Ep.315 – Quest to Resonate and Revolutionize with Musician....Sarantos

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This is the widow tale music speaks podcast with Blake Mosley, James Tux, and Amanda Dolan. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Woodenworthy of Music weeks, where we fight depression with the power of music. I'm handicapped, professional handicapped host James Cox and I got an awesome interview with today. I just saw his email and Michael's email blast, and I had to get you on, man, this is so good.

Thank you.

His name is Sorantos. Yes. So Mister Sorontos is a Chicago based nerd. We love that here. And retired superhero who always has a story to tell. He is a do it yourself international award winning solo music artist. Top seven itunes UK charting in the rock genre. Top five iTunes UK singer songwriter, top eight iTunes UK country, number one iTunes South Africa folk and country. And he got lost. Awesome. Yeah, he has been. He has also been, been on spite of our charts many times, including hitting number one in Iceland in all genres. How you doing?

Great. How you doing, James? Thank you so much for having me tonight.

So you're so. Okay, so you're based in Chicago right now, right?

Correct. Yeah, born and raised.

Nice. Nice. So. So, um, how. How is the music scene over there? Is it, like, very good or. Bleh. It's okay.

So, to be honest with you, Chicago gets dissed on by a lot of people. Yeah, we're not LA. We're not New York. Yeah, we're not Nashville. But I think there's a lot of cool music happening here and a lot of fusion. And obviously, people know chance the rapper Kanye kind of came from Chicago, but I'm trying to put my stamp on it, and my goal is to make Chicago known all over the world for music.

Well, I think you're doing a great job because it's from the paragraph I read everybody knows you right now. Everybody.

I don't know about that. I wish everyone knew me, but I'm not Taylor Swift. I'm not gonna lie. So. No, not everybody knows me, but that's where I'm at, and I'm hoping.

Nice. Well, who is Taylor Swift? Right? Not me. We're definitely not Taylor Swift. Podcast here, so that's good. Uh, you are a nerd, and I love that term because I am avid comic book reader. Well, I used to click on a lot of comic books back in the day because I'm 44. I used to. I started when I was 16. I don't collect as much comics as I do now. Who is your favorite comedy character and why, essentially? I mean, because I know that's a broad question, and so hard.

Yeah. I love Marvel, DC. I loved image. I love all of them. I would read even, like, cartoon things like the Simpsons. I did everything. And then if I had to pick one. Yeah, I mean, you know, growing up, it was Superman, you know, so, of course, then it was Batman, because he's an actual human, and, you know, it's more relatable. But there's so many cool characters in the Marvel universe. And honestly, if Marvel or DC called, I would be happy to play a superhero, whether it's a new one that's based on my life or whether it's, you know, one of the classics. I love all superheroes, man. I'm a nut.

Well, I read. And your bio also, I'm gonna bring up your bio a lot here, but I read in your bio that your music got on some movies and tv shows. Is that true? I mean, like.

Yeah, so I don't have a publisher, and I don't have a record label, so it's not promoted, like, some of those other venues that have connections, and it hasn't been featured where people, you know, mostly it's instrumental music. But again, my goal is to one day get one of my lyric songs where I'm singing, be, like, one of the main songs. The movie that a lot of people know. There's a lot of indie music. There's a lot of, you know, nowadays, you have Hulu, you have Netflix, you have all these indie films. So everybody, the dream is to get on a big film that everybody knows, and then, you know, it's not. Your words are cut out. It's, wow, that's, you know, that song.

That's all right, though.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, I love you for saying Superman, because he is my favorite hero of all time. I don't care what anybody says, but there's a lot of talk between Batman versus Superman, like, who's gonna win? I'm like, bro, come on now. You got alien and you got a human being. There was no contest. No contest. Even with Batman's. Even if Batman can help kryptonite, I don't think you, you know, he would win. But, um, yeah, it's, it's, uh, it's very weird how to use comic book. Comic book fans can, can overthink something, you know?

Yeah, fans are infectious. They're great whether they're music fans, comic book fans, movie fans, but they definitely like to argue sometimes a little bit, and clash with fans of different artists or different genres of movies. But at the end of the day, it's all fun, you know, I don't think you should go over the line and hurt someone or say something really mean, but it's, it's playful.

Yeah, I mean, I mean, that, that the reason why I brought it up is because it's true with music, you know, same thing as comic book fans. Music fans can be very much, very outspoken about their favorite band, you know, oh, you like this is. You suck, cuz you like this, you know, who cares? Yeah, it's all good stuff, you know? Yeah.

