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

Andrew, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

I’ve had the privilege of working on lots of different projects with lots of different artists. I thrive on collaboration, so I spend lots of time finding new people and making things that we can all get excited about. These projects have varied from concerts series and festivals, to recorded music for myself and other artists, and lots of unique ideas in between.

For an example, one friend of mine in Nashville spent a lot of 2022 traveling around in a camper van and working remotely. I told him that we should work on some music in a new place during his trip. We ended up going to Zion National Park in Utah and stayed for a few days hiking and writing. The end result was this really cool piece of music representative of our conversations during the trip and that shared experience. He plans to release it this fall I believe. Things like that get me very excited, because even if no one ever heard that song or knew we even did that trip, the experience itself was more than enough.

Another example: an artist friend of mine wanted to find a way to stand out a bit and do something unique with his concerts; so we came up with a festival-style show concept, called it “Circle Fest” and hosted it in a friend’s backyard. We had a few artists playing, pop-up vintage vendors, a hot dog stand, we colored the whole driveway in chalk. Huge success for him, packed in as many people as would fit in this backyard. It felt cool that weekend knowing we had made something that brought all those people together.

Andrew, 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 am an artist and producer, currently based in Nashville, TN. I was a founding member of a band called The Band CAMINO, which I left in 2017 for personal reasons. Since then I have enjoyed exploring all aspects of music and art that get me excited, spending time growing as a person and musician. I now spend most of my time writing and producing music with artists in my studio in Nashville. Occasionally I will release music under my own name; my latest release entitled “Midnight in Marseille” is a collaboration with Memphis artist Aaron James and is available on all streaming services. I love working on projects with people who aren’t afraid to try something new or out-of-the-box. My favorite music to listen to is what stands out from the rest, and that’s what I would like my musical legacy to be as well.

I want to be the collaborator that people come to if they want to hit a reset button, or try exploring a new sound/idea. Every time I leave one of those sessions I feel full and excited about the process. It has less to do with the music so much as it does the psychology behind it (for me at least). I love helping people find what they’re looking for. It helps me to do that for myself when I’m helping someone else do it too. Everybody is exploring things in their own time and their own way. It’s a privilege to be let into that process in any capacity.

Recently I have re-entered the touring world as well. I’ve been working with lovelytheband for the last few months, and this fall I will be on tour with The Brook and The Bluff. As much as I love working in the studio, I’m also enjoying being out learning new things and meeting so many new musicians.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

When I was in my first band, we saw a lot of success very quickly. I was young at the time, the band was formed when I was 17 and I left before turning 20, but within that time we got to do so many amazing things. After leaving that group and striking out on my own, I had this false sense that I would find success just as quickly again. That was definitely not the case. It made me redefine success for myself, but it also made me reevaluate what I really wanted out of my career. I found myself slowly stripping away the things that were not important, and gradually focusing on what made me happy.

I found that creating music makes me very happy, and that I naturally drift towards being the person in charge. I found that I do not enjoy being a frontman, but that I love singing. I found that I enjoy drumming for people, but I enjoy it a lot more if I wrote the song. Little things like that, but one by one I was kind of hammering out where I wanted to put my energy. For me, I overthink things, and if I wasn’t certain that what I was doing was the right thing for me, I had a hard time putting my all into it.

It took years for me to sort those things out, and I think in part I am still sorting them out. But now that I’ve taken that time to establish who I want to be in my industry, I can confidently show up and do my job well. And the time it took me has also taught me to stay persistent. I feel like now I’m starting to look back and see that the time and patience I put in has paid off.

Now that I feel like I’m making strides independently, I’m very grateful for any opportunity that comes my way. My outlook was a little arrogant all those years ago. To have a job in a creative field is a privilege, and to make your full income on music is something to be celebrated no matter how it looks. People trusting you with their music is a really big deal.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

I think in music, and probably lots of other lanes of work, friends are your biggest asset. My friends have put my name in so many hats, recommended me for gigs, shown people my music, helped me work on things for as cheap as possible when I couldn’t afford it, helped me find places to work on my music. I don’t think there is a single thing I’ve done lately that isn’t the direct result of a helpful friend. For all of 2022 I was working out of a friend’s basement because I couldn’t afford my own studio space. Both of the tours I’ve accepted this year were from friends recommending me. And even me being able to produce music for a living comes from a couple of friends trusting me with their art. And that led to more people seeing me as a producer.

It’s not that I didn’t know this early on; I think I just had the false idea that I could do it all on my own. That I didn’t need help. But since I started asking for it, and making sure I was learning all I could from the people around me, things have really started to move a lot quicker. I’m happy to finally be reaching a point where I can be the friend helping other musicians out.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: andrew._.isbell
• Other: Latest solo release: https://open.spotify.com/track/5pAFwshcQUVCr1nuc50vr9?si=1f43ff6257004316 Playlist of all released works: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0jBejBvFOYJi1W4e1FDZ2f?si=f8aaab2c02f84a13

Image Credits
Gina Di Maio Nox Nohi Cooper Scobey Matt West