Congratulations on the release of your new single “Summer Love” featuring Sophia Goln! Can you share with us the creative process for this track and what inspired you to produce it?
Chase: Thanks! This track has been in the works for about 2 years so it’s great to finally have it out. Sophia and I started working on it in the midst of the pandemic, so the recordings were done both virtually and in-person, which created some challenges. We both shared a similar vision for the song, though many different versions of the track existed before we settled on the final version you hear now. After producing the original demo, I felt something was missing, so I called upon my good friend Stoyan (aka Universe Hopper) to lay down some guitar, which I think really brings the whole track together.
What instruments did you learn to play when you were younger? How did you use your knowledge of music to teach yourself how to DJ?
Chase: I started playing piano around the age of 4, then played some guitar and drums. I took a short DJ lesson at the age of 12 while on holidays and instantly fell in love. From there I spent most of my teenage years teaching myself how to DJ and produce music (shoutout to Youtube tutorials). My background in piano is still the foundation of how I write music today. Most of my songs start off with messing around on the piano or playing some simple chords and melodies, and then I kind of just go crazy from there.
How did you find Sophia Goln and end up collaborating with her? The two of you working together is just absolute magic!
Chase: Sophia and I were both founders of a group called Music for Mental Health. We wrote music together as part of that group, before branching out into some of our own projects. Sophia not only has an incredible voice, but an amazing ability to improvise over almost any music. Often when I’m recording with her in a studio or just in my room, I give her a beat and tell her to go wild over it with some runs and harmonies and she always kills it. Beyond being super easy to work with, we also just seemed to click really well and have a similar mentality towards music so we’ll hopefully have lots more music coming in the future!
Tell us more about your non-profit organization and record label, “Music for Mental Health"!
Chase: Music for Mental Health has easily been one of the most special projects I’ve ever been a part of. It came to existence out of a group chat of students at our University that were interested in helping people through music during the midst of the pandemic, when students' mental health was at an all-time low. We came up with the idea to send out forms where students could write about their mental health experiences, and then we use their words to write the lyrics of our music. The goal is to share the story of what it’s like to live with, and persevere through various mental health struggles. Our community quickly grew to hundreds of students interested in what we were doing, so we incorporated as a non-profit so that we could distribute music from students at other schools. I’m currently the Vice-President and Director of Operations of Music for Mental Health, and helping to lead the expansion of the organization into more schools across Canada and beyond.
You can learn more about our community here: https://www.musicformentalhealth.ca/
What has been your favorite gig you’ve performed so far? Any specific memories that stuck with you?
Chase: My favorite gig by far was playing at our University’s nightclub on campus called “The Pit”. While I always enjoy playing music, it’s 1000x better when you know so many of the people in the crowd. Literally no better feeling in the world than seeing the joy you can bring to peoples face with the right song!
I know you’re releasing a new single every month of 2022, which is incredible btw, so what can we expect for the rest of the releases?! I cannot wait to hear more!
Chase: As any musician will tell you, we have hundreds of songs that are 90% finished, it's getting that last 10% done and sending it off to be published that's the hardest part. Therefore this year I set the personal goal to try to get a song out every month, just to track my progress over time. I’ve been experimenting with a lot of different sounds and genres, so expect to keep hearing an interesting mix of some hopefully unique music. In general, I’ve been trying to get out of the habit of writing slow, sad, songs and bring some more upbeat vibes. I view the music creation process as more of a music discovery process though, so I never try to limit what kind of music I’ll make. As long as it vibes, it's a go.
Interviewed By Sarah Curry
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