Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Metal Mastermind Podcast. I'm your host, Ken Kanellis, and today I'm with a special guest, Derek Cruz. Derek, why don't you introduce yourself to our audience and just talk a little bit about, you know, what you do on a daily basis and then we'll get it deeper into that. OK, hey, yeah, as Ken said, my name is Derrick Cruz.
I am a producer, multi instrumentalist, musician, advocate for all things music so doesn't matter if it is in the business side of it or if it's just playing and rocking and jamming my friends. So yeah, my day-to-day is pretty much wake up, find the music in the world and figure out how to squeeze some more out of it. That's amazing. So actually, yes, OK, we're, we're still recording, just making sure we're actually trying this as a new thing
today. We're doing in person podcasting, which is a little different than we've always done this. And you guys have seen a couple of the things with me and Elizabeth. But having a guest here on Metal Mastermind in person like this outside of our immediate closest relatives is actually quite exciting. So we're going to get into it now. I want to just start off by asking you, Derek, your sort of background. What was it like when you were growing up?
Were you always involved in music or did this kind of spring on to you over time? What was your upbringing in music like? OK. Yeah. So honestly, from an early age, there was always music around my house. My parents are both musicians, so my father plays. He is an engineer. He worked in the music store when I grew up. So there was always music around. My mother's singer, she sang with Sammy Davis Junior when she was 19 years old.
And they had careers. They were, it was the 70s and the 80s, you know, they grew up playing. So like from that there was always great music around. I stole the records when I was old enough to understand it, you know, mostly a show tunes collection. But, you know, some Zeppelin here, some really Joel there,
some good stuff. You know, so that my grandmother was amateur Jingle writer, so she kind of taught me piano early on. And so, yeah, like from that, you know, you had a little kid drum set when you were, you know, really young and having just the encouragement of that. My father being an engineer, he had a studio when I was like, yeah, hi. And it was in a, it was in a plywood like closet that he built.
And he had old Yamaha speakers hanging on chains and like an old Macintosh LC2 or something with like no RAM. And they would make records in the, in the laundry room with eggshell on the walls and, you know, do the thing. So that's, that was my home environment growing up in that world. And going to the music store. I, if I wanted to skip school, they would take me, he would
take me to the music store. So I'm surrounded by, you know, old, angry, you know, music store, guitar freaks and all sorts of weird. Character changes as. No, they're all the same. It's always the same. They heard the same people. From Guitar Center all the way back to my childhood ace music in Miami. So, yeah, like through that, like, you know, I got a love of, of music and appreciation of the lifestyle and the whole thing.
And it led to around like I, I want to say I was maybe like 8 that that there was this after school program called the Singing Suns right in Florida. And they were a boy choir that would train people at a certain level that they believe could sing and, you know, hadn't had pitch and things. And they would train them at like a college degree of theory, composition and and sight reading and that kind of thing intervals. So like after school I would be going, you know, three times a week.
And then after a certain point, there were multiple choirs and you get to a point where you're touring. So then by the time I was 12, I was touring the UK and this choir and doing, you know, these international choir performances, singing in Latin, French and German and all these crazy languages. What's? That like at at a young age, you know, being involved in music and then having to experience like a tour at that age, like,
were you nervous? Did you have like stage fright or was it kind of natural over time? Where are you just a natural at it? Well, it's funny, all right. I have a good, I have a good story for you. All right. So, so early on, the director really like kind of thrusted me into like, I guess because of my personality, a lot of the boys in the choir, they all we we had like a click and a thing. So I was kind of in almost leader position.
So he would if if I was messing around, he'd he'd pull me aside, be like, they look to you. You can't mess around like that. Hey, you can't play Patty cake in the court, you know, the actual Patty cake. So, you know, it's like, come on, you got to you got to adults up a little bit. So when we go, when we would go over, right, like, yeah, like we would have to do some of the the higher tier singers would have to do like solo competition. And that's where the pressure
you're like, I'm by myself. I don't have all, you know, 40 of the other guys with me to do this. So the second tour I ever did, the first in in England, which was crazy because you know, you're 12 years old and you're touring at another country and your parents are just going like, OK, here you go. Have fun. It's. Like I don't know what. I'm doing right, Like what am I doing here? You know, there's adults watching you.
