Meet Derek dboi” Chan | Artist & Audio Engineer”

We had the good fortune of connecting with Derek “dboi” Chan and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Derek “dboi”, putting aside the decision to work for yourself, what other decisions were critical to your success?
Finding a solid team and support system. TRIPLE7 has that in spades, and I’m forever grateful to be a part of this family.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
My name is Derek Chan, but the homies call me dboi. As a producer, director, and software developer, I tend to wear a ton of hats and produce a wide range of products across multiple mediums. While I started out as a singer songwriter recording demos in GarageBand in college, I quickly learned how to scale the recording space to my needs and within my college career opened a private recording studio, where I offered my mixing and mastering services as I honed my skills. The challenges I faced as a budding young studio owner and freelancer was that I was still student in the college of business at San Diego State University. Learning how to create a work/life balance was essential, and knowing where my limits where for things was also another point of discovery I hadn’t considered prior to going into a field that is so self-driven. Over the years, my studio and services offered expanded, enabling me to meet and work with more and larger artists. I was fortunate enough to catch the attention of San Diegan boy band, TRIPLE7, as within a year of joining on as an engineer, I became the 4th performing member. Since, we’ve played several shows, dropped multiple singles with music videos I shot and directed with the help of our creative director, Jose Guzman and our founding performing member, $kye. We even recently released our first plug-in, packed with sounds from our band!
Before joining TRIPLE7, I was successfully a part of smaller projects and teams, where we would work on writing, recording, releasing, and promoting an album. I’m beyond blessed to still be doing that same type of work, but to be able to share the experiences and work load with such creative, hardworking guys that I have the honor of calling my brothers in TRIPLE7. Since joining the group, I’ve been given the opportunity to take up new skills like rapping, video directing, and even coding, as the sharing of responsibilities allows for individuals in the group to focus on their strengths they bring to the group rather than having to wear all the hats simultaneously for any given project. (For example, HUGE shout out, to our manager Brandon for linking us with SHOUTOUT interviews!) Team work makes the dream work, but it’s essential to have everyone on the team understand what the dream is. TRIPLE7 is focused on creating quality content that will last for years, all while staying true to ourselves creatively as we operate as a team. I hope that through my work with TRIPLE7 and my various projects, I can continue to push boundaries and innovate in the music industry. If you’re interested in learning more about me or my work, feel free to check out my studio website (www.TheTrainStation.studio) or follow us (@yourfavboyband) on social media. Thank you for taking the time to read about my journey!

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Okay, so it’s actually wildly exciting that I get to answer this one because all the other members of TRIPLE7 are born and raised in San Diego, but I’m from Reno/Northern California, I moved down to San Diego about 9 years ago for college at SDSU, and I never moved back because I fell in love with the city! I think as a SD transplant, I’ve got a pretty solid itinerary for y’all:

First, I’d hit the taco spots around town. Every local has their own favorite hole in the wall (mine is Gualberto’s on University), but an essential stop that even most in-the-know tourists would hit is Tacos El Gordo in National City.
If tacos aren’t your thing, there’s a plenty of other cultural communities throughout the city! You’ve got bomb Filipino food in National City (shouts out Tita’s Kitchen), amazing Cantonese style dim sum at Diamond Palace in City Heights, famous egg rolls and Vietnamese cuisine at A Chau off University Avenue, and some of the best Ethiopian food you’ll ever try at Muzita Abyssinian Bistro of Park Blvd. Right next door from there, you’ll find one of the city’s most renowned Thai spots, Bahn Thai!

After getting some grub, I’d get some drinks down at The Holding Company in Ocean Beach; a bar that has a restaurant upstairs and live music downstairs. On any given month, you might be able to catch TRIPLE7 playing too! (Come say hi if you do, I’m the lil guy with the guitar!)
If you’re looking to bar hop, check out North Park! Our neighborhood has debatably more bars than any other area in town (that’s where my recording studio is located!)
If you’re looking to bar hop along the beach, then head to Pacific Beach (locals call it PB!)

If you’re really into the arts like I am, you’d probably love the many museums downtown and around Balboa Park and Liberty Station. A personal favorite museum is the Museum of Making Music which is based in north-county San Diego.

TRIPLE7 is also a huge sports loving group, with many members fans of the local sports around here. There’s a ton of awesome games you can attend, from Aztec basketball games, SD WAVE soccer at the stadium, to Seagulls hockey games in Point Loma. there’s truly not a corner of this city that doesn’t have some sort of live sports events available.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I’d like to dedicate my shout out to my man Chris, who goes by the artist name Goodsir. He’s this LA homie I met on Instagram and we just really vied with each other’s sound and style. He’s really about his grind and quality of work, and I’ve seen a lot of growth in his stuff in the short year we’ve been connected. If you reach him, send him my love! We still gotta link & collab!

Website: www.thetrainstation.studio

Instagram: @yourfavboyband

Twitter: @yourfavboyband

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@yourfavboyband

Other: if you have any questions, my personal instagram is @prodbydboi! It’s been an honor sharing my story with y’all, thank you!

Image Credits
picture credit: Jose Guzman