I think my goal is, I love when fans email me or message me on social media. I have an email list that's been slowly growing over the years, and my goal is only to continue to put stuff out there. And it really touches me when someone says something that I inspired them or that they love one of my songs or it's relatable. And that's really all I'm trying to do. I don't, I'm not trying to get into war with the swifties or the BTS army or, you know, I'm not trying to say I'm the best thing out there. All I can do is try to get better every day. I write books, you know, they fiction, fantasy books. I put out, you know, poems, I put out music. I write lyrics. I put out instrumentals. I'm just trying to get better, and I'm having fun at it. So that's really, I think if you read my bio or if you read my social media or interact with me, I'm playful, I'm sarcastic. I don't take myself too seriously in Greek. I'm greek.

Oh, nice.

Born in Chicago, though. But there's a word called pirakhtiri. So what that means is Lucy translated American. It's like a botherer. So I'm very, like, playful. You know, I don't really look to destroy someone. I have no enemies. You know, I kind of take everything in shrine.

There you go. Okay. So, um, your Greek. So what's the best greek food you could, you could recommend to me if I ever had a foodie?

I'm a foodie and I grew up in the restaurant business. I grew up cooking, cleaning. I was a waiter, I was a dishwasher. I was everything. And I always loved to create my own dishes. So if I had to pick one greek food, you can't go wrong, especially in Greece, with a shish kebab, just like a pork is kebab, with french fries, a little rice, you know, something like that. When I visit Greece, I could literally eat that every day with a little tomato salad and a little watermelon for dessert. Yeah, it doesn't have to be complicated.

Yeah. Awesome. So you are a mochi instrumentalist, and that, that term is very vague. So I want to ask you, how many instruments can you play as of right now?

Hey, hey.

Okay. Okay, that's fine.

Okay, no problem.

All right. Well, I'm gonna repeat the question again. So you're, you are a multi instrumentalist, and that term is very vague because it, I mean. So can you tell me how many instruments you actually play or can play?

Sure. Sure. So when I started many years ago in like 3rd, 4th grade, my focus was lyrics and words. And that's really all I did. And there, some of them were probably poems more than songs. And about eleven years ago, when I started this journey, I, my father passed away a couple years before that after fighting lung cancer for many years. And I just didn't want to be on my deathbed and said, I never gave this a shot because growing up, no one took musicians seriously. If you said, I want to be in a band or I want to make music, they said, okay, yeah, whatever. But what's, what's your real job? So I grew up in that kind of environment, and it always kind of bothered me. So when I started, I didn't technically know how to play any instrument. It was all about lyrics and I wanted to sing, but truthfully, that was my instrument. But I kind of sucked at it because I didn't know what I was doing. And I would put together these songs and I would use loops. I would hire people and say, hey, here's my idea. Here's an, here's a loop idea. Can you make this into a guitar for the song? And after about two years, I was at a taxi. Music conference, and I met a songwriting coach, and I started taking songwriting lessons, and I've been doing that about eight years now. And I started, I didn't know anything. I didn't even know what a chord was. So he slowly got me to learn that. Then I basically learned how to play the piano. And I'll never forget, when I first started, I was like, I have no idea what I'm doing because obviously I wasn't, like, five when I was learning. And I would, like, not even know, like, what each key is called. And I put little post its and I bought something on Amazon that had what the key is. That's a c, that's a d. But eventually I took those away. I learned how to play the piano, and that was, that's my main instrument. And as I've transitioned to learning all the other things from, you know, rhythm, groove, vocal melody, all these other things, my proficiency has been logic. So if you have a daw, like a digital platform, and if you know theory and music and chords, and you can play an instrument like the piano, you could pretend you play every instrument. So I've dabbled with real guitars. I've dabbled with real drums. I've dabbled with all sorts of instruments. I have a bouzouki from Greece. I have flute, I have a harmonica. So I probably try to play about ten different instruments. But the truth is, I think piano is really the main one, and I'm finishing production. And once I do that, Jai Joseph, who's the songwriter coach, is going to teach me the guitar for real. So that's kind of my objective. And then after that, I want to do the drums for real, so I want to keep learning.

There you go. There you go. Well, from what I hear, musicians always tell me that the guitar is one of the most easiest instruments to play. All you gotta do is three notes, three chords that start out with. And basically you can just teach yourself from there on.

You know, people say that, like, you know, if you listen to some of the. Some songs like Tom Patty or just some of the modern pop things, it's the same three chords. Yeah, but in my mind, I have just, like, when I was singing before, when I was playing the piano, you take garageband but never stuck until you really challenge yourself to learn. At one point, I knew the different chords on a guitar, but if you don't play it consistently, you just forget it. And it really takes a little effort and time to practice it to get it stuck in your brain. Like, even if I don't play the piano for a month. I know it now. You know, I don't have to. When I go back, I may not be as fast, right. But I don't have to go back and wonder, like, what's a c chord? What's a c minor? What's an f sharp? You know, I kind of just once you built it into, you practice, and it. But it's. It's hard to learn at an older age, too, so it is. I highly encourage people to start when they're young. It. Then it's much easier.