So the second tour we went to San Francisco, which was, you know, not as glamorous as the UK, but still fun because, you know, I'm 13, you know, there's some cute girls from Finland I'm liking. There's always a dance at the end of it for all of us. But that competition in England, I didn't win anything, but in that competition I got second
place. So at the end of the performing or the week that you're there performing against all these international choirs, you know, Japan, Germany, China, they're all there right in Piedmont, CA, like just outside of San Francisco, you have to sing in front of all the choirs at the final concert, which is in this like 10,000 person auditorium and all the patrons who enjoy this kind of thing. So I'm little 13 year old me, and I have to go sing in front
of 1015 thousand people. And this is like crazy to me. And I'm backstage, like waiting to go out to call your name. I walk up to the stage now. The stage was like a plywood, you know, like, like what we're used to, you know, at some like lower tier festivals or something like that. Little rickety. Yeah, I'm excited. You know, I'm in my little suit and I'm a fat I, I for my whole life, I was just run upstairs, right? And I always like very quickly, I want to get up, get it over
with. So a couple steps and I snack on my face. Like I fall right on my face in front of 15,000 people. Now you've never heard 15,000 people. Heard around the world 15,000 without Will Smith involved so. A couple more zeros. So you've never heard 15,000 people laugh at you, right? I mean like outright laughing, right? So now I'm like, OK, I got to get up. I got to dust myself off. And I take a couple more steps. I almost trip again and I hear a gasp, right?
Like you hear it. And then I get on stage. Finally, I'm in front of the microphone. It's a straight stand and I sing my song, which is a silly little, you know, song. I got me a cat. That's a silly little farm song almost. So at the end of it, right, it's through the whole thing. My legs are shaking like you can see the micro stand just going like this because I'm I'm that nervous like it.
And it was that rickety of a stage and going from the most embarrassing moment of your life to the one of the more satisfying with a standing applause and like the, you know, the standing ovation. So like the humility is there. It's like I've fallen in my face in front of 15,000 people. Once you do that, I think you're pretty much like, OK, I can do.
It well, so that that actually brings up a really interesting perspective of, you know, approaching live sound and being a part of, you know, the music scene for an audience is that I mean, you have to kind of go through an experience and it doesn't have to be necessarily traumatic, but I do think that that helped you, that helped you, you know, allowed you to kind of shrug off the nerves and like, oh, I've had a really bad moment in my past before for this kind of thing that I mean,
it'd have to really go pretty far for where to top at. So it helps you to just kind of be a little bit more comfortable, I think. Yeah, and that's the butterflies kind of all flew out after. The moment, I mean, I always I always still akin that, you know, there's still a little bit of a nerve, but it kind of it kind of like you learn to deal with it. And as you go through these things, it becomes a lot easier over time. So just fall flat on your face, you know, that's all you got.
To get in front of 15,000 people or more, you know. And then you pass the bar for what it means to be a musician on stage. No, that's hilarious. So now, so your father was an engineer and you so you've always been around like production and all this kind of stuff. And being at an early age, your parents really like nurtured that for you, which is which is which is amazing. Yeah, they really encouraged it. Yeah, for, for me, I come from an artistic family as well.
So arts and you know, for me early on it was more visual, but I grew into music later in my teens and it was always the same. So I, I can relate with an artistic family supporting that. It's a, it's a super important part of, of, of being a, a musician in your upbringing. And it quite it does give advantages into how you pull yourself through your career. So now let's go into production a little bit further. Because you're, you know, you're
an independent artist. You also like work with your wife, who's Amanda Cross. She's an amazing, talented singer. Yep, she's incredible. And you also help produce her records. All the while you're even manufacturing vinyl, right? Like that's a whole nother side of this, which you are passionate about and makes sense. You in your younger years wanted to just take the records from your parents and, you know, play from them. So you have an attachment to vinyl?
Yeah, definitely. Like in in production, do you, do you always think about like vinyl at the end of it as like I'm recording this with the purpose that it's going to be on vinyl and that's how you intended to it or is that an afterthought? Yeah, I think for me it's definitely like the end goal is the highest fidelity is, you know, for listening other than, you know, like high fidelity wave is vinyl, at least for the physical, right.
So I, I grew up in a time frame, you know, I'm born in the 80s. So like, you know, I I'm in the record headspace where like it's all about LP, right. Full LPEPS are fun too, you know, 7 inches and, and that. But LP is like, you know, there is nothing better than opening the record, looking through the lyrics, looking through the credits, seeing who played on it and who engineered it and what studio they did it in.
And you know, and the artwork was so big and like, you're like trying to find little secret things and different people's records. You know, your friend says, oh, if you play this one backwards, it does this and there's a little image there. And that was that. That was the fun of it to me. It was almost like a little, there's always a little mystery. Interesting when you open it up, right? So like, I feel like the thing that makes music so interesting is that there is a little bit of
mystery and everything, right? Because you don't know where the artist is coming from when they write the song. Or, you know, like my wife, when she writes, she has a perspective, right? But when I'm listening to her lyrics. I have a completely. Different perspective of what I think the song is, right? And that's the great thing about music. Everybody can adapt their own version of the song or the record in their own way, based, based off of their life.
And then when they actually get the vinyl and the real thing, they can go. And there's sometimes their stories, you know, you talk, you're going on something like this, and you go, well, actually, that song was about, you know, liver and onions. Yeah, a little stinky and sometimes, but not no, that's hilarious that that. It's actually also really cool because when you're thinking about, you know, fidelity, there is a lot that goes behind it engineering wise and technically right.
