Your Iconic Image : Never Give Up On Your Dream

Rich Chambers - Songwriter/Producer/Musician/Singer

Does anyone still use the term "rock n' roll" anymore? Rich Chambers certainly does. In fact, he specializes in it, bringing us all the fun, excitement, and energy from the early days of rock n' roll in a uniquely fresh way built specifically for the 2020s. 

Starting with the 2019 release of his Christmas album, “Santa’s Rockin’ Band,” Rich has been on a roll. His Christmas album produced one single, “the Snow Miser vs. Heat Miser,” which has been streamed more than one million times on Spotify to date. Following this has been six single releases beginning in January 2021, including his film festival award-winning video for his rock original, "I'm So Tired,” which has received accolades in over 50 film festivals across the globe for its hard-hitting social commentary. His most recent release is his guitar-driven version of the Beatles, “I Saw Her Standing There,” which debuted in March 2022 to high critical acclaim. 

Rich’s music videos have received a combined total of well over 500,000 views, and his Spotify streaming is clocking in at approximately 25,000 listeners a month and growing. With more single and album releases planned for 2022, Chambers is making his mark as a rock n’ roll artist to watch for. As one music journalist recently said in the FLEX music blog about Chambers, who hails from Langley, British Columbia: "One of Canada's best-kept secrets, Rich Chambers could easily become a household name in a matter of months!"

With bombastic guitars and a vocal style that oozes rock n’ roll. Rich Chambers is giving us something that rock n’ roll has not seen in quite some time—energy and fun. It’s Rock n’ Roll Reimagined.

https://richchambers.com/

https://www.facebook.com/richchambersrocknroll

https://www.instagram.com/richchambersrocknroll/

https://www.youtube.com/c/RichChambers

www.marlanasemenza.com

Audio : Ariza Music Productions

Transcription : Vision In Word

Marlana  

Does anyone still use the term rock and roll anymore, or chamber certainly does. In fact, he specializes in it bringing us all the fun excitement and energy from the early days of rock and roll in a uniquely fresh way built specifically for today, which is a songwriter, producer, musician and singer, whose music videos have received well over half a million views and his Spotify at approximately 25,000 listeners a month and growing with more single and album releases planned for 2022 chambers is making his mark as a rock and roll artist to watch for. Welcome Rich! 

Rich

Hey! Thanks for that. That's a cool introduction. I like that. Thank you.

Marlana  

What makes your story a bit unique is that you're actually circling back around to a passion that you couldn't let go of. So, talk to us a little bit about that.

Rich

Correct. I mean, I'm a middle-aged rocker. And it's like most musicians, I've been doing this since I was a little kid, I picked up the guitar at 10 and started writing songs of fourteen. And that's where I got absolutely hooked, songwriting was what did it for me. If it weren’t for songwriting, I would just be a hobbyist guitar player and singer, but you put songwriting in the mix, and I went nuts with it. And that's been one of my huge passions is but like many, you know, life journeys, things happen. And when I got out of high school, I was going to be the next rock star. A few cheesy days later, and about a year into that I realize, oh, this is going nowhere. I didn't want the smartest things I could have ever done when I went back to school. And then I pursued went further on as a kid very barely passed high school, I finished a bachelor's degree, a master's degree in it for a while was actually toying with PhD work. And it's pretty good considering I barely finished high school. So, I’m a huge massive advocate of education. 

Along the way, I played in bands, I had one band and we together for 15 years, start a family, all that kind of thing. And then I got to that point where most people are starting to ramp up for retirement. You know, I'm looking in the mirror and I'm saying to myself rich, this is your passion and this your entire life. But you've never really gone full bore into it. Why aren't you doing that? And I didn't have an answer for myself. So, at that point, I decided right then and there, I'm going to go full in. I'm going to give it all I've got. So, I often laugh, you know, when people hit their midlife crisis, the stereotypical image is the guy who you know, gets the young girlfriend and the convertible. Well, I bought the guitar and started singing songs. So that's how I sort of come full circle. My big thing, Marlana, is I sort of looked in that proverbial metaphorical mirror, we always look at and say, What am I doing with my life? And I said, I don't want to grow old with regrets, you know, so I figured what am I got to lose chasing my passion? Regrets The only thing I had to lose? Who wants regret anyway?

