Episode 52 - Justine Blazer

Hey guys, welcome back to the Tee Party podcast. It's a podcast where you find new friends and new music. And this week I'm joined by a Nashville do it yourselfer who you might recognize from the TV show American supergroup or maybe you've come across one of her seven independent chart number ones, please welcome to the show. Justine blazer How the heck are you?

Hey, I'm doing well. Thank you so much for having me.

Absolutely. And guys, before we get too far into it, we want to let you know that we have teamed up with audible in December as a thank you to everybody that supports this show. This month, you can get an absolutely free audiobook and access to things like podcasts, wellness lessons, and of course access to everything on the audible platform, including their humongous online library and you get a free credit. If you if you're interested. Head over to audible trial.com slash tea party. That's audible trial.com slash t e p A RT y and sign up for your absolutely free trial. today. It's

time to tee off with Ty and today's guest Justin blazer. Here comes the first four.

And now it's time for the first question. What is your favorite song?

Oh my gosh, my favorite song would have to be over the rainbow by Judy Garland from the Wizard of Oz.

Oh, good pick. Yes. How about this? What was your high school mascot?

We were the chiefs.

Like it? Yeah. This one's a little bit tougher for everybody. If you would go on tour with anybody alive or dead who would it be?

Man I gosh, there's so many people I would love to tour with. I'm kind of a nostalgic, like person I love I love kind of just the old time. So it'd be like either Frank Sinatra if you even watched me on the road, but you know, Judy Garland, she was so amazing. I love her stuff. Um, and anyone that's like, really from that older era. I just am fascinated with how they did stuff back then. So pretty much anyone in that era, but but it's a close tie to probably Reba McEntire. I love her too. So it says that's a tough question.

I can imagine. Yeah. The last question of the first four, what is your favorite song to play for people?

My favorite song to play for people would be I like pioneer salt shaker that's one of my originals. And I really like the message with that song. It's very empowering. I also like there's a song called cigarettes and secrets, which is just a really cool tune as well. But once again, that's That's like asking your favorite child, you know what I mean? Like there's so many songs I love playing. It just really depends on the day. But I have the originals. And then I also love my new one, just saying. So

we do have that one for everybody here in a little bit. And that's kind of a good transition here out of the first four. And now I want to move on to talking about you give us kind of the the cliff notes version of growing up and how you started playing music.

Sure, absolutely. So I grew up in Detroit, Michigan. My dad worked for Ford Motor Company and my mother owned a dance studio. So I pretty much grew up in the performing arts. At a very young age. My mother was a professional dancer and she was also a model and she just kind of put my sister and I in all that kind of stuff from like the time we were two years old. We were doing pageants and modeling and dancing and singing and piano and Syrian guitar and musical theater. I did Performing Arts camps in the summer I did um, you know theater stuff, I just did it all I honestly like I loved it. And I just kept bugging my mom for you know, anything I could do. Um, I had a vocal coach at six years old. I worked with them for many, many years. I started recording when I was 12. So I just basically like one of the other studios are recording an EP, and I just loved it. I wanted to be anything that would let me be out there. That's what I wanted to do. And then I after after high school, I went to college, but I wasn't really like the best college student. I was like grammatically, I was good. Like I had good grades and stuff. But I was like so not involved in that. Like I was very touching go. And this is kind of when they were doing online stuff, but I would just miss a lot of class and I was traveling a lot. So I was like living in New York and I was I'm doing stuff out there and doing odd dishes for different things and studying dance out there. And then I was traveling for like six years I was modeling for the car shows. So I did everything from like the LA, you know, car show like International Auto Show to Boston to New York to Detroit to Miami to Portland or Texas. I mean, I was everywhere trust travel, travel, travel. And then the meantime, I was getting my band together and recording my albums and doing my music and really building my fan base. And then I ended up in Nashville 10 years ago. And I've been here ever since just doing the Nashville things. So I started off doing a lot of touring stuff, then I started playing more in town, or I was just doing a lot more in town type of performances. And these last few years, I really, you know, kind of dove into the production aspect of it and developing artists and writing for artists and stuff like that. So and I still do my own music, so it's just kind of doing more and more stuff. So

in the circle back, is it true that you kind of got your your first big step up in music by winning a battle of the bands contest?