So your efforts are you know, you, I know you definitely think this way that you know upfront going to, you know, even an an expensive place to record at it. It might seem expensive, but the payoff is is a legacy. Yes, exactly in the in the sound, you know, growing up at home, right, going from a closet 2 by 4 closet of my dad's recording studio at a young age and then building my first studio with him at like the same year I went to England, right. It was understanding like why
sound does what it does, right. And then going through all of that, reading the books of like The Beatles and saying like, oh, they put that mic there and I went and that's how they got that sound. And then figuring that out, I think that like learning every step of it and understanding why electronics and frequency and tubes and all these things. Do you dabble in like, tinkering and electronics? Oh. No, no, that was one thing. I always kind of just let my engineer friend.
Yeah, it took me a long time to actually want to engineer because I was spoiled. My father was an engineer, so I was like, you'd be the engineer, I'll be the producer and I'll play, you know, and I'll have the, the creative ideas and then you just find the sounds, you know, I go, I wanted to sound like a, you know, Radiohead's blah, blah, blah. Or, you know, like when we had a metal band, it was like we needed to sound as like heavy as this record, you know.
So with engineers, I've it's like a whole other brain side, right. You have to strap on left brain, right brain, you know, and just think like, OK, wait, I have to make sure everything's in a row and my eggs are, you know, ducks are in her own eggs are in the right basket. So I, I, I really dragged my feet on Pro Tools and like diving into the understandings of compression and you know, all
of the things. And then finally it all, you know, you build a couple of enough studios around town and you know, like, well, I got to do this myself. Right. So how, how, how much work do you do in your personal studio versus going out to recording
studios nowadays? I think it's about 1/2 and half for me, you know, like you were saying, like major studios like electric lady or, or there's a studio in New York I like to work in called Flux that I keep a lot of different pieces of gear there because I do a lot there.
Like the advantages to doing work in those studios are obviously we're in New York. So like my, my home studio is just a a control room and a small live room that basically is the vocal booth or you can put a guitar amp in there, right? And so, you know, we get creative. We go in our living rooms and we hook up drums when we detune the craziness.
But because I'm striving for something that I feel should be able to be on the same level as the idols of my, you know, my past and the music that's been made before me, I feel it's important to like, they're, they played through these pieces of
equipment for reasons, right? You know, there's a reason why Eddie Kramer loved Helios. You know, why the, you know, the, the Stones had a Helios, you know, mobile studio or why the board at Abbey Road makes all The Beatles records and the Pink Floyd record sound that way because it's the electronics and the things in it. So to me, I feel it's really important to be able to start at a level where if I'm going to not be working at home, right, where I'm just doing overdubs or
maybe I'm doing pre production to go into these rooms and let the electricity do the work, you know, but all of that happened when working with people that are better than me. I think that's. The most important thing? That's a big, big, big facet of that I. Think right Engineers like yourself, musicians, producers across the board, You know, for me, no ego.
It's like I'm always going to learn from everyone around me because I know that if I put people in a room that are better than me, I'm going to want to raise my abilities to that standard. And this is something we talked about our metal mastermind quite a bit, which is that working in the music industry, it's a people industry.
It's not just, you know, you twiddling your fingers on a guitar at home all day every day, which you can do, but like when you're moving in a direction to achieve a certain either notoriety, fame or just success in your in your career, whatever you that defines for you in that case, most of the time it's going to involve somebody else involved in that process. So, you know, I think it's, it's super important to also like keep that in mind.
A lot of the things and efforts that we do in modern home recording, they still apply as they do in in traditional, you know, commercial sound recordings. But I think that in the home, because of the limitations, you know, we, we, we sort of garner for at least trying to get the most efficient way and or economical way to, to get a recording. And that could be in many ways like a very professional sounding demo. And if you have the space, you can get it to a higher level, of
course. But you know, where's the blurred line of what becomes commercial versus, you know, home, you know, equivalency. So I. Feel like that's changed now. Like for instance, you know the example of Phineas, who is, you know, Billy Eilish's brother, right? So they made that first record. The rumor is on $3500 of gear, right? So like you're talking your laptop, you know, an Apollo, a good microphone and maybe a mic free, right?
And the right plug in. So I feel like now home recordings can be completely commercial, right? The first guy to really do that and do the mobile studio thing was Todd Rundgren, right? Todd, do you know when he did those early records by himself? He really created the whole mobile studio thing. Now, The funny thing is most people don't know that before Todd, there was a guy named Emmett Rhodes. Emmett Rhodes was this guy who made an entire recording studio in like the late 60s in his in
his house. And or in his garage. I think he was a he was a true garage warrior and the guy sounds like Paul McCartney. It's amazing stuff. You should listen to to Emmett if you don't don't know his work. It's good stuff. Wow, amazing. Yeah. And, and it's so true. I mean, like now, like those blurry lines are becoming even more diffused.