Marlana  

Yeah, let me ask you this, because I was recently having a conversation with a musician who is in her early twenties. And she said that someone had said to her, Well, what's your plan B? And I said to her, tell them that you don't have one, because if you have a plan B in the back of your head, then there's always that default though, there's always that what if I don't make it? But if there is no plan B, and this is all there is, then you have to go forward, and you have to make it work. What are your thoughts on having a plan B or not?

Rich

Alright, it's a great question when I just think every musician has it. Because I was faced with that to an interesting story. I had a high school counselor. Like I said, I barely passed High School. I remember seeing my high school counselor’s mandatory all season. And she said, What do you wanna do with your life? Music? That was my answer. And she said exactly what you just said, Well, what's your backup plan? Music, she said, You have to have a backup plan. And then she went on to explain why you should do this and do that and everything else. And I thought, I don't want to listen to this woman. I was out there. And I thought, so we're seeing a high school counselor could have said, and it's the irony is that later in my working career, I became an academic advisor at University where I advise students on career choices. And one of the things I always said as a go after your passions, and I said, whether it's drama, music, engineering, computer science, chemistry, there will be a job for you. Go after your passions and make your passions define your career by what you want to do. Don't let a career define you. 

That's the sort of route everybody gets into. And that's where this plan B comes from. People say all musicians don't make money. Lots don't have lots do and the ones that have a plan to be a musician, make money. There's no two ways about it. I mean, people can say, well, rich, you're sort of a bit of a walking orcs oxymoron because you have a regular job at a university right now and you're pursuing this music thing. But what is my true career? I have a job and I have a passionate career. So that's how I look at it. So, your plan B isn't necessarily a Plan B, a plan your plan A is I want to do music. And what people call Plan B actually is maybe it's in my case, it's a job. It's not a plan B, it's just what I do for a work on a day-to-day basis to pay the bills while I pursue the music. So, you're absolutely right, I totally agree. Because as soon as you put a plan B mindset in your head, it becomes a default becomes easy to fall back on that you're not going for it.

Marlana  

And I think sometimes, you know, you do the things that you have to do to do the things that you want to do. 

Rich

Absolutely!

Marlana

 But also, it's interesting to me, because as somebody who also works in one of the arts, when we talk to people, and they say, oh, I want to be a computer scientist, or I want to be a doctor, or they're never usually asked, What's your plan B, it's the people in the arts that are usually asked What's…

Rich

Your right, you know, it's interesting to be a doctor, I work in education, I know what it takes to be a doctor. Oh, my goodness, you have to be the creme de la creme of your students. To get there. You have to be an amazing student. Most people can't do it. But yet, you're absolutely right. If somebody says I want to be a doctor, they can be a C student, I'll tell you the actual fact of a C student want to be a doctor. Sorry, right now, you're not going to make it. That's the reality. But people don't say that. They say, Oh, good for you go for it. Well, you know, so it, people miss it. And we come I come back to what I say often is, like I said, my years of academic advising, helping students and people figure out career paths. Don't define yourself by your career, you define your career. So, you don't want to be a doctor or a lawyer. You want to do what your passion is. And most people don't know there's so many different careers out what often a bit of a tangent, but it's so important in development and plans and goal making. 

There are so many careers out there. For instance, I used to tell students, okay, look at the there's the Bank Tower, and Canada's huge bank is like the RBC or Scotia Bank. These are big banks, I say, look at the Scotiabank tower in Vancouver where I live. And it's you know, twenty stories, and thousands of people work there and say, who works at what careers are there, the students will look at me say banker. So that's one career. You're not looking at the accountant, you're not looking at the ITP you're not looking at the project managers. And Phyllis goes on and on and on. And people don't realize that there are so many different jobs out there. So, the worst thing anybody can do is I want to be this no, do what go after your passion. If your passion happens to be medicine, as a lot more than just doctor you can be if you're passionate actors of your writing, there's a lot more than just a novel writer you can be if your passion happens to be music, there's lots more than just a musician you can be you define it. And that comes back to your plan B thing. There is no plan B, your plan A is I love music. I'm going down music path. I love planning.