I've heard the same thing about foreign languages, because if you start learning at a young age, like five or six years old, it's much easier to learn anything at a low, at a. At a younger age. But you still can learn it if you're older, like me, you know?

Yeah.

I mean, I guess it just matters about how you're disciplined. You're disciplining yourself.

You know, my advice and my goal is, if I ever am lucky enough to make it, to be up on the Grammy stage and win something. And as much as I fantasize about winning album of the year, artist of the year, have, like, you know, eight out of my eleven songs in a year be number one hits, whatever it is, part of my story is at one point, if I make it, I want people to hear the raw stuff that I put out initially and how bad it was and then how I slowly evolved, because a lot of people have this misconception that you're born with it. I think you can be born with a lot of things. You might have a certain level of intelligence. You might have a certain level of drive. We all have our personality flaws. Some we inherit from our parents, some our circumstances. But I think you can become anything you want. I really do. And it takes a lot of hard work. And, yeah, it could take 10,000 hours to do it. It could take ten years, but I think a lot of people quit. And when you challenge yourself, if you're just playing, if I'm singing, you know, certain melodies, or I'm. Or I'm playing through piano exercises, it's boring and repetitive. It doesn't challenge you. I think you have to challenge yourself to get that plasticity, to have your neurons and your brain, you know? And it takes time and effort, and it's frustrating as hell, to be honest with you.

Yes. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. Um, okay, so earlier you said you took songwriting lessons, correct? Mm hmm.

Still do.

Okay, nice. Yeah. Okay, so can you tell us the easiest way to get started? Just in case, like, somebody like me, right. I've always wanted to write my own songs. I wasn't sure how to, you know, write in book written song. I tried playing guitar, I might go back into that again, I'm not sure. But for, for my listeners out there, if they want to, if they want to start, they want learning to write a song, what steps would they need to take to accomplish that goal? The easiest. Not the easiest way, but the. But the way that you were taught. Yeah.

The hard thing about the music business, there's a couple different things that you should think about before you start on this journey. One is, is this your passion? Like, are you going to be doing this for ten or 20 years and never stop? And that's what it is for me. And I might have gotten to the. To the starting line late in life, but again, I love doing it and I'm going to do it till the day I die. So I think the flip side is people nowadays, there's so many songs going out on Spotify every day, and people are bedroom producers and they kind of just make stuff at home. And again, you have to decide what you want to be. And there's nothing wrong with saying, I want to learn how to play the piano. I want to write a song and I want to do it because I'm getting married in a year and I want to make a song for my wife or my husband or whatever you decide to do. But if at some point, and you could start off like that, but at some point, if you want to take it seriously, nothing is going to replace the shortest distance between you and your. Your end dream is you got to find the right teachers. And the hard thing about the music business is there's so much b's out there where everybody says, give me $100, I'll get your Spotify, your song on 100 Spotify playlists. But it's all garbage and it's all bots. So the hardest part to this is there are gatekeepers, which are the record labels. A song takes one or $2 million minimum to promote it. And if you're an indie artist with zero marketing budget. I stopped advertising. I don't remember exactly when. I think it was 2017, because I said, I can get engagement, I can get some followers. But I felt like even if it was on a legitimate platform like Facebook, it just gave me fake people that wanted to look legitimate to Facebook. And you look at your users and you're like, wow, I have 200,000 followers in Turkey. I have no issue with Turkey. But when you look at Bangladesh and you look at some of these, some of these, they're bots, they're fake, they don't help you. So you have to decide what you want to do. And I decided I'm going to focus on getting better when I feel like my music and my vocals and everything is where it's not embarrassing and it's really. Everything's getting ranked at least 70th percentile among musicians. When I review it, which I'm pretty much at nowadays, then I'm going to start advertising again. So my goal is at some point, maybe this year or next year, to start advertising a little bit because it works. But to me, I think the education is, if you don't want to take it so seriously, look at Garageband. They have free tutorials for piano and guitar. If you look at YouTube, there's a lot of free channels that will teach you how to play guitar. And are you a beginner? Are you an intermediate? So there's a lot of free resources, but you have to ask yourself why you're doing it.

Because.

Because when it's Saturday night and all your friends are partying and your significant other is like, hey, I'm gonna go. You're the one that's sitting there at two in the morning, at midnight working on a song. And people don't realize this, but I might work hundreds of hours on a song that they take three minutes to listen to and they decide the first 1015 seconds if they even like it. Sometimes they don't make it to the end and they're not going to hear what I did in the third chorus and that cool harmony I added or the counter melodies. So you could write a great song, but if someone isn't in the mood for a depressing song about killing yourself, they're not going to listen to it. You know, one of the most touching songs I've written was my song at the end of last year's album called I thought, you know, that basically I thought God would help me. And it talks about me thinking about suicide, that, you know, I'm sick of this shit and I. I can't take it anymore. Like, you know, but that's not a.