So the, But what I find really valuable about a commercial space and the, the most recent I would say that I, I've, I've experienced was a very special place, which was Guilford. Guilford is in, in Vermont. It's like this isolated, you know, place. I I think I've spoken to you a little. Bit about this.
Before, but like going into a place like that where everything is essentially done for you because you're hiring A-Team to, you know, execute your work, the vibe of how you approach a recording changes and you're so much more like, Oh well, if I'm not engineering myself today because that's a total distraction now you're focusing on making art, right And that's a that's a huge proponent of why I think commercial studios are
still very valuable. We need to have places where people focus on one job, either engineering, either you're just being a musician and you know, that cost might be expensive for a lot of folks. But you think about if we're talking about efficiency and like working with home gear, right? How much longer is it going to take you to really try and get the same quality as it's just buying it for once and getting in there and doing it right?
So that's, that's I, I think it's still a very big lesson for a lot of people to, to walk away with there. I definitely agree. You know, I feel that the the reason like for Guilford, right, the reason to do something like that, right, is you're isolating yourself from distraction, right? You know, and when you are doing it at home, right, you have unlimited time, right, Because you go at your speed in your pace, right?
In the studio, a lot of people are going, oh, oh, I'm paying an hourly rate or I'm paying a daily rate, right? So that mentality is still there, right? But once you get that mentality out of your head and you're like, I'm here to create. I trust my, you know, abilities. I trust the people around me, that's when the true art can really blossom because you've taken all the distraction away.
You're focusing on one thing, like you said, and then you're able to live in it and see it, you know? Absolutely. Yeah. And being, being intuitive about that process, you know, and that takes experience. Actually. I think honestly, you know, for someone walking into this for the first time, that's not gonna be obvious to them. Yeah, you know as. Their cervant and they've, they've just lived that way their whole lives. And then, right, Good on you, man.
Yeah, but no, that's, that's so cool. And but you know, guys like we, we, we, we see a lot of these similar stories. It's it, I think it's a very universal concept in, in how that goes. So let's let's talk about now the other thing to this whole, you know, music side of you, which is, you know, management and like promo and all this kind of stuff that usually revolves around music business, you know, like, how did that become a
thing for you? When did you actually start paying attention to Like Music Business? OK. I would say probably early on because so you start your first band right and then you're like, well, where are we going to play? What are we going to do? You know, most of the time you're hoping, you know, I, I started playing in bands at 12, like the same time I built my first studio and I, I'm touring. So you're figuring it out as you go along.
But early on we had older, we had friends, like a friend, the piano player in our band, his older brother decided they want to start their own record label. So, and we were going to be their first signing and they were going to put our CDs out and they were going to book us tours. And so having like a close friends, like older sibling to kind of go like here we're spearheading it. You can see the, the reality of what it takes to book and to
manage and to do these things. It kind of it, it instilled like a, OK, there's a DIY in this to to music, right? You can wear any hat you want. And in, in this day and age, it's probably better to wear as many hats as you can because then you make yourself more valuable, right? You show up and and you go like, well, I can play. I can, I can produce, I can manage, I can book.
So what do you need? You know, so I think early on it was just understanding that like there is value to being able to do all these things. And then as you do it more and more, you get better at it. You know, you're going to fall on your face, you're going to book a show, Nobody's going to show up and you're going to, oh, I didn't market it enough. Or, you know, I picked the wrong bands to play together.
You know, it wasn't the right vibe or whatever it is or the venue was too far, you know, for people to go to. It was a holiday or it's not. So I feel like with everything in the music business, you got to remember it's a music business. It's not just music. Music's fun and we're lucky because it's the only There's only two industries where you get to play for a living, right?
And music is one of them. So, but the other side of it is to be able to make it a career and a living, you have to realize the other side is the business side. So, you know, like go out there, read every book about music business that you can and like get close to people who are in it, right? Like the internships at studios, you're learning how a studio is managed. Internships at record labels or or PR companies, you're learning from the people who are doing it, how to do it.
And that's only going to make your ability to to promote your music and to promote your vision and your arts is going to get out better and into the more people. People. Industry. Yes. It's not about what you know,
it's about who. Yes, and that's, that really is how it is. And that, and, and as a matter of fact, it's one of the defining reasons why we, we call, you know, places like New York or LA or Boston, like these mecas, because that's where people come and they congregate so much that music and art tend to blossom in those places because of it. That's why I came here.
Yeah. There was a scene, you know, New York City. You think like if I can make their, you know, Sinatra, I can make it anywhere. Right, exactly. So yeah, it's it's all about your people around you. They make you better and and you find your people. You know that's the. Let's talk about, you know, prepping for something like a tour because in the music business I feel though as in order to do a tour for for a lot of bands, it it doesn't make financial sense. Yeah, it's tough.
