We recently had the chance to connect with Adam Usry and have shared our conversation below.
Good morning Adam, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: What makes you lose track of time—and find yourself again?
I’m always thinking about projects. That’s usually where I spend most of my days– in mind head. The actual act of creating is something that I do every day, any chance I get. If you tallied up all of the hours that I’ve spent in my life daydreaming or even just thinking about creating something, I’d say that I’ve probably spent over half of my life in my head.
The actual act of creating something has always been a helpful tool for self-discovery. Especially because I feel like I’m constantly working on myself, so to make something new and watch how it reflects who I was when I started versus who I am when I’m finished– it can be pretty eye-opening.
My main thing I’m always working on is music, but lately I’ve been experimenting with different mediums. I recently finished a rough first draft of a short story, I made a trailer for my upcoming album, I landed a leading role in a short film a few months back, etc. They all started from being obsessed with creating something new, and I spend so much of my time in this phase that I feel like I’m always learning more and more about who I am.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My moniker is thatdudechandler, and as an artist I enjoy being a sort of chameleon. I started off by making lofi hip-hop back in 2018, but lately I’ve been experimenting with abstract hip-hop. I’ve released 4 full albums, 1 EP, and several singles. My upcoming album is much less an “album” and more so a collection of songs that I want to have in my back pocket when performing live. What makes my music different is my vulnerability. I think that my openness paired with my beat selection is often what sets me apart from other artists and that’s something I love about what I make. I feel like I have a great ear for everything left-field and that’s my bread and butter when it comes to my art.
My upcoming “album” is titled “Yessir!” and it is a way for me to get back to basics. I wanted to have songs that held the emotional vulnerability of all my previous works, but still felt fun. My albums can be pretty heavy and I just needed to do something different this time around.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: What relationship most shaped how you see yourself?
My wife has shaped how I see myself in a way that is hard to describe. I think that there is a clear difference in the person that I was before I met her and the person that I am now. But, the biggest change was my self-confidence. I think it would have taken quite a bit longer for me to find my self-confidence if I had never met her, and for that, I’m thankful that we found each other when we did.
I’ve never met someone who instills such confidence in everyone else around them and it’s a blessing to be a part of that. We often talk about how we find it odd that people will come up to either her or me and just vent about really deeply personal things, but I think it’s in our nature. Part of that is because we are comfortable in our own skin and I think people can see that, pick up on it, and feel more secure as a result.
Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
It’s funny because I’ve talked about this in my music, but I go through phases every 2-3 months where I feel extremely confident and then immediately after I’m like, “Yeah, I think I’m done.”. It’s funny to think about when I’m not in that phase, but it can be pretty devastating when I’m going through it. Realistically, I don’t think I’ll ever stop making music, though if I do I would just obsess over some other artform for me to get my ideas out. It can be a constant struggle not to give up, but you can never fail if you never quit. That’s really why I continue to do what I do.
Also having a full-time job allows me to have grace with myself. If I relied on my music for my income my stress levels would be through the roof, so I enjoy being able to still treat it like a hobby.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What’s a belief you used to hold tightly but now think was naive or wrong?
Right now in the music industry there is a huge shift towards content creation. If you can constantly post and be at the forefront of people’s minds you can “make it”. And while that may be true for some people, it really is just naïve for artists to participate in this way. I definitely thought that this was true and so during my promotional run of my last album, Freudian Thoughts Volume 1,
I was posting videos on TikTok and all the other social media platforms every day, multiple times a day in fact, and so much of my life was focused on it. I thought that content creation was the magical solution and if I were to push the right buttons on the magical algorithm I was going to be fine. But, the only thing it did was make me more self-conscious than ever before, and it all just felt robotic. It was the opposite of the humanity I had been striving towards in my music and I just couldn’t handle it. I was getting so many hate comments a day that it definitely made me want to quit more than a few times.
I decided to pull the plug on that and just go back to having fun making the art and not worry about everything else. I needed to take a break from it and I honestly don’t think I’ll ever go back to posting content like that again because of how self-conscious I became. The music industry thinks that this is the way to go about selling a product, aka the music, but really I think people are hungrier than ever before for something human. And to sell something human you actually have to be human. You can’t keep faking it anymore.
This is also a big part of why I’m releasing my upcoming album, “Yessir!”. I felt like I needed to force myself to have fun again, and part of that is just releasing songs that I can enjoy performing. Even now, I feel myself hesitating but ultimately I’m doing myself a disservice by holding onto these songs forever. As far as content for the album I plan on releasing a few little videos here and there but I need to prioritize my own sanity, so I’ll have a few things lined up but nothing super crazy. I’m hoping that putting the music first and having a few visuals will prove that this view of content creation isn’t a sustainable method, but at the end of the day I don’t need this project to go viral or anything wild. I just want to enjoy making art and putting it out there for anyone to listen.
Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. What do you think people will most misunderstand about your legacy?
I think about this question a lot, and I fear that people will misunderstand my art and what it stands for. I feel like people are actively wanting to fight about any and everything right now instead of really listening and starting conversations. I use my art to invite those tough conversations and try to bring awareness to things, but I’m sure it won’t always be viewed that way. I definitely fear being misunderstood, but you can’t do anything to prevent that.
Ultimately, if someone misunderstands my work I would prefer to just talk to them. I don’t know if these conversations are feasible online, but I would love to hold workshops or in-person discussions with other like-minded artists and just talk about the difficult topics. I think that’s the only way to really make meaningful change, and by avoiding these things it’ll only make it worse. Art always has been a way for people to enact change or at least start conversations around any and all topics though, so maybe it is better to be temporarily misunderstood.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thatdudechandler.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thatdudechandler/?hl=en
- Twitter: https://x.com/thatdudechandlr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thatdudechandler
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thatdudechandler
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@thatdudechandler?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc
Image Credits
Sabrina English
