Wikitubia:Interviews/Chad Wild Clay

This interview was conducted on November 30, 2015 by Purzyckij

Chad Wild Clay is a YouTuber with over 150,000 subscribers

Q1: How did you discover YouTube and what did you think of it? I created my YouTube account on March 25th, 2006 but I have no memory of doing it! I didn’t upload my first video until 2009. The second video I uploaded was the video of my marriage proposal to Vy, which quickly received over a million views and got me hooked on YouTube.

Q2: Where there any influences that made you want to make YouTube videos or did you decide to just make them? I’ve been a big fan of Weird Al Yankovic and his parody videos since I was seven years old. I had already created a comedy music alter-ego named “B.B. Bling” over on MySpace so I decided I’d start making parody music videos as that character on YouTube.

Q3: What made you decide to pursue music parodies instead of the other popular genres on YouTube (I.E Gaming or Daily Vlogging)? My dream career growing up was to be a musician, songwriter or recording engineer so creating music parodies was a great fit incorporating all three.

Q4: What’s your process for coming up with your parodies? I’ve created a list of ideas which is now over 17 pages long. As funny ideas come to me (often while in the shower) I’ll jot it down. I then am always keeping on eye on which songs are popular on YouTube and on the radio. If I like a song, I’ll parody it. I start by trying to come up with a main idea based on the title or main hook of the song and will reference previous ideas from my list. After writing the lyrics, I’ll recreate the music, sing, mix the audio, film scenes for the video and then finally to video editing which is often done by Vy Qwaint.

Q5: Where there any songs you were afraid of parodying, in fear you would receive a lot of negative press? For my very first parody music video “I like Jesus” (Parody of “Like a G6”) I was very concerned it would upset a lot of people since I was a comedy song involving Jesus. I made my best attempt to not say anything negative about Jesus and instead put the negativity towards ‘naughty catholic school girls’ but still a lot of people were upset. It wasn’t too bad though.

Q6: How did you come up with your new series C.R.A.P (Comment Raps and Parodies)? There were a lot of influences that lead to the C.R.A.P. series. Vy and I had been creating bigger production parodies for over 5 years yet the rate of growth and level of engagement seemed to be slowing. I was really impressed with videos by Matthias and how he’s been able to build such a fun and engaged community around his videos. His ‘Reading your Comments’ series is a great example. He and ‘KSic Games’ are good friends of mine and both had been recommending I create something that interacts and engages with my community. I had also been loving JackFilms YIAY series and thought it was a great idea. I was resistant to change because I had hoped I could be successful making just higher production parodies. I eventually gave in but decided to call the series CRAP because I knew I’d have to greatly lower the production quality of the parodies in order to make two each week.

Q7: Do you have a favorite and a least favorite video you have made? My favorite video is ‘Asian Massage (Parody of “Thrift Shop”)’ for a few reasons; it’s based on true events that happened to Vy and I while traveling Asia, it was really fun to film it with our friends, and I think it’s one of the best jobs I’ve done in writing new lyrics that tell a new story while still matching the rhyming and syllable count of the original song.

Q8: Do you have any memorable fan experiences? I’ve met so many great people, especially at VidCon and Playlist Live. One that comes to mind because it’s kind of funny is while at VidCon a young couple wanted to take a picture of me holding their baby. They told me their baby was my youngest fan.

'''Q9: You currently have over 150,000 subscribers. Did you ever think your channel would get this big?''' Yes, but I thought it would have reached this size many years ago, haha! I guess I was overconfident! I remember back in 2010 thinking, “If only I had 100,000 subscribers I’d be set!”. Back then 150k would put you in the top 300 of all YouTubers. How times have changed!

Q10: What advice would you give someone who is trying to make videos on this huge platform known as YouTube? Only do it if you love making videos or love being creative. Don’t do it if your goal is to be famous. If you’re trying to make YouTube a full-time career, be prepared for an emotional rollercoaster ride of happiness, confusion, disappointment, and hopefully some success but it definitely requires a lot of luck.

Q11: What is the future for you and your channel? My goal is to build a large and engaged audience with the CRAP series and eventually start making higher production parodies again (while still making CRAP), which I hope the new audience will come be a part of.