Today we’d like to introduce you to Tyson Motsenbocker.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I moved to California from Washington State in 2010 after deciding that music was an unattainable career option. I was writing songs in a two bedroom apartment in Solana Beach that I shared with four other people, and one of them decided I needed to make a record, so he lent me $3000 to make my first EP. I was able to scrape by playing music after that release, playing as a hired gun in some bands and touring my own music.
A few years later, my mother got cancer and passed away. I spent six months in Washington with her before she died, and when I flew back to California I decided I needed a break from the world and from what I’d been doing, so I walked out the front door of my house and spent the next forty days walking the coastline from Del Mar to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. I wrote a number of the songs from my first LP on that walk. It was also the best thing I ever decided to do.
I kickstarted the full length about six months after I returned from my walk, and recorded it in Victoria BC in a studio covered with blackberry bushes. Jon from Switchfoot had heard about my walk and my story and was inspired by it, I guess. He asked me to open his solo tour for “The Wonderlands” release. When I released my first LP “Letters to Lost Loves,” it was well received. NPR called it best new music. I received record contract offers from Capitol and Tooth and Nail and signed with the latter. I was offered tours with Judah and the Lion, John Mark McMillan, Yukon Blonde, Dave Barnes, and a handful of others.
I spent the fall opening the Switchfoot Native Tongue tour with Colony House, nearly 50 shows across the US. My second LP is finished and is set to begin releases late 2019.
Please tell us about your art.
I want to make things that are beautiful, that inspire wonder. I want it to be honest and clear. I want it to irritate the comfortable and comfort the afraid.
Do you have any advice for other artists? Any lessons you wished you learned earlier?
Find your voice and speak in it. Don’t worry about what other people are doing, and certainly don’t compare yourself to them.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
Music is in music places. Spotify, Apple Music, etc. You can buy Vinyl on Amazon, my website or Tooth and Nail’s, as well as other merchandise. Coming to a show is always the best way to support an artist.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.tysonmotsenbocker.com
- Email: tyson.motsenbocker@gmail.com
- Instagram: @japhyrider
- Facebook: @tysonmotsenbockermusic
- Twitter: @tmotsenbocker
Image Credit:
Erick Frost, David Niacaris, Patrick Dodd
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