So after that tour, the REAL journey began heading back to Nashville. I had no idea what I was going to do, where I was going to stay or what the journey was going to be like. But God opened so many doors of opportunity and AMAZING people to surround me with. Within the next few weeks and months, I found a place to stay which was owned by Sidewalk Prophets guitarist Daniel Macal who I became incredible friends with him and his family. I was getting flown or driven out to different parts of the country to record guitars on albums, play in peoples original shows, going to some of the most amazing studios in Nashville to play guitar, film sessions to do social media work for artists and gear companies. Just the fact that I was surrounded by people who did music 24 / 7, having a community who understood what it meant to be a musician, living in the city and a country where music is so appreciated and so valued … it was amazing.
The experience of leaving your family, friends, job, hometown to pursue a dream and a God calling and throwing all your chips in the table ready to risk everything when you don’ t know what’ s gonna happen. As a 21 / 22 year old at the time, it’ s crazy that I even thought of doing that and I really can’ t take any credit for that moment in my life. That’ s all God.
[ WM ] After you returned to Australia, Covid hit and shut down your country for a good while. I know you wanted to return to the States but that just didn’ t happen. How did you adjust to that disappointment? Is this when you turned to doing more video influencer type of things on guitar?
[ Jemm ] I was only on a 6-month temporary visa, so the day before I boarded on the plane to go back to Australia, I had just finished recording overdubs for the church in Michigan in Nashville and then headed to the airport in Nashville going to Houston, Texas. When I got in the terminal going from Houston to Sydney, I heard the voice of God tell me“ You’ re not gonna go anywhere for a while.” That was in November of 2019. When I arrived back to Australia, I heard the Lord tell me again“ Do not drift from doing anything music related. Keep doing music and don’ t take any other jobs that aren’ t related to your music career. Go start off with making a website and working on your YouTube channel.”
So, I worked hard when I arrived to start working on a website to create work for music production, live gigs and teaching as I had this huge momentum coming from Nashville. And then I also started to work on my YouTube channel for VLOGs and potential influencer type content. What happened months later was crazy, Australia went into lockdowns during covid, but also on Mothers day of 2020, my mother had a stroke while singing at church during a Mother’ s day live stream service and that changed everything for me and my family. My Dad was still working two jobs, my sister was finishing her last year of her college degree, my brother and sister-in-law were in a different state locked down so no one was able to help but me and that completely shut down the rest of my music projects, live gigs or people I had booked to do production work with. I had no idea what I was going to do during the time I was there to help my Mom with her stroke recovery. It made things very hard. As now my
48 November 2025 Subscribe for Free...