Joel: 0:00

Like I, I wouldn't even take a long car ride with

Jamie: 0:02

Oh wow. Wow. Okay.

Joel: 0:05

I don't wanna cry while I'm driving,

Jamie: 0:09

It is hard to cry and drive.

0:12

I am Jamie. And I'm Rebecca. Welcome to the Burnout Collective.

Jamie: 0:20

Hey, hey, hey everybody.

Joel: 0:23

Hey, everybody, buddy.

Jamie: 0:24

Welcome this. This guy, this is Joel.

Joel: 0:30

That's

Jamie: 0:30

of Red Heaven. Usually Rebecca is here with me. We're co-host. This is our podcast. Rebecca just had some work emergencies come up and was unable to make it today, We do Miss Rebecca terribly. Joel and Rebecca got to meet though, so that was great. This is now, uh, Joel and I'S podcast. So, um, welcome, welcome. So Joel and I met on Twitter, no idea. Don't remember how we were both,

Joel: 1:00

We're both working in the same industry, so that's how we got to know each other. And you know, you, you and I both have mutual friends and I don't know how the conversation

Jamie: 1:08

those mutual friends are. We have no idea. Did

Joel: 1:12

Yeah, that's right. It's just, it's just our imaginary mutual friends and, uh, yeah, and we started talking and we just kept talking, so that's it, which was great.

Jamie: 1:24

So brought Joel on to talk about all the ways the modern musician especially is being, worked to death, and having to do way more than just focus on their music, which wouldn't that be great if that's all you had to do.

Joel: 1:44

Yeah. Yeah, that would be great. I do like the other stuff I've gotta do as well. There's a lot of fun in it, but it is a lot. So

Jamie: 1:52

It's a lot for one person. It's

Joel: 1:53

it is a lot for one

Jamie: 1:54

doing a million jobs. It's too much. You're an artist, Joel. You should be making art, not writing copy.

Joel: 2:03

you ask, but Sure. No, you're right.

Jamie: 2:07

Anyway, Joel, tell us a little bit about, uh, your band, red Heaven.

Joel: 2:12

Okay,

Jamie: 2:12

get going.

Joel: 2:13

so I have been running a band called Red Heavens since kind of 2011 ish. I think that's about right. And it is, it's great. I have, I've released some albums, I've made some videos, I've done some live performances. I really plugged into the online thing pretty early and did a lot of streaming of my shows really early, all through different, platforms and, uh, and that's been great. it's making no money for me. What else is new? but it's just nice to, it's, it's, it's been a great it, journey for me to, to have this band. And I'm about to release a new album. I say about like, I'm about like four months out from it. But, uh, I have another album coming and it's, uh, it's exciting. Yeah, there's a lot of potential that a guy like me can exploit, in this day and age to, to bring some of the musical dreams to reality. And I'm trying to do that.

Jamie: 3:05

Yeah. That's awesome. That's funny because I guess I, I think I met. You around 2011, so, oh, okay. is it 2012?

Joel: 3:16

20. No, no, no, no. 2011, you're right. Nevermind. 2011,

Jamie: 3:19

about right.

Joel: 3:21

Yeah, that's about right.

Jamie: 3:22

I was very much in like the

Joel: 3:24

Very much

Jamie: 3:26

moth,

Joel: 3:27

moth.

Jamie: 3:28

amplifi amplification era.

Joel: 3:31

Yeah. The first two albums were called Amplification, and the second one was called Moth, and that's when I was working on him.

Jamie: 3:37

So actually wait, tell me, I don't even think we got into this, what happened with SoundCloud?

Joel: 3:42

Oh, SoundCloud is moving in some new directions. And one of the things that they're doing is they are taking the material that is uploaded by artists and they're using it to train ai, without, uh, without, I mean basically the, the terms of service are, is if you upload to SoundCloud, they use your stuff to train ai. And I was like, no, I'm sorry. That's not gonna happen.

Jamie: 4:06

God, that's so fucked up.

Joel: 4:09

Yeah. A lot of the distributors and uh, publishers are, are doing that now. They're either sort of doing it as like, if you want to use the service, you, you have to let us train our AI on it, or it's an opt-out situation. And it's always buried so deep in the terms that people don't know what's happening. So if I wasn't like checking, like I don't know why, even now that I'm saying this, I don't know why I do this, but if I wasn't checking like, blogs and like, uh, um, uh, YouTube stuff about like law enter, entertainment law, I wouldn't know this was happening. But, but I've been following it pretty

Jamie: 4:39

So a lot of musicians, like new music musicians just get like bamboozled.

Joel: 4:45

Yeah, so I mean, a lot of people aren't super familiar with how this works, so I'll just give you sort of a thumbnail sketch. What happens is AI has, AI is great at, um, making stuff up that resembles, an authentic version of whatever it is. And in order to do that, it has to like gorge on massive amount of data. So it basically has to listen to every song ever recorded and released to be able to figure out how to write a song. And so. you know, so people who are training AI are the people who are gonna make money from it, right? So they just wanna shovel all the music, all the, the, all the songs they can into it so that it can learn and just get better, right? And the, the thing is, there's no compensation for an art, an artist. So if I do a bunch of albums and they shovel my stuff into, into ai, and then somebody says, Hey, ai, can you make a song in the style of red heaven? And they can do it? And, uh, none of that goes back to the artist. So, so I was like, well, you know, if you wanna make money off my music, you can't do it for free,

Jamie: 5:48

You're gonna have to pay me first. But also that's fucked up. Like, listen, I've heard some of the shit, like some of the AI. Songs that like people have made just to be funny and it's awful. I mean, even just copy because like, you know, like I have journalism background and AI is ruining everything that I've been doing for my career for the past like

Joel: 6:17

Yeah.

Jamie: 6:18

13 years.

Joel: 6:19

And so one of the, it, not everybody is aware of this, which is totally fine. It's just one of those nerd things that I follow. But one of the things that, is sort of currently in contention around the AI issue is that, uh, the people who run ai, open AI and, and Google and Facebook and the people who are working on their AI systems, they're all like, we don't train on copyright materials. We don't do that. We just train on, on publicly available materials. And then there are all sorts of like tells in the, the stuff that AI generates that says like, no, you don't, you train on copyright and stuff too. So the idea is basically, you know, the, like they scoop everything that's on YouTube, everything that's on Spotify, and they use that to train the ai. We're still in the denial phase where they're saying like, no,

Jamie: 7:02

because they're all like filthy liars that.

Joel: 7:05

so, yeah. and where all that's gonna go? I'm not really sure. Unfortunately right now, a few governments are really, um, making it easier for AI to be able to do that, or, or for companies run AI to do that. So anyway, why did I delete SoundCloud? Because they're like, we'll, just take your music and train our ai. Like, that's fine. Right? And I said, it's not fine. So that's why I did it. Yeah. Plus like, who goes to my SoundCloud? nobody goes to my, I don't go to my SoundCloud, so like, I, it wasn't exactly a big loss for me.

Jamie: 7:34

that's why I stopped listening. Honestly. You weren't on SoundCloud so

Joel: 7:38

Yeah, no, you, you're not the first.

Jamie: 7:40

you're not on Spotify. You're not on SoundCloud. I just

Joel: 7:43

I bound, no, I dropped Spotify as well. Um, ethical concerns, and, uh, the thing about Spotify, a lot of people don't know this either. like Spotify is, uh, I don't wanna go into too much of a rant about this. It uses up a lot of time. But basically Spotify is incrementally, They're basically abusing the, the art artists and the material that they make, and it's increasing over time. It's becoming more of a dire thing over time. So, um, you know, for instance, there's an, a payola element now where if you wanna be heard, you gotta pay something. there's a whole thing of like, if you don't have a thousand streams, I think a month or, or something like that, then they don't pay you at all. and I'm, that's the thing I don't get into, like basically if they're using my music, if people are listening to it, which generates revenue for Spotify, and then I get nothing, even if like I'm getting like 25 cents or whatever, like I understand that it's not gonna be much, but if they're like, no, we'll just hold that back, that's ridiculous. So anyway, I don't wanna dwell on that too much, but that's why I pulled it off Spotify because they're only getting worse and they're only gonna keep getting worse. And I will not say that I was personally offended by the things that like Daniel Eck has been saying, but it did indicate to me that they are not. Thinking about this as a way to support and foster the development of artists, and that's their right, but I don't have to be

Jamie: 9:04

Yeah, exactly. That's very interesting. I'm sure it'll change, I guess as like,'cause you know, music's been around forever. Podcasts aren't quite there yet, even though they've been around a while now. But like

Joel: 9:16

right?