Well, it's really a blurry line, to be honest. So I guess that's kind of like the best way to sort of define my sort of national, national sort of presence. Because before that, it was a lot of local stuffs, you know, so I was just doing a lot of local things opening for this artists and doing that festival that, you know, bar and whatever. And so it was sort of like a process where I felt like I had to kind of go through that. But it wasn't really the catapulted thing that could really get me to that national spotlight until I won that competition. So it was something where I was now on more of a national stage. And I was working with like a, you know, a corporate type sponsor. And, you know, they had me do all type of events, I did the Nash, Nash national finals, rodeo, and Vegas three years in a row, I sing at the Texas State Fair, Austin rodeo at their headquarters. So they had me do a lot of great performances and a lot of opportunities from that one little contest that was just like a Facebook thing. And so and it also we want some money with that too. So kind of help, you know, pay for more promotion and that kind of thing. So, but I really wasn't until, like 2013, that's when my album gasoline came out. And that was really the year that I feel was like my biggest year in terms of like, artists success, if that makes sense. Where I was able to do a lot of touring, I was over in Europe, I did stuff over there. I had charted on the Music Row charts, we were on GC tn n Zeus country network, all of the all of the big platforms. And so I when I was 100% doing artist stuff I wasn't producing yet, so that was probably like my biggest year, um, you know, as an artist, and then now it's kind of like transitioned into the where I'm at right now.

What do you been putting out music, you mentioned it for quite a while now. And even kind of before Spotify, and even Apple streaming were really huge. You were you're still out there releasing music, what are some of the biggest things that you've seen change, from the first time that you put out a single to putting out just seeing now that, you know, maybe somebody out there that's, that's starting getting their start can kind of learn from?

Well, you know, when I was really kind of coming up, and I've been doing this roughly 15 years, so that was probably like the mid 2000s. Um, and we put out CDs, you know, like you have your CD run, you know, I do 1000 CDs at a time, I used to work with disc makers. And, you know, it was a lot of hands on type of stuff. So you know, I would have a merge area, I would do a meet and greet, I would, you know, do pictures with the fans and the people that came out to the shows, and there was a lot more interaction and tangible type of stuff. And then all of those people, you know, kind of followed me into the sort of social media world that we're in, but I did all of that before all of that even existed. And so I guess I applied a lot of the same principles is like really down to basic core stuff, though. I don't think a lot of artists even think about now, because it never was something that they had to do so me growing up with that was the only way that you did it. You know, you had CDs you had you know, posters you signed you had real tangible things that gave that human emotion that human interaction where people remember you versus like a stream or a social media post. I mean, it's it's its impact. But it doesn't have the the amount of power that it used to have, like back when you could actually shake someone's hand and sign their CD in person, you know, and so the only people that are kind of doing that still are like huge, huge concerts. But even now COVID and everything, you can't even do that either. So it's just, I feel like it's really been a big disconnect from like, what it used to be. Um, however, I you know, the streaming platforms and all that stuff, it's, it's very powerful. And, you know, you can definitely utilize that a lot. I personally am on those things just to be on them. Just because I know that's kind of where we are with the times that I personally don't love those, you know, platforms I use, I love having a CD and being able to sell it or selling like a vinyl or you know, or something like that, that to me feels like you're really connecting with the fan. versus just like, here's stream my song like, I just don't feel like there's that emotional connection like it used to have, but that makes sense. Oh, absolutely. And I am a huge fan of vinyl. And it's kind of funny, I bought record player A few years ago, my parents like why we moved away from that, you know, you can get that on your phone now. Right? It's not the scale, it's not the same streaming something as it is hearing something on a record or even on a CD. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, it's like a true effort of someone who actually buys you know, a vinyl like yourself and buys a player and, or CD even. And, you know, sits down and puts it on and presses play, and has to just be still and listen to the music and really submerge themselves, which, which I don't think we've are doing as much as we used to the error of just like sitting down and like laying on your floor, like listening to a you know, an EP or an LP is like gone. And we're just kind of you're doing these quick past time kind of processes of just like whatever's on our Spotify playlist, or Apple playlists, or Amazon playlists or whatever. And it's great and convenient. But once again, we just talk about, like the disconnect. And so you really got to search hard and hard and wide for like the true music fans like yourself that are still doing that. And they they're out there. But they're like a dying breed. You know,

we're trying to bring them back. But, you know, so much easier just to yell at Alexa to play, whatever you want. Alexa, play it. I know,

I know, it's so true. And I do it myself, you know, I mean, we do have great technology and the conveniences of this stuff. But once again, it's just one of those things where, you know, we do have a little bit of that disconnect. So

it is, as somebody that kind of does everything for herself. I want to pivot a little bit and talk about your songwriting for a bit. To start, how would you describe your sound to somebody that's never heard you before because even though this is mainly a country music podcast, your music can fit into so many different genres, you know, kind of every song can fit into different genres.

