Hot Rock & Alternative<\/a> chart. The song, like previously released tunes \u201cQuitter\u201d and \u201cMedusa,\u201d meshes folk-rock and country influences with a raw songwriting style and emotionally charged vocal delivery.<\/p>\n\n\tWhitcomb wrote \u201cKingdom of Fear\u201d at his home in Nanaimo in Vancouver Island with Jack Riley (who also produced) and Nolan Sipe, before later finishing the song in Nashville with Cal Shapiro.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI was reading this book at the time, and it had nothing to do with the song, but I thought the title of the book, \u2018Kingdom of Fear,\u2019 was just a cool title,\u201d Whitcomb says. \u201cWe all kind of live in a kingdom of fear, whether it\u2019s struggling with anxiety or depression, or any of that. It\u2019s like this constant kind of overwhelming thing sometimes. That\u2019s how I pictured it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tWhitcomb, Billboard<\/em>\u2019s Country Up-and-Coming Artist for July, spoke about making the video for \u201cKingdom of Fear,\u201d his stint on American Idol<\/em>, and his evolution as a touring artist.<\/p>\n\n\tLooking back, was there a certain show, whether your own or a festival performance, where you realized that \u201cKingdom of Fear\u201d was really connecting with fans?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tWe played in Boston [in April at the Citizens House of Blues] and there were about 3,000 people there. I\u2019d never played for an audience that big \u2014 and then, I totally psyched myself out before Stagecoach in April. I thought, \u201cNobody\u2019s going to be at my stage, and my show is at 3:00 p.m., and it\u2019s a huge festival.\u201d But I showed up and the entire place was packed.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe video for \u201cKingdom of Fear\u201d features you playing a lead character who experiences a litany of mishaps, from a car breaking down to getting kicked out of a restaurant. Were there any funny moments or bloopers that stood out to you while making the video?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tThere was a guy that we hired as an extra, like the guy that punched me out in the gas station [in the video]. That guy, funnily enough, somehow when I was a kid, we used to go camping together. He\u2019s from San Diego and I\u2019m from Canada. He just showed up and I was like, \u201cMan, that\u2019s hilarious. Really didn\u2019t expect that.\u201d But the whole crew was great.<\/p>\n
\n\tYou have worked with Jack Riley on the Deep Water<\/em> EP and The Hard Way<\/em>. How does the way he approaches making music complement how you approach it?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tI really pride myself on lyricism and that sort of thing, but as far as musicianship, I\u2019m not that great of a guitar player. The thing that makes us a good team is he offers the perfect canvas for what I\u2019m trying to portray. He\u2019ll throw a guitar riff down and I just tell him how I feel and he\u2019ll start noodling on guitar and lay down a super sweet melody and lyrics that maybe I wouldn\u2019t have thought of if I didn\u2019t have the right canvas. And Cal and Nolan, they don\u2019t try to shut down some of those more abstract thoughts I have. It\u2019s almost kind of like a therapy session to an extent, writing with those guys.<\/p>\n
\n\tWhat was it like growing up on Vancouver Island in Canada and how did you get into music?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tIt\u2019s beautiful. I used to play drums when I was a kid. I listened to lots of rap music, like Stompdown Killaz, Snak The Ripper and those guys. I loved music, but I was 17 when I realized I wanted to make a career out of it. I just started posting [songs] on the internet and I didn\u2019t think it would turn into what it\u2019s turned into.<\/p>\n
\n\tYou were also on American Idol<\/em> in 2022 and made it to the top 20. How did that impact your career?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tI didn\u2019t plan on going on American Idol<\/em> at all. A casting agent reached out and asked if I wanted to do the show, and it just went from one thing to another. I was grateful for the opportunity, and it showed me that [a career in music] is a possibility. It wasn\u2019t until I got sent home where I had to really buckle down and learn to play guitar and write songs. American Idol<\/em> was great, and it was so foreign to me that it was inspiring \u2014 because I had been working on a pipeline and doing blue collar jobs. When I got home, I was just doing whatever I could to make music.<\/p>\n\n\tWhat are you most looking forward to about your Kingdom of Fear Tour, which launches in September?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tWhen you first start touring, it\u2019s such a humbling experience, going up from venues where nobody\u2019s there or you only sell half the tickets and you lose a bunch of money. There\u2019s so many learning curves. You\u2019ll go through 10 different sound guys and it\u2019s such an unforgiving territory to be in when you\u2019re first starting out. We\u2019re at the point now where my crew is so unbelievable that the shows go off without a hitch. And I got an amazing vocal coach and feel like I\u2019ve reached a point vocally where I\u2019m feeling good and strong.<\/p>\n
\n\tWho have been some of the fellow artists you have connected with along the way?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tBailey [Zimmerman]\u2019s been unbelievable. Evan Honer is one of my best friends. Max McNown\u2019s great, Diplo has been absolutely such an incredible human. Same with Marshmello and HARDY and Nate Smith. There\u2019s so many to name that have kind of embraced me and have just been so kind.<\/p>\n
\n\tObviously, you are passionate about music \u2014 but are there other areas fans might be surprised to know you\u2019re really into?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tI\u2019ve been working on getting my skydiving license and I\u2019ve jumped out of a plane solo. In my off-time, I\u2019m constantly doing little projects. I\u2019m working on getting my pilot\u2019s license to fly planes. I love racing cars\u2014I have a car I take to the track. I get obsessive about random subjects.<\/p>\n
\n\tDo you want to eventually be able to pilot yourself to some of your own shows?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\t100%. If it was shows around Canada and whatever, I could just hop on my plane and fly in, play a show and fly home. That\u2019s exactly what I\u2019d love to do. It\u2019s a lot of work, but I want to get my IFR [Instrument Rating] license, then the more hours, the better you get. So that\u2019s the idea.<\/p>\n
\n\tIs there a podcast you are into right now?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tYeah, Bad Friends<\/em> with Bobby Lee and Andrew Santino. I love those guys. And I love Theo Von\u2019s podcast. We just did Bert Kreischer\u2019s podcast \u2014 I\u2019m a huge comedy fan.<\/p>\n\n\tWhat is the most recent song you listened to?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\tAfter going on tour with HARDY, I\u2019ve been really digging into a lot of stuff he\u2019s doing. That Quit!!<\/em> album is unbelievable.<\/p>\n
![\"Billboard](\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/2HpFicp.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.billboard.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cameron Whitcomb may just be getting started in the United States \u2014 but in Canada, he has fully arrived. When the Canadian Country Music Awards were announced July 16, the Alberta, Canada native led the pack (tied with Josh Ross) with seven nominations for the Sept. 19 awards ceremony, including entertainer of the year, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2010122,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[309228],"class_list":["post-2513047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-genre-country"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Melanie-Santiler-Cimafunks-Ese-Besito-Voted-Best-New-Latin-Music.gif","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2513047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2513047"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2513047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2513048,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2513047\/revisions\/2513048"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2010122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2513047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2513047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2513047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}