Jamie: 9:17

Spotify, I. Spotify is actually pretty good. Like we don't use Spotify as a host, but they're pretty good. I like researched a lot and compared a lot when we were trying to figure out who's gonna host us and, um, they like really help. they like feature just like a and coming podcasts. They let you like easily add like your videos and reels or if you do clips like, yeah, they just have all these ways to like sponsor, but I'm sure it'll like flip. As soon as they've done that for a little bit, then they'll be like, how can we fuck over podcasts? Like, we're fucking over music musicians.

Joel: 9:54

one of the ways that they're, one of the reasons it's not the only reason, but one of the reasons they're in interested in podcasts other than it being a burgeoning market, is that, um, they, the agreement with the user is that if you meet these conditions, we pay X amount, and X is a small number in this case, but like, we'll pay X amount to, you know, if you get streamed. So what they do now is they offer bundles to, to users when they're signing up for a plan where they get like podcasts and music and stuff like that in the bundle. It, it is a loophole in the contract. So if people who sign up for the bundle. Stream your music. You don't get paid for that because under the contract it's because it's in a bundle. It's not counted towards, regular streams. So when you say like pod, you know, they're really good with podcasts. I'm like, yeah, they love podcasts right now because they're trying to create this situation where people buy and bundles instead of just like straight up streaming music. And that's how they get outta paying artists, uh, musicians like

Jamie: 10:50

I didn't even know that. me. You're like, that's how they get out of paying artists, musicians like me, Jamie,

Joel: 10:57

It is, yeah.

Jamie: 10:58

I was gonna, I know we touched on, you know, just wearing multiple hats and like doing so much and not getting to focus on your music as as much. tell me a little bit about all of the little hats you wear like this one, a top of your head right now.

Joel: 11:14

yeah, this one. They're not all little. I got a

Jamie: 11:16

That's his podcast hat. That's his podcast

Joel: 11:18

I'll go with you on this. Yeah. A lot. I mean, a lot of this is just like my, my public facing hat. I'm still getting used to, I'm still getting used to metal pattern baldness, but we'll, just like, that's a different podcast. So, um, I, I can go into this topic pretty deep, but I will try to skim, so help me, help me if I don't. But basically, the way it used to be in 1992, I was doing music and I was, younger and

Jamie: 11:46

And I was in second grade.

Joel: 11:47

to picture, but it's

Jamie: 11:48

Go on.

Joel: 11:50

Thank you. Yep. I was looking very much at the music industry at the time. one of many books that I read was Frederick Dannon's Hit Men, which I highly recommend for anybody who wants to read it. And after reading that, I was like, there's literally no chance. There's no chance I can be anything in the music industry. Like, it's just impossible. And it's kind of true. it's really hard to get signed in 1992. And then you gotta do all this at that time, if you wanted to get signed by a major label, you, and that was the way, like you get signed by a major label or forget it. And at that time you had to like find a way to get into a major studio and record for$250 an hour to make a demo. And then somehow the demo has to end up into the, in, in, uh, the, record company's hands and they have to like it. And then they'll, that's where the conversation begins about your lousy contract that's gonna make you broke. And so I was just like, you know what? It can't happen. There's no answer. I know we're really in a different time, and I love this time. Like I, it's exhausting, but I don't wanna lie about the fact that I kinda love this because just with my computer and what I have in this room, I can do a professional album at the level of, of any, uh, almost anything, but like, I got what I need to put out a pro level album, and I don't have to rent a

Jamie: 13:06

That's what I was gonna

Joel: 13:07

I don't have to,

Jamie: 13:08

you just do all your own?

Joel: 13:10

I just do all my own stuff. And I, you know, I, I, uh, even dr stuff like drums and stuff like that, I just clear out my living room and set up microphones and I record in there and it works great and it, but it requires a lot more. And this is where sort of the burnout angle comes from. So. It used to be, back in the old days, gather around children. Grandpa's gonna tell you a story. So back in the old days, record companies all had what was called like an artist development, and they used different names. So it was a, artist ar rep artist representative or artist relations. And they basically, the job was to work with the artist to develop them, bring them along, give them resources they wouldn't normally have. And this was especially true in the sort of leading up to like the eighties. Things started to change a little bit in the eighties, but basically that was in a broad brush. That's basically how it worked. And, um, you know, you needed that, like you needed to work with people like that to, to develop to the level of being like, you know, like Duran Duran or, or

Jamie: 14:07

Well also just to like to figure your shit out, right? Like when you're starting out, there's so much.

Joel: 14:15

And so the difference is now there's been a lot of change in the, where the, how and where the money flows in the music industry. particularly with regard to how record companies get their money. And I will, I'm trying to figure out the right way to say this really, like succinctly, but much of how the record companies got money was, in my view, unethical, or at least it was, um, exploitive of artists. Uh, so for example, the way that you would get an album made, and this is like, this is common, this is, I'm not just sort of citing some like random,

Jamie: 14:50

Oh, we fact check everything. We're journalists up in here. We'll fact check you.

Joel: 14:53

All right, excellent. Well, that makes one of us. what they would do is they'd say, okay, well, you're gonna do a studio album. We're gonna lend you$250,000 to make the album. And then, you know, we say, look, but like to do that, you're gonna have to change these songs. And like, we're kicking this guy outta the band. We're gonna replace him with somebody else, but like, we'll lend you the money to do it. So you go ahead and do it, and then you owe that money to the record company and that money comes outta your royalties. And so the money that you make from the CDs, or like whatever it is you're selling, is divided up into chunks. Obviously the, a big portion of it goes to the record company and then you're after things like manufacturing and you know, the gasoline that goes in the truck that drives it to Missouri or like whatever. After that, what's left over is your royalties, and that's the money that's used to repay the loan. However, you are the last to be paid. So your royalties pay first to, uh, the studio time,, gasoline that goes in the truck, the caterers, all that sort of stuff. Everybody gets paid. The artist gets paid last. And so if you still, if there's still money to be paid out, you'll never pay back a$250,000 loan doing that. So then you're in, put into this, some artists just go bankrupt. Especially because like after they record your album, they can then say like, yeah, you know what? We've decided not to release it, but you do owe us the money still. And so that can happen. oh, oh yeah. Yeah.'cause they're not obligated to you to do that. So, um, a lot of,

Jamie: 16:19

credit card companies and

Joel: 16:22

every single

Jamie: 16:23

banks giving you loans.

Joel: 16:25

So what, what would happen is you end up in this kind of endless cycle of ha either having to do another album to generate revenue, to pay off the first album, and then like a tour because you can't afford, you know, that sort of thing. And, uh, you get, and a lot of these, a lot of people, that's why a lot of artists end up bankrupt. So anyhow, things changed and things changed in a really interesting way where like, I can make an album here if I want to, and I don't really need an, I don't really need somebody to lend me$250,000 anymore. And so that dynamic, those contracts that were so scary in 1992 that made me think like, I, I'll literally never do anything in the modern day. I can kind of do the whole thing myself. There are parts like, are, are hard for me to do things like distribution marketing, that, that gets a lot more difficult. But it, it is interesting because obviously the record companies are like, no, no, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Uh, we could still help you out. But what they, what record companies do now when they sign you is, They're making so much less money from you than they used to. They need, they, they expect you to have everything done and they expect you to, everything is your, your responsibility now. So that whole a and r, like that whole artist development side, that's over now. So you have to have not just your finished recording, but you've also gotta have like your own marketing team and you've gotta have your own graphic artist. You gotta have all that stuff. And so, that's kind of where we're at now. I would not sign a record company, a record contract right now if it was the standard contract that I know gets given to schmucks like me. So like, if I, if you're beyond, say you pretty much write your own ticket, right? And everybody's like, yes. Master whatever you wish. But for like a guy like me, they're just gonna be like, we'll, uh, we'll lend you, we'll lend you, uh, here's what we'll do. We'll lend you a thousand dollars. You pay back$250,000, and by the way, we're not gonna do anything. It's a lot more like that.

