We were lucky to catch up with Ross Newhouse recently and have shared our conversation below.

Ross, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s the best or worst investment you’ve made (either in terms of time or money)? (Note, these responses are only intended as entertainment and shouldn’t be construed as investment advice)

I think my best and worst investments would both be the people that I’ve chosen to work with in the past. As a musician, you’re continuously expected to do it all, and folks are always impressed by artists that can play all the instruments, mix, and master their own music. I am in awe of that also, because I know how difficult it is to conquer so many different facets of music. There are other musicians, like myself, who love to bring in other players that are stronger at certain aspects of music-making than we are. I’ve found wonderful producers, piano players, guitarists, etc. that have made my songs into what I was envisioning in my head.

There are also times when I hired other folks out of laziness when I should have been practicing and getting better. I remember spending a couple of hundred dollars on a top-line artist (someone who specialized in vocal melodies) for a song, and we ended up not using any of the melodies because he didn’t know how to sing my specific lyrics in the way that I envisioned. There have been producers I’ve hired because of their pedigree but who isn’t right for my songs, and it ends up not only wasting money but time.

I’ve found these all to be learning lessons in really considering if it’s something you can execute yourself. For example, I play guitar and was recently going to pay someone to write a bass line. But, I have a bass, so I just took a few hours to get past the frustration and ended up finding a lick that I really liked for my song. On the other hand, I’m terrible with photoshop, so I’ll always lean on my design friends and their strengths when working towards a design.

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

My name is Ross Newhouse and I’m a songwriter out of Brooklyn, I grew up playing guitar and going to shows in the NJ punk/hardcore scene, but always had an affinity for lyric-first music. I am a huge fan of artists like Modest Mouse, Andy Shauf, Bob Dylan, Gia Margaret, and folks who are tried-and-true songwriters. After a few years in corporate America and in a band that was more about production and vibe, I decided to give music a try full-time and started my solo project under my own name.

Over the past few years, I’ve written songs with a gloss of sophistication and understated romance that have resonated with folks who like my tongue-in-cheek approach to lyric writing. I often write a lot of biting lines, with punchlines and tension that leave you wanting to hear more of the song.

I also like playing chameleon and writing for other artists, keeping my witty storytelling but applying it to the artist at hand. I tend to have as much fun writing for other artists as I do for myself.

I’m most proud of my recent album, Avonlea, which covers themes of insecurity, love, lostness, and more. I wrote it during the height of the pandemic and it is a benchmark for my songwriting and something I will compare my future music to.

I am also proud of my songwriting show, Stage Banter, which is every other Tuesday on Instagram Live. I’ve interviewed artists like Jack Van Cleaf, Elliott Skinner, Victoria Canal, and a host of others. We do a deep dive into lyric and songwriting and musicians and non-musicians alike tend to get a lot out of it.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

“The hustle” or “the grind” – yes, you have to work extremely hard to be an artist. You have to make your own opportunities and you need to set yourself up for success. But, if that’s all you do, you will burn out. You need to have hobbies outside of your craft that you are not trying to monetize and you need to have friends that aren’t artists as well. Take breaks. Take naps. Sleep in. Some rich person will tell you to wake up a 3am, to work on Christmas because your competition won’t, but that’s never how I’ll live my life. I believe you need to practice, you need to hustle, but the idea that working on your career is the only thing you should be doing is harmful and I hope to see folks shifting away from it,

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Actually pay them. For the listener, having the entirety of music available for $9.99 a month on Spotify is a wonderful deal. For musicians, it’s awful. If you buy a record on bandcamp or at a store, it’s the equivalent of streaming that song hundreds of thousands of times. The U.S is getting increasingly expensive to live, and artists literally do not have time to make art in the same way they used to because they are trying to survive. So, if you want to keep consuming art from folks who don’t have rich parents, support the artists. Put money in their tip jar, buy the record, go to the shows. Please!!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.rossnewhouse.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/ross__newhouse
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@RossNewhouse

Image Credits
Katelyn Sparks @ghostobservatory