Song for everybody, so it's not, you.

Know, and it's not even. Even if you're a fan of mine, you might not be in the mood for that song on a certain day, right? You know, so there's so many variables to it.

But just imagine how that song could help someone if they were actually listening to it. Fully, you know, I'm sure, sure that song helped a lot of, a lot of your fans, you know, for sure.

Yeah. And what I've tried to do, you know, I'm a writer, right. Obviously. So it's all about words. So if you're going to look at anything of mine, the first song, the new song every month comes out on the first Tuesday with a free lyric video. The second Tuesday of the month, the new music video comes out. The third Tuesday of the month, the new book chapter comes out, and the fourth Tuesday of the month, it's the new poem. So if you read my post on the first month and the second, you know, Tuesday of the month, you're going to find out the story of the song. And the second one, it expands a little more and talks about the music video. But if you just read that paragraph or two, that's all you need to know. You don't need to follow me on social media if you don't want and see what in the world is he doing? Why is he posting that video of the car driving next to him or something? So again, to me, I try to be authentic because the truth is I'm not going to relate to everybody. People will either want to relate to me or they won't. And I'm just trying to get better and be authentic. And hopefully they come along for the ride. If they hop off the car, maybe in three months they'll come back because I'm not going anywhere.

Nice. Nice. Well, I'm currently looking at your Apple music play, a playlist, and I see a whole lot of albums. Right now. You have about probably 16, maybe. I don't, you know, if I could count.

Yeah, there's, there's probably more. So this is my 11th year. And what I've done is every single year, the new song that comes out every month in November, I package it into a CD. So this year I'm working on the 11th CD. But what I've done, and I started this my first year out, is I released a surprise CD every year. So the first year the surprise CD was a Christmas CD with a bunch of originals, a bunch of public domain, you know, covers that I did. I read like ten short stories, like Christmas short stories. The second year, I did a movie instrumentals and a tv instrumentals. I've done jazz instrumentals, I did a funeral CD, I did a healing and meditation CD. So I've actually, this year I'm going to be putting on my 21st and 22nd CD. So that's a lot of a lot of songs in eleven years.

You are busy. I can tell you that right now. You can't say that you can't slack off because I know you're working. Um, but what I thought was, was interesting of you, of you was, um, just a while ago you said that that means to get a depression and you'll do it to you die. Right? And that's absolutely, that's awesome. Awesome. You said that. But yeah, now, now artists are doing singles and I read that you are doing a single every month until you go. Until you pass away. Correct?

Correct.

Yes. You just mentioned that before. You have a, you've got a song, a music video, a new book in your, a new chapter in your book every, every week or. Yeah, any month. Yeah, a poem every month. So do you, do you find that, that people get a little bored with, with full blown albums as opposed to singles every, every, every month? Because I like that album, but I like like two songs, you know, but, but if you give them one single, we're like, oh my God, this, this one is amazing. I was to it for, you know, for a long time. Yeah, yeah.

When I started, you know, the, and it still is, you know, if you look at all the big artists, they put a CD out every two to three years. When they put a CD out, they're only gonna make like two music videos, you know, Taylor's probably the exception to that, right? Yeah, but, but if you look at what I tried to do, I said, I don't want to fall away for two, three years and have them forget about me. So I said, I'm going to put out a song every month and that means one CD every year. And the last couple years I've actually started throwing a surprise song. So it's actually not eleven, it's twelve songs. And I'm always trying to make surprises for the fans. And I probably in the beginning, in the beginning, I would use other people to mix it and to help me with some of the different elements. And then about maybe after 2017, I actually kept trying to do everything myself. So in my eyes, if you look at 2018 to 2021, there's a time there where my stuff, you know, there were issues, there were issues with it. But eventually, as I broke through and I got better and better and better and I learned how to do almost everything, the music has definitely picked up. And I think the last key for me was doing vocal melody. Um, with Jaya learning about Melody as opposed to just singing and not having a clue what that means, that's really helped me, because in the past, people would be like, your voice sucks. Your pitch, you know, you're off pitch. I'd be like, what are they talking about? I'm looking at it. I used auto tune. I used. I don't understand. And it took me a while to be able to understand and to edit melodies. And. And now if people say, and they don't really say that anymore, but if they say, oh, you're off pitch, really, it tells me one of two things. Either they don't understand what they're talking about, or my tone is off, or something that I did. A melody I did is boring, or it's not attractive to them, or it's not ear candy. And they don't, you know, it's not a good melody. So it's not that, you know, if I try 50 melody ideas for every section of my song and I settle on, you know, whatever the melody I did is, it just means, hey, that melody sucks. It's not that good. So that's something I've come to understand that I had no idea about before, before I listened to my old stuff. And I'm like, oh, right, yeah, I didn't quite get it. I thought I got it. But the other thing that I would recommend for anyone really interested in a career in music, I started this back in 2017, and it took forever, but ear training, you do not understand. If your ears can't pick it up. Mine couldn't. When I would listen to music, you know, my whole life, I just heard it, and I had no idea what was the guitar, what was the drum, what was the keys, and now I can pick things out. And ear training enables you to listen to something. And even if you don't have perfect pitch, to say, that's a c sharp or that's a b flat, if relative pitch is really what's really important, to know that, hey, I went from c to e to g. That's a third and a fifth. So there's a lot of things that you can learn, but you got to want to learn them.