Jamie: 18:22

say, we'll lend you 1000 and you'll pay back 250

Joel: 18:26

I'm exaggerating like a little bit, but you get the idea. because e the system of how records get made and distributed has changed, but a lot of the people who make the decisions in the industry have not changed. And so what they're doing is they're still thinking like, how do we do like 1993 numbers where if you wanted to buy, like if you, if a band had like one banger song, you gotta buy a$20 CD to get the one song. How do we do that again? But right now people aren't buying CDs, they're streaming individual songs. They're also like, discovering new songs. Does they're the record. Industry is no longer, gatekeeping that like they once were. So anyway, all of that to say is, and this is a long way of getting there, but I wanted to kind of underline it with a little bit of a story, which is if I wanna have some kind of success, and it's more available to me now than ever, like in 1992, there literally is a brick wall. Like you just can't get, like, how am I supposed to come up with$250,000 to record an album by myself in 1992? But now I just, you know, I just get a, my computer and my, my stuff and I, you know, I watch YouTube videos of how to do stuff and I get helpful and brilliant and, and skilled people to help me when I can and then I can release on my own. Now the problem with that is that whole artist development and artist support system is not there. So this is what I'm getting down to and it's a long way to get there. But basically, so I write a song and I perf, I perform it, I record it, I sing it, I do all that sort of stuff. I, in theory, I would, you know, mix it, master, I have people help me with stuff like that and like with drums and stuff, but you get the idea. Then that's kinda where it begins. And then after that, like I've gotta figure out something to do with, I've gotta do something with Instagram, you don't get to not be on Instagram, right? Unless you're in a very specific niche. And it could exist. I just, but that's not me. So I have to be on Instagram. But that's the thing is if I'm going to engage Instagram, well now guess what? Now I'm a photographer. Now I'm a graphic artist. Now I'm a copywriter. Now

Jamie: 20:26

Video

Joel: 20:26

video of

Jamie: 20:27

Yeah.

Joel: 20:28

myself and I'm like, Hey, well, I'm doing a thing on Thursday night. Like, I get a moron, but that's my job now. that's me now. And that's all on me. So like a, aside from the fact that I have to acquire some of those, tools, it's not a lot. But like, you gotta have Photoshop and you've gotta have some kind of video editing capacity. Now that's on me, right? And what that means, there's another implication of that, which is now, it's not just the time and the skills to create art and to write copy and to go like, Ooh, how do I edit a photo in Photoshop? So it looks good. But it's also like you, now you gotta understand algorithms, right? Which change constantly. So you gotta be like, what? What do I do that teaches Instagram that I am worth putting in front of people who don't know me yet, who are most likely to get interested in my music? You gotta be on that. Otherwise, what's the point, right? You're just doing this and like nobody's seeing it. So again, all this stuff is doable. It is doable. And pe and there are people who do it mostly, like people who are like half my age and like whatever. But, that's the job now. And so there are very, you, there's, there's different angles and there's like, it's not one size fits all, but if I was gonna sort of get on average, that's the job now. And so touching on the theme of the show. You can burn out on that because there is all,

Jamie: 21:46

about it honestly.

Joel: 21:49

I got into this so I could write and perform music. Like why am I studying algorithms to try to figure out how to trigger some key words so that Instagram will decide to advertise me to people who would like to hear me. And that's, that is exhausting. And I, it's, I don't carry a resentment for it. Like, it doesn't make me angry. I'm not remember, like these people was like, oh, the old days it was so much better. No, it was terrible. In the old days, you had like zero chance in the old days. And, and I mean, like fewer people in like 1992 or 85 or whatever, fewer people made way more money. So in other words, the, the number of people who won the lottery was. Way fewer, but they would be, you know, this, you like your Michael Jackson's or Huey Lewis but now like a musician who's not like wild, crazy famous and doing like a Pepsi commercial and has like branded shoes and stuff like that. A an artist who is not at that level can actually like, make a living, can actually like, make money and sort of survive on it, you know, especially if they manage to get to the point where they're make enough that it's, it's not their second job. Once you make that transition, it's your first job. You can, you can do it. It's not easy. And the thing is, it means letting go of the ego-based dream of being famous and the materialism based dream of being rich. But if you can let go of those two things, you can get a lot done. And I love it. And I love the fact that if I'm, like, I just wanna do an album. Like I don't have to check with anybody. Nobody, I don't have to be like, oh, sir, you know, at the record company, sir. Sorry

Jamie: 23:21

Beyonce, please. Can

Joel: 23:22

wondering, yeah. Yeah. would you please allow me to do an album of like, I don't have to do any of that. I can just do it. And I love that freedom, and that's not something that was really available to artists, you know, 30 years ago. However, if I'm gonna say that I'm really tired and burned out, I would say this is why, because I'm not interested in algorithms. Like when I'm just drinking coffee and sitting on my front step, I'm like, ah, just think about algorithms. Like, what can I do? Like, I never think about that,

Jamie: 23:50

about algorithms

Joel: 23:51

something you have to be interested in it. You have to know it to be able to pro proceed in marketing your stuff. And you know, you have to understand things like you have to play the game and, you know, like, fair enough, like I, I much prefer an industry in which I have, in which it's an incredible amount of work to succeed versus there's no chance.

Jamie: 24:13

And just hearing you talk about record labels, that's payday loan territory. That's all I was thinking when you were talking about this, and I didn't realize that. That's insane. That's something

Joel: 24:22

Yeah.

Jamie: 24:23

I didn't

Joel: 24:24

And look, that's standard. And that's standard. And I wanna tell you something else about record companies is that contract that I was talking about, the one where you get loaned all that money, it's impossible to pay back. They know it's impossible to pay back and. That's if they even decide to pay you back. So like the contract says X, Y, Z, the contract is usually not very fair, but there's a lot of shenanigans that happens. And so for instance, you get a situation with a guy like, you know, James Taylor, he's been, he had to take his record company to court literally 125 times to get his royalties. So just because, just because it's in the contract doesn't mean they're gonna do it. So under ideal situation, you may still not get paid. Even if you check all the boxes, you're like, you know, we sold all these albums, all this sort of stuff. You may

Jamie: 25:11

And then you need to start learning

Joel: 25:13

like,

Jamie: 25:14

yeah, like law, like you said, basically.

Joel: 25:17

I start learning. No, you do. You absolutely

Jamie: 25:19

mean, get a lawyer obviously, but also like read up so you know.

Joel: 25:24

Yeah. And I mean, part of learning the law stuff is knowing what's outside the scope, right? So that, you know when you go like, okay, this actually, this isn't fair. Even though my record company who seem like nice guys, they tell me it's fair. You know, like, like that's the sort of stuff you gotta learn. So that's another thing that I think that people get exhausted less by honest work, by hard honest work than they do by the mental exhaustion of having to outthink all of the ways in which forces, which have nothing to do with the art, are trying to either defeat you completely or pick your pocket on the way. And I think that's the part that's exhausting to me.

Jamie: 26:03

Yeah, you're burnt out. I hear you.

Joel: 26:07

Not like, I mean, I'm burned out, but like, happy, like I'm, I'm, I'm a pretty happy guy in general. I, but I am, I, I have made some changes in how I approach marketing my material and those changes are gonna stick for good. yeah. Actually, with regard to the burnout

Jamie: 26:25

Yeah.

