Signed to Nickelback frontman Chad Kroeger's 604 Record label back in 2006, pop-punk quartet Faber Drive have enjoyed reasonable success in their native Canada across their 20 year career. Fronted by Dave Faber, the band from British Columbia have landed five Top 40 singles, toured with the likes of Simple Plan and Metro Station, and were nominated for a Juno Award (Canada's equivalent of a Grammy) for New Group of the Year back in 2008.
Not bad at all, but their achievements have been rather dwarfed by the achievements of Dave Faber's son, Isaiah Faber, aka Powfu, with lo-fi home recordings made in his bedroom.
Powfu's best-known song, Death Bed (Coffee For Your Head) has been streamed a remarkable 1, 976, 55, 125 times on Spotify alone, its video been watched 825 million times on his YouTube page, and the song has been used as the soundtrack to billions of TikTok videos, receiving four billion TikTok plays in March 2020 alone. Serious numbers for a young man who became a star by accident, and all without leaving his bedroom.
Having learned to play drums aged two, in his teens Isaiah Faber would borrow a microphone from his father, and lie in his bedroom, sharing his thoughts and worries in raps over beats he found online, then upload his DIY lo-fi songs to Soundcloud to share with an online community of like-minded souls.
"I was pretty lonely when I started making music," he told The Guardian in 2021. "I'd just stay at home, I didn't really hang out with friends, so I feel like a lot of people that listened to it were in the same boat."