Yeah, great stuff. Um, so, okay, so I'm not. I'm not sure if I'm going. If I'm going to ask you this right, but please, please bear with me.

No problem, man. Ask whatever.

So, out of your songs with the lyrics as well as instrumental, do you write your songs with lyrics for the. For the listener, or do you write them just get out of your thoughts or your experiences? Do you know what I mean?

I know exactly what you mean.

Okay, good.

So, great years ago, all I did was write lyrics, right? And I might have had an idea in my head of, I want this to sound like Billy Joel piano manner. I want this to sound like. But again, I didn't have the skillset to be able to tell you other than this is hard rock, this is a pop song. You know, I couldn't really tell you. I've written over 4000 songs. So that's a lot of songs. So some songs are very emotional to me where, hey, this happened to me today at work, and, God, I'm so annoyed and I just can't take it and I want to quit or whatever. So some songs are 100% about me. Other songs have nothing to do with me. They are me watching a movie or listening to a song and hearing a line. And the line could be as simple as, you know, I love you, why did you leave me? And all of a sudden, like, my mind wanders and then, you know, a song is, is birthed in my head and then I create it. So I have this weird challenge where I have so much content. And it's funny because I have a notes in my, in my iPhone. I used to have everything written and I put it digital many years ago. So I keep, anytime I hear something, I have a note and I just keep adding to it. But the funny thing is, when I write a song, I literally almost never look at that note. So I have all these cool little lines in my notepad that I almost never use, that I've heard somewhere or came to me when I was running or something. But I wish in my perfect world that other artists would want to collaborate with me, because every time I've reached out to them or every time someone's reached out to me, I was like, sure, what do you want to do? And they're like, oh, I just want to sing. And I'm like, all right, what are you in the mood for? And they're like, how about something jazzy? That's this. And I'm like, all right. I'm like, I'll come up with something. Send it to you. We'll split it 50 50. You know, let me know. You can come up with lyrics and set your thing. Send it back to me. I'll, you know, we'll go back and forth, and then you decide what you want to sing. I'll. So I'm so flexible, and then I never hear from them again. This has happened to me six times.

Why?

So I don't know if they get intimidated or they're like, holy crap, this guy just sent me the logic file and, you know, there's like, 20 tracks and he sent me this finished song.

Right.

But I would love to collaborate. I would love to keep doing my thing. Yeah, I'd love to collaborate and I'd love to be in a band.

Right.

And I'd love to be in a band because I haven't done a live show since the Toronto music festival many years ago. But that's a whole other challenge, is trying to find bandmates that want to play with you and rehearse. And the Toronto music festival two weeks before, the band I had hired and the musical director were like, hey, we don't have passports. We can't go to Toronto. I was like, I kept asking you for months. You told me you had it, right? So then I struggled to find a cover band last minute, and I said, I'm not gonna do that until people are okay showing up, rehearsing, playing with me.

Right.

I love. Even if it's a gig a month or one a week, I'd love to do it.

But, yeah, it sucks. I did the other. I'm sorry about that, but. Okay, so, yeah, you know, you did mention live expect. So I want to go. I'm gonna ask you about the live. When you did play live, I also read that you embrace imperfections with life.

Yeah.

Life playing, you know? And I find that so awesome that you say that, because many artists struggle to be perfection perfectionists, but we're not. We're human beings, you know, and I. And I. And I love you for owning up to your. Your imperfections, if they happen, you know?

Yeah. I used to allow imperfections in my music that went on to the world, too.

Yeah.

But I don't allow as much now because people latch on to that and they're like. They don't understand it's a passing note and it's purposely chromatic or what you're trying to do all the time, so little stuff you can get away with. But the bottom line is everyone is so used to listening to perfectly auto tune. Perfectly like every. And it's, again, in a perfect world, I wish with all my heart. Now I'm completely in a different place than I was five or eight, nine years ago, because now I feel confident on stage and I can sing a hell of a lot better. And my range is way expanded compared to what it was. So I would love to get out there and my. Again, I don't know if this is coming through, but I'm a nerd, I'm an idiot. I'm playful. I make jokes up on stage. I'm very. It's almost like, you know, songwriter slash musician slash comedian slash greek guy who thinks he knows everything. You know, it just. You're gonna know exactly what's on my mind. I'm not gonna sugarcoat it. I'm not gonna. I don't offend people. I poke fun of myself probably more than anyone else.