Joel: 26:25

I do wanna talk, if, if you'll let me, I wanna mention a couple things about that because I just feel like it's a good part of the story, that's all. which is, I just, it was about a year and a half ago. I'm not sure. It was, it was something like that. All I know is folding laundry and I was listening to a podcast, so that could have been a lot. Anyway, I was listening to a podcast called Search Engine hosted by PJ Vote, and he had Ezra Klein on the show and a well-known podcast journalists, the guy who founded Vox, all that stuff. And they were talking about the question of, is there a sane way to use the internet? And it's a great episode. So if you're a podcast kind of person, I highly recommend checking out search engine and looking for that episode. Is there a sane way to use the

Jamie: 27:09

We'll put that in the show notes

Joel: 27:10

a year and a half ago. One of the things that Klein talked about was the burnout of chasing the algorithm and how that creates inauthentic content. So how you get a somebody, the thing he said was so interesting. He said, influencers on social media who are real influencers, who are actually in influencers don't act like influencers, quote unquote. he said, but the ones who are sort of like, like faking it, do all of that pretentious stuff that we think of influencers doing. I just thought that was super interesting. And what he's getting at is all of the inauthentic content created on social media that is. Meant to ensnare, um, the, the viewer, not to communicate with but to ensnare, but also to ensnare the algorithm, basically to get the algorithm by the throat and communicate with it. And to basically bend it to your will. And he said, doing that creates inauthentic content on, it's not really coming from you anymore. Like it's not the real you anymore. And I had this experience, and it was, I'm glad I did it, but I learned a really important lesson I think it was 2022. I released, 2022. I released the Ever Turning Wheel, which is the most recent album that Red Heaven did. And

Jamie: 28:37

that the, was that the marketing campaign one.

Joel: 28:39

Yeah, that's the one. So I did like a 30 day lead up to the release of the album. And it was like this real social media. And I was like posting videos every day. It was like a, like a virtual tour. Like every day if you're on a special guest list and I have your email address, I would email you a, a link to a page. It was like a secret page and you could see like videos and like interviews and like all sorts of interesting stuff about a specific song on that day. And like every day it was like a new thing. And I just, I followed the recipe to a t like, and I did, and I don't think it was a mistake. Like I believe in that stuff. Like I believe in creative and novel ways to market stuff. But weirdly, and I can't, I'm not gonna pin this solely on. The campaign, but it was my lowest selling album of all time. What I learned from the podcast with Ezra Klein when he was talking about sort of slavishly I. Chasing the algorithm all the time is that, it, it risks creating inauthentic content. And so what he said he was doing is he was changed his, his marketing, direction where he basically just like opened up Gmail. Like not like a MailChimp or a, any of that sort of thing, but like just a, just an email. And he just put people in the, the address, who were like people that he cared about and he knew, cared about him, and he was interested in them, and they were interested in him. And I think he said like, people who, like, if I met them on the street, I would give him a hug, you know, like that kind of thing. And just people who are sort of close to him. And then he just typed out like, here's what I've been doing, uh, what have you been doing? You know, and like just that in this email, he sent that out and I started working a lot more like that. where I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to, I. I'm trying to connect a lot more with people directly now with the music and talk to people about my music, and so I take a lot more time.

Jamie: 30:31

Yeah, that's actually one of the things I did when I,'cause I got. I got laid off like five months ago or something like that. And, uh, I kind of redid my website portfolio and my resume and everything. And one of the things that I focused on was like, and I put it like this, and maybe it's cheesy, I don't know, but I always say I create content for humans, not an algorithm, because I think that's so important. but it's just interesting seeing like, yeah, it's just like the parallel for all d you know, musicians like con, I mean, content creators. I guess you're a content creator too. but we're all like always chasing the algorithm and it does, it's just like, it ends up being impersonal. And I always say like, you're doing marketing and SEO wrong if, like, that's what you're putting out, people, that's not gonna resonate with people. People aren't gonna wanna read it, people aren't gonna wanna listen to it. they want.

Joel: 31:27

And people are also, they're also used to it, right? So when you come at somebody, with something that algorithmically is supposed to ensnare them and catch their attention, uh, whether it's directly or like it's a trick,

Jamie: 31:41

Or like it's a

Joel: 31:41

are pretty savvy to that now. Well, but, but honestly, uh, there's a great example again in that podcast where, PJ Volt was talking about, like, I think he was in, I think he said San Francisco. but basically there's a thing that they were, that he ran into where he is like walking down the street, and then like some guy comes up to him and goes like, Hey, hey, hey, I'm bother. I'm sorry to bother you, but I was looking for this Italian restaurant supposed to be down here, and it's supposed to be like really, really good. And he, and, um, volt would say like, oh, I, I am sorry. I don't know that. He was like, well, you're lucky because here it is. And like, it turns out he's just like marketing for the, the restaurant. And nobody wants that. nobody likes that. Right. So when I hear that, I feel like that is actually,

Jamie: 32:25

one of my worst nightmares right there. Sounds awful.

Joel: 32:28

I know there's several stages in that story that are like nightmarish to me, but it does it, people are not receptive to tricks or sort of like al algorithmic based, methods of pulling them in. and so, I find that it makes like sort of bypassing that it makes me a better person. It makes me more attuned to having real authentic conversations with people just like people

Jamie: 32:57

Authenticity.

Joel: 32:58

guy would with people, right? And not like, oh, how do I, how do I, you know, game this to make it more authentic? I just mean like just being a guy, right? And, uh, and I connect with people much better, but the fee for having that kind of quality interaction is letting go of the compulsive notion that you have to sell to people all the time. So that's, that's, and I, I think that's a great trade, to be honest.

Jamie: 33:25

Yeah. No, I, I, I do too. Google has messed up a lot of things for a lot of people because of the algorithm. yeah. Uh, speaking of algorithms,

Joel: 33:40

Yes.

Jamie: 33:41

I hear you have a story about Facebook algorithms.

Joel: 33:45

Oh yeah.

Jamie: 33:46

favorite.

Joel: 33:47

For a while it was like a year, if not a year and a half, I was doing regular Facebook live shows. I flip on the camera, I do my songs, whatever, and people would come to the show and whatever. And I'm doing video and I'm playing guitar and it's this whole thing. And, and I didn't realize it, but like it didn't really go anywhere. There was no momentum, there was no nothing. Like, it was just, and it was discouraging by the end, like after 18 months of just like not much happening and I was trying to figure out like, where am I going wrong?'cause I'm putting in hashtags and I'm like posting in a certain way and all this sort of stuff. One thing I didn't know, is if, if you do say like an hour of live streaming on Facebook and other platforms are similar, I just don't know the particulars of all the others. But if you do like an hour live stream on Facebook and somebody comes into the, the live stream, watch us for five minutes and then leaves, that tells the algorithm you're not very good and this is not very interesting. And so maybe what happens is like a friend is popping in and going like, Hey, I can't stay, but I just wanna wish you luck with the show. And then they go, like, that would happen all the time when I would perform on Facebook. But the algorithm's like, oh, this guy must really suck.'cause people are not staying. So that was one way of basically shooting myself in the foot. The other thing was, I was advertising on my personal page a lot as well as my red heaven page and just like, Hey, I'm doing this thing. So I get my mom who's lovely, but like she'd bring all of her friends who are sort of in their, their seventies. So we, I would do these shows and what would happen is my mom, who is very supportive, would come in and she would bring like six, seven of her friends who are women in like their mid seventies. So the alms rhythm is trying to figure out what does this guy do exactly? Like, okay, these women, they like Richard Clayderman, uh, za Fear, um, the theme music from the Golden Girls and like this kind and red heaven.

Jamie: 35:38

Who doesn't like the theme music from Golden Girls, first

Joel: 35:41

red Heaven must be like the other three. So when we're showing this to

Jamie: 35:46

Manalow.

Joel: 35:47

we're gonna show it to people who like these things. Exactly. However, we're not gonna show it very often because people leave his show all the time, so he must suck. But when we do show it to people, it's gonna be people who like Barry Manalow and Neil aka, and like that kind of thing. So that's the kind of thing where like, I gotta watch my back all the time for what the algorithm is doing.