Yeah, it's true. You know, even when I was just starting off, with back in the day, I remember, like MySpace, I don't remember that at all. That was like a huge, huge thing we use all the time. And underneath your name for my space, you could put your genre. And I remember I always put myself as like multi genre because I really didn't know how to define myself because I grew up listening to so many different things. I could not pick just one style to sings I love singing all of it, you know, so for like marketing purposes, it made sense for me to kind of stick with the country. Um, thing back, you know, back when I was living in Detroit, because there wasn't that many countries singers. So for me to be kind of a rarity. From like a marketing standpoint, it was able for me to like get ahead and be like the female country artists, because like no one else was doing that, like back in back when I was you know, getting going. So even though I love everything, and I would always try to write stuff that was just so like, broad, but I always find a little bit of a sprinkle to keep it that country by whether it's like, throwing fiddle in there, or banjo or whatever, just to maintain that country labeling, you know,

that makes total sense, especially in the world of MySpace was such a, you know, Wild, Wild West time, that, you know, just trying to do what you could like that to stand out, I think really, you know, might have made the difference.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. So what is your songwriting process look like? You know, are you somebody that sits down with a melody or lyrics or it kind of depends?

Yeah, so it's really changed a lot over the years. I used to do a lot of writes. First of all, I wrote all by myself for many, many years. And it wasn't until I got to Nashville, till I started doing co writes, it was kind of a new thing. For me, so it was it was sort of a learning curve in the beginning because I had to kind of sit in a room with someone and like you sort of feed off, you know, the ideas that they bring, and you're kind of, it's this weird sort of tone sometimes because you just don't really know like to take the lead, why kind of drive the boat, why sort of sit back, but it's gotten a lot easier over the years, just like doing it over and over and over again. And I like to write with the same people now. So I like to know who I'm writing with. And I like to kind of have, like, you know, sort of a general idea. But I do write with my, a lot of my clients that I produce, so so that's always a cool experience. But I'm usually letting them kind of take the lead on what they want for their vision. So I'm just sort of supporting their, their sort of thing. And it's something that I'm writing for myself, you know, I'm going in there with a pretty clear, like vision of what I want, but I'm usually sitting down either, if I play the piano, I do write a little bit differently than if I was just playing the guitar. Sometimes I'm actually just like, writing something off of like, a sample on my sense, or I'm doing a beat or whatever. And that that will inspire the song, but I tried to overthink it, I tried to over plan it, I just kind of like sit in the moment and just let it come out. However it comes out. Um, and you know, we I'm pretty fast with it, I can write a song within like 45 minutes, you know, finished. And so I don't like to drag out that process and overthink stuff. And, you know, I there's a lot of people that do that. And that's great. But that's not the way I like to do it. Like just kind of knock it out. And don't question it don't it's just how you were in that moment. And that point in time in your life and you know, if it's a great song, great if it's a bad song, then you write then who cares that you just keep writing another one. And you know, so you just repeat that process. But I think the biggest mistake people have is they like overthink stuff or over change it or they like rework stuff. And there's a there's a there's an extent you can do that too. But at the end of the day, it's like you have to if you have to force it, it's just not going to be an authentic sound. And it's might not be the best song.

Oh, absolutely. And you actually put out a song earlier this month, it's called just sing it give us a story about how this song came about and what the writing process was like for this song.

Yes, that came out December 7, and my video comes out January 4, so stay tuned for that. And we're actually gonna be it's gonna be working radio the first week of January right now we're on pause because of the holidays. But um, yeah, so basically I wrote this back in August with Melissa Lee. And she you know, I've known Melissa for a while she was an MC one she's a writer, an artist herself. And just you know, we just kind of like sat down and sat down the piano and I just started like playing you know, the chords that you hear and um, I think either as her me which had this idea of like the just sing sort of analogy where it's just like let go whatever your you know, sort of thinking with this whole pandemic this year has been insane and you know, I feel like my voice was somewhat silence this year because I was singing so much before the shot down and I was playing a ton you know, in town on Broadway and and then I wasn't so for me it was just an opportunity to just channel that emotion channel that that feeling of that day and you know, have a song and I really proud of the song I really am I it's one of my best like a call. I feel like it's one of my best accomplishments as a writer as a producer as a singer. And I put out a lot of songs but this one is like by far my most favorite if not the most favorite you know it really is special to me this the song

winner let's let everybody take a listen to it. This one is called just sing to brand new music from Justine Glaser.