Nice. So you host a. A songwriters show, which is like, which is a radio show, and it's ranked number one. And you have listeners from all over the country, including 206 countries. Can you explain what your. What that show is all about? And if you want to come on, candy, or do you have to be.

Like, okay, no, absolutely. If anybody wants to be on the songwriter show, they can reach out to me on my social media platforms. They can email me infoelegea.com, melogia.com. The website is melogia.com, which in Greek means with words. And I thought that was kind of cool since I'm all about the words. And truthfully, sorontos.com was taken. So when I went trying to think of what's my website going to be, I tried a bunch of things, but everything was taken. So settled in on, and it's a great show. It's very authentic. I've had some pretty big songwriters and musicians on there. I've had a lot of indie artists where the show runs, and a bunch of fans are emailing me like, this is terrible. They don't know how to do this. But again, it's an indie artist show.

Yeah.

And I've been doing it for a while now, and it keeps growing and growing, and it's very fun, and I think people really enjoy it. They enjoy listening to it if they're trying to learn. So if you're a musician and you want to learn, but also if you're a fan and you just want to know, how is music made? How are songs made? And we talk about all sorts of different elements, but it's not. It's not all, like, nerd speak. It's. It's very casual, and it's. It's very dumbed down. So even if you know nothing about music, you'll enjoy it.

Right. Um, how do you decide to. What to share with the audience? Okay, I'm gonna. I'm gonna back it up. Right. There are some songs that you write that you don't want to release to the public because it's so personal. Right. And I'm sure you've written hundreds of songs like that. How do you. How do you know that it's right for you to share with us as opposed to the songs that you hold?

So I learned a long time ago, I don't ever hold anything out of the public eye because it's too personal. So I've learned. Everyone says, oh, it's a love song. It's a this and a breakup song. And there's some cliches that people write. So if something is really powerful and it means a lot to me nowadays, I just release it because I feel like it's more authentic and true and people otherwise see right through that. Yeah, there's no question. Sometimes I write it again. When you're a professional songwriter, which I've learned it's got to be relatable. So there's some songs I release. I release the song. Every songwriter want you to need to spend a night in Nashville, right? So that's kind of a fun song, but at the end of day, that's more for people that, you know, our songwriters. So sometimes you release a song that is in a certain, you know, genre. It's an LGBTQ song, and it's not going to relate to other people.

Right.

But at the end of the day, you try to make it relatable to at least a certain subset of listeners. But I want every song to be relatable to everybody, and I'm hoping that eventually, people kind of understand what I'm doing. They understand the songs, the mission. Every song, I pick a charity and donate to a charity for every song every month. So, hopefully, eventually again, I want to grow up to be Taylor, you know, where anything I put out, you know, the crowd is like, oh, that's great. And, you know, and again, everyone's going to give you bad press or they're going to jump on something because people want to build you up, then they want to tear you down. But I'm just gonna try to be humble and keep working hard and keep being nice to as many people as I can.

I go. I mean, it does cost money to be nice like anybody, you know, cost money to be evil, you know, be suing everybody, you know? But, um, so I really relate, like, instrumental songs, and I like your instrumental songs, too, because I feel like. Like you wrote them for my experiences later in life or what I'm feeling right now. How do you know what song is going to be just instrumental, and how do you know that it's going to be with. With lyrics, words?

That's a great question. So, in general, when I say, hey, I'm going to put out a rainforest instrumental, you know, CD. I will kind of come up with some themes and topics, and one might be called Amazon rainforest, the other might be called lizard or just whatever I decide. And then I try to put myself in the mood to come up with an instrumental. Most instrumentals that I write nowadays, if they're on a CD and they're meant for movies and tv cues and stuff like that, I kind of limit it to a couple minutes. So most of them are about anywhere from a minute 45 to two minutes, 10 seconds. So they're very different than a song. So most songs, again, most people want around a three minute song. So I'd say most of my songs are about three minutes to three minutes and 30 seconds. Some songs are seven minutes. Once a year, I try to piss off everybody and say, hey, here's a song that's a seven minute rock song. Yeah, some are four or five minutes. So usually I kind of know if it's going to be instrumental or with lyrics, but the truth is, even the songs with lyrics, I always have an instrumental version. And on places like reverb nation, you know, I'll release that, too. So people sometimes don't mind listening to an instrumental that's three or four minutes. But in general, I kind of know in my head of which direction am I going.

