Cami Nyx | Matt Connarton Unleashed

0:00 Speaker 1: That is catchy as hell. That is Greedy. That's the name of the track. That is Cammy next, and we're going to talk with Cammy in just a moment. Welcome everybody. This is Matt Connorton Unleashed. We have entered our number three new Marrow Trace on this Saturday, July five, twenty twenty five. Thank you all for joining us. And Jenny is here, of course, is at the news table, presented accounted for. I think almost at news Desko seeing old school. It's a table and uh let's see Campy here. Bring Cammy on here.

0:28 Speaker 1: Cammy are you there?

0:31 Speaker 2: Hi, Yes, I'm here.

0:32 Speaker 1: Welcome to the program. We just started using Google Teams recently, so it's still a little bit of an adventure.

0:39 Speaker 2: So okay, cool.

0:40 Speaker 1: So I'm always relieved when the guest is connected and everything's good. Welcome to the show. I love that song Greedy. It's very very catchy.

0:47 Speaker 2: Thank you so much, and thank you for having.

0:49 Speaker 1: Me absolutely absolutely. Uh So, where are you from?

0:54 Speaker 2: Originally Columbus, Ohio, but I live in Nashville.

0:57 Speaker 1: Now, okay, okay, what's it like living in Nashville, Because you know, we've had we've had a lot of guests on the show who have traveled there, but you know, maybe to spend a weekend or a week there. But I don't think we've had anybody on the show who lives there currently. And obviously Nashville known for being for music. I mean, is is it a lot of pressure there living there and being a part of the scene there or what's that like?

1:23 Speaker 2: It is definitely interesting, there's a lot of pressure, but more so I just say, it's very saturated, so it's really really difficult to get your foot in the door. But at the same time, because it's so saturated, there's so many people to work with and so many people to network with. Yeah, and it's such a good community of people, but it is very tricky to kind of get going and get a name for yourself.

1:50 Speaker 1: Yeah, I would imagine. I would imagine it is. But that's that's a great place to be for what you're doing, and it's it might cut against some of the ideas, some of the preconceptions too that people about Nashville, because you know, a lot of people when they hear Nashville, especially people not in the industry, they think of country music. But it's more than just country music and obviously, you know what you're doing is in country. I don't know if you have any country songs, but but really, I mean there's all kinds of music happening there, and there's all kinds of connections you can make and people to work with.

2:18 Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, definitely. I think it has the stigma that it's country music because that's what it started as. But it's really any and every genre, and it is more so just the music city, as people call it, and this is where everyone comes to record, even non country people. They all record in the studios here or work with people here, or have session players from Nashville. Because these people are very talented and they can play any genre. They can do anything. So yeah, it's it's any genre really.

2:50 Speaker 1: Absolutely. How long have you lived there?

2:53 Speaker 2: This is my sixth year living here?

2:55 Speaker 1: Oh believe, Oh you've been there a long time? Okay? Great?

2:58 Speaker 2: Great to college here. So I moved when I was seventeen?

3:03 Speaker 1: Oh outstanding? Okay? Was greedy? Was that recorded there? See?

3:09 Speaker 2: It was? Yeah?

3:10 Speaker 1: Okay, okay, very cool? Now what about so you started pretty young? I would imagine you're from Ohio originally you said, right, yes, were you involved in music before moving to Nashville, I assume. I mean, I know you moved there for school, but growing up you said, was a Columbus, Ohio.

3:27 Speaker 2: You said, yeah, Columbus, Ohio. I grew up there and was definitely involved in music, and specifically musical theater. I did a lot of that as a kid in like growing up and in all throughout my life. In high school everything I was known as like the musical kid in my town. And I ran all the music programs. I was the president of all these different choirs and small ensembles, and I did all the community theater shows and this, that and the other. So I was definitely musically inclined from a very young age, and that just kind of became my thing.

4:03 Speaker 2: And I didn't really do sports. It was always just music. And so I made the decision to Originally I was going to go to college for musical theater because I thought that I liked that, but I then quickly realized I just liked the singing part of it. I didn't care about the acting or the dancing. I just wanted some like someplace to sing in front of people. Sure, So then I pivoted and moved to Nashville to do music no, that makes sense.

4:29 Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean doing music that was clearly inevitable, you know, given you your background and everything that you did growing up. So that's that's great. Now, how many? So you have several singles out? I know, have you have you recorded an album or an EP yet or is that on your radar?

4:47 Speaker 2: It's not currently on my radar. I have four singles out right now, and I'm kind of just riding the singles wave because I think as a smaller independent artist, it's pretty difficult to put out an EP or an album and expect people to listen to the whole thing. Yeah, because that's a lot easier when you have a big following and people want to sit down and listen to it. But I would rather create singles and put them out one at a time and give them a bunch of attention or as much as I can, and that way they get kind of the spotlight for a second, rather than putting out like a forty five minute long album and hoping that people will listen to it.

