Born in Winslow, Jeremy Greene has overcome many obstacles in his young life and now, as a resident of Los Angeles, California, has gotten it all together and has created a staggering amount of success on two levels. As founder and CEO of a tech company and a guy who challenged Rascal Flatts’ lead singer Gary LaVox to a “sing-off” (as part of a COVID-19 charity event he created — in fact they did a duet of “Bless the Broken Road”) Greene is ready to take on the country music world with a hit single that has hit the 3-million mark, “My Way.” Let’s face it, this confident young man has a couple of very full plates in front of him. In a phone interview on May 19 from his L.A. home, Greene was more than happy to share his current circumstances with me … after a bit of technical difficulty with his phone.
Greene: Can you hear me now?

Q: Yup, loud and clear.
Greene: Okay, cool. Oh, man, so much is happening, it’s exciting.

Q: Yeah, you said yesterday when we were setting this up that things were kind of busy for you.
Greene: I mean, the record is about to hit one million views — in three days and that’s on SoundCloud right now.

Q: How long have you been living in California?
Greene: About five years.

Q: Did you move right from Maine?
Greene: Yes, sir — yes, I did.

Q: Having watched the video of “My Life” I was wondering, are you responsible for the animation in that video?
Greene: Ah, yes. I’m the CEO of a company called Mojichat, as well, so we made the animation for that, too, which involves facial filters and overlays. It’s the No. 1 platform in the world for gamers.

Q: I read in your bio that in 2015 you formed PingTank — an early animated emoji app that was integrated into Facebook’s newest, at that time, feature platform Messenger. How long have you been doing this Mojichat app?
Greene: The company’s been open about 22 months, but it blew up pretty quickly. We have over 20 million users and we work with companies from DoorDash to Nike and Adidas, a whole bunch of stuff, yeah. And I just can’t believe how much this music has taken off.

Q: Well, that was the reason I made this call — the music end of things — and now, hearing about your tech work, it sounds like you have two full plates in front of you.
Greene: Yeah, and this record just started taking off, man, with me and Gary (LeVox, lead singer of Rascal Flatts), I mean my single, but Gary opened the door. He’s such an amazing role model to have, I mean, Rascal Flatts is the biggest band in the entire world in country music, you know?

Q: Yeah, I’ve been a fan of their close vocal harmonies ever since they came out, they’re about the best at it.
Greene: Yeah, they’re the best ever.

Q: I know touring is not an option now but I bet you’re chomping at the bit to get out on the road and start supporting the record.
Greene: I can’t wait. When I get out and tour I’m going to be going out with Gary and with Rascal Flatts — they’re doing stadiums so we’re just waiting for this to open back up so we can get back there on the road and play the Waterfront in Bangor — that should be awesome.

Q: Now how long have you been into music?
Greene: I started off back in the early 2000s and put together a deal on MySpace and became like the biggest artist in the world on MySpace, then I put out a record with Pitbull — it went platinum — but it wasn’t me, you know what I mean? Then MySpace collapsed and I signed a deal with Sean Combs — you know, Puff Daddy, P Diddy — but that wasn’t me, either. I kept telling people that I wanted to do country but no one listened — I mean, I’m from a trailer park, what are you talking about? So I got involved with tech and that started really working for me with the facial filters in Facebook and stuff; and just recently is when I jumped back into music. I decided to give it a shot here and Gary was like, “Let’s rock!” It just took off, it’s just crazy — I really can’t believe what’s happening. I’m shocked.

Q: What I find interesting is the fact that you have two full-time jobs.
Greene: Yeah, I know. I’m the CEO of Mojichat, which is a huge conglomerate and I’m trying to be an artist, too, at the same time. It’s fine because I can do quite a bit from my mobile and I have a huge team of staff so if at any time I need to step aside from Mojichat, I have a whole team to do that for me.

Q: Where do you want to go as far as your music goes?
Greene: I really want to focus on this and I want to be Best New Artist here, and I really want to go all the way. I’ve been doing this, I love doing this — I love tech, too, but I’m not a tech guy doing music, I’m a music guy that got into tech and then went back to music.

Q: Now, “My Way” is your first single. What are you going to follow that up with?
Greene: I’ve got another single, I can’t talk about it yet but it’s going to be much bigger than this one — it’s a home-run one.

Q: Speaking of “My Way,” that’s an autobiographical song, correct?
Greene: Fully autobiographical, yes.

Q: It seems like you have found a home in country music, by the sound of it.
Greene:: I’ve always had a home in country but no one ever believed me (laughter) until Gary came along.

Q: How did you put the challenge out to him for that duet you two did?
Greene: So I challenged him on Instagram, his daughter saw it and made him pay attention to it (chuckle). That’s how the whole thing started — me and him just clicked, he’s my good buddy … he’s such a wonderful person.

Q: I take it you’ll be working with him in the future, then?
Greene: We’re definitely putting out a record together, for sure — not even a question.

Q: Is there anything you’d like to pass on to the hometown folks reading this article?
Greene: I would just like to say that if you have a dream and people tell you “No!”, focus. You’re going to hear 10 million “No’s” before you hear that one “Yes,” but it only takes one “Yes.” Anything is possible … anything!

Q: Oh, that reminds me — you said something yesterday about once you can get on the road that you want to do something about the Boys & Girls Club in Waterville? Can you talk a little about that?
Greene: My cousin, Uriah, bought the old Boys & Girls Club and we want to create a creative center and actually partner back up with the Boys & Girls Club and bring that building back to life. To turn it into a place where kids can learn how to do music and programming and building things, because there’s none of those things in Waterville for these kids to do. So we’re really going to build this creative center there, and I’m going to come up there with Rascal Flatts and have a concert and raise money to build that thing.

Lucky Clark has spent over 50 years writing about good music and the people who make it. He can be reached at luckyc@myfairpoint.net if you have any questions, comments or suggestions.

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