What’s it like being a brand new independent artist in a brand new decade AND during a world pandemic?
Brand new artist and actor Stanley Ray, hopped on a flight to LA in 2019 with little to no money, a pair of Nike slides for shoes and a heart full of love and hope for his dream to become a singer and actor in the entertainment industry to become his reality.
A small town boy now living alone in the big city of Los Angeles, he struggled as a waiter and cashier to support himself before becoming a background actor after releasing his debut album ‘BabyBoy‘ in January of 2020.
Going off of a very small budget and not having major connections right away, he was forced to do everything himself by using nothing but his low quality phone at the time and a leap of faith that everything would still work out and go as planned.
Growing up in Southern IL, Stanley realised as young as the age of 4 that he has a unique love for music. His parents played a ton of golden oldies around him early on, like Al Green, Earth Wind & Fire, Stephanie Mills, The Isley Brothers, S.O.S Band, and many more but he was mostly fond of Destiny’s Child.
When he was 8, he wanted to start recording his own music but didn’t have an actual studio to go to, so he got creative and decided to use a tiny video camera his dad bought for family pictures and videos. He learned how to look up blank instrumentals on YouTube and would sing over them. Starting out, he didn’t write lyrics, he instead did what he later called “freestyle singing”, making up the words as he went along.
When he was 11, he got his 1st Nintendo DSI, where he began using FlipNote Studios to continue recording his demos. The quality was often distorted but Stanley didn’t want any excuse as to why he couldn’t make music. He used what he had to make things work. He often spent long nights recording ’til the sun came up, letting his drive guide him and exercise his work ethic to always get his music done no matter how long it took.
After 10 years of recording what became over 100+ demo songs, he graduated high school in 2017 and moved to Vegas to pursue becoming a real singer and actor. He came back home after 3 months and instantly started plotting his next move. After a year working as a cashier and waiter, he quietly booked a flight to LA in September of 2019 after saving up only $1000, while also finishing up the recording of his debut album ‘BabyBoy’, that officially dropped on all streaming platforms on Jan 4, 2020 independently.
The pandemic didn’t stand in Stanley’s way. He made sure to still do whatever it took to get his music off of the ground and up on the radar for success. After doing a ton of research, Stanley focused strictly on getting his songs radio airplay and Spotify playlist placements. Starting out with college radio and small indie radio stations and internet stations before gradually going to mainstream. Like most artists starting out, they undergo certain challenges. Aside from having an old soul rather than a trap modern day hip hop sound, which caused him to be rejected by certain media and radio outlets when he tried to submit his music, Stanley was also a gay black male who was only 21 years old, so there was always a continuous fight for respect and to be taken seriously. Being surrounded by older people all the time, he was often mistaken as just a kid who wasn’t serious about what he was doing. But luckily, Stanley continued pushing through and proving himself and believing in what he was doing, no matter what was said or thought about him, which ultimately in the end is success within itself.
