Today we’d like to introduce you to Adrian Gamboa.
Hi Adrian, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today.
My name is Jesus Adrian Gamboa. I was born in San Diego, CA, on January 12, 1994, to immigrant parents. After my first few years of life, we moved to the Inland Empire, where I grew up for most of my life, specifically in Moreno Valley and Riverside, CA. As long as I can remember, I was always creative with things I did. Even as a kid, I’d spend most of my time in my room making things, writing, coloring books, or drawing. In grade school, I always had the best creative projects in class, and my teachers would often keep my projects as examples to show the following year. As the years went by, I eventually got into making music and found design through that because I needed to create the cover art for each song. In high school, I created an album where I designed the cover art myself and burned 400-500 CDs myself to pass out all over school. In college, I started performing and doing shows, all while meeting other creative people and developing my creativity and skills. My design skills developed from working on my projects as well as creating album art for other artists I met, creating flyers for events, etcetera. In college, I was in a Fraternity and held the position of Design Chair and was responsible for working on the marketing materials and merchandise design for events we would host. Throughout college, I started doing freelance design work here and there and would help people that were starting their businesses with creative requests, all while I was working at a Radio station called KOLA 99.9 in Redlands, CA. Shortly after that, I moved to be part of an in-house gig, working for a billion-dollar Hispanic grocery company called Cardenas Markets. While I was there, I took on developing the brand and cleaning up the look. A lot of the work I did while I was there is still used today, including rebranding their biggest marketing promotion called Cardenas Markets Lotería. Aside from being part of that in-house team, I simultaneously worked on quite a few projects on my own time, including work for Wu-Tang Clan’s 25th Anniversary Tour, Will.I.Am, Universal Music Group, Live Nation Events, Modern Sky (a record label in China) for Vinida Weng’s Solo album packaging, and Prison Break Brewery to name a few. Currently, I work as a Senior Designer at Monster Energy Beverage Company, where I work on point of sale and promotional material for some of the different brands under the Monster Energy umbrella, including some notable promos like UFC and NASCAR.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
The biggest struggle along the way has been figuring out a way to present myself to the world. I think that in order for people to make sense of things, they put you into a box or category, and it’s difficult to conceptualize that someone may have more dimension to them than what you initially pick up on when you first meet or see them. For the longest time, it seemed like people mainly viewed me as the music guy, and they were often surprised that I knew how to do anything else outside of that. To this day, I think there’s a lot of work to do to showcase all of the different creative sides I have.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I am an artist and designer. I specialize in developing ideas and brands. Most people know me for music, but from a design standpoint, among my circle, I’m called on mostly for brand work. I’d say I’m most proud of my work ethic. I’m willing to put in the extra effort and time it takes to get projects across the finish line. As far as what sets me apart from others, I’d say it’s that same work ethic and just having many skills to pull from that I’ve had the opportunity to develop over years of work.
We’re always looking for the lessons that can be learned in any situation, including tragic ones like the Covid-19 crisis. Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you can share?
In-person experiences and interactions remain and always will be, undefeated.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://jadriangamboa.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/agnotforsale/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/J.AdrianGamboa/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jadriangamboa/
