Diana Rein on Her New Album Queen Of My Castle

Diana Rein Interview her songs, her story and her newest album Queen Of My Castle

Diana Rein, a guitarist and vocalist, perfectly dubbed as The ‘Six-String Siren, of Blues infused music has come into her own. From humble beginnings, she has raised through the ranks of music from the releases her highly-anticipated sophomore album Long Road, a truly amazing one woman tour to performing in some of the greatest music halls of America, she has, and is a talent to be admired and has proven herself in an industry that has not given the women of music the full respect they deserve, and her greatest work is yet to come.

Diana Rein is presently in the studio, working on her next release Queen Of My Castle, which promises not only to be an highly anticipated release, but a tribute to her influences. In a prior interview, Diana said “The new album is a collection of fifteen songs, one song is a tribute to Stevie Ray Vaughan,” says Rein, just back from representing Guitar Girl Magazine at the 2018 NAMM Conference (she’s featured for the month of April in the 2018 Guitar Girl Magazine Calendar). “There’s a lot of traditional blues, high energy, upbeat, and a few blues-rock songs that I know you guys will love. This album will be lucky #3 for me, my first full-band album. I loved making my last record on my own, but I am really looking forward to challenging myself this time around and working with a major collaborating music icon.” Diana has launched a crowd-funding campaign for her upcoming album, Queen Of My Castle. The follow-up to her critically-lauded 2016 release Long Road, Queen Of My Castle is being co-produced by Michael Leasure (drummer extraordinaire with the Walter Trout Band).

In this updated interview, we will discuss with Diana Rein her plans for the album, her present work, goals and the recording process. IndiePulse will also get her opinion of the digital distribution that has become the new way of music reaching the masses.

IPM: Diana, we have enjoyed covering your work, and even more, listening to your music, we have discussed so many aspects of your work and life, working your music career around family, your involvement with Guitar Girl Magazine, your performances at NAMM and your albums. Tell us about your new project, “Queen Of My Castle”, what was your inspiration?

My inspiration was initially to just write and get my creative flow going. I usually write songs in spurts and take breaks from the songwriting process when I feel I have enough songs for an album. Or at least that’s how I have done it in the past. I feel that it might be a defense mechanism to operate that way because I fall in love with my songs so quickly and want to put all of them on a record. And that’s too much pressure to have if I am writing songs constantly, when it’s so expensive to produce albums independently. When

I started writing the songs for “Queen of My Castle”, the news was just coming out about Hollywood and the #metoo and #timesup campaigns. I definitely think it played a part in my writing, even if subconsciously. I grew up in that world and it really hit some nerves. I don’t think my songs are political at all, but I think what it brought out in my music is more of a sense of empowerment and strength and owning your power. I think it’s important for all of us women and men to find our inner strength and inner Queens and Kings. I know there have been a lot of men that have been hurt in their lives too so I feel like #metoo or #timesup is not gender specific. It’s human specific. I think we all just need to find our voices and speak up, help others, weed out the bad. It’s exciting to see where this will take us……

IPM: You are presently running a Pre-Order and Crowd-funding the album; we see this as a unique opportunity for your fans and for music lovers to be “part of the magic” of bringing about the creation of an epic album. Other artists have done this, but this really is a game changer for record producing in general, what are some of your points on this?

Well, the word has been out for a while…..it’s not necessary to have a record label to operate as an artist nowadays. And that feels very liberating. As an artist that loves to write and producer her own material, it’s really a gift to be able to have that chance to make the music that I hear. I also think that it gives the fans a better opportunity to be involved from the start. For instance, I have set up a private FB group for the album where I document all of the progress on the album daily with videos, facetime lives, regular posts.

I am getting to know all of my contributors on a closer level and I plan to keep the group going even when the album is done because I know that the relationships that I create with my fans will be invaluable. The gates have been opened for artists to create whenever they want and that is all that an artistic soul wants to do anyway….to always be creating.

IPM: I know the album is still in “Secret Mode” but can you tell us about what we can expect; we understand there will be a tribute to one of your influences as well as other topics you hold in high esteem?

There is a song on the album that I wrote for Stevie Ray Vaughan who continues to be an influence on me. He gave me my start…..meaning that once I saw him on a dvd….I knew that the electric guitar was where it was at for me and I wanted to get to know it better. So I am very grateful to him for helping me find my passion in life. And that’s why I honor him. As of now, the album will have 15 songs and I am hoping that one of those will be an instrumental of mine called Zoe. Otherwise, the rest of the songs are takes on traditional blues and a couple of songs that lean more towards blues rock.

IPM: We assume you will release the album on CD, but we understand you will also focus on Digital distribution as well, using iTunes, Amazon and Spotify. The possibilities of global distribution for today’s artists has grown exponentially, will “Queen Of My Castle“ be slated for a “World Wide “release?

I released my last album digitally as well. I feel like Digital Distribution is not slowing down and that’s how many people want to hear their music. So I am going to go with the flow of that “stream” and stay onboard. The album will still be available as an autographed CD from my website though. I think the great thing about Streaming is that every time someone listens to your music you did get paid something…even though it may not be much…if your music is great and resonates with people then it can really make a difference if a large amount of people take listens and create playlists with your music, etc. And I love that you don’t have to ask your fans for money, you just have to ask them to listen to your music if they are on Spotify, which is a win/win situation.

The hardest thing about being an Independent musician these days is asking your fans to buy stuff…….so I have decided to just keep creating and I really think that the music I create will speak louder than words and get me to my goal of funding this album a lot faster. It’s sort of aligned with that saying “Build it and they will come”. So stop asking for things and just build, create and if it’s good music…..somehow or another you will get to your goals whether it’s crowdfunding or building a fan base or selling your music.

IPM: Please, tell us about whom you will be co-producing the album with, we understand you are working with Michael Leasure, how exciting! Who else will you are working with?

Yes, the album is being co-Produced by my friend Michael Leasure. He is Walter Trout’s drummer of 10 years and has played with many other great artists and will be playing drums on “Queen of My Castle” as well. We have gotten together for pre-production meetings and have just worked on arranging the songs to be the best they can be. It is still the early stages. As far as other people that will play on the album, I don’t know just yet. We haven’t made any hard decisions yet. I know that Michael has talked to a few of his friends to get things going. It will be really exciting when we all get to play together….I can tell you that much.

IPM: So, how can people get information and sign up to help fund the production of “Queen Of My Castle“, and what can they look forward to getting for their show of support?

If you go to my website www.dianarein.com , right on the home page, you will find a video that explains the project and right underneath the video you will get to see all of the rewards and links that correspond to the pre-orders/contribution amounts. If you contribute anything from $25 on up, you get access to the private FB group that is documenting the whole album making process, behind the scenes, that is building a close community of awesome people.

Other rewards are an autographed album, t-shirt, thank you’s in the cd liner notes, a glitter art canvas that I will personally make, a cover song of your choice that is recorded by me, access to another FB group that will only have 30 people where for 6 months we will meet up at a specific time and I will perform on FB live, an original song made just for you that includes a phone call to brainstorm ideas with you and lastly a chance to have me fly out to your home anywhere in the USA to do a house concert! Thanks in advance for your support in helping me make this album; I truly couldn’t do it without the help of my fans.

More Information on how to become part of an Incredible Journey into Music History and to support an Amazing Artist –

www.dianarein.com and at www.facebook.com/dianareinmusic