Meet Joel Chandler | Bassist/Vocalist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Joel Chandler and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Joel, why did you decide to pursue a creative path?
I wish I had a cool answer but the short answer is I can’t not. Music is a terrible career. There’s no money, tons of investment of time and money, rejection is omnipresent at every level, and it often feels like nobody gives a short or it’s impossible to cut through the noise.

But we wade through months and years of bullshit for the perfect moments. The part of your set where the front row is singing along at your favorite part, the first time you hear a mix together and know you made something special, the after show hangs with bands you love just having a drink in the RV. They’re quick, they’re fleeting, you never know if or when they’ll come again, but they make it all worth it.

I don’t know if I answered the question. The stupid answer is cause my friends were starting a band and needed a bassist and I liked Green Day.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Wow, that’s a lot of questions in one.

Our band has a varied musical background, I personally have been at it for 20+ years with almost nothing to show for it until T!IHI, a few of the other members it’s their first band. I’m not sure if they all even know this isn’t how it usually goes.

We’re a pandemic band. Our two guitarists (Will Loomis and Ryan Jansky) used to jam in the same garage as me and our drummer when we were playing some metalcore stuff. Will was actually the drummer. He’s still a damn good drummer. I heard songs that sounded like my youth coming from them, this was my first exposure to the emo revival, I had no idea it was happening. Once the metalcore band broke up our drummer (Ryan Loomis) and I started jamming with them and everything clicked quickly. Funny enough we found our singer (Sam Hogan) on craigslist. They showed up with a garder belt full of throwing knives under their skirt just in case we were weirdos. We were, but not the kind they were worried about. It’s funny the amount of coincidences that had to come together for this thing to happen. We weren’t even sure Sam fit our style but figured we’d give them a shot. Now their lyrics and vocal style are a big reason anyone is interested in listening to us. From there we just kind of did everything ourselves until folks started jumping on board. We wrote and recorded (Ryan Loomis produced and engineered) our first EP ourselves and Take This To Heart took a huge chance on signing us when we had basically no fanbase. Labels don’t really do that anymore, usually you have to have a ready made product with a big following and they will be happy to take a cut. Joe Urban took a chance on us cause he liked the music. He’s one of the good ones still out there, From there we released our first album Lovers Lane and that got us a tour with one of our favorite bands Palette Knife which was all DIY too. We’ve done a couple other tours since and now we have our album Scatternbrain set to debut this year.

I guess what I’m most proud of is making music that has affected people. You never get sick of people telling you “your music got me through a hard time” or how much our album means to them. You never know what to say except ‘thanks’ but it really does reaffirm all the hours and years you’ve put into it.

It’s just amazing that all we do is write songs we like and lucky for us lots of other folks seem to like it too. I’ll never forget the first show we played on tour where folks were singing along. It wasn’t a everyone (most of the crowd was there for an oldschool punk band Last Gang and half of their fans hated us) but it was enough to notice. Des Moines, 2000 miles away, and here were kids singing our songs back at us. Just incredible. Last Gang couldn’t have been nicer by the way and same with the other half of their fans at that show.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Eh, I don’t know the city well enough to be honest. Let’s go get tattoos at old traditional then catch a show at the Glass House I guess.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Our friends and fans. I’m sure we would have given up years ago if it wasn’t for the support we’ve gotten from them. It never ceases to amaze me how friendly and helpful the DIY emo scene is. We get so much love from them and we love them back.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thanksihateitca/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thanksihateit6815

Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2AXYLreE6e33pDQgQNNNyu?si=WEfBqAG-T7GfkBpDRuaUdg