It's a very big financial toll. So in, in doing a tour, at what point do you think it's ripe for a band to go ahead or even a solo artist to go ahead and, and, and think about doing a tour? That's a tough question. I feel like there's no really right time, right? I mean, obviously if the if the stars align and your single is climbing up the Spotify playlist or the charts on the radio, or maybe you had a song in ATV show, you know, because you had
a good licensing, a sink deal. Or if you had a friend who was just like making a movie, it's a hit and they and you get it. Those are the right times, obviously, because you have to support momentum, right? It's a wave that we're all trying. You know, you make a record, you put it out and you just try to ride that wave as long as you
can. You know, in the old days, it was usually like a 18 month, A2 year cycle where you'd put a record out, you would tour it, you'd have money from the record labels. If it was a super hit, you could really stretch it out, you know, like Taylor Swift, you know, and all these other people who are doing huge, huge numbers. But I feel like as an independent artist, right, it's kind of up to you on how far you want to go with your touring, right? Because say, for instance, like
my wife and I, right? So we, we're still independent artist in our own right. We put our own records out. We have our own record label. We we do it all ourselves. So the touring is the same, right? Like it's all based off of how far we're willing to go, right? So I feel like if you can find the finances to get yourself to where you need to go, right, And get to a place where, you know, I'm going to be able to play a show, there's going to be people
there. I have merchandise, so hopefully sell that'll get me enough gas money in the next place and, you know, to build my audience and my brand. So I feel like that the preparation is really mental. Yeah. It's preparing yourself for like, OK, it's not going to be, you know, Beatlemania. Yeah, it's not like everybody's screaming, you know, like you're going to go out there, you're going to work, you're going to play. Some days it's McDonald's and the other days it's filet mignon.
You know, that's that's music. You never know what you're going to get, but if you and you stay consistent with it and you just you hammer your markets. If you're a country artist, you go to Nashville, you play Nashville, you play the South, you do the festivals, you know, you hit the the venues that you know are going to lift that up. You're playing metal. You know, you got to hit the metal circuit. You want to try to get on Oz Fest.
You want to hit these things that you know are going to build the brand. And if you know someone who might be able to get you on that opening gig for, you know, Black Sabbath and Birmingham, give me a call. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hear 70,000 tons of metal is a pretty fun cruise line to play on. And yes. And stuff that yeah, the cruises are great. Yeah, the cruises are great. Yeah, so and we, we have a couple listeners that have been on 70,000 so they know exactly what we're talking about.
But this is, this is such an important part of that you're saying is you know that most of it is mental preparation, awareness and aptitude in that case. Because. Yeah, I think that's that is very true. Like if you're going to go on a tour, you have to really be totally ready that things are going to probably burnout. Yeah, break, break fire. You know people are going to get sick.
Stuff might get stolen, stolen, which by the way, like the music community is amazing about rallying when those things happen, right? Like I know so many stories of people getting stuff stolen and like people get together and they get you new gear and you're back on that show the next day.
So like, don't let that want to discourage you because obviously, like in the world, there are terrible things that are going to happen, but there's a bit of optimism that you have to keep with with music, you know, you have to be a bit of an optimist it. Always feels kind of like a bit of a brother or sister kind of. I've especially with metal, I've always felt like there's a very big familial community about
metal. Definitely where, you know, actually there was a recent situation where exactly that situation happened. A whole band lost their entire thing. I think it was during one of these hurricanes. Yeah. And they were reimbursed by their audience. Yeah, man, it's, it's amazing. It's amazing. Well, the metal community, like, so like I had a metal band when I was in my 20s, right, with my brother. And I realized early on that, you know, I'd loved metal.
What was it called? It was called the Watergate Conspiracy. Yeah, we were metal core and we loved, we loved like Norma Jean and Poison the well. You know, that's cool, that kind of stuff. And you know, that was so we were, we were heavy with, you know, the breakdowns, the whole thing. But obviously what I realized like playing because Miami had a really good metal scene, like in the in the early 2000s, right? So there was Churchills, Churchills with the spot where
you could go see. Everybody would come through. Right. So I would be kind of friendly with some of the guys like the guys in Shy Halud or, you know, like some of these people in some of these like early hardcore metal bands from the Florida scene. And you would see that like, the whole point is like, we're going to hit each other. But like, if you fall down, I'm going to pick you up, you know, And I think that's the that's the camaraderie with with not just metal, but music in
general. Like if you fall down, I'm going to pick you up because I know, you know, you're trying to do the same things I am. We're going to beat on each other a little bit because we love each other. So you crack jokes on the road and keep things light. You know, the pranks don't go too far, you know, but. Yeah, no, I, I actually, I loved touring.
Touring was a big, big part of, you know, what I loved about doing what I do. And I was doing monitors for a band and it was like family, you know? And you know, you, you develop these relationships with people, and those relationships last a lifetime. Most definitely. You know, it's a beautiful thing, you know, and you when you're on tour, I, I always felt that it was hard to see sometimes the world and the ways that you want to see them, but you know, because you're
working. However, it is such a cool thing to be able to just like be on the road and just go and experience places that you've never been before. Try food you would have never tried. Those are some of the perks of definitely doing a tour. And if you're in a position, if you're in a position and you're thinking about doing a tour or joining somebody on their tour, do it if you haven't done it before because it will be a life
changing experience for you. And I always advocate for that because I think it's so much fun. Yeah, so. Definitely my first tour, like officials tour, right? You go on the road. This is the other thing that like they don't tell you, right? You go on the road, you got a job at home, right? Your, your job's probably not going to be there when you get back unless you got a job that is really cool.