Growing

feeling weak,

this world is hot and it's taken too long. But I got phones and

use

in these dark times. I feel like God

was gonna say

when you're gone dogs

me

love and love and

hate

that was Sam from

raising a little bit louder.

Miami

Marvel's gonna give sample

when you

was gone up

a little bit

feel my power.

And that one was just sing by Justin blazer and that song came out, like we were saying in early December music video coming out in January. And it's the first song that you released after signing with Sony for distribution, right?

Yes. So I have been with MC one unofficially for like over a year now. I've been writing with them and Corey Lee Barker and Randy Barnett and all of them. And I've been producing a lot of their artists and I've been writing for a lot of their sync stuff. And so I've just kind of become like pretty, pretty tight in that whole circle and Darlene Fowler, she's great. She heard I just clicked really like from the day from day one. And she you know, she talked about this last year. And I was just kind of like, I don't know, you know if I really have anything that that's that I want to promote this at this time. So I did plague back in in April. And that was kind of a weird situation because the song was called plague and we had written it like six months prior to. Yeah, and so I put it out because it's just like you sort of have to but I got a little bit of backlash. People thought like, oh, you're trying to capitalize on Coronavirus. You're trying to capitalize on like COVID it was like No, I really didn't like this stuff is usually playing like months in advance. And it's just the timing was weird. So I you know, I sort of went into that with like, oh, gosh, so when I finished just saying I had done everything myself, and I'm producing it myself and mixed it and did the video myself, I hired a videographer. And I just I did the video myself and just I just love to be like hands on in all aspects of it. And I finished it. And then I felt like okay, let me bring this in. So I brought it in Darlene and they loved it. And it was like, let's go, let's just let's just let's roll with this. And so we signed I signed like the next day, it was just like a really last minute thing. But at the time, I was still like it wasn't last minute. And in the context of like we've been, we've been wanting to do this for a while, if that makes sense. But finally I had something ready to go. And then I signed like, it's like a it's going to be with them for the next like year and a half. So that's really exciting. I'm going to be doing this thing, obviously the single and then a few more coming up as well. And then I have a couple other projects that I'm working on with them. So it's just really exciting, um, to have like a family and a home base and just you know, having a little bit of extra push with the whole Sony stuff and the playing PE and the billboard stuff. And, you know, they have a lot of different things that they're involved in. And it's just really helps because I usually have had to pay all that all that stuff myself and the bass and now it's just they're able to like help, you know, help, like they cover the cost of that stuff. So it's great, you know, so it's really, really helpful.

Where can people keep up with what you have going on in you know, 2021 and beyond? What are your socials and your website? Yeah, I mean,

I'm pretty much I'm on all the social medias, you know, the Instagrams, the Facebook, I am on Twitter a little bit and I sort of started using tik tok even though I'm, I'm really not good at it. Um, you know, but at any rate, but yeah, I just searched my name Justine Blaser, that's pretty much my handles. And then you can also go to my website, Justin blaser.com has links to all my other stuff so

well, and anybody that goes to your website can immediately tell that you are far more than just an artist, like I've been saying you kind of do everything, you're a producer as well. And I don't get to ask this question often enough. But what's something that a new or even a veteran artists should know? before stepping into the studio?

Yeah, so preparation is absolutely key. And also knowing who you are, as an artist, knowing what you want to say what you want to sing about. The thing I don't like it, I see it a lot, not just with myself and my artists, but other artists too, is like the kind of like puppet if that makes sense. Like they don't really know who they are what to do. And they have to be kind of whole, like every single thing along the way. It's like, I get that to an extent, but you should be like, this is who I am, this is my sound, this is what I want to say. And then my job is to enhance that. So you know, a lot of times if it's like I'm having to start like the whole crafting process from scratch, I can do it. But it's harder because it's it's more of a foundational type of thing. And so it's really, really great when they have a True Vision, they know who they want to market to, they know what their sound is. And then I just enhance that and tweak it. And I'm like the icing on the cake versus like the bread and butter of that bag says you know, so but I've been on all sides of the specter of I mean, I had some things where I'm just kind of adding a little bit of my creativity to it to full on, like starting from ground zero type type of stuff. So just being as, like, I guess, when you're starting off, take every single opportunity that you can, like Do not say no to anything like literally just do it all because every single experience, especially in the beginning is going to teach you something whether it's you know, learning something on that day or meeting a new contact. Nothing is is a waste of time, nothing is considered a failure. It's just all about like perspective of where you are on the spectrum, where you are in that point in time. And like, oh, that didn't go well. So I'm going to work on that or but if you have nothing to gauge it by and you just have like your mom and your dad telling you how great you are all the time, it's hard for you to really know in reality in the music industry in general, kind of where you fall in the spectrum. So like no, nothing is perfect. From day one. You have to always keep working at something. So being as open as and as like out there as you possibly can just to continue to better yourself as an artist. It's a never ending process. You're always evolving. So just just do everything you possibly can.