Jamie: 36:11

It's another trap.

Joel: 36:12

So anyhow, with as far as the question of burnout goes, that's just another factor.

Jamie: 36:18

You need to teach your friends and family about what we on Twitch, at least, like to say, like, oh, I'll tab, you can't stay, but I'll tab you, I'm an lurk. We call it a lurk. So

Joel: 36:30

yeah. Yeah. You should explain to people what that is so

Jamie: 36:33

So if you keep, if you can't like attend or whatever, but if you can at least keep that browser tab open, keep that browser window open, you'll stay as a viewer for that person. So that helps support them. And you can mute the tab. Yeah, even like, I encourage lurkers, even if you,'cause some people sometimes don't feel comfortable saying anything in chat and that's totally fine. is Twitch a good place to perform livestream music? Are there prerequisites? So that's something Joel and I were talking about. I don't know. I think I need to give Joel that homework to check it out because I was telling him he should stream on Twitch. I just don't know how it works.'cause there's a lot of like legal mumbo jumbo when it comes to music. I follow some musicians, some DJs, some musicians, some people, a lot of people actually on Twitch do covers, so people in chat, they have like, you can request songs and they have a request queue and they'll play those covers live. I don't know how that works though, with licensing. I have no idea.

Joel: 37:37

Yes, it's complicated, but it does. O one of the things I mentioned to Jamie when we were talking about this is that Twitch has a history of being weird about license and content stuff. and I don't know if that's still the case, but it used to be a thing where, and this happened, I know some people this happened to, so that's, I was a little bit wary of this, where like you'd go on Twitch, play your own song, Twitch would copyright strike you, which for those who of you who don't know, this basically means like, Hey, you're stealing somebody's song. They would copyright strike you and then go straight to deleting your account, deleting your channel. And that was a little, like, I was a little bit like that's too like, yeah. It's a, and it's just like unpredictable for me. Like even fa, even YouTube, which is notoriously unreasonable when it comes to like working through issues of copyright violations and stuff. Even YouTube's better than that. I don't know if that's still how Twitch is with, with music, uh, and licensing stuff, but that's why I haven't gotten into it up to this point.

Jamie: 38:39

Yeah, I'm not sure, but I would say, look into it. Liz said she tried it once and it is a lot of, I. Bumbo jumbo, but be a word for the

Joel: 38:50

say that.

Jamie: 38:51

of like, saying things in chat. I just call it introverted.

Joel: 38:56

Uh, Liz knows a lot about a lot of the stuff I'm talking about, and she knows it from a lot of different angles that I don't.

Jamie: 39:03

Liz, just get in here. I'll kick him out.

Joel: 39:06

Liz is singing on my new album and, it's great. I'm really excited for you guys to hear what she does. I'm really

Jamie: 39:13

I know.

Joel: 39:14

with the material and, and I, we work really well together. She doesn't say anything that hurts my feelings and in my book, that's like a great working

Jamie: 39:23

So we could never have a great working relationship is what you're saying.

Joel: 39:28

n no,

Jamie: 39:29

Like every

Joel: 39:30

Like I, I wouldn't even take a long car ride with

Jamie: 39:33

Oh wow. Wow. Okay.

Joel: 39:36

I don't wanna cry while I'm driving,

Jamie: 39:39

It is hard to cry and drive.

Joel: 39:42

You know what you're like. So

Jamie: 39:44

do know what I'm like. and I'm amazing. So maybe talk about a little bit of your journey, like doing live shows and how you started doing that? virtually.

Joel: 39:57

I have, a hangup around,

Jamie: 40:02

Yeah.

Joel: 40:03

This. And so I'm like, oh man, I always resist explaining this, but I'm gonna try. so in 2007, I started using Second Life, and for people who don't know what that is, it is a virtual community in which you basically make a little guy and he walks around and it's like, picture a game, but there's no game. It's just like people walking around doing stuff. But it's kind of cool too because like in the virtual world, you can also like, you can build things and you can also do things like you can stream directly into second Life, which means you can listen to music, right? and so it's, it there's a lot of, and some people have done some absolutely. Genius level stuff like, like even past my own wildest dreams of what somebody could do and far beyond my own skill. But in 2011, I started playing music in Second Life and I get my little avatar guy and he'd be like, I'm playing music and then streaming and basically any of the other avatars that are in the zone nearby can listen to me perform when I do that.

Jamie: 41:18

Can they mute you?

Joel: 41:19

I have, yeah, but I mean, they're, the thing is they're not there unless they want to hear me. but that doesn't mean they're not muting me,

Jamie: 41:27

Sounds a little egotistical. I don't know, Joel.

Joel: 41:30

yeah. Well let me, it's sort of like saying if you're in my living room while I'm playing guitar, you're probably there'cause you wanna hear me play. So I have done probably north of, so, uh, fine Kei has been with me since the beginning of my music thing in Second Life. And I. Think I've done north of like 2,500 shows, if not

Jamie: 41:53

Wow.

Joel: 41:54

Every time I say it, every time I say that to her, she's like, I dunno, but I have them all, I record them

Jamie: 42:01

but then does she like check up

Joel: 42:03

stupid folder.

Jamie: 42:04

to try to prove you wrong?

Joel: 42:05

No, I think I think the thing is over time she has gotten used to me being consistently wrong on anything that involves numbers, which, you know what? Fair.

Jamie: 42:15

actually. Yeah, I get that. I hate

Joel: 42:18

Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, doing that, really brought along my skill as a performer and an engineer and my, as a singer, and really galvanized the band. And it really started off as just me playing my dopey songs. And then like, over a period of years, like it became a band and we're like, you know, we, I'm not bragging, but like, we won some awards. We're on tv, we release albums, we get all this. Like, it turned into an actual band, which was kind of cool. And people are like, well, so, so how do you do these things online? And I don't wanna tell them that I'm playing an avatar in Second Life where

Jamie: 42:55

Hey,

Joel: 42:55

because they're like, whoa.

Jamie: 42:56

is for

Joel: 42:57

is that where you go to do, be to?

Jamie: 42:58

get it. We get it.

Joel: 43:00

No, I, that's probably true, but I don't wanna say like, that's the world where people go if they wanna be a robot cat. Like, I, I just feel like

Jamie: 43:08

Or like a furry, are you a furry sometimes in second life

Joel: 43:11

or if, or a, for a. Never a furry, uh, I think I'd probably mean like more of a prickly if it was gonna be, uh, labeled in some way. But I dunno, I'll get, I'll look into it, but, uh, yeah. So anyway, I still perform in Second Life, uh, fairly regularly. It, it goes back and forth. Like sometimes I do more, sometimes I do less. Right now I perform between like two and four times a month, so it's not a lot. But, uh, sometimes in the past I performed like three times a week, so it just, it depends. But, uh, yeah, I'm still doing it and I still like it. And what's kind of cool about it is, there's two things that I just love about it. One is I make a little bit of money doing it. Not tons, but I don't lose money doing it. And the other is I get a little bit of a following. It's not like fame, but it's like just a little bit of a following and it's just nice, you know, it's just like I meet people and it's really cool that way. And like it's so. Bizarrely human. And despite what it sounds like, like people are just really great to connect. And that leads me to the second thing I love about playing in Second Life so much, which is that I have never performed for a more open-minded audience in my life. Like people who are there. you don't have to be perfect. And like, you can also be like, I'm playing a country Western song now I'm playing a rock song, now I'm playing a, a jazz song. Like, whatever. And people are like, yeah, fine, do it. Like, it's great. Whereas like if you're in a bar and you're doing

Jamie: 44:31

get like booed

Joel: 44:33

like they're gonna f they're gonna fire you,

Jamie: 44:35

that Yeah. I'm like, you'll get booed. You're like, you'll get fired actually.

Joel: 44:39

yeah. The blues usually precipitate the firing. So,

Jamie: 44:42

Was that a pun? Booze.

