photo provided by Kobe Patterson

Kobe Patterson, local artist and Trinity student, recently released his new album, “We Were Never Meant to Get Here.” I sat down with Patterson to discuss his music journey and most recent project.

How many albums/songs have you released in your music career, and can you give us background on your music journey and how you got to where you are?

So I’ve released a couple of EPs and a few singles before this project. It’s all really fun stuff that I enjoyed and learned a lot in the process of making, but listening to those songs now feels like looking at old pictures of yourself. so they might have to get taken off of streaming at some point in the future.

I’d say my musical journey started when I was a kid strapped into a car seat in my mom’s old Ford Explorer; I used to be just absolutely obsessed with pretty much whatever she’d put on the radio. My dad put me on to The Eagles when I was 9 or 10, and once I heard the guitar solo at the end of “Hotel California,” I was dead set on becoming a guitar player. I’m so blessed to have super supportive parents that caved under my consistent nagging for a guitar, so around the same time they bought me a little starter guitar and (this makes me feel old) I’ve been playing for over a decade now. I taught myself how to play guitar and a few other instruments over time and once I got to high school I had discovered Garageband on my dads old Macbook and began making beats for some of my rapper buddies in school. Senior year, I met an artist/musician that I now consider to be a friend/mentor, and he convinced me to kind of put all my skills together and try to write my own music. That was a real turning point for me. I started writing, producing, and recording all of my stuff in my bedroom and in dorm rooms at Trinity, and here we are with an album under the belt!

What inspired this album?

This ones easy… being big sad in Thomas 668 my sophomore year here at Trinity. I was 100% on the struggle bus that year, to the point where I considered giving up music because I was so overwhelmed by a lot of other stuff going on in my life. PS I tried for like a day and quickly realized giving up on music just simply can’t happen. The album is called We Were Never Meant to Get Here and even though I didn’t realize I was doing so while writing it, it is definitely an album all about location. It’s inspired by all the different places you can find yourself in, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. That sounds corny but it’s ok, the album is definitely a reflection on where I found myself at that time in my life.”

What inspired your passion for music, and when did you know this is what you wanted to do?

I really want to say the passion has always been there. Or maybe I just can’t remember the exact moment it really developed. I remember one time when I was like 6 or 7, I got in trouble for running up on stage at church, snatching the mic and proceeding to sing “Brick House” by The Commodores. Probably not the best song to sing in church; my mother did not appreciate my performance at all. In all seriousness though, this has been at times an unhealthy life long obsession for me, so I think I always knew deep down this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, even though I didn’t know exactly how that would look or how I would get there.

What would you say to other up and coming musical artists?

This is going to sound cliche but in all honesty I’ll repeat the good ol’ 10,000 hours bit. I’m talking about actually putting in 10,000 hours though, not just talking about it as a motivational phrase like dudes do at the gym. Just practice your craft whatever it may be, even when you don’t feel the motivation to get up and do it you have to clock in and put in the hours. Also I’d stress the importance of networking. I’ve noticed a lot of creatives have really big egos or are just very protective of their brand so sometimes they present themselves as unapproachable. I’d advise against that one. Meet as many people as you can, work with as many people as you can, do stuff for other people (yes, even if it’s for free) because you never know what might come from an opportunity. It takes a team to really do the music thing at a high level, so make sure you’re making moves to surround yourself with that team of people.