5:29 Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that makes sense. It's a lot of artists it's very important to them to do albums. But there's I don't remember who it was we were talking to about this, but we had a guest on the show recently talking about how when you put out an album, it's like, you know, in terms of algorithms, like on Spotify, for example, you get that initial boost of okay, here's something new. You know, it might show up in your suggestions, here's something you might like, whether it be Spotify or even on YouTube or wherever.

5:58 Speaker 1: But but you get that big bump, that little not even a big bump, but you get that little extra push once with the album and then that's it. Whereas if you just release a series of singles. With every single you get that little push algorithmically speaking, and so that ends up being a little bit of a more sustainable strategy. Although some of the guests too that we've had on the show recently, they've kind of inverted, you know, because the old approach, you know, sort of pre internet, was you release an album and then a series of singles to radio.

6:31 Speaker 1: And some artists now they release a series of singles that eventually coalesce into an album or any exactly. Yeah, but what you're doing, I think that's.

6:40 Speaker 2: More than norm I think now as people putting out singles and then they release like an EP, but it's just all of the singles they've already put out.

6:48 Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Now in terms of you, uh, in terms of your songs, the songs that you've put out, are these all written by you or do you have I'm really curious about this, especially given where you are geographically, because you have so many you know, you're just surrounded by all kinds of talent. So I'm curious about your process and who you collaborate with or maybe you do it all your own. I don't know, but I'm really interested in that.

7:13 Speaker 2: Yeah. I write all of my own songs that are currently out. I've some of them have co writers on them, so people that I worked with, but a few of them were fully just written by me. Start to finish, and then I have a recording studio in town. There's two producers there that I work with, and I bring them my songs, play it for them and see what they think, and then they help me bring it to life and make it what it ends up being. And we do everything in house. It's all real instruments, like we play.

7:49 Speaker 2: It's the two guys and then myself I play a few instruments and so we between the three of us can play every instrument that we need for the track. We record it live and have real instruments, real players, everything, and then they mix and master it for me. And that's kind of been our process for a while. However, I have a single coming out in August, and it's the first time I'm releasing a song that I had no part in writing. I took a cut from some friends that I have that are professional songwriters, and I kind of started to explore this idea of I don't have to do everything myself.

8:29 Speaker 2: I can just be the artist or just be the performer. And there are many talented songwriters here, obviously, and that's what people in the real industry do. These huge, famous people are not writing their songs themselves. They have ten fifteen people helping them write songs, or they don't even write them at all, and they get these cuts from very talented songwriters. So I tried that out and I really liked how the song turned out. So my next single is fully just written by other people.

9:02 Speaker 1: Okay, interesting, was it hard to take that step? I mean, was that something did you? Did you go into that saying no, Maybe maybe I will try this and see what happens or was it more like, like, did you have to be kind of coaxed into it? Because that's got to be because that's a big shift, right because, like you said, you were used to doing everything yourself, which gives you a lot of autonomy and control over your material. And to take that step and do something that someone else wrote, was was that difficult or did it?

9:30 Speaker 1: Did it come naturally or what was that?

9:31 Speaker 2: Like? I think it really came naturally. It was my idea. I kind of put feelers out and let people in the industry know, hey, I'm open to cuts. If you have songs that you aren't going to cut or you don't have anybody to cut them, send them my way and I'll listen to them and if they fit my vibe, my overall kind of genre that I'm building for myself. And I took them to my producers too, and we kind of listened to them to together because they know my style, and we decided which ones fit me, which ones didn't fit me, and then narrowed it down to the song that's gonna come out.

10:09 Speaker 2: And I honestly think it wasn't that difficult because I grew up my whole life obviously doing theater, and I was in lots of cover bands and things like that, so I grew up singing other people's songs my whole life. It really wasn't that different, and if it's a good song at the end of the day, I think that's all that matters. And yeah, it wasn't. It really wasn't a hard process. It was. It kind of made it more enjoyable because I wasn't scrutinizing it as much as if it were my own songwriting. I'm much more like, oh, does this sound stupid?

10:43 Speaker 2: I wrote this, these words are probably dumb. But since somebody else wrote it and I very much enjoyed their songwriting already, I just sang it and liked it from the.

10:54 Speaker 1: Start, that makes sense. So it sounds like it was kind of liberating in a way. Yeah, yeah, that's very cool. You mentioned too, So I noticed you went out of your way to put extra emphasis on talking about how everything that you do it's played by real people, real musicians. And it makes me curious because one of the things that we talk about on the show a lot, because we have a lot of sort of industry centric, shall we say, conversations on the show is we talk a lot about AI, the use of AI and music and whatnot, and I'm curious.

