of artists that I speak to that are struggling to get their songs heard and struggling to feel like they can get their their talents out there and stuff is immense and I've seen through this process that, you know, granted this is not like my soul piece of income yet, it's been such a blessing to be able to create something from the concert of my house and sell it to these, you know, these clients that they have and it's such a fun process man and it's a cool way to get out there.

I feel like this is the new way, because, you know, in this sort of climate that we're in, I'm not releasing Chad Kowal solo music, I'm releasing Chad Kowal with the DJ and a lot of times those DJs are signed with a label and they have their connections to playlist placement and label marketing push and you know, contact creation and that sort of stuff. So I mean if anybody is interested in in top lining there's definitely a lot of companies out there that might be for you, but I would definitely check out its vocal Kitchen dot com.

We're always looking for new vocalists to join the roster, new singer songwriters that can bring, you know, something wonderful to the table, so yeah, awesome, thank you. And then if people want to learn more about you, where should they go? It will be uh at Chad Kowal on all social media. All right Chad well, thanks again for joining us. This has been a blast and I hope you have an awesome rest of your day, you as well man, thanks for having me. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. That does it for this episode of the Bandhive podcast.

Thanks so much to each and every one of you for tuning in and listening to learn about your music career. Super big. Thanks as well to Chad Kowal for coming on the show, to talk about top lining in vocal kitchen and of course also all the amazing side conversations we had, and you know, I know I'm so guilty of side tracking this one a lot, but Chad and I came up not in the same scene geographically, but listening to a lot of the same bands, so being able to talk about different things we've seen in this world, this genre of artists doing innovative things that was so much fun, so I'm really looking forward to seeing what you all think of this episode, because there's so much to learn.

You know, I keep mentioning the main over and over, this is probably the third or fourth time I've mentioned them, but they really have such a good strategy and business model. It really works for them. It's paying off and, you know, same thing for bands like Ballyhoo, who we talked to back on episode 48 they've been doing that for such a long time and it's finally paying off for them. You can find that at Bandhive dot Rocks slash 48 if you want to listen to it. And of course, the same for the interview last week with brian from I Fight Dragons number 77 at Bandhive dot Rocks slash 77 another artist who really is showing that they've taken some outside the box ideas to make what they want to do work and pay for their career essentially.

So it's really useful to think outside of the box like this. And maybe top lining is one of those things where you think outside of the box, if you're not constantly writing or touring, if you have some downtime that you want to fill with more songwriting, vocal kitchen or top lining through another agency might be a really good move for you. So I definitely encourage you to check it out. Thanks again for listening. We really appreciate it. And if you have any episode requests any topic requests, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at band.

I've got rocks on instagram or you can email me directly. James at Bandhive dot rocks. That's the domain name is banned. Hive dot Rocks. Thanks again for listening. We'll be back with another new episode next Tuesday at six a.m. Eastern time. Until then have a great week. Stay safe. And of course, as always, keep rocking.