Okay, so I have about three more songs, three more questions for you. I almost. That's fine. Yeah. So what is your favorite part about being a singer songwriter and what do you find the most challenging about that career path? Like, what do you like and what you don't like about being a singer song.

I'll tell you what I love. I love. There's nothing like when a fan reaches out and it could be as simple as you made my day. I love your song. This song reminds me of, you know, my dead husband. This song, it really just, there's nothing that, it's like crack and cocaine and I've never done drugs, but it's just like, it's just such a powerful, humbling feeling because we're all busy, we don't have a lot of time. And if somebody takes their precious time to listen to one of my songs and then they take an extra 10 seconds or five minutes to write me an email or send me a message, it just means the world to me. So that's, that's definitely the highest high. And maybe that's going to be replaced one day if I win a Grammy or have a number one hit. But I don't think so. I think, you know, hopefully I get even more emails from people at that time. The most frustrating thing by far is you're an indie artist, you have no label, so you could put out a great song, but if five or ten people hear it, you know, again, did you just waste six months of your life and 300 hours on that? And I hate feeling like that. But I understand that there's a lot of noise in the world today. And what I'm hoping happens that people hear about me, listen to something and be like, wait a minute. He's never used a label. He's never used a recording studio. Like, he does this in his family room that has terrible acoustics except for three songs out of 250. Like, holy crap, this kid's talented. Or this guy is, you know, he's persevering because he's doing this for eleven years and he's got. He sucked and he's getting better and he's. I want someone to believe in me. Not that I don't believe in myself, but I want someone to believe in me. Like, you know, Ed Sheeran's investor did in him, or, like, somebody to take me to that next level, because I know I can't do it alone. And I want someone to believe in me and to say, hey, you know what? Let me fund you. Let me, you know, let's sign a record deal here and it'll be fair to you. It's not going to be, because again, it's such a fine line between getting taken advantage of and, you know, but at the end of the day, I think that I'm only going to keep getting better. And I would love to collaborate. I'd love to write songs. I have songs. If someone says, hey, do you have a song I can buy off you or a song I can release to the world, then you'll get some points and royalties. I have so much content that I would love to produce other people. I would love to have a publisher that says, hey, this new movie needs a theme song, and it's about this. And can you come up with something? I'd love to do that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's funny you say that about the. About the record labels, because after doing this for four years, I found out that most, like 95% of the musicians I talked to would rather be independent, then have a big label, because, yes, you don't get as many listens and views, but you do it out of love for this business and you get to do what you want to do. Without being told what to do. You know what I'm saying?

So, yeah, but I also. You're right. And I think the indie artist is like, screw the label, you know? But then you don't have those doors. You're not going to get that real exposure. So if you look at some artists, they understand and they're like, yeah, I get paid a lot less, but guess what? I get to write with this famous person and that famous person. So, yeah, to me, it's not really. I'm not doing this for the money, and I don't really care. But what I hope happens is once you have enough credibility and once you have something people want and they come to you and they say, hey, I want to sign you to 360. Instead of arguing with them, I want to be honest and say, look, I want to keep doing exactly what I'm doing. One song a month, every day till the day I die. Yeah. I don't want to have the pressure of you telling me I have to put out 40 songs a year, but I already put out more content than anybody. But what a label would do for someone like me is say, oh, what's the song you're thinking of putting out for February?

What?

Love song. And I'll be like, oh, this one? And they'll be like, it's okay. We beta tested it. And you know what? The chorus doesn't work. And, you know, getting that kind of feedback as opposed to doing it yourself or if you. If you're like, well, these are the three songs I'm thinking about having their experts, their producers there say, oh, my God, this song's a hit. These other two songs are okay, but this is it. And then being able to say, I want you to fly to Nashville, record this in a real studio, and instead of you screwing around on the piano and the guitar and doing something in logic, we're going to have a professional orchestra, we're going to have a professional choir in the background where, I mean, that's taking your thing from a b or b to an a, right? Why would I not want that? I would totally want that. I'm mature enough to understand how the world works. And again, I think it could be a win win. I think if you think you're getting screwed or you think they have all the leverage, you're in the wrong. You're in the wrong relationship. Whether it's marriage, whether it's a label, it's got to be a win win. Then everyone's happy.

Yeah, I agree. I agree, cuz, because everybody should be. Should be free to do what they want to. But I think there's so many bad opinions about the industry. Many people think it's for sure automatically evil, you know, and. Yeah, yes, but no, it is the same time, you know? Well, yeah, it is, but sometimes. Sometimes, um. Like, um, I don't. Well, I think Rob's lovely has its own record label, but doesn't screw over his. Or his artists. From what I know, he doesn't do it, you know? But then again, I'm not really sure if he still has that label or not, you know? But, um. Two more. Two more questions, and then I will let you go. Um, I wouldn't. I want to dive into your new song, never trust a happy song, which is a great title. I love it. Um, okay, so that song is about. For people who are wondering, and I. And I want to run by. Run that by you. That's about how happy songs aren't very happy at all. You know, they'll tell you one thing, but the real world will tell you the other. Do I have that tip somewhat to correct?

