We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dwayne Williams a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Dwayne, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

As a young bright eyed individual I wanted to try everything that struct my attention. The biggest problem was finances and locations. It was hard to find studios that weren’t charging me triple what I was making for the gig. This led to me wanting to create a company that provided a place for interested minds to work. When I created Out East Records, LLC. I implemented that way of thinking into everything we do. From performance to photo shoots it’s all set in stone to put us all as a people in uplifting positions. Hopefully giving them the opportunity to bless someone else.

Dwayne, 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?

My journey started in 2018 as a photographer. I had just left college and stopped playing football, so I started searching for things I was talented at to occupy my time. That summer my brother, Devon Williams, moved to Nashville for the summer, he had been writing music for years. We talked for hours about the concept of music and watched him write songs. He described it as “tell a story but to a beat, as long as you’re being real people will listen.” This lead to me writing recreationally, just as a stress reliever. Around 2020 my sister, Maarji, kept pushing me to record my music because I had a skill but was just wasting it. I remained hesitant due to not wanting people in my business, I didn’t want to be famous, and I was use to being behind the scenes with photography. By the end of 2020 I started mapping out plans to start my own record label. I told myself I didn’t want to work for anybody else and whenever I decided to back down I could have something of my own to pass to generations. In 2021 Out East Records, LLC. was born in Clarksville, TN in honor of where I’m from, Out East. Now I strive to overcome all obstacles and create an avenue for other Nashville artist who has a talent being overlooked.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Team building, I say this because being a start up company a lot of people overlook us. They usual leave for a more established company to become a number instead of a respected team member. It’s made it hard to be consistent in my work because the work load of organizing recording sessions, recording, filming, setting up releases, planning events, etc. all falls on me. This challenge hasn’t stopped the growth of my company. I look at it as I can’t expect other people to want to work hard for a dream I have, some people like the easy route and want things just given. We have continued to build keeping the employees that fit into the dream of the organization. This has lead to us obtaining a building to host events, coming in 2023 and more.

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

Consistency is the most effective strategy. You’re going to fail, you’re going to get laughed at and talked about. Those same people are waiting around until it’s considered cool to support you to say they’ve known you forever. Push all the negativity to the back and use it as fuel to continue to grown and prosper. When it all boils down this journey is yours, so all that matters is that you love what you’re doing. From that mindset alone you will build loyal clientele, supporters, fans, and employees.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.outeastrecords.net/catalog
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/outeastrecordsllc?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dwayne-williams-015b25230
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/oe_dwill
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCmq7N0yUR1VsPSdYMEE3P1Q

Image Credits
Dwayne Williams Dwill Photography Frank