Marlana  

So how do you manage the two things that you're doing? Because you do work a full-time job right now. And you are following this passion? So how do you? How do you do both?

Rich

Whoa, crazy. Well, that's partly why I'm doing it now. Because if you go back 15 years, when I had toddlers at home, there's no way I could have done it. I mean, and I was also pursuing a master's degree, doing a master's thesis while working full time and two young kids at home. So that was the choices I made at that point in my life. I kept it’s all about choices, career goals and paths in life, things are all about choices. And I chose to do that. And no regrets whatsoever because I raised two wonderful young boys. And you know, I got cheap, the master's degree, which was put on the bucket list. And I'm so happy and proud of that. But now I have more time open and it's time to make a different decision. And you know, I get frustrated with people. And once people do it, I mean, I get it, you get stuck in a rut, you say, Oh, I can't do that. I need that. All you need is a drive determination and a plan. Do it in some ways. It's that simple.

Marlana  

Yeah. So how are you getting traction for your music?

Rich

That's the interesting thing. Boy is it takes a lot of work. Wow. It's one of those things where I started. I mean, I started with just a bit somewhat just a pipe dream, my guitar, and some songs. And I always had full belief in my songwriting, not necessarily some of my production levels, and my singing and guitar playing has taken a lot of years to work at it. But when I was a young boy and I first started writing songs at full belief, and I come back to I haven't said this yet, but having belief in yourself is massive, because in any career endeavor, no matter what it is, you're going to come up with roadblocks and you got to have that belief in yourself to get over around those roadblocks. So, when I started this huge music push you know as a hugely, I was definitely a neophyte I'm What am I doing? I went on and checked all the Google boards and Reddit and everything else. What's everybody saying? How do you do this and how do you do that? And I started by basically releasing a Christmas single Christmas song. And part of that and by logic there was Christmas sells itself. So, you know if you do a good version or Frosty the Snowman that helps you right there, which actually ended up being a smart move on my part. So, I've won a Christmas song up to 1.2 million streams and Spotify last three years. 

So that's pretty cool. And that's because of Christmas. And people familiar with the song. I didn't write it though. So, I My goal was to be original music. So, I piggyback use Christmas to start, and I love Christmas too. So, it wasn't really that big. So unfortunately.

And so, I started Christmas. And then from there I by pure Fluke Marlana. It was two years ago, January 2020, through the middle of the pandemic. And I'd written a song over the Christmas holidays after I released my Christmas album, called I'm so tired, and all sent January 6 hit and I finished a song two or three days before January 6, and people storming Capitol Hill, I'm sitting watching TV that most people can't believe what I'm seeing is this actually happening in our backyard. And I realized I finished writing, producing a song five days earlier called I'm so tired. And it was it was, and I realized how prophetic And how fitting the song was to what's actually happening. In our culture, there maybe you know, maybe it's tapping in some subconscious thing or something. But at that point, I decided I'm going to release the song, but I want to I want to put my statement and what I feel is going on. So, I made a social video, I went on to social media, when the Facebook, YouTube everywhere else upload these clips from all the unrest and going on the protests and what happened in Portland, all the protests in Washington and people protesting in the streets are so many different protests, and I dove in a company how much stuff was out there. And I made this what I call a social video, called I'm so tired with all these clips. 

I'm super proud because in the last two years since at least I've received accolades from over fifty film festivals on this video, because it's so socially cutting and hitting. And the amount of feedback I got when I released that in January of 2020. I was like, Wow, maybe I'm onto something, you know, I plan to release a Christmas album. And my initial plan was a year later releasing another album, and I thought I'm gonna start releasing singles. So that started in like any plant, it's evolved, it's changed as I've gone, it has to because you have to be ready to change on anytime and adapt to the environment that's happening around you. So, I start releasing singles. And I started making contacts and some radio airplay, and it started and I through trial and error, you find who the good promoters or the bad promoters are. And I think a lot of artists, I have promoters that were getting me robot plays on Spotify and YouTube and you trash them, and you go for the ones that get you legitimate place trial and error. And now I have a network of writers that enjoy my music, and they'll write for me, I have a network of promoters that will throw it on Spotify...