That is fantastic advice. And Justin, it's been an absolute blast. And I know we're running short on time here but we end every podcast the same way. We call it the Final Four. And these questions are a little bit tougher just because they make you think a little bit okay, okay. Okay, here we go. Question one. What are your three most recently played artists on your Spotify?

I don't have Spotify.

I don't Yeah, I

don't support that flavor. But anyway, I do have amazon music and I love Megan stallion I love Love, love her stuff. I also love a lot of like Christian music like CCM stuff, just because they love the production of those artists like casting crowns and um, you know, Francesca, Sally and just all those artists. And then I also really like at anything like EDM or like dance music. So that's typically what I'm listening to.

Okay, how about this question two? What is your favorite onstage memory?

Oh my gosh, there's

so many. Um, okay, so my band is Lou moulage, Brian Jones and Isaac Lesko. And those are like some of my best friends. I still talk to them, but they've been with me for like going on seven years. Um, and so we've done literally, like at least 1000 shows together. It has to be at least we were playing on Broadway so much. But there's one time I can't even tell the story without laughing.

Um, this

it's it's so stupid. But like, we got a weird one of those days where like, this big group of fans came in and like all this bachelorette parties or whatever. And, um, and so my bass player.

I don't

remember what happened, what went down, but Oh, I remember now. So he I was just like in a goofy mood that day and I pulled one of the girls up from the audience that I threw her on stage and she's just starts like, she just starts like, grabbing by basically. Literally, like, on the floor, like for 20 minutes like curl, right? Like I literally I could not I couldn't even perform. I couldn't he would say, because it was just so good. He was like so embarrassed. It's so excited to

save today. It's like, so

funny and I start over that and it's like, telling it back. It doesn't sound like that funny, but it was it just hadn't been there. It was hilarious.

Okay, here we go. Question. What is your favorite venue that you've ever played?

Um, man,

you got these

are all hard because it's so many a great news. Um, so I have I've opened for a lot of artists, and there was this theater up in Michigan. And it was eye opening for Kathy matea. And I honestly don't even remember the name of the theater. But it was just such a beautiful theater. And it was like a two storey kind of, like, theater, you know, and it was just this kind of place in Michigan. And so that's definitely up there. And I also have seen the national anthem for a lot of sports teams. So I have saying for the Lucas Oil Stadium, like the very first year open in Indianapolis, and I was one of the inaugural singers to sing the national anthem for the Colts for like 70,000 people it was it was amazing. And so I did that. And then the last place I played that was definitely say up there was actually I had been on stage at the Ryman I was on stage at the Ryman for for Nam. So I was with I was sponsored by Luna guitars. And I was up on stage. And I was showcasing when the new guitars with lit with with Luna guitars. And so that was really needs to be out there and just having that experience.

Well, it's really cool. Yeah. Last question. If you could pick one thing for people to take away from this podcast or your music in general? What would it be?

Um,

just the fact that you know, I am just trying, you know, every day just to keep at it, and you know, just make something happen, make music happen. And, you know, just try to continue to inspire other people, you know, just just because we live in a really tumultuous time right now. And I think all we can do is just support each other and inspire others. And through the power of music is you know, the best the best way to do that.

That is a fantastic message to leave everybody on. Just eat. Thank you so much for jumping on here. It's been a blast, and I can't wait for the music video on January 4.

Absolutely. It's gonna be airing premiering on the country network. So

thank you guys so much for having me. I appreciate it. Absolutely. And that was another episode of the Tea Party podcast, the Country Music podcast where you find new friends and new music like Justin blazer and just saying

go tee off on the like [email protected] slash tea party podcast. This has been a tea party communications production thing music created by Jesse corns, announcer voiceovers by Jake Lynn and as always hosted by hypersonics