Broke in Stereo Didn’t Just Survive 2025 — He Turned the Chaos Into Art Worth Bleeding For

Some artists make music. Broke in Stereo builds worlds, then shreds right through them with a guitar solo that could peel paint off a dive bar wall.

The California-born, Berklee-trained, South America–wandered, Brooklyn-hardened, LA-refined force of nature, known offstage as Cabell Harris, spent 2025 doing what he does best: refusing to fit anywhere neatly.

His alt-blues-rock universe is gritty, experimental, beautifully unstable, and somehow still anchored by melodies that hit like emotional sucker punches. There’s no glossy PR polish here. No “brand-friendly persona.” Just a lifelong musician who’s been writing, producing, and performing since age five, chasing the next honest line, the next dangerous chord, the next thing worth saying.

And this year, the standout was clear: “Trouble’s Comin.” A track that cuts right into the uncomfortable, unfixable truth about love, the fact that it’s risky, messy, and occasionally a full-contact sport. Harris doesn’t romanticize it; he tells you straight-up that letting someone close is terrifying, that even healthy love leaves bruises, and that fighting for connection is part of the deal… unless it crosses into abuse, and then the only fight worth having is the one to get out.

It’s raw, self-aware blues-rock storytelling delivered with the unfiltered honesty of a guy who spends more time composing than talking about himself. Outside the studio, Harris kept things simple this year, writing orchestral and jazz compositions under his own name and staying laser-focused on the one thing that’s never let him down: the work.

As he heads into 2026 with plans to release music monthly and return to the stage, Broke in Stereo is embracing growth, reinvention, and a life with fewer apologies and more distortion pedals. And if there’s one piece of advice he’s carrying into the new year, it’s this: stop letting other people’s opinions poison your art, and broaden what you consume if you want your creativity to actually breathe.

“Trouble’s Comin” feels brutally honest about how love can wound you even when it’s good. What moment or realization pulled that song out of you, and what part of yourself were you finally ready to say out loud?

I was playing around on the guitar, and when that riff came out, the words immediately came to me. It jumped out of my mouth, and it just made sense. After singing it a few times, I reverse-engineered what that meant to me. Freudian, maybe, but it just came right out. The music and the lyrics just came right out and fit together. That riff is basically representing dissonance…but it’s alluring, not a turn off. Everyone likes cat and mouse so this is the next level of love. Catty back and forth.

You’ve always kept a foot in experimentation,  alt blues, rock, orchestral work, and jazz composition. What sonic itch were you scratching in 2025 that you hadn’t touched before?

Well the similarity is that I always follow what feels good first…after that: I stopped asking, “Does this make sense?” and started asking, “Does this make people’s eyebrows raise?”. I scratched the itch to be uncomfortable, my favorite genre. People (especially the music industry) are desperate to give criticism, and I kinda closed the door on it, and don’t worry if it fits perfectly in a box. I think it’s got enough ground to stand on where it’s still pretty digestible. The general audience is more open to new than the industry allows them to be. I worry less about the boundaries and more about if it feels right. So I don’t think there are many specifics I can point to, but maybe keeping more “mistakes” and “polishing” less.

Between Ear Art, Outer-Net, Auditory Artifacts, and now “Trouble’s Comin',” there’s a clear evolution but also a thread of emotional unrest. Do you feel like your music is getting closer to who you are, or further away on purpose?

I know it’s not further, that’s for sure. I don’t know if I’m closer either, though. I think each release represents where I am when I’m there. That’s not meant to be a cop out. I just think if I avoid being disingenuous, then I’ll be ok. I think the evolution might be that the style of the music is more aimed at. When I play live, I think it’s far more cohesive, but production always offers so many production decisions that it can push the styles a bit further apart between releases. I’ve tried to constrain the instrumentation to restrain that a little bit.

You joked that outside of music, life feels like “a hassle,” but you’ve lived one of the wildest artist journeys: Berklee, Argentina, Brooklyn, LA. What kept you committed through the years when nothing felt rewarding except the work?

I don’t think it was hard to say committed. Unfortunately; this answer is very straight forward. I stayed committed because it was the only thing that kept me getting out of bed…also, I’m probably OCD.

You mentioned “stop taking criticism at a certain point.” Was there a specific moment or person who made you realize other people’s opinions were poisoning your process?

After a couple of years of sitting on the tracks, I had a few different good people work on the music. I listened back to the original stuff and just loved how it sounded. People can have a lot of criticism to try and help “fix” what’s wrong so the music can “fit in”. The algorithm has certainly made it worse. The more they fix it, the less it sounds like how you want it. So it’s just hitting a wall of realizing that it makes you feel misunderstood and misrepresented. It’s not a unique struggle. I definitely attempted to make my music fit in a bit more, but even still, it will have that issue. The moment was circling back, and I realized I nailed it before I got help. I did work with a handful of folks who were helpful, occasionally engineering vocal recordings. I just know to ignore opinions and focus on my instincts.

You plan to release music monthly in 2026,  a huge shift in momentum. What does “revival” look like for you right now, and what part of yourself are you trying to resurrect?

Hmmm, I have to reshape habits to do things I don’t normally want to do. I enjoy being on social media a bit, but releasing monthly is a different type of job. If I can manage to artistically represent myself in a visual format it will serve that part of the artist identity and help the audience. So I suppose it will give birth as oppose to resurrect. I did have a visual persona before but I think regularly doing it is adding a different component to the art.

You said writer’s block only happens when people consume a narrow slice of life. What unexpected art, culture, or experiences fed your creativity the most this year?

This year I listened to a lot more vinyl. Reading the vinyl covers and listening to stuff that sometimes isn’t online for streaming. A lot of history falls between the cracks. Also, I listen to a lot of history, either podcasts or short-form videos. This year, I got a huge amount of inspiration from history. In Jan 2025, I was in Peru and Ecuador (I’m in Ecuador often, actually); I spent time learning about the Inca and indigenous. Sometimes it’s hard to pin point how it influences come into music. But it certainly keeps the brain turning, and I don’t ever feel a sense of writer’s block.