Which by the way, if you have hold on to that job because music's good, it'll pay, you know when it pays. But then when you come home, you got nothing to do. You got to have that JOB. Yeah. So if you're lucky enough, right, like you will have people around you, you know, maybe it's your parents, maybe it's, you know, like people who inspire you, but they will encourage you like, hey, listen, do what you got to do and they'll support you. I was lucky enough to where my
dad said go on the road. I got you, you know, I know like you got your bills. Like we'll help you. Like they they saw touring as my college education. Absolutely. College, I quit college for touring, by the way. That was like, that was my moment of like, I'm either going to go to college and I'm going to be a music major or I'm going to go on the road and I'm going
to learn music life. And it really it had that not happen, I probably wouldn't be where I am now because like you hit the road and you learn the rules of the road and. Scary, scary moment, I think for anybody who has to make that decision because you, you had a very like unusual situation. The most unusual. Yeah, right. You know, usually people like, get a job.
Music's not going to go. Anywhere and even even, you know, like, like I think my father, who who had toured for most of his life, would probably have said something very similar. I think it was probably mostly my mother who would have been more hesitant.
Yeah, yeah, moms are worried. Yes, and but that's that is so interesting too to hear because like I've I've heard also other countless stories where, you know, people who have gone to like some of even the best, you know, conservatories and they'll they'll quit the Conservatory because they had an opportunity. Yeah. And yeah, it's a gamble, but sometimes it pays off. This is true. And, you know, Yolo so. Yes exactly. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was Yoloing my entire life
away. Yeah, but that's inspiring because it worked out. It worked out. And, you know, sometimes when you take chances that way, it actually becomes very fruitful for you in the future. And your best education was doing something like that because you gained actual experience, not, yeah, theoretics experience. Exactly.
Yeah, it's funny. Like you look back on where you were, right and you think like if 12 year old me picking up the guitar for the first time, right, hearing, you know, Van Halen and his friend's, you know, garage that one day, you know, or Metallica or whatever it was that like inspired me it early on. It was, you know, saying like, oh, you're actually going to be playing with some of these people in the future. You go, you're full of it.
That's not that's not real, right, But like, that's the gamble that you take, right? Like I have the theory, if you stay in it long enough, right, you'll you'll get to the places that you want, right? Like just keep doing it. Keep your head down, stay humble. You know, like I play music. I you know, I play guitar. I love guitar. You know, I love all types of
guitar. That guitar has allowed me to, you know, to stand next to other people who play guitar who I looked up to, you know, and that is, that's worth its weight in gold because you learn from those people too, you know, not. Guys humble. He played with slash man. Come on, dude, that's awesome. Oh man, dude, like can you can you shed a light a little bit on like some of your experiences with people that you idolize like was and you don't have to
get too specific. I no. That's fine, I love telling this like. What, what? What was it like for you did? Was it like, Oh my God, everything that I've always imagined came true, or was it like let down? What was it like? No, I so, you know, you always think like you're meeting your idols, right? Aren't they cool? Yeah. Like, are they going to be chill or are they going to be like a Dick, you know? So I have found like every single person I've been able to work with, they're amazing,
right? They're all incredible people. Like you mentioned Slash, right? Slash is incredible. The first time I did something with Slash was in the city. It was for, it was for a tribute actually a charity. He had been sober for, you know, X amount of years. So they did a concert in town and we played it and you know, I got to meet him on that, you know, very, very short, very
short moment. Then a couple years later, they asked a friend of mine who's no longer with us, sadly, Wayne Kramer, brother Wayne Kramer from the MC5 to put together the Jimi Hendrix U.S. Postal stamp tribute show at South by Southwest, which is in 2014 I think. So Jimmy called Slash. Jimmy she's gone now. Wayne called Slash. Wayne called Slash and was like, hey, do you want to do this? So the one of the artists that I work with, Jesse Mallon, Wayne and Jesse are very close.
So Wayne asked Jesse and I to perform a Jimmy Hendrix song. So we're doing it's, it's a huge event, right? Doug Pinnock from, you know, Kings X is performing. Really nice guy, by the way. Lovely, I heard. All the guys from Kings X were really. Really. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. They were all hanging backstage. Rusty Anderson from Paul McCartney's band, his guitar player. He was. He did a song was chilling. Robbie Krieger from the Doors was a part of this thing.
