We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful James Cox. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with James below.
James, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.
My first experience with depression was quite some time ago. I’d say around 2014 maybe? I runs through my mom’s side of the family, so I can defiantly say I got it from my mom’s side.I was mainly depressed because I didn’t have a girlfriend, (I still don’t by the way).
I started podcasting in 2015 I’d say. I had 7 different podcasts (not at the same time). We’ll one day I was out with a friend and he jokingly said “James, you know what…you know too much about music.” “You should do a podcast on and about music”.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
On out Podcast “When Words Fail Music Speaks”
I didn’t want this just to be an ordinary podcast about music. It’s been done. So i then thought how I felt when I was depressed and I never want anyone to have that feelings cause it’s a worse feeling that no one can explain and most people dismiss because they have no idea about it or what they’re talking about.
I then contacted my friend Blake Moseley (I call him “Broseley” on the show). I met him in college some years ago…we had done a podcast called “Communicating with Words” that wasn’t going anywhere we thought.
So we recorded our first episode of “When Words Fail Music Speaks” in February of 2020 and we’ve recorded 204 episodes as of this interview. We have 4 series on our podcast. Or Main Show where we talk about different genres and artist, Then We have “Cover Wars” which is we pick out a song, and then we find two covers of that one song. Then we discuss which one is better and why. There have been a few times where we didn’t like either of the cover or have liked them equally!
Then our most popular one is “Cover Wars with Musicians” which is the same thing as the regular cover wars but it’s with musicians we’ve interviewed on the podcast in the past.
Yes! we also interview musicians we have had the great opportunity to interview amazing country talent like Buddy Jewell, Sarah Harralson, Shantell Ogden, Becks, and others. In other genres we have interviewed wonderful artists such as Leland Sklar, Judy Rodman, Jane Bach, Tony Campos, David Ellefson, Elias Soriano, Tommy Vext, and many others. The podcast has acquired nearly 7500 downloads and regularly has over 100 downloads a week.
We will bring a 5th “series” to the podcast and it will be … again the “Cover Wars” idea just brought to the public. Everyone loves music. It brings back memories, idea’s and motivates in ways that are explainable. We want the public to also be involved in this as well, and what better way to do that then to listen to their favorite song.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
I’d say the outcome, I haven’t yet received an email saying how we’ve helped them. But just the fact that I know people listen to our podcast, means the world to us.
How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?
By physical merchandise, it’s so important to do that. Yes, it’s easy to click “download” on SpotIfy or Apple Music; but bying physical items such as t-shirts, cd’s, patches, or even vinyl goes directly to the artist.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.whenwordsfailmusicspeaks.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/when_words_fail_podcast
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WWFMSPodcast
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/WhenWordsFailMS
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/whenwordsfailmusicspeaks
- Other: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@whenwordsfailmusicspeaks