Conversations with Andrew Clark

Today we’d like to introduce you to Andrew Clark.

Hi Andrew, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I was raised in a household that influenced free thought and will. I went on throughout my years of late teens, early 20s, and all through most of my 30s of professional work with a blue-collar. I grew up with an appreciation for hard physical work and holding an intimate relationship with the pride that comes along with that. Shortly before the end of my senior year in high school, I dropped out. I had begun working at 15 sweeping floors at The San Jose Ice Center in San Jose, CA where I grew up, and then retail industry selling men’s formal shoes in Valley Fair Mall, That continued that all through high school. I eventually would drop out of high school to work more hours instead. I almost left for the Navy with a best friend around the age of 19-20, but had quite the difficulty joining fully due to recovering from two broken legs within the span of a couple of years leading up to from sports. It did however force to get my high school equivalency diploma during the time.

My friend ultimately left to the Navy alone, and it never happened. I actually remember recovering from the second broken leg in a cast while watching the Twin Towers in New York City collapse live. My injuries kept me from going to war.

I eventually got into the field of construction shortly after recovering, And I would then go on to become a plumber for a span of 17 years, from the age of 20 to 37.

After the first 9-10 years of plumbing, I eventually opened up my own plumbing company and was running with magnets on the side of my gas-guzzling, 5.9 liter Dodge Ram I was driving at the time. I was just working on my own. I was doing ok for myself and beginning to get constant work. I remember I even financed a Yellow Page ad in upwards of $5,000 for a space the size of half a business card. That was a mistake I learned from.

After a hard breakup with a steady girlfriend at this time and a good amount of time to reflect on my future, I was influenced enough to explore some life-changing opportunities. I decided didn’t want to be a plumber any longer my whole life.

Throughout my childhood, I was brought up and surrounded with peers that all listened and were influenced by 90s Alternative, Grunge & Hip Hop music. Music in general was huge in my environment. My mother was a photographer for 18 years and played the guitar with her friend a lot. I remember falling asleep at night to her writing and playing to her own songs.

My biological father passed away when I was barely three years old from hypertension, but was a live sound man and played and performed guitar as well. He was a floor sales manager for years at the infamous Guitar Center on Van Ness in San Francisco. I even have his company t-shirt still from the early 1980s.

After enough reflection, I had made the choice to go back to register for a school to facilitate my interest to become an Audio Engineer. At the time, I knew this was another 10-year investment. I knew I wasn’t going to really see the complete life change for maybe another ten years. I was ok with that. I just didn’t have financial support to help pay for it, so I had to keep working.

I would reverse engineer the plan. I had went and obtained my GED with flying colors earlier on. I just then needed to quickly would enroll into The Art Institute of California–San Francisco, which would be the precursor to the change that would go on to occur.

I had no family with enough money to help support the $96,000 tuition that would come along with this bold choice of mine. Naturally, I fell back on my plumbing experience and maintained my full-time career as a service plumber while attending college full-time for four years straight–no breaks.

I went on to apply for another plumbing company when quickly realizing it was impractical to attempt to run your own plumbing business while attending college full time. During this time, I found a company that hired me, and I eventually got promoted to management while still attending and balancing school and training as an audio engineer. I would go on to wear these two hats for four years, enduring the conflict of interest it brought. And it was absolute hell.

Upon close to graduation, I suffered an acute hyperextension of my right ACL and bucket tear of my meniscus, and had to get surgery. I went in and got it and continued to go to class, showing up against doctor’s orders. I could barely get around, but I didn’t care. I needed to graduate.

I was then also breaking up from a relationship yet again while recovering and was forced to move out of the house at the time I was staying in, as it was her family’s home. I found a small room that my boss from the plumbing company at the time was able to help me acquire. I would go on to complete my senior project, attend the graduation ceremony and portfolio show with crutches, high on painkillers, while somehow also winning best portfolio in my graduating class. It had felt like I blacked out and then came to in that moment. Everything I had worked so hard for I got. But was it really just about the degree? I knew I’ve barely started my journey, and I had a lot of more work to do. In the real world.

Out of the four years in school for audio, I had developed a massive network of creatives like no other. I had made life-lasting impressions and life-lasting friends. I had made a portfolio of work. Something no degree could replace. Now I knew what I had really manifested.

I went on to work for that plumbing company for another two years before finally coming clean and admitting I no longer wanted to work as a plumber. It was devastating for my boss. And I actually had gotten therapy to help emotionally navigate through it, as I had built a strong bond with the company and my boss.

After building enough experience as a freelance audio engineer and mustering up enough cash and confidence, I finally made the move to Southern California. I stayed in San Diego my first year with my best friend Aaron Goldsmith. He let me stay with him at his condo to help me get on my feet. I eventually needed to go back into plumbing shortly after moving and failing at freelancing as a sound designer and engineer in San Diego.

I got hired out of Oceanside, CA at a small company and continued there, commuting an hour each way until I then eventually moved to Los Angeles l—exactly one year after. I wrote it down on a big whiteboard: “I WILL MOVE TO LA.” I would read that every day while living in San Diego for that year.

I continued plumbing, still with yet another small independent company while freelancing for another couple of years after moving to LA. At a certain point, I was plumbing, freelancing as an engineer while also working a graveyard shift, editing overdubs in Portuguese and Spanish for reruns of classic American sitcoms.