Joel: 44:44

in that way I'm very grateful that I've had Second Life and I kind of feel in a way, like the music scene in Second Life, who. That has been home to some truly, like, incredibly musicianship. Some people that I'm just like, what are you doing here? Like that. But what I do love about it, and I don't want to, I don't wanna overgeneralize, but one of the things I absolutely love about it is that it's not a musical opportunity just for people like me who kind of like brush up against like the, the professional stuff where it's sort of like professional adjacent, but it's also just like, you know, it's a, there's a single mom, she's 25 and you know, maybe she's unemployed and she used to play guitar when she was in high school, but she doesn't really have time anymore to go out and do that. But she misses it well. Like she goes in a second life and she plays for an hour and people listen and they love it and just lets. I love it because it lets ordinary people just connect with the opportunity to create music without having to make it into a, a, something where they have to compete with others. I just, I love that. In fact, the reason I got, well, the main reason I got into performing in Second Life in the first place is that I was in a position where I couldn't form a band. At the time I lived in a city where like I didn't know anybody and they were French speaking. My French is not that good. I didn't have a space to practice in and just, there was like, so I was like, I'm just gonna do this, and it turned out to be fantastic. So yeah, I highly

Jamie: 46:13

you met Liz there too, she said. I didn't realize that. That's awesome.

Joel: 46:17

I did. Yeah, I met Liz there and, fine ante. I met her there too. I met a lot of great people in Second Life and people who like in real life, I'm friends with them now,

Jamie: 46:25

that's like me apparently with Twitter and Twitch and

Joel: 46:29

Yeah, but the thing is like you were never in the robot cat zone, so it's less of a leap, you know, where in second life, It's a little more anonymity. but anyway, yeah, so that's how I got, that's how I got started. And then after about a year and a half, I was doing a lot of shows and I was writing a lot and, you know, like recording a lot of stuff at home. And I spoke to my, my best friend, whose name is Aaron, and I sat down with him and I'm like, what should I do next? Like, I'm doing this, I didn't expect to do this. What should I do next? He said, do an album. And so we did, uh, the first album, which is called, uh, amplification. And that's, and then I did another one, and then I did another one, and then I did another one, and I did another one, and now I'm working on

Jamie: 47:05

And now we can't get him to stop. Ladies and gentlemen.

Joel: 47:09

yeah, no, I'm not stopping. I, I mean, I might this is the sixth album that I'm about to release and uh, it might be the

Jamie: 47:19

No. You'll release more albums.

Joel: 47:23

Look, Jamie, I'm 56 years old. I can't keep spending my retirement money on these albums that don't do

Jamie: 47:30

Hey, what else are you gonna spend it on?

Joel: 47:32

I food and shelter was what I was thinking.

Jamie: 47:34

You're not a true artist then.

Joel: 47:36

You know what? I'll, I can live with that.

Jamie: 47:39

As long as I can live.

Joel: 47:40

I, I am, I am gonna say that, the money's a, the money's a, a concern. I've blown. I wouldn't say blown. I'm glad I did it. I'm glad I did it. But the money is a concern. It's cheaper now to do a high quality album than it's ever been, but it's not nothing. And this is actually one of the things that like, what's the, what, uh, Daniel Eck from Spotify gets wrong where he says it costs nothing to make an album to do music. That's not true. It costs nothing to make an extremely narrow sli yeah. A very narrow sliver of, of, of a genre. you could make the argument, but like, what I do, like I gotta get my guitars set up every two years or like, forget it, right? Like, I gotta, there's, I gotta have microphones, I gotta do all that stuff and. So, I mean, the money is a concern is clearly not a major concern'cause I keep spending it. But, uh, the money is a concern. But also, I thought after the ever turning wheel, the last album, I thought I'd gotten to a point where I just didn't have any more ideas for red heaven. Not no music ideas, but I just thought, like, like I've done, I don't know how to iterate further on what I've done. I came up with stuff, but like, maybe after this album I'm gonna be like, yeah, I think that's a wrap. Like, I don't have any more red heaven ideas.

Jamie: 48:55

Yeah, but you thought about that at the end of the other album, and now you're making another album. So

Joel: 49:01

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And maybe I, maybe I will, but like I might do something different, musically

Jamie: 49:07

We'll just run it by all of us. We'll let you

Joel: 49:09

don't, yeah, making albums is also kind of tricky. It's a, it's a bit of an, it works, but it's a bit of an, an antiquated idea because, People are consuming music In album. In album as as an album. they're, yeah. It's different now. They don't do like, there's still people who are buying CDs. Absolutely. I sell CDs, which is as big a surprise to me as it is to you. But a lot of people are streaming now and they will expect you to deliver music in a way that accommodates the way they want to hear, hear it. Which is fair. Absolutely fair. but the concept of doing an album, I don't know if that works. Like it used to, like, it used to be an, like a band to put out an album and it'd be a banger and you get the whole album at once and it'd be like three and a half years, they would, maybe four years they'd do another one. it's not like that. And it is not like that anymore. And so, I don't wanna force it to, to make an album just because that's something that's meaningful to me as a Gen X musician.

Jamie: 50:12

Sure.

Joel: 50:13

I dunno. I, I, there's a lot of stuff I really haven't thought through yet. Clearly, so. but yeah,

Jamie: 50:18

What were you saying about like Spotify and stuff? I keep losing my train of thought because I am, I'm actually listening to you, Joel, like I'm proud of myself.

Joel: 50:27

Yeah. No, it's the first for everything.

Jamie: 50:30

I'm doing a good job, hi, marina. I was getting Taco Bell, but I'm here now. You can start the show. Perfect. We can start the show now. Marina's here.

Joel: 50:38

Okay. So anyway, I'm a musician and I've been a, yeah.

Jamie: 50:41

again, please. Oh my God, dear God.

Joel: 50:43

Rewind. yeah. So let's talk about being burned out and what you do about that. do you want, do you wanna talk? I, I'm trying, I'm just trying to stay on brand for

Jamie: 50:53

it is On brand. It's all on a brand. Like being on brand doesn't mean we're like, I'm burnt out. Let's talk about being burnt out. I mean, it's just, burnout comes in many shapes and many sizes and many types and people are burnt out for different reasons. Work, hobbies, career, family, sickness, pain, mental health. So

Joel: 51:17

I, I heard a really interesting thing on the radio years ago, and I wish I, I'm sorry, I don't remember what exactly. What the show was. But I remember hearing this thing, it was basically a guy who studied, it's more interesting than it sounds. He studied annoyance and what annoys people and how, like what the qualities of something are that annoys you. And he was saying, so for instance, there's a neighbor

Jamie: 51:42

for the follow fair.

Joel: 51:44

who's, there's a neighbor who's listening to, or like, like play doing loud something, work in their yard at like certain times of the day. And it's like, it's annoying. And he was like, well, breaking that down, what are the qualities of that thing that make it annoying? One of them, one of the things that makes it annoying is that it's intermittent so that it's, so that it starts and stops irregularly and you don't know

Jamie: 52:10

So it's like a little jarring.

Joel: 52:11

pattern is. Yeah. And he said the other thing is that you never know, if you don't know when it's gonna end. That's the other thing that's really, can be really annoying. And so, you know, if somebody's gonna start working on their, their deck or whatever, using loud power tools for five minutes, they only need to do five minutes work. But those five minutes sound identical to somebody who's gonna do it for two hours. And like, you don't know. So that, that to stress. And the reason I mention all this is because I think one of the real burnouts for people who are stressed out with like the combination of work life, home life, all of these things is that, oddly enough, those things have a lot of the same qualities that. Annoying things have, which is that they're irregular. You don't know what's gonna happen next all the time. And the other thing is like, you never know when it's gonna end. And I think a lot of people who like go to the same job every day, which is a great thing to do. I mean, I'm not saying that that's, that's a bad decision, but like, go to the same job every day. After a while they start to think like, is this gonna ever end? And like, you know, it's gonna end, but it sure doesn't feel like it. And I think that those things contribute largely, very much to, to burnout as well and, uh, exhaustion. And I think one of the angles to examine that by is by looking at like, what's the opposite? Something that has. Pattern has structure, goes a long way to calming the, uh, the psyche in the, you know, in, in that way. And I think also something that is like, you know, where it's going and you know what it's for goes a long way to battle that internal, like just the mental burnout, which I think is the worst burnout, the mental emotional burnout. I think that's part of it

Jamie: 53:56

Yeah, no, I think that's a huge part of it. I think it's just also when you're working, and this is definitely coming from like my experience and you're working your ass off and sometimes it's like, oh, a special project and like we need this done quicker, so you're gonna be working a little bit longer hours. I think I had definitely have better boundaries now, but it took me until I was like in my mid to late thirties to I think really solidify those boundaries.'cause like back when you and I met, I, you know, you were telling me that I had such great work ethic, like I had no work boundaries. That's probably why you think I have such great work

Joel: 54:31

No, you No, no. It's, you do have a great, you have a, you have a, you are impressive in your professional, practice. But I think that, having boundaries is something that you learn just as you get more mature, but like your, your work ethic is

Jamie: 54:48

Boundaries are hard.

