We recently connected with Joshua Crawford and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Joshua, thanks for joining us today. One of the toughest things about progressing in your creative career is that there are almost always unexpected problems that come up – problems that you often can’t read about in advance, can’t prepare for, etc. Have you had such and experience and if so, can you tell us the story of one of those unexpected problems you’ve encountered?

So there are two that really stand out back in June 2020 I hit 75,000 subscribers on YouTube after that I received an email to do a product review of a software one of the biggest mistakes I’ve ever done in my career after upon opening the software, I was signed out of my YouTube channel automatically password has been changed and a space X live stream was running on my channel. Also all 500 of my videos were deleted almost instantly. I’ve gotten several DM’s from across all of my platforms asking me did my channel just get hacked some of my followers sent me emails accusing me of scamming them out of money because they believed that I was part of whatever the hacker was doing with my channel. But my Community stepped up in a way. I could not imagine from everybody sharing on their stories. What had happened to all of them tagging YouTube but it wasn’t until I reached out to YouTube via Twitter at the time and within a 2 to 3 week process, I was able to get my channel back and one of the funny things was that none of my videos were deleted. They were all put on private so I had to go through all 500 videos and make them all public, but what’s funny is within that same week for the very first time I went extremely viral off of a reaction video that video hit 4 million views in two weeks moving me from 75,000 subscribers and helping me hit the YouTube milestone of 100,000 subscribers ! The second incident happened, not too long ago maybe last year in November I was wrongfully accused by a bug of some sort where my entire channel was demonetized I got in contact with YouTube and they told me that if I felt it was a mistake that I had the right to appeal the decision. I also got a email prior to this from YouTube stating that I need to make sure that my channel is 100% removed of any copyrighted content so not fully understanding fair use I assumed two specific YouTube shorts might fall into this category so I deleted those two not knowing that deleting anything during the appeal process will instantly make my appeal denied so that’s what happened. My appeal was denied and I could not reapply for monetization for the next five months. It was a very hard five months, but I never quit. I always knew this is what I wanted to do and I kept grinding as usual fast forward to today. I am monetized again and the channel is thriving more successful than ever.

Joshua, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Josh Crawford is an American drummer and content creator best known for his energetic reactions to drum performances on YouTube. The channel also features lessons and performances by Josh and has enjoyed over 70 million views to date. With over 260,000 subscribers.

Fun Fact: Josh is AN IDENTICAL TRIPLET! On June 12th, 1990, He entered this world with two roommates: my brothers Justin and Jason Crawford. Yes, he’s the oldest of a set of triplets and amazingly, they’re all musicians! His interest in music began differently than you may have expected. Joshua originally had an intense desire to play the guitar and his younger brother Justin, played the drums.

They all started as church musicians and still play in church ’til this day, his younger brother Justin on drums and Jason on keys. Even though He wanted to play the guitar They didn’t have one yet so Joshua sat in as a back up drummer scared to death hoping that his brother Justin would never get tired, or just let me play the slow songs. However, his fear and hesitation to playing drums changed as soon as He joined his high school jazz band. Not to mention according to Joshua his brother Justin stopped progressing as a drummer and had now moved on to play guitar which now serves as his main instrument.

His brothers, best friend Alex Rassberry, and Joshua started a jazz band called 3+1, get it? They were now gigging all throughout our local city Newark NJ and his love for drumming was morphing into a love for different kinds of drummers. While they were out trying to make a name for themselves, Joshua would meet different talents and just seeing what other drummers were capable of.

That’s when He started my YouTube channel. Joshua started doing reactions featuring different drummers. On June 10, 2020, I built my channel up to around 76,000 subscribers and it was on that day my channel got hacked two weeks after that with the help of YouTube I was able to recover my channel and the very next week I went viral which helped me reach over 100,000 subscribers (currently now at 260,000 subscribers.)I also landed an endorsement deal with Meinl Cymbals, Also I became partners with the biggest drum Channel on YouTube and it is pretty much the staple of the Drum community called Drumeo! (Over 2 million subscribers) and also I am partners with the biggest instrument store in the world Sweetwater sound!

And In October 2021 I started a TikTok and as of today, I have over 200,000 followers and Tons Of viral videos all over 3 million views with Tiktok! Can’t wait to see what the future holds!

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Honestly, clicking the upload button every time I do that I know there’s a chance that it’s gonna reach someone that needs it whether it’s encouragement, motivation inspiration anything like that every upload is an opportunity to reach someone!

Have you ever had to pivot?

I’m going to be 100% transparent with this question I always have to pivot and train something up because in the world of social media even though you are the originator and your specific content there are those who will take your ideas and repackage it and make it there’s as if they are the originator there are times where I literally feel like Little Richard and I have to literally say to myself. I am the originator but every time and it’s happening a lot where creative will come in and see what I have done and try to create it as if they are the originators my pivot is always to come up with even more ideas.!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://joshdumclass.wixsite.com/mysite?fbclid=PAdGRleAM1C1RleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABp2gHCK85zB6hfxxW3JJh2jseDjgBYAPt4O0iw5pPsRy-L52SknS_swEiOmNe_aem_OP5SjcDklR5DdeGQhRdQWA
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joshdrumclass?igsh=d3NmbzQ3ZjM4OTg3&utm_source=qr
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1BZ9dgFT9N/?mibextid=wwXIfr
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/c/JoshuaCrawford1990
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1v7UbFDMytWdMgLN7p1ZAV?si=eCalgMkZQZakMf2cv_g-aQ

Image Credits

@ milosherwood

andrealee.designstudio