11:27 Speaker 1: I suspect based on what you've said that this might be something that you're concerned about, So I'd like to get your thoughts on that, or maybe there's another dimension to it. But I'm really interested because, like I said, you went out of your way to tell us you know this is all real, so obviously there's no none of these parts were created by AI and any of your songs. So I'm curious if you if you have further thoughts on that that you like to share.

11:54 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting because my kind of stance on that started even before A kind of joined the picture. I was always looking for what my niche was in the industry, Like I think everybody has their thing that makes them unique and their genre or it's their sound or this, that and the other. And I realized that I think what makes me unique is that our music is very commercial, it's very commercially successful, but it's all real. And in today's day, most music is not real. It's all done digitally or it can be done digitally.

12:38 Speaker 2: And I went to college here and there were so many people at my school who made full songs in their dorm rooms on their laptop and you would never know that they did it by themselves at midnight, just on their computer. And I wanted something that made us stand out. And I realized, like, hey, we play all this for real, and I don't think a lot of people do that, and I think that's something we should emphasize and tell people, is like this is real. Like this there's someone sitting there actually playing the drums.

13:10 Speaker 2: Every single beat that you hear, he played it, and that's impressive. And I went to school with so many talented musicians, and I was starting to realize these people like won't be needed if we continue down this path. And I think there's something special about someone actually playing it, and especially live. You can't have a live show if someone's not actually playing the instrument, you know. And now it's turned to AI and it is insane what they can do and make, you know, a whole song or parts of a song.

13:47 Speaker 2: So yeah, that's kind of become my shtick and my nichees saying like, hey, this is real, so just keep that in consideration when you're listening to it, Like some guy sat down and played every note on that guitar that you're hearing. So I think that deserves some it deserves to be shouted out, and you know, yeah, get the credit.

14:08 Speaker 1: And so even the drums are live.

14:11 Speaker 2: The drums are live, the bass, the guitar, everything. We usually stack it from the bottom, so he'll will record the drums first, and he does that fully with no other instruments, Like he sits down and will play the entire song from start to finish, just on the drums, and with a really crappy demo that we made, and he can pull out an entire song on the drums, and then we build it from the bottom up. So bass, guitar.

14:39 Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's great, and that's you know, that's how it used to always be done. Although the reason I asked said about the drums specifically is because I've been surprised at various points when you know, even even stuff that was recorded in the eighties that I assumed, you know, just you know, hard rock songs that you know, a little research, and I learned that you know, this was pre AI, but obviously this was you know, we're talking about eighties even early nineties rock where it's like, oh no, they actually did that with a with a drum machine.

15:14 Speaker 1: Those weren't real drums, and it's like, wow, that's uh, you know, it's kind of impressive in a way that they were able to create something so real. But at the same time, it's like sometimes it's sometimes if you do a little digging, you'll be really surprised at how much was was not real drums. Yeah, and of course now you can do that with everything.

15:32 Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it is. I think it is insane, you know, you would assume those things were all real. But yeah, drum machines were huge in the eighties. So a lot of those songs are just programmed and we play everything live maybe here and there they'll get he well, actually, I mean we use samples, but there's samples that they'll make themselves. So yeah, if a tom that he hit during the track wasn't strong enough, he'll go hit the tom one time, take that recording and put it right over the one that maybe he flubbed a little bit, so it's still him playing it.

16:06 Speaker 2: But oh yeah, yeah, that's how you like have to really fix stuff if it's real, you know.

16:11 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, you gotta do overdubs. I mean, there's no get there's no getting it. Yeah. Absolutely, but that's just that's just part of the process. Has it been so has it been done that way with every all of the singles that you've released, it's all been done done that same way.

16:27 Speaker 2: Yes, everything I have out is real.

16:30 Speaker 1: That's great.

16:31 Speaker 2: Yeah, that's kind of we It kind of started that way on accident, and then I started telling people, Hey, this song is real, and then we were like, well, if we're going to keep putting out songs, maybe we should do them all like that and that way they kind of have a cohesive sound. But then also we can continue to tell people and showcase like this is real, Like these are real people that are have years of training and talent that they can showcase.

16:57 Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, No, I think that's great. And then what's the live situation, Like are you playing these songs out? Do you play out a lot? Obviously there's a lot of I know there's a lot of places to play in Nashville, but it's also probably pretty crowded in some ways. But what's that like as far as the live scene and do you get out and tour or how are you doing with that?

