We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Southview Drive. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Southview Drive below.

Southview Drive, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

Writing music:

Learning to write music together requires a lot of collaboration. We like to try and combine each of our musical influences to create a unique sound. Trial and error is a big part of our creative process.

Counterintuitively, one of the things that would have sped up the learning process would be pacing ourselves. You get a much better product when you take your time rather than rushing through to meet a deadline.

The most essential skill when writing music is listening. To effectively create good music, you have to listen to music you like and don’t like and be critical, but you also have to listen to people. There is no music without listening.

The main obstacle that stood and currently stand in the way of learning more and creating more is work. Because it’s so difficult to make it in the industry, we have to spend the majority of our time and energy on our jobs, which means that we can’t spend that time on doing what we really love: bettering ourselves as musicians and as a band.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Drummer Sean and Guitarist/Singer Mike have known each other for 13 years and instantly clicked. They have played music together since they first met. Southview Drive has been around for 6 years. We found our bass player, Nigel, on Craigslist. We met our second guitarist, Liam, through the local music scene. He was in a band that we played shows with often who, unfortunately, broke up. We saw an opportunity to bring this project to the next level and invited him to join. We all have different backgrounds and experiences which we bring into our music. The music that we make is authentically us. We write music that we like to listen to. If we can’t vibe with what we make, how can we expect the fans to? Our music gives the listener an opportunity to peer into who we are. When music carries a piece of who made it, listeners can tell. There is a connection between the artist and the listener when music is written and produced from the heart and soul of the musician. We are able to write freely because we are completely self-produced. Each member of the band takes on several different roles. We write, record, mix, master, and release all of our own music. We make our own merch and book our own shows. Everything that this band does is a labor of love. Because we are completely DIY, we’re not afraid to take risks. We’re not afraid to take less mainstream ideas to mainstream audiences and, in doing so, we present the truest version of ourselves to our fans. We make true friends by playing our music and making connections in the local music scene. We have improved so much as artists just by working together and pushing each other to be better every day.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

When the song is there and you’re satisfied. Hearing the audience scream the words to your song along with you.
When a bad memory turns into a good song.
Knowing when the show starts we will be nonstop smiling for the next 45 mins.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

When we initially started, it took us two years before we were able to book our first real gig. For the next few years, we were lucky to get more than one gig a year. We recognized that going out and networking in the local music scene is what we needed to do to actually get our name out there. We have been booking 6-7 shows per year since we actively started marketing ourselves locally. We are looking forward to booking shows out of state and making connections throughout the country.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/southviewdrive.band/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/southviewdrive/
• Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3eYjUO8WCJ6D29GKXwvdr0?si=gvoEzhKnRYyS6QzaEmbe9A Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/southview-drive/1296501961 BandCamp: http://southviewdrive.bandcamp.com

Image Credits
Mr. Homebrew Photography, Superfan Photography