So like, I'm there feeling like Forrest Gump. I'm like, what am I doing here with? Lots of chocolate. Right, all these legend. Yeah, my Lucille was the box of chocolates that day. So like, you know, like we were doing the rehearsals and at the rehearsal, Slash was there, you know, he's playing with everybody. He's sitting in with the whole band. So Wayne's had a had a thing.
He was like, all right, so at the end we're going to all get on stage and play all along the Watchtower, which is an incredible, you know, and he was like at the end of it all, we're going to do the national anthem, the Hendricks national anthem, so. And everybody burn your guitars. Yeah, yeah. So hope you didn't bring your good 1 today. So, so we do the song, right? We're now at the performance, we do the song and all on the
watchtowers. Done big ending and everybody starts walking off stage and I remember I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, because Wayne's still on stage. Everyone's walking up stage. So I'm yelling at Slash and Robbie and Rusty. I'm like, no, guys, we got to play the I say Slash put your guitar back on Postal Service. So he puts it back on. They all put it back on and we
all come together in the middle. And I had like earlier that day, I'd spent like a couple like, you know, hours sitting and learning the National anthem and then trying to figure out a guitar mini version of it because I knew those guys with. Guitar Mini. Guitar mini. I love it. So I was I was like, I'm gonna play the guitar mini on this and then all of these guys, you know, because that's for me. I'm a side band in my own mind, right? I like to be the support for
people. So like, fuck, let's get Slash and yeah, Wayne, let's give them the moment and I'll I'll give that guitar many support. So we did it and it was a great thing. And at the end, you know, you laugh about it like everyone running off stage, you're like, no, you gotta play It's. That is incredible. Wow. I mean, there's, there's only a few moments like that you know that you'll have and so cherish every one of them. Exactly. Anytime it happens, remember one thing, right?
It's not about ego. It's not about anything. It's about like the humility of like you're here. Enjoy every moment of it, you know? Memories you'll make. Yeah, exactly. You know, and hopefully if somebody has a camera to capture it, right? Yes, because if you don't have a camera, it never happened. I mean, it's it's one of the one of the few industries where what what we do is evoke emotion and how you do it and how Jimi Hendrix did it. I mean, yeah, there was. That was a master class.
He was trying to replicate the sound of WAR with his guitar, which is a whole other thing. I mean, Vietnam was going on, yeah, that was crazy stuff. And there was a lot of political motives and all this stuff. I mean, Watergate conspiracy. Hello. So that's yeah, I mean, this is Sullen Brand. It's all there. And so. But yeah, I mean, that's our
voice. It's our voice as to who we are as people, what we represent, and it comes back to what you represent like and when we ever talk about like brands and stuff like that, that you've mentioned on this podcast, it's just what do you stand for and who are who are you? What are you about? What are? You saying with your music? What are you saying? Because, you know, that is something that I think is not
shared enough sometimes. Yeah. And I don't know if it was just because of the rise of the Internet or if it was because of just changes in culture, but I feel like in some cases there isn't an emphasis on stuff like that where it becomes a little bit shallow. Commerce took over a little bit. Yeah. You know, did you ever see that thing with Rick Rubin and and him talking about art versus commerce? I thought that was a very good quote.
Quite intuitive. And just to, you know, point out to you guys, he says that if you are making something for somebody else, essentially it's commerce versus making something for yourself, which is real art. If you don't like it then you know like why you doing it? Right, right, right, right. Exactly. So that is something that I've, I feel like I've lived by for a very long time.
But it's nice to hear that from the, you know, one of the most found industry producers out there who, by the way, yeah, confesses to not playing instruments, not knowing what EQ or compression does. He just. He's just ahead. He he just claims that he sits down and he listens and he just reacts. He's ears, man. He's got really great ears. That's amazing. And intuition, right? Like. I think that's what it.
Is yeah, you know, his intuition is incredible, like the what he's done with all the artists he's worked with. And I love his idea, his studio, Shangri-La, right? I have a couple of engineers that I've worked with that have worked there. I haven't had the pleasure yet, but everything is blank on the walls. It's all white. Whoa. With the idea that like there's nothing that will taint the inspiration, right? Or that will steer the inspiration. So like, you have a blank
canvas. Create whatever you want to create, you know. Note on studio design. Yeah, Aesthetics on how the artists perceive their world. Right. And very cool. Yeah, there's something you, I wanted to go back to that you said you were talking about like it's about the emotion of what you play, right? Yeah. I think that what's been lost is that a lot of people don't remember the Beethoven quote, right? Which is, I don't care if you play the right notes.
It's just, did you have passion while you were playing them? Yeah, right. I think that's the, you know, that's the thing. Mess up. It's fine, you know. Or or the just this even like you're talking about, you know, classical composers. But like people like Bach, they knew they knew people like had to interpret what they wrote on the page too. So part of me making music in those times, some people they look at the page and like, this is exactly how he meant it.
And I was like, yes, but also like, don't be so bland about it, You know, like putting a little your flair. I'm sure Bach would have been like. Yeah, don't bring it to life. I can put it in a MIDI and have it do whatever I want. Yeah, Bach would have looked at this. It would have been like, this is lifeless, you know, what are we doing with this MIDI thing like zeros and ones? How about ink and paper?
