Interview with Self Made Recording's Astray and CEO Nic Spaulding

By Dru Mighty

I was recently able to catch up with Astray and the CEO of Self Made Recordings Nic Spaulding for a quick interview.  For those of you locally who haven't heard of Self Made Recordings - WAKE UP!!  Several artists deep, and Astray with his 3rd CD "Who's Coming With Me" which has ranked and re-ranked on the regional charts with Sound Scan, Self Made is doing big things.  Now, less than a year after his 3rd CD, and over 20,000 units later, things are still looking up for Astray and his label Self Made Recordings.  In fact, let's get to this interview!

Dru:  So Astray, you got some real nice SoundScan numbersŠ How do you feel about the reaction to your CD so far?

Astray:  Man!  It was crazyŠ Especially the first week, Nic was like here check it out, and I saw I was on the charts, and I couldn't stop looking at itŠ I was just like "Holy S@*t!", ya know?  Like oh my god, what the hell is going on?  We're selling mad records!

Dru: So what are your plans from here?

Astray: Basically, stay on top of selling records.  It only came out in AugustŠ  It's only almost a year oldŠ and we haven't touched half of what we do want to touchŠ so keep that going.  Going to have a meeting with Gee Pierce aboutŠ what's it called, a productionŠ?

Nic:  Well, yea, he's gonna work on some new material that's strictly for record company stuff.  Not for release.

Astray:  Yea, just to shop. Not to put out or anythingŠ Like throughout the year, the numbers that we did, we've been getting a lot of labels interested in usŠ but no one's bit yetŠ cuz they're like "we wanna hear more, we wanna hear more"Š Sometimes we're real busy where we don't have the opportunity at that second to give them more.  And with this we can be in the lab everyday and knockin s*#t out, and sendin it off, and just put us in a really good position

Nic:  This will be the first time Astray will be able to slow down, because when we record records, we record records to release recordsŠHe'll do mixtape stuffŠ But when he records albums, he'll record 12-15 songs, right, and when that's done, we'll release a record. 
So this is gonna be the first time he's gonna sit with a producer and everything's gonna be that relationship of them making music just to make music.  This record's still selling well enough where he doesn't have to jump right into do a new record.  He'll do music he wants to do.  And if someone's interested, great, if not we'll release laterŠ But this will be the first time that he'll be in there from the concept of the beat all the way to the end, instead of going into a producer and saying "yea I'll take number 6, number 12, number 15" and then going back and writing and come back.  This will be the first time he can say "Well I wanna do this, or this is the sounds I want in development of the beat" and having an experienced person like GeeŠ  Who is an amazing musicianŠ He has a lot of music knowledge.., and being able to go beginning to endŠ What that's gonna end up doing is allow  the true vision to show.

Dru: So Gee Pierce is producing the next album as well I take it?

Nic: Gee Pierce is producing the next material, whether that becomes an album or notŠ. It is what it isŠ

Astray: And every time I've worked with Gee before we've always had a real good chemistry.  I've always been real proud of everything that I've ever did that's came out of there.  So I'm really excited about that.

Dru:  What's that track that came out on Gee's compilation a while back? 

Astray:  It's All Love.  Yea, that one, Mack the Jacka, I did a song with him.  Recorded that at Gee's.  Who else?  Teddy from Bay City, an R & B artist, he released a CD last summer.  I recorded my verse for that at Gee's.  Just the environment there.  Gee is just a great guy.

Nic:  There's a lot of producers out here that are really dope.  You've got your Ennix's and your Cryonic Sun's, and even Astray who does his own music.  But a lot of them go away from this Midwest sound.  And the one thing that Gee does, is he kinda does thisŠ thisŠ not old, but this classic Dayton Family sound here.  So if Astray goes in there, updates and really starts to blend his love of the new music with Gee's love of the old music, you could get something that really feels like it's from here, rather than feeling like its from any other part of the country.  Which would be really dope to actually have a Midwest album, because right now we don't have a lot that.  Especially with Astray's albumŠ Using peoples production from all over the country, it's not going to sound like a Midwest album.

Astray:  Yea cuz when I do albums, It's like he said, we do them to release 'em, so we do them fast and I have to pick the beats.  It's basically like as soon as I get one song done, I have to pick the beat for the next, write to it, and so on and so on...  I almost end up doing what I really like at the time, instead of creating something that is totallyŠ OrganicŠ.  I'll be like "Oh I like that beat, lemme do something to that" kind of feeling a little rushed, and I'll make something out of it.  It's like I don't think I had the potential to do what I can now with as far as working with Gee.

Dru:  You guys brought up something very noteworthy about how classic that Dayton Family sound is and has to be the most under-rated and classic sounds in Michigan and the Midwest.

Nic:  It's all about the yin and the yang, blending the old with the new.  If you blend that old sound, and update it with newer stuff you can make a golden ticket.  And you can do it without having commercialism, I mean if it happens organic, then it's great.  It's when you try to force something that you have problems.  We've been blessed that even when we do force something, we've created kind of a commercial thing.  But this would actually be a record where Astray would really feel "This is my record, I did this, this is cool"

Dru:  How are you doing as far as radio play?

Nic:  Not well.  I can honestly say that radio hasn't sold a single record, and I don't really care for it.  My philosophy on radio is when I got into the business I didn't want to be one of those people that say "radio sucks", because they don't play my material, because they don't play local music and all that. 
To me that says you don't know how to play the game.  If you play the game properly these people should come to you, right?  Because these people play hits, so if you make hits, you should be played. 
I'm not saying we make hits, I'm saying they haven't helped usŠ.

Dru:  Wow, very interesting indeed.  Hopefully we will get to see more radio support of our underground artistsŠ Well, Nic and Astray, I want to thank you for giving me the time for this interview.  Congratulations on your successes thus far, and I'm sure we'll be speaking again soon!

Well, there you have it ladies and gentlemen.  If you haven't heard the CD yet, get out there and cop it!  Check out Self Made Recording's web site at www.selfmaderecordings.com. 
To all you up-and-comers out there, make sure and get some material to me, Dru Mighty, so I can check it out and possibly get you some coverage!  Send any demos, CD releases, press kits to the Review Magazine office, or contact me by email at drumighty@review-mag.com.