We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Richie Cunning. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Richie below.

Hi Richie, thanks for joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

I’m not there yet. I’ve been working on it while working for someone else for almost 20 years now. I’ve gone through periods of “I can do it” and periods of “It’s not for me”, back and forth, many, many times.

Richie, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m Richie. From The City. I was born and raised in San Francisco and I’ve been here ever since. Music has always been the only thing that made perfect sense to me. It hit me at a very young age and I never really looked back. As a kid, that manifested itself with guitar lessons and trumpet classes. As a teenager and young adult, that turned into samplers and drum machines and GEAR.

I first started recording myself in high school on 4-track tapes. I would later figure out how to use computers for more tracks and fx, etc. I went to shows, bought records, and stayed on the scene. I met my crew, REC LEAGUE, who taught me everything that I didn’t know I didn’t know. I honed my craft for many years until I felt bold enough to release my first full-length album “Night Train”. It was finished in 2008 and I sent out many demos to various local record labels and some bigger ones. No one replied. I waited longer than I should have, but eventually decided that I was going to put the record out by myself. So “Night Train” came out in January of 2010.

Everything changed after that. But to me, nothing has. I’m still an unknown waiting to release a big album.

That initial release has gained me a ton of notoriety and media mentions and tours and streams, etc. But I still have a dayjob.

The indie music landscape is as wild as it’s ever been and one of the things that all the “experts” will tell you is that you need new “content” all the time. Constantly. To feed the hungry beast. That’s something that I’m still not good at because I won’t even let my closest friends hear a track that I don’t think is the best I can do. I can work harder and I can stay up later, but one thing I will never do is put out a song that I personally don’t think is great.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

This might be obvious, but if you want to support an artist, look for a way that does not involve a 3rd party mega-corporation! Sure, I make money off of Spotify and Apple streams (cents and cents), but where I really make money that matters is on merch and shows.

If you love a musician, go to their website/bandcamp/whatever. Buy things directly from them. If you know who runs or books a club in your town, tell them to make an offer to that artist.

Every artist who is serious about making a living has a way for you to contribute directly and you shouldn’t have to look very hard to find it!

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The messages that I get from fans are far and away the most rewarding thing. I don’t get bags of fanmail every day or even every year, but once in a while, I get a little message on IG or Twitter or whatever and it always humbles me to the core. A stranger sending me words about my music and what it means to them. That makes everything I’ve ever done completely worth it. I was and still am the headphoned guy on the train, soaking up every word and beat that came through and it is still surreal for me to consider myself on the other end of those headphones.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.richiecunning.com
• Instagram: @richiecunning
• Facebook: facebook.com/Richiecunning
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richielipton/
• Twitter: @richiecunning
• Youtube: Search “Richie Cunning”
• Other: https://richiecunning.bandcamp.com/merch

Image Credits