We were lucky to catch up with Joel Aka YENSHIN! recently and have shared our conversation below.

Joel, appreciate you joining us today. I’m sure there have been days where the challenges of being an artist or creative force you to think about what it would be like to just have a regular job. When’s the last time you felt that way? Did you have any insights from the experience?

I am so much happier now as a full-time artist, designer, or whatever you want to call it. I used to work in random IT jobs for corporate companies, which made me depressed. I even did graphic design and creative work for someone else’s company, which made me miserable. Realizing that was gut-wrenching to me. The thing I always thought I wanted to do or even the thing that paid me very well was driving me to suicidal thoughts daily. So I am much happier than I have ever been. I may be broke, but I am happy haha

Joel, 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?

Let me start by saying that I have ADHD, haha. So this will all make a bit more sense, but I do a lot of everything. I am a multimedia designer mainly. This includes everything from graphic edits to VHS video editing to merchandising for musicians. On top of that, I have been chronically online since the 2000s, including making myspace layouts for random cyber grindcore bands launching hobby YouTube channels, and doing everything from the marketing to the content itself. Oh wait, I a not done yet; speaking of that hobby youtube channel (TRUEGUNPLA), I started my clothing line based on that channel. Merging the aesthetics of death metal with the imagery of nostalgic mecha animes from my childhood and adulthood.

Remember that ADHD thing I talked about at the beginning of this? Well, doing all of this shit made sense after getting a diagnosis and learning about my mental health and who I am as a person. This led to a hobby and mental health podcast I do with two friends called The Cutting Mat Podcast. Just wait; the multi-hyphen train doesn’t stop there. During the pandemic, I picked up making beats and producing for trap and hip-hop artists. I have always been involved with music as a death metal vocalist in various local and online bands and projects. Since I could install a pirated version of fruity loops on the school computers, I was always kinda producing or making some random stuff at home. In the height of the underground SoundCloud era, I was lucky enough to work with Russian artist VELIAL SQUAD on some early projects. I was mainly providing black metal-style vocals for random songs or a feature here and there. This leads me down a rabbit hole of learning about various producers and artists. Fast forward to 2022, and I am back to my real passion in music, which is rap. Mainly phonk, hip hop, and trap if you want to get into particular genres that I produce. Oh yeah, remember all that design stuff and social media stuff I told you I have been doing since like 2008?? Luckily all play into making beats, and now I can use my skills to help both myself and local and online artists starting in this industry.

Phew, sorry, that is a lot of words I typed, but oh yeah, I also have my toy store called YENSHIN! TOYS, where other artists in our community and I paint cool toys like sofubi figures from Japan. Right now, it’s just my homie Adam Payne, who helps with painting figures, and myself, who runs the company and paints figures. My goal is to help LGBTIQA+, neurodivergent, ASD folks like ourselves to be able to pursue art as a method to keep a roof over their head and share dope art with the world.

Alright – so here’s a fun one. What do you think about NFTs?

Literal worst marketing method ever invented.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

Therapy.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://yenshinstudio.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yenshinstudio/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/TrueGunpla
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsaAqqZk-RL0eBkB8RqtqwA

Image Credits
I took all the photos so you can use credit as me or YENSHIN! STUDIO