You know, so that is so true. And it's, I think that's just a beautiful thing that, you know, we can, we can still adapt from all these old, you know, times of ways of thinking and still there is, you know, value that is universal. I mean, like, I was just watching stuff about, you know, some of the oldest parts of human history. And we were making music before we actually knew how to talk.
Yeah, I mean. You know, it was just like beat, you know, your chest and beat, you know, or, or literally make rocks like, you know, early form rock music. You know, you just beat them together. I mean like like even in war we were using. The war drums. As giving orders to soldiers on the battlefield, that's why they would always go for, you know, the little drummer boy 1st and you got to take. Him. Out. Yeah, take him out for Chaos you. Know who's giving the orders around here?
Where's the drummer? It it was like. The drummer's the backbeat of every band, man backbeat the backbone. Backbone. Yeah, yeah, you take out the spine and you're just. So as we are sort of like wrapping up here, I just want to, you know, ask, you know, what would you say to somebody who's getting into, let's say, trying to trying to get where you are, you know, like where, where do you think somebody, let's say in the beginning, middle or maybe they're further
down the road? Do you have any perspective that helped you as you were going down your path that you'd like to share? Yeah. Let me think about that for a second. I, I would say that an important aspect is you want to first believe in what you're doing, right? Like we said, like you have to have a passion for it. If you have no passion for it, then find something that you have a passion for. So that that's the first thing
you're starting out. Make sure you that it's your passion, right, because that's going to drive the, the fire through you for your entire career. All right, Like I wake up every morning and I'm still excited to play music. I'm so excited to create because you're always finding something new. You know, there's always something undiscovered every day, a new beat, a new band, a new melody. And you know, or you're looking at it a little differently.
Say you're you're now you're a little bit further in your career and you're, you know, the insights that I found were that like, you know, we talked about it earlier, putting yourself in a room with people who are better than you to learn from and to inspire you to greatness and to higher heights, right. And then being able to like you get to a place to where you play with the people that you that you have been inspired, you know, by an early age. It's keeping that humility, man.
Like you got like if you show up and you're like, I'm the best, no one is better than me, right? You're going to close a lot of doors in your face because like, yeah, you, you like a good example. Jaco Pistores, right? Jaco was self-proclaimed I'm the best bass player of all time. Now, he wasn't wrong. He was, in my opinion, probably the best bass player of all time. You know, if for bass playing, right, it's all, it's all relative to style and choice and all of those things, right?
But he was also his own worst enemy. You know, he got in his own way because of with that ego came like the the lack of realization that it was destroying the things around him and the people around him because nobody wanted to deal with it. You know, like, so I feel like
keep the ego out right. You know, if you are in Buddhism, like that's going to help you a lot, you know, or at least like getting rid of the the mentality that I'm the best thing since sliced bread, you know, just show up, you know, do the work right. Homework. Hey, when you show up to a rehearsal, rehearsal is not about learning the song. Rehearsal is about doing it with the people around you. Making it gel. Yeah, making it gel exactly. Great, Great.
So yeah, like, do your homework. You know, those are the things. I think it's just a work ethic that like you show up, it's still the job at the end of the day, right? Like there's days, you know, that I have where I'm just like, OK, I have to learn X amount of songs for this show I'm doing, you know, maybe it's 30 songs for a show with all these guest singers. And I'm the bandleader. And so I have to know everybody's part because I'm the guy going like, oh, that's not right.
Or, you know, like, so like showing up and doing your homework and doing the work and being the most prepared person in the room is going to allow you the advantage of going like, well, you know, like that, you know, that didn't seem right. You know, like, and obviously like don't tell people they suck. You know, like I've had moments where I have and they bit me and bit me and, you know. Have some social cue awareness. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. Well, there might be a little autism in all of us, but, you know, but, you know, we might all be on the spectrum a little bit. But we're musicians, so we're, we're, we're very, you know.
No, it's a beautiful message. It's, it's, it's very much put your best foot forward and in, in, in, in so many of those statements that you made, I feel as though when you're walking into a room and you don't assume and you are just trying to do what's best for and you know, my father would always do this. You got to do what, what, what's best for this. He was referring to the song, the vibe, the song, the vibe and what what's, what is it? Song is king.
You are, you are, you are a servant to that the. Ethereal So if you're playing in a metal band and you're playing country licks, you're probably not doing the right thing for the song, right? You know? And vice versa, you know. Unless it's some of that southern metal that. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah. Then then you know, just make sure you know what genres you're doing. Yeah. Yeah, exactly right, John. So black metal, OK. Yeah, it's OK, right, You know. Oh. Man, well, this has been such an
enlightening conversation. Derek, thank you so much for being on the Metal Mastermind podcast. And as we always say here on Metal Mastermind is to create your phone.