In this interview, we chat with Rob Carroll about his debut album Room Without A View, his progression as a songwriter, navigating the digital music world and much more.

You can listen to the podcast or read the full interview below the video.

Where are you from and what style of music do you create? (In your own words, not necessarily in marketing terms or by popular genre classifications.)

I’m from Long Island, New York. I often have a hard time defining what genre of music I write because I draw from so many influences. The album I’m releasing is pretty eclectic in terms of styles. I guess what I do can be considered pop rock but there are definitely a bunch of heavier moments on this CD. I hate to call it “pop rock” though because I feel it’s come to have such a negative connotation. There are tons of great pop rock bands but I feel as if people often associate a lack of musicianship with pop rock and that is often not the case. I guess I’d go with singer-songwriter above all else because that is pretty ambiguous. It’s also closer to the truth since I’m basically the only musician performing on this album and wrote all of the music.

What led you down this path of music and what motivates you to stay the course?

The Beatles. I know it’s cliche but for so long they were my favorite band and they completely changed the way I thought about music. I used to be a total metalhead but after listening to Abbey Road for the first time everything I ever thought about music went out the window. Up until that point if a song didn’t have a guitar solo in it or a tempo over 160 I just wasn’t interested. Never even gave it a chance. But after listening to The Beatles, almost instantly, all I wanted to do was write pop music. I still love metal and heavier music, and I do try to incorporate some aspects of those genres into my music, but to me there’s something special about pop. I think anyone who gives my album a listen will be able to tell how big of a Beatles fan I am.. for better or worse.

Who or what are your biggest influences when it comes to your creativity?

I could go on forever about creative and musical influences but I’ll keep this somewhat short. I’d say for music, above all else, it would have to be The Beatles. You can learn almost everything you need to know about songwriting by listening to The Beatles discography. I try to listen to as many different genres of music as I can and am pretty open minded. Some other current favorites include: Weezer, Prince, Jeff Buckley, Faith No More, Frank Zappa, Brand New, Jack White, Panic at the Disco and Fountains of Wayne.

As far as creativity I’d have to say Donald Glover and Louis C.K. They have completely different styles but they’re both so ambitious and have worked on so many different kinds of projects. I really admire their work ethic and the sheer volume of work they’ve put out. Between writing stand up specials, t.v. shows, (and in Glover’s case music) I don’t know how they continue to produce content at such a high level.

How is your new release different than previous ones? Did you set out to accomplish anything specific?

‘Room Without a View‘ is actually my debut album. I’ve been writing songs for a long time now but I finally made the move to record them within the past two years or so. Initially I thought of this as an opportunity to record my best songs but as I began to take a closer look at my music, I realized that many of my songs were about relationships (both romantic and platonic) and how they change over time. I started to think that since so much of my material was built around similar themes, I could incorporate the music I already had into some kind of loosely connected narrative.