17:18 Speaker 2: I this is my third summer that I am playing. I primarily play in the summers just because winter kind of slows down a little bit, and I use that time more so for recording and writing and getting stuff ready to release and whatnot. And like I said, I'm from Columbus, Ohio. All of my family still lives there, Like every single family member lives there. All of my old friends from high school and before all still live there. So I visit there very frequently. I've built a very good community of people and kind of a following back there, and so I go back there very very frequently and play festivals and fairs in the surrounding area.

18:08 Speaker 2: Just because I've created a good community and I have lots of good contacts back there that it's easier, or it's gotten easier for me to get my foot in the door there rather than here. So yes, I play all my songs there and it's so much fun. I have a band that lives in Columbus, so I just go there and they're ready for me. They practice on their own and we kind of just show up and rip it, and then I head back to Nashville and work on stuff and then go back there. I definitely love to expand get out of just playing in Ohio.

18:44 Speaker 2: I've played in Nashville a handful of times, but it's really not that fun because it's so saturated. It's just not the same energy as going to Columbus and the people there are like, oh my gosh, this is incredible music, like thank you so much for playing for us, or this is people actually stand up and are singing along and these people have no idea who I am, but they'll really get into it. So trying to expand, but it's one step at a time.

19:16 Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's really cool. That's really cool. Have you done any videos for these songs?

19:21 Speaker 2: I have one video out. Actually, I have a couple out. I love making videos. I love every once in a while I vlog like our shows that we go to. So when we play at festivals and whatnot, I'll bring a camera or a guy that will come and video kind of the whole process because it's just fun to have for memories. But then it also turns into like a fun little video for people to see what we do and what it's like to go play. And honestly, I started reaching out to radio stations because it seemed like a good way for me to kind of talk to people that weren't in Tennessee or Ohio.

20:04 Speaker 2: It is a way for me to kind of get myself started in new places.

20:11 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, absolutely absolutely So now what's the uh so the single Greedy now that's been out a couple months.

20:20 Speaker 2: Yeah, it came out in April.

20:21 Speaker 1: Okay, now you're working on the next one already or are you? Are you focusing on uh more on other things or what's like, what what's the current uh trajectory? Because you did mention that other one.

20:32 Speaker 2: That Yes, yeah, I have a song. It's called su Venirs and it comes out August first, and that's the one that was not written by me. We're just kind of trying something new out.

20:46 Speaker 1: Okay, is that that one's all all recorded and ready coming out.

20:50 Speaker 2: It's done, it's up, it's uploaded, so it's kind of just sitting there waiting to come out. So, oh yeah, that'll be the next one, and we're starting Actually, funny enough, we took a pause on making my music and we really want to do like a fun Christmas song in obviously like November December, but you have to start them so early, so we're starting a Christmas song next week. So we kind of took a pause. This other song will come out, and while that one is being processed and coming out, we're working on a Christmas song to do later, and then we'll get back to the normal stuff.

21:32 Speaker 1: Oh, very cool, very cool, but souvenirs August first.

21:36 Speaker 2: You said, right, August first, Yes, very.

21:38 Speaker 1: Cool, excellent, excellent. Yeah, be sure to be sure to send that to us too. You know, we'll spin it here.

21:45 Speaker 2: Absolutely definitely, I will.

21:47 Speaker 1: Absolutely absolutely, Now, where should people go online to keep up with everything that you're doing. Where's the best place to go?

21:54 Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say probably Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, all those places I post every day. Yeah, my name's the Cammi Knicks t A G, C A, M I N y X. And then I also have a website, the kammiecks dot com. Yes, and yeah, I post everything kind of all over those places, just what I'm doing and where I'm playing and what's coming out. And yeah, very good, very good.

22:22 Speaker 1: Yeah. I encourage everyone to follow you keep track of what you're doing as you're releasing new music. And I was thinking, so we'll let you go in a moment, Cammy, but I was thinking about ending the segment. You know, we played reedy to open up. I was thinking about ending with this track good Things, which is also very catchy. I really like this a lot. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely so. I was thinking, well, we'll close out the segment with this, but yeah, thank you so much for joining us today. Are you in Nashville right now?

22:45 Speaker 1: Is that where you're joining us from.

22:48 Speaker 2: Yes, I'm calling in from Nashville. I'll be here for I think two more weeks and then I have a show the third week of July back in Ohio, so I'll be heading out there. Yeah, and then back back to it. Oh.

23:02 Speaker 1: Very cool, very cool. All right, well, Cammy, I appreciate you joining us today. We'll let you go. I'm gonna hit this track good Things, but Cammy Nicks, thank you so much.

23:11 Speaker 2: Thank you so much.

23:12 Speaker 1: You got it. We'll talk to you soon. Bye bye bye