Joel: 54:49

for some people, yeah,

Jamie: 54:51

Not for Joel, but

Joel: 54:52

just to speak to, well, no, I mean, like, and there's so many fronts on which to create boundaries. So some people are good at some stuff and not others. So, Strava said something you said, do you get, burnout from battling what you want to create versus the pressure of the algorithm? Like what you're saying? No, I don't. And I, speaking to that, looking back, I would say I didn't get that. I might have gotten that feeling, but I didn't get it because I have been consistently unrealistic about what people are gonna like when

Jamie: 55:29

don't you just

Joel: 55:30

So I'll create

Jamie: 55:31

you want and what you feel and what you like. Do you really create for anyone else right now?

Joel: 55:38

yes. But what I'm talking about is like. I always just assume everybody will get what I'm, get what I'm doing. and that's the part that's unrealistic is that, that often there's something and I'm like, this is not sour grapes at all. It doesn't bother me at all. But every album, there are a couple songs that PE or maybe if I'm lucky, three or four songs that people really like and click with. And for me, I like them, but like there'll be a couple songs sort of in between where I'll be like, that's my favorite. And like, nobody cares about that song and I'll put it in my set anyway because I'm like, I just love this song so much. I want to play it, I want to hear it. And then people are like, yeah, but I really like that other one. So, all of that is to say str I have, I have not given it much thought, and I definitely haven't given it any worry trying to please the algorithm in terms of how I write and how I produce and that sort of thing. I have given it a lot of thought and worry when it comes to marketing and trying to figure out what to do. That part has is stressful, but I honestly, I just write what I write

Jamie: 56:42

fair.

Joel: 56:43

I, yeah. Yeah, and it's just better, like if you write music that you yourself want to hear. That's the point, right? Like, like why would you write something that you yourself wouldn't listen to?

Jamie: 56:53

I was thinking,'cause you were saying like some songs mean something to you. If I recall, let's see if I'm right. It's been a while. It's been like, I don't know, a decade since I thought about this. Wasn't a little moon written as like kind of like a lullaby one of your daughters or started

Joel: 57:12

You got right story, wrong song.

Jamie: 57:16

what song?

Joel: 57:17

So I'll tell you the, about both of the songs. first of all, little Moon is a song I wrote from my friend whose name is Duren. She's Irish. So it's one of these names where like, you're never totally sure if you're pronouncing it correctly unless you actually are Irish. You know, she's just an incredible singer, incredible. And like, she's a lawyer, super, super smart, really talented. I just felt like I, she, I just wanted to write a song that would help her to feel better when she was so scared

Jamie: 57:41

I love that.

Joel: 57:42

was why I wrote that. The other, the song you are talking about is a song I wrote called Beautiful You and

Jamie: 57:51

Yeah,

Joel: 57:52

Yeah, that's the one. So when my oldest daughter, my oldest daughter's now 27 and married, and so it's been a while, but when she was little, she was, I have two daughters, one of them my youngest, when you put her to sleep, basically as her body is touching the mattress, she's like out

Jamie: 58:10

that's like every man I know. I wish I could do that.

Joel: 58:14

Putting, putting my older daughter to bed was easily an hour of of work, if not more, just like getting there. And so I had, I would sit by her crib with an acoustic guitar and just play this riff over like this little sequence over and over again. And if you listen to the song, you'll hear that's the, the opening part of that song is the part I would play. And you know, oddly at 27, she doesn't want me to come and play that anyway. Like, I don't understand, like I will literally go and sit by your bed and play it. And she's like, no, I'm fine. So, um, there's that

Jamie: 58:48

Wait, is she the one that's married?

Joel: 58:50

s Yeah.

Jamie: 58:52

Like I'll come over play it for you guys.

Joel: 58:55

Anyhow, so what happened was, no, I wasn't asked, so I should tell you both my daughters. Think I am like super uncool and that my music is even more uncool than I myself am. So they never act, say like, Hey dad, pull out the guitar and play that song. You're like, never happened. It's never happened. But my occasion, yeah. Yeah. I, I mean like I have a great relationship with'em, so I'm saying it, I'm laughing, but it's just, yeah, I'm a little surprised too, not so much that they don't recognize what I do, but just like they were never really interested in doing any kind of music with me, which is fine, but it's something I thought would happen that didn't. So anyway, as my daughter got older and I was no longer playing this thing next to her bed, I was like, well, I liked this song. So I added a chorus to it, and then I just produced it and added some lyrics, which it didn't have at that point. And so I wrote a song about my two daughters, and that was actually a cool writing experience because as a rock musician, everything you write has a, there's a darkness in it somewhere. And, somewhere in it. Right. And this song I intentionally wrote without a shade of darkness in it anywhere, which was, I found out, was much harder for me than I thought, And, uh, yeah. So anyway, it was, but I think the crowning, the gem of that song has nothing to do with me, is I had my friend who is also a collaborator, who is a Master sitar player whose name is Ward Che, and he played Sitar on it. And I think that the sitar was the part that

Jamie: 1:00:28

guitar. Yeah.

Joel: 1:00:30

good. Yeah. He took it from good to Great.

Jamie: 1:00:32

Did he play on other songs?'cause I thought you had

Joel: 1:00:36

Ton, tons of songs. Yeah.

Jamie: 1:00:40

Okay.

Joel: 1:00:40

it is interesting because, and I like this is fine. People don't know and like, I don't think any less of it before, but like I play a lot of Arabic, there's a lot of Arabic influence in the music, in a lot of the music that I write. And a lot of people don't know. They know I'm not playing a guitar or that, like they'll hear something be like, that's not a guitar, but they don't know if it's like, is it a sitar? Like everything that's not a guitar is a sitar basically. So if it's like Saud sitar, if it's a, a dobe sitar, if it's an ood sitar, you know, like that sort of thing, which is like, it just makes me laugh. Like, you know, if people don't know, that's totally fine. But that's something that

Jamie: 1:01:15

What is a, like, um, Richard D. James of Aex twin using a, what is it? A

Joel: 1:01:23

it

Jamie: 1:01:24

Di dig. Dig? Yeah.

Joel: 1:01:28

I don't feel like I should speak about the Radu while Liz is in the chat because she's like, actually Australian.

Jamie: 1:01:35

You hate it. You hate it? Are you saying you hate it?

Joel: 1:01:38

I like the, I as far as instruments that play one note, it's my favorite.

Jamie: 1:01:43

Oh, yeah. I love it. I thought you were gonna shit on it. So

Joel: 1:01:47

No, it's, it's an amazing instrument. If, if I, I've found that bringing in music from other cultures from around the world, there's two secrets that I've come up with. One of them is if you want a song to pull somebody's heartstrings. Put a sitar in it. If you wanna rock, if you want a song to like really rock hard, put Turkish percussion in it. Those are

Jamie: 1:02:12

What is Turkish percussion?

