I was really speechless while checking Subcon‘ Suburban Gutterpunk album, and his music provoked me enough to have a chat with Subcon mastermind Brandon Ingram.
● Congrats on your debut amazing album, well done! Tell more more about the beginning of your musical journey, when did it all start?
Thanks so much! I’d say the true beginning was when I heard Green Day’s “American Idiot” album for the first time when I was 11. All I’d really heard before that was your typical top 40 stuff so it felt pretty freaky. It was sort of like the moment in Spiderman where Peter Parker gets the DNA-altering spider bite – only instead of super powers I was given intense feelings of alienation and an obsession with the pop punk / emo / hardcore music scene. Anyway, it inspired me enough to start learning guitar and writing music of my own. It really got me exploring, and as I got older I started playing in bands.
● It’s rare to find such a perfect style mix, was the diversity planned for Subcon from the beginning?
It’s hard to say – basically, after playing in various pop punk and ‘easycore’ type bands (and a brief acoustic emo pop phase), I’d lost motivation and stopped really playing or writing anything for a couple years. Honestly, I was really depressed at the time and “Subcon” was sort of this random burst of motivation I had. I just knew I needed an outlet and wrote whatever music felt natural. I’d been listening to primarily rap at the time, so I guess that manifested itself with my roots and the genre blend kind of just happened. The process I stuck to was essentially just to make a cool instrumental in Logic, then do whatfeels right vocally – singing, rapping, screaming, whatever.
● So this means that you recorded all those vocal styles in the album or there are some guest musicians?
The 2nd verse in “Cyanide” is a rapper from the UK named Sigleif – other than that, it’s all me.
● When I checked your EPK, I was pleased with the promotional pack. Do you manage the publicity matters by yourself or is there an agency?
Yeah, I do all that kind of stuff on my own. If I’m being honest though, a publicist is the first person I’ll hire if I ever have the money for it, because nothing will suck the creative energy out of you like the world of marketing and promotion.
● I can’t deny that I am already a fan of your music now, but I am wondering, are you considering adding other members in your upcoming releases or do you prefer to continue solo?
That’s awesome! I plan on continuing solo, just because as fun as it is to play in a band, it’s a lot to keep up with – I like having control of when I record, release, perform, etc. without having to coordinate with multiple peoples’ schedules. In terms of live performance though, it would be sick to have a live drummer sometime to take the intensity up a notch.
● I loved the ‘Secondhand Serotonin’ music video so much. Was it your idea? And I noticed there are no other music videos from the album, are you gonna release any soon?
Thank you! Yeah, I’d been wanting to make a music video for a while and have ideas for a few different songs written up, but I started with this one since it was a fairly simple concept that I knew wouldn’t require any elaborate setup. I haven’t filmed any others yet, although I would love to do one for Destination Desolation, as well as my upcoming single.
● Finally, the COVID effect still threatens our live music scene, what are your promotional plans for the current and the new releases?
It’s been a weird time for sure. I’ve always been more of a studio recluse than a stage-dweller (my nerves aren’t the strongest), but I really miss doing shows at this point – I’ve gotten my vaccine though so I’m hoping it shouldn’t be long now! As far as promotion goes, I have a new song I’m pretty excited about that drops on June 18th so I’ll be doing my usual online marketing thing for that (social media spamming, emailing bloggers, merch giveaways, and the like).
Subcon on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Apple Music, SoundCloud, and Spotify.
