January 30, 2017

Meet Rob Copeland of Deadcell Entertainment in Downtown

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Rob Copeland.

Rob, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
First I’d like to say thank you for, I guess seeing something in my work that attracted you & for being inquisitive regarding this industry. A lot of the time its a thankless unseen profession regarding the people who work very hard to produce events. I’ve always been into arts of any form & creating something from nothing. The concept of your limits being set by you should always be considered limitless with practical strategy or application. I thrive on challenges & adversity. What I’m doing here is something I don’t really ever do which is analyze myself & explain. I prefer to not think about why but focus on the what. Aside just creating things at a young age or being intrigued by artistic things, I started in a small Pennsylvania city. My first real start helping build a show, I think I was 16 & my girlfriend at the time had a brother who was in a band. I would go to their shows as much as possible. They were a dark heavy sounding band. I loved it & it sparked a high interest in the entire idea of performance & production. They started showing me stuff & letting me help with the shows. I vividly recall learning what a power condition was which at this point is funny in comparison to what I do & work with now. I worked with them for awhile, started pushing for my own band, found friends to help produce & jumped in on local shows as much as possible. Essentially just anything I could get my hands into. I remember my first light programming experience was with a local venue. I had now idea what the hell I was doing. The venue showed me 2 lighting boards right as the show started. One hand on each board & just pushed buttons in time with the music. For not knowing anything, I actually did a decent job in retrospect & even hit some cool cues with some slick blackouts. I ended up starting a band & my first real job was working at a fast food place. My only goal was to get money & buy gear. That’s what I did. I remember having the catalog next to my bed for months looking at what I was going to get every night before I went to sleep. I saved then bought a Carvin Concert Series PA system & a vocal processor. My first show with that system was in a skate park where we built a stage out of plywood & had 3 bands from Virgina come up to perform while kids would skate. I also had a band going, changed jobs to a factory working 12hr days then going to band practice for roughly 4hrs after. I sang so much I remember I made my tonsils bleed. I started driving to larger cities for clubs & shows but eventually the band broke up so I decided to move out of that area. I’ve actually moved with family & then on my own more than I hear of 99% of the time. Not a bragging point just my reality. In the realm of 70 times at this point. I guess there’s a little nomadic blood in circulation. After the band I moved around to a few different cities in Pennsylvania then to Orlando Florida pushing to get involved in local events. After a year in Orlando I moved to NYC, researched what was going on, pushed to get involved & eventually started my own event production company. I started producing concerts/party nights for a couple years then expanded into high-end event work on a large scale. I stayed around NYC for 13yrs aside a brief move to Los Angeles your going to read about in a second. I still moved around all the NYC boroughs. I worked with so many venues/artists over this time both major & local its mind boggling honestly. I ended up producing an event for Ginger Fish, now Rob Zombie’s drummer but at that time he was still part of Marilyn Manson. After that event we kept in contact & I eventually moved to Los Angeles in 2011. Same thing, I pushed to get involved in local events & pick up production work while living with & helping Ginger. I stayed there briefly & after Ginger transition into Rob Zombie I decided to move back to NYC for awhile to keep things going on both coasts. I kept my main home in NYC for the next 4yrs producing events, started an apparel printing company X Inject Printing/Design & created a new band called The X Sense. Last year I decided to make Los Angeles my permanent home & moved back. Over the past year I am honestly blown away with how fast things have progressed across multiple mediums. I’ve been working with the majority of major movie production houses like Paramount Pictures, a lot of companies & other artists. I was even fortunate to work with another favorite drummer, Danny Carey of Tool. I’ve really appreciated the places I’ve been & those I’ve worked with. There’s details I’m missing throughout this but I can’t give the complete story or you might get tired of reading. I don’t want to seem pretentious of course either. I love what I do. I guess others see that, appreciate it & see a value in it. I think when you love what you do your not really working & I’ve been fortunate enough to make a living off being creative in some form or another.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
The entertainment/event industry is one of the most aggressive & honestly vile cutthroat industries that exist. 100% not smooth with a long trail of blood, sweat & tears. A couple years ago a friend told me she saw a report about the most stressful jobs you can have. Event producer was #1. I thought it would be a doctor, astronaut or something more but I found that pretty interesting. I can understand though I guess. I’ve had just about every point of adversity that you could be hit with thrown at me. Some challenges would be trusting others, protecting your ideas & methods of execution from being ripped off. As well as making sure you don’t float out too far & loose your own integrity by the amount of people who will try to push you off your stance. Even your words, thoughts, personal approaches people will try to steal & portray if they think it’ll get them something. This may sound funny but I used to think Tupac Shakur was excessive in his interviews saying don’t trust anyone but honestly & unfortunately I now really understand that mentality. The best way to avoid excess struggle or exploitation is just being on top of what you do, keeping your core methods to yourself & always use contracts. Adversity is fuel for the fire though & you’ll get it now matter what but the way you process it dictates your outcome.

Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Deadcell Entertainment – what should we know?
Deadcell Entertainment is a multimedia event production company providing services in fields of audio/video/lighting/staging/fx/management/printing/design.

I have proven success in all these fields with specific niches in each one on both local & major levels that people seem to have really appreciated & hold in high value. I’m grateful for that & hope to never lose sight of what brings that type of quality to my work.
If you love what you do people see that & respond to it. I think that’s what sets what I do apart from others or so I’m told.

Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
Credit for me always goes to my family when I was in my teens for allowing me to be myself & pursue what I loved without serious judgment even when they didn’t understand my point or the goal I was chasing. If I didn’t have that I think my mental state & personal progression would have been obstructed.

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