Joel: 1:02:15

It's like dobe mainly. That's kind of the, the workhorse of the do of Turkish percussion, which is like a goblet clay goblet drum. And the reason it's called Dobe is because those, the sounds it makes, make do beck are the two sounds that it makes. And, uh, it's like fire. Like when you see somebody play Beck, who really knows what they're doing, it is incendiary. And so there's a lot of fire in the Turkish percussion, which is why I put it into the, into the rock stuff.

Jamie: 1:02:42

horn. Where's the,

Joel: 1:02:44

Oh yeah, I've done that too.

Jamie: 1:02:45

Love says straw bitch.

Joel: 1:02:47

I don't under, I don't understand banjo. I know what it is and I love hearing people play it, who know how to play it. I'm not one of those people, so I wouldn't know how to use it in that way. so I banjo, I. Mutual respect, love might be overstating it.

Jamie: 1:03:02

That's fair. No, I love the sitar on your songs.

Joel: 1:03:07

I do too. I do too. I do too. And it was actually really cool working with Anwar because I learned a lot about Sitar too. And a great example of the kind of thing you gotta learn as a western musician

Jamie: 1:03:19

How are you like

Joel: 1:03:21

is,

Jamie: 1:03:21

don't,

Joel: 1:03:22

I don't know how I'm triggering that, but whatever.

Jamie: 1:03:25

fine.

Joel: 1:03:26

I don't understand what young people do with this. Anyway.

Jamie: 1:03:29

Get off my lawn.

Joel: 1:03:30

there's two things. So if you guys know the song Norwegian Wood by The Beatles in which George Harrison plays

Jamie: 1:03:37

That was also my nickname in college.

Joel: 1:03:38

Sounds Norwegian Wood, or George. Or George Harrison.

Jamie: 1:03:44

one, please.

Joel: 1:03:45

The, uh, it sounds fantastic. It's a beautiful sound. But what's interesting is he knew that he was taking the sitar and adapting it to a style of music. It wasn't designed to play, and he wanted to play something authentically sitar, like something that's Indian, right? And so on Sergeant Pepper, they did a song called Within You And Without You, in which George Harrison sort of did like proper sitar music. And I had to make a lot of the same kind of Anwar really helped me to figure out not just how a sitar works, but like what does a sitar player do when he's got it? And that has really been lovely for me to know because I've been able to bring some of that stuff into my own, like as a guitarist, I've been able to use some of that stuff.

Jamie: 1:04:30

That's awesome.

Joel: 1:04:32

He taught me a lot. I learned a lot from him, and I was really grateful. We know where he lives, not very close to me, and he's like super busy, so we don't see each other much, but he's taught me a lot as a musician and I'm really grateful for that.

Jamie: 1:04:44

And that's like when I told you kind of the biggest thing, like we're about here at the Burnout Collective was like it first started just with the idea of community and like not being alone and lifting each other up and supporting each other. And I feel like you've found, you have like a really great. Like artist, musician, community surrounding you. Like people you found. Yeah.

Joel: 1:05:09

I do. And so I really live in a, in a state of abundance.'cause there's these amazing people who lend so much to me and have, take these little seeds of ideas that I have and just blow them up. So they're incredible when they're done. And people say like, oh, it's so fantastic. And I have to admit to them like, I wrote it, but like, I didn't create this whole scene. Like this is a, this is a collaboration with geniuses.

Jamie: 1:05:32

Yeah. Oh, now tell, okay. Now tell us, a little bit about what you're working on right now and where people can find you.

Joel: 1:05:41

okay. Okay, so right now I'm working on an album called Let the Dead Things Die. And I love working on this album. I love the songs that are on it. And one of the things that's really cool about it is that the, the albums that I've done before this were a combination of new songs and songs that I wrote like 30 years ago that I just never put out before. The Let the Dead Things, diets all new songs that I've written like in the last three years. And so it all feels really fresh to me in a really great way. And I'm trying some new stuff with guitar. I'm trying some new stuff vocally, lyrically as well. And so like I'm really into it. I am expecting it should probably be out in November and I hesitate to say that, but I think it, I think November's, I think November's the, when it's gonna come out. Yeah, I just released a single about a month and a half ago called Martyr. And Martyr is a video and a song that's about 10 Baha women in Shiraz, Iran in 1983 who are put to death. Um, so that's, um, that's really special to me. I am on the precipice of releasing the next one, which will happen this summer, and the next song's called Somewhere, someday. And I have a video ready to go for that. Pretty soon I have to finish mixing the song, but, but we're pretty close to that. I'm gonna do two more releases after that, before the album drops, and we'll

Jamie: 1:07:00

Are they releases from the album?

Joel: 1:07:02

find

Jamie: 1:07:03

Okay.

Joel: 1:07:03

Yeah. So if you wanna find anything that I've got going on, it's red heaven.ca. I usually echo everything there. if I it on my socials, it's either Red Heaven or Red Heaven Live. Those are, those are the two handles that I use. Don't look for me on Spotify. I don't use it. I'm not gonna start using it. don't look for me on SoundCloud for the same reason. And so, um, so yeah, there's that. I do livestream. I'm getting back into livestream video on YouTube. and I'm trying to kind of do like every two weeks, every three weeks. Like I haven't really decided yet, but all the information about it will be on Instagram and Facebook, if that's a thing you want to do. So that's there. Yeah. Yeah, I am looking at, I've, I feel like I'm nervous to say this out loud, but I am looking at the possibility of starting to do a lot more like live shows with the full which I don't do

Jamie: 1:07:57

oh wow.

Joel: 1:07:57

but I think with the new album coming out, it might be kind of a cool idea. So I've just been kicking that around with most things. It's like, where's the money gonna come from? That's really the, that's really it. but I'm trying to figure out ways to make that work because one thing I will say is I have it. Great band. And I have gone through tons and tons of people over the last like 12, 13 years trying to find the right people. And I have the right people and they are so good. It is such, such a, not like an honor and a delight. And sometimes I am like overwhelmed by how good they are. So, I would, I guess what I'm thinking is I just don't wanna, people deserve to hear these guys play, so that's kind of why I want to get into that.

Jamie: 1:08:40

I would love that.

Joel: 1:08:41

we'll see how that goes. Yeah, it could be kind of cool. So yeah, I think that's, I think that's basically it. I am very, interested and happy to respond to people who wanna just chat personally about like, whatever. So, um, there's no barrier there. I love meeting people and I love just chatting with people about whatever, so don't hold back if that's a thing you want to do.

Jamie: 1:09:03

Awesome. I won't hold back. I will make sure to,

Joel: 1:09:07

Well, I know you don't hold back.

Jamie: 1:09:10

all right.

Joel: 1:09:11

I also wanna just tell everybody that like she's gonna cut me off when I say this, but like Jamie is one of the smartest, hardest working professionals that I know. And that's the truth. She is really something special. So when I saw she was doing this, uh, I knew this was gonna be, I knew this was gonna be something special and it is. she's worth the burnout collective is worth a follow as

Jamie: 1:09:33

much. Yeah. And thank you guys for following, and thanks everybody for being here. thank you. Joel means a lot. Thank you.

Joel: 1:09:41

it means a lot that you invited me. Thank you.

Jamie: 1:09:43

yeah. Now, yeah, now follow us on Twitch. Joel, what the fuck?

Joel: 1:09:46

Also,

Jamie: 1:09:47

don't even follow.

Joel: 1:09:49

I have to figure out how to make it, I have to make, figure out how to make an

Jamie: 1:09:51

Oh, I thought you did that. All right. I thought we were doing it live.

Joel: 1:09:55

No, I, I didn't, I realized I don't have to make an account to watch the chat. I have to make an account to,

Jamie: 1:10:01

To say

Joel: 1:10:01

type in the chat. And then I was like, why am I typing in the chat when I'm literally on a microphone? So,

Jamie: 1:10:07

yeah. But thank you Joel. Thank you so much.

Joel: 1:10:11

Really fun talking to you. Thank you. You've been very generous and I appreciate

Jamie: 1:10:14

great. Thank you everybody for being here. Thank you. Joel. Red heaven. Go listen to some red heaven guys. See you later.