I hit a breaking point after enough time had passed with no movement and countless resumes, interviews and fall-throughs. I was plumbing, beating my body up day after day, with no successful opportunities. After the pandemic hit in 2019-20, things became even more stagnant. My creative work came to a halt. I had to push through and keep myself inspired while renting a small room in the quiet neighborhood of Woodland Hills in San Fernando Valley during a global lockdown. I was waiting it out to make yet another big push for myself in my audio career.

It all seemed to happen as I met my life and now business partner Teresa Rosa. She saw the best in me once we met and pushed me/us to take our passions and talents further to what eventually developed into our company–Dópamín Media. Through the beautiful people, we would go on to photograph, is where we would find our calling and momentum to build a creative, purpose-driven and empathetic media company from it. It is here we feel most safe and free to express ourselves on a daily basis, and the people seem to like that. The company has literally been forged from the love of the people that have been on the other side of the lens. I wouldn’t have changed a thing about the journey.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
There is no “smooth road” behind self-success of any kind, on any level. The road I’ve been on for the last 10-11 years has been a constant uphill battle, but it’s all intentional. I decided to put myself through a different experience, to do different things, and eventually be a different person–The person I ultimately wanted to be, instead of who at the time I was becoming.

I went to both college and work full-time for four years straight. I didn’t miss once the whole time. I don’t think most could continue both plumbing full-time while cranking out classes and projects surrounding around an entirely different industry. But that’s what you have to do if you want a real CHANGE and win. You have to be willing to do the stuff 99% of the world’s population simply don’t do. It’s too easy and simply boring to just be comfortable all the time.

It was tough as hell, but it embedded skills in me I still use now and plan on using for the rest of my life. I barely would sleep most of the time due to stress of bills and just always working on something. I had to live above my work (plumbing shop) eventually in the last year of college, and for the first two, I walked a solid mile and a half every day I had class there and back to the train station. I did anything I needed to make sure I won those four years. Regardless of being broken and battered all the time, my perspective was flipped, and life was working “for me.” Aside from the technical skill sets learned, my experience over those 4 years gave me something that would increase in value as it aged, and that was a network. Despite all the personal hardships I endured throughout, I built strong relationships and skill sets, and it would go on to be the brick and motor for the foundation of my freelance career.

I’m from the Bay Area, California, and for me, living there was always seen as a permanent thing growing up, It wasn’t until deciding to go back to school to follow a passion as a career did I see relocating as a reality. It became REAL. I knew I would be in LA eventually. It wouldn’t be until two years after I graduated that I would eventually leave for Southern California. I packed up everything and moved by myself with a little U-Haul truck fresh out of a nasty breakup.

I would take on anything I could get my hands on once I was relocated. I constantly would apply to studios as well but kept getting denied due to the fact that most studios just didn’t really need the help that bad at the time. The ones that did paid crap, yet had extremely high expectations of productivity and requirements of experience.

I suffered several nervous breakdowns and anxiety attacks after moving from my hometown. But the last one was the biggest, and I knew that was the end of the line, and I was fed up. I had it while on a plumbing job, and I remember eventually breaking down and crying in my company work van at the supply house getting parts for the job. I was unfulfilled in my purpose and couldn’t bare the purposeless reality I was living any longer. I had to find the mental strength in that moment to not only get that job done but get through the day. It seemed like eternity. I set up a meeting with my boss the next day and gave him my notice. That was in the Fall of 2020. I haven’t gone back to plumbing since.

In order to grow, you must endure pain. It is part of the process. Like most, I’ve gone through horrible breakups, family, and best friend deaths, sickness, injury–you name it. I went through a lot of it while going through school those four years. Then more after. It made me grow. Forcing myself through difficult situations and intentionally challenging myself has continued to advance me closer to my goals in life, as well as ultimately achieve them one by one.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I became drawn to sound design while within my audio program in school, and I was introduced to some new classes on the subject matter. I originally went to school to learn how to mix and master music professionally but became interested and eventually enveloped in sound for film. My passion for cinema, combined with my passion for sound would create a drive toward something like I never had before.

I ultimately would go on to build a little IMDb for myself, working on sound design and editing on projects for television networks like BET, as well as full-feature movies under productions such as Lion’s Gate and several others. I worked professionally as a freelance sound designer and editor for film for another couple of years while in San Fernando Valley. I eventually met the love of my life, Teresa, and I would go on to build a media company together with her in late 2020. We are a photography-loving power couple who decided to join forces creatively, and a media company was born from it.

I personally specialize in custom sound design for visual media of all mediums, as well as sound/dialogue editing and general short-form content creation. My genre of choice is drama, realism and suspense. I am now also taking on more challenging ventures, such as beginning a full-length docu-series edit and on the road assisting with production sound and DP expertise for a new Television series pilot.

I couldn’t be more proud of my achievement of getting a dream business off the ground, and while during a global pandemic mind you. I simply do not quit. I am relentless and consistent, especially when it comes to something I know I’m destined for. Nothing will stand in my way. Not even a pandemic. This is what I know sets myself, as well as my business and Teresa apart from others. It’s the simple action of getting up and doing the same thing over and over and over and over again.

What does success mean to you?
Success is whatever you make it to be. It is extremely subjective. For lack of better terms—Happiness. However, it is that you truly find it. Internal, deep & genuine happiness, to me is “success.”

Contact Info:

• Website: dopaminmedia.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/dopaminmedia
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064595392235&mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/d%C3%B3pam%C3%ADn-media/
• Twitter: twitter.com/dopaminmedia
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@dopaminmedia
• Yelp: https://s.yelp.com/HGyXd0uVCD