Yeah, it's. It's open ended. There's a couple little ways to interpret it. And I did that on purpose, where. That's one way. The other way is I just can't trust the happy song, because ultimately, a happy song, I listen to it, I get happy. I think, this is great. I was sad. Now I'm happy. But it's not going to change your life for you right now. The irony is a good song can change your life. Right?

Right.

So there's all these, like, little nuggets in many ways that it could be relatable to different people. And honestly, when I was thinking about it, it had different titles. I went through a bunch of ideas, but as I said, you know, no one's ever written a song saying that happy songs suck, you know, like, so that's kind of what I tried to do. I tried to really do, like, a 360 or feel like, wait, what's the song about? And then they listen to it, you know? So that's kind of what I tried to do.

Nice, nice, nice. Well, thank you for that.

Thank you.

And it might be the hardest. We're wrapping up this. This interview, so I always ask this to my guests. Is there a artist, album, or song that you can tell me that you can listen to right now, but you can't tell me or anybody else how it makes you feel deep inside your soul?

I am such an audiophile. I. I'm an eighties child yes, that's the best. But I. But I. But I mix modern pop rock. So when I look at eighties, oh, my God, journey.

Yeah.

Michael Jackson. I mean, these are def Leppard. Those are probably, like, the four things that pop to my head. But almost anything eighties, I, you know, I, like, I am drooling. I would love to listen to it. And then the modern stuff, I mean, Taylor, Ed Sheeran, you know, Justin Bieber is kind of missing now, but there's so many fantastic artists, and I'm humbled. There's nothing cooler than find this song that fits you in the moment. And you're like, oh, I want to play this over and over and over. And that's why my mission is, you know, if you look at my website, I want you to hit that, you know, replay button over and over. Then I know I've hooked you and I've touched you and that I've made a difference in your life.

Yeah. Well, cool. Thank you, Brett. Yeah, because that's. That's. That's awesome. Yeah. Because many, many songs can reach you so emotionally, you can't tell anybody how it makes me feel. And I got several songs, you know, that's behind me that I can't tell anybody about, so. Yeah, but the eighties, man, eighties was, you know, business back in the day. I loved eighties a little bit in the nineties, you know, but. But eighties really got me, you know, where I am today, so. Yes, but thank you for that.

Yeah, I love the eighties.

Yeah, I wish they would all come back, you know, the eighties five.

I'm trying. I'm trying to bring them back. Yeah, man, that's what I'm trying to do. But I'm trying not to have these 42nd intros. You know, it's. Right, it's eighties, but with all the stuff that you got to do today, you got to change something every four to eight bars. You got a, you know, that's. That's exactly what I'm trying to do, my friends. So.

Yeah, well, keep it up, brother. You know, it's going to be good.

Thank you.

For you. So for anybody listening to this interview, you can go to Sorontos. You can visit his Instagram, Facebook, and tick tock. You're on TikTok, right?

Yes.

I really don't understand TikTok. I'm still trying to find, you know, Instagram. You know, instagram I can do. But TikTok is wild, wild ride for me, you know, so. And if you want to go on this radio show, can you tell them what email to. They can have again for it.

Yeah. So the easiest thing, so if you're not sure, you could just Google Sorantos Soronto's music and all my socials will show up. My website will show up. My website is ww dot me logia.com. And on there, of course, you're going to find all my socials. You're going to find my email, which is infoellowgear.com dot. But there's a lot of different ways to get a hold. I mean, if you.

Yeah, yeah.

Spotify, apple music.

Everything.

Everything.

Yes, sir. Well, we greatly appreciate you coming on, and we honestly hope to God you. You come back whenever you want to. Um, and I'd love to. You're going to do big things like, I see it in the future for you. You know, you just have. It takes time and a lot of patience. Know, being in the music industry, it's not, um. You won't get it right away. You know, it takes time and practice, and I'm sure Taylor Swift went through.

That, too, you know, and she worked her ass off.

Yeah.

You know, I mean, she still deserves everything she's gotten. I mean, people can be mad because, you know, maybe her dad, you know, they were a little wealthy and. But she's worked her ass off.

Yeah.

All these interviews, all these songs, all these. I mean, she deserves 100% of what she gets. She got there because she worked her ass off. That's the bottom line.

And to go from country to where she is now, it's unbelievable. Yeah. So. Well, we honestly thank you for coming on the show again, and I want you to come back anytime you want to. And thank you. Yeah. And for everybody listening. Always remember, when word fails, music speaks. Bye, guys. I.