By AIDAN KNIGHT

 

FORMER Gippsland Power captain, Josh Cashman is a man of many talents.

Cashman has shined in the music world since forgoing his football. He released his debut album the same week he was named Power captain in 2013, and moved to Melbourne to pursue his promising sporting career – only to become a successful musician instead.

Steadily carving a name for himself in the singer-songwriter pocket of the industry, Cashman has found himself performing at the prestigious Red Rocks amphitheatre in Colorado and collaborating with chart-topping Australian artists like Tash Sultana.

Sultana in particular has had the Sale artist feature on her ARIA-nominated sophomore album Terra Firma and opened for her across 51 dates on the Europe and North America tours promoting it. Cashman has come a long way, having performed to more people than the population of his hometown, playing at Germany’s monumental Reeperbahn festival to almost 50,000 people.

His newest single, Black Sand Beaches, is the final of his weekly releases, a schedule he stuck to for the closing 30 weeks of 2024.

This particular song braved the Christmas period, something not a lot of artist’s attempt, as celebrations and the annual Mariah Carey epidemic take over people’s regular listening habits.

Cashman called this schedule “Rotation 30”, a number significant for the artists age this year, saying “I wanted to drop a song every week until I turned 30”.

The Sale artist clocked up a momentous 2.6 million Spotify streams in 2023 alone and, heading forward, is always looking to maximise reach and potential audiences in a world where radio has been overtaken by algorithms.

“It’s for the people who want to be a deeper part of this artistic journey I’m on a bit more,” he shared.

“It’s really important to me that these songs reach the eyes and ears of those who would want it the most.”

It’s not about any notion of stardom for Cashman, but simply feeling a duty to ensure the music is heard by people who would genuinely relish it. This signifies his dedication to the hardcore audiences, while appreciating and welcoming casual listeners into the fold, he really has a certain loyalty and drive for those who live and breathe music, such as himself.

Cashman began his music journey at age 11 as a guitar player, before quickly developing song writing skills as second nature.

“Growing up in a household where music resonated more than television,” he said of his time in Sale.

Now 19 years later, the nights spent at open mics as a young teenager have paid off, now bragging an impressive 70 international shows annually, on average, and more than 50,000 monthly listeners on Spotify.

Mellow guitar-picked and soft, affable vocal tones have seen this athletic artist compared to acts such as Matt Corby and Vance Joy – with more than a few similarities to the latter. James Keogh, aka Vance Joy, played VFL for Coburg.

Black Sand Beaches, and the other 29 tracks Josh Cashman released for “Rotation 30′ are available now to stream and download on all platforms.