We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Chris Warren. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Chris below.
Chris, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. If you could go back in time do you wish you had started your creative career sooner or later?
I didn’t start podcasting until 2020. I was 34 years old. In regards to music, I started playing guitar and writing songs when I was 14 but I didn’t record anything professionally until about 5 years ago. I was on the older side of the spectrum when I started pursuing my creative endeavors. When I was teenager, makeshift recording studios weren’t what they are today and were not readily available. In the early 2000’s you had to actually go to a studio to record and pay for studio time. There are kids now who are recording entire albums in their bedroom on a laptop and streaming it across the world. It’s mind-blowing how much technology has changed in relatively short amount of time. It’s pretty rad.
I wish I had started earlier because I knew I had talent, but like most people, we can be guided by fear of the unknown. When I was in my 20’s, I didn’t have the financial stability that I do now, so taking major risks wasn’t appealing at the time. You need leverage to be able to do what you want to do in life and I just didn’t have that. The “starving artist” trope wasn’t for me. I was very much a product of my generation in that regard. I was told my whole life to go to college and get a 9-5. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I still work a regular job on top of my creative endeavors. No one should ever feel shame about working a “regular job.” I am just here to say that you CAN DO BOTH if you want to. You also don’t have to do both. That’s a personal choice on your creative journey.
Conversely, you don’t really need a lot of money now to do what you want to do what you want to do because there’s so many free tools online for creatives, you need the time and need to have the dedication. That’s it. It’s really that simple. It’s free to start a podcast on Anchor. It’s free to record a song because there’s free recording software on the internet. You can record content for Youtube or TikTok with just a cell phone. There’s really no excuse anymore. It’s the wild west out here and a fun time to be a creative. I am the embodiment of that it’s never too late to pursue your interests.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I started the Trapped in Austin Podcast in February 2020, ironically a month before the pandemic hit, The podcast was an idea I always ruminated about. I loved good conversation and listening to people talk. I grew up listening to and watching guys like Howard Stern and Charlie Rose and beloved news anchors like Barbara Walters and Dan Rather. I was born in the 80’s so I am definitely from that era. I just love conversation and hearing people’s stories. Till this day, I would choose to listen to a good interview or an interesting monologue over a fictional show.
My podcast happened almost incidentally, It was just me and my childhood best friend, Zack goofing around and then it evolved into one of the marquee platforms for some of the most interesting people in Austin to tell their story. The value I offer is I give these individuals a welcoming place to control their own narrative.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
At this stage, the goal is to keep doing exactly what I’ve been doing. I don’t know if there is an end game at this point. I enjoy exactly how things are going. If I get too hung up on end results, I don’t think I would like the journey as much. If I end up getting signed to a media company, that would be cool. If not, I will keep doing the show independently.
Alright – so here’s a fun one. What do you think about NFTs?
This is an interesting question. I have personally lost money on NFT’s so my admittedly selfish response is that I don’t think they are great. At least not right now. A part of me thinks that this technology might be too ahead of the curve for the average civilian to truly comprehend. It has its purpose because there will be a time in the foreseeable future where blockchain technology and smart contracts will have utility in society. But I don’t think we are quite there just yet.
If you think about it, you can really break down society into two segments; People who live on the internet and are very much submerged in technology and what’s the newest trend and then people who are taking their kids to soccer games and mowing their lawn on Saturdays and don’t really care about what’s happening online. It’s really that paradoxical.
There is definitely a technological renaissance going on behind the curtain, but I really don’t think the adaptation of it is going to go as smoothly as some may think.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswarrenmusic/?hl=en
- Other: Podcast Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/trappedinaustin/
Image Credits
These are all my photos.