What motivates you outside of music?
My relationships have always been a huge motivator to me. Whether it be my girlfriend, past girlfriends, friendships, or family, I draw inspiration from real things that have happened to me or the people around me. Also movies and shows have always motivated me in a lot of different ways, as well as given me ideas for songs. I’ve even used things characters have said in my lyrics.
How do you define success?
I define success as freedom. I feel like the freedom that money buys, is more valuable than any tangible thing. I’ve always wanted to be a business owner instead of working for someone else my entire life. So my philosophy is when it comes to music, if I am making music that I want to make and people want to hear, that’s all that matters.
What are your biggest challenges as an artist?
Finding your “brand” or “sound” is the hardest thing when it comes to being an artist. It’s a lot of self reflection, looking at what is important to you, who you are, who you want to be, and putting that all together and presenting it to the public which can be a pretty scary thing. It’s also always evolving, because a “brand” is basically just “who are you” and we are always learning and changing as people, or at least should be.
How do you look back at a track like ‘You’ now?
I almost look back at it like a child I guess (I don’t have human babies, only fur babies). It’s grown a lot since I first released it and so have I. I’m not sure if I would release a song like it now, but thats the cool thing about releasing music. It’s like a time capsule of where you were when you wrote it, produced, and released it.
How important is the visual aspect of what you do?
It’s incredibly important. When I first started releasing music, I was not very excited about that aspect. Getting in front of a camera and everything that comes with creating visuals was foreign to me, and since I’m a solo act on a shoestring budget, I had to learn it all on my own. It’s now become second nature, and a whole new for of self expression for me. I really have fun creating visuals now, which is good because with social media it’s basically the only way for people to discover your music now a days.
What is your message to your supporters?
My message is centred around loving yourself for who you are, and being happy living your own life. I think a lot of people struggle with this more today than ever because of social media and expectations from the people around them. At the end of the day you are who you are, and that is beautiful. If you’re living a life to make other people happy or to live up to expectations of friends, family, or society and you’re miserable while doing it, whats the point? Take your power and freedom back and do what you want, and everything will work out in the end.
What have you got coming up?
I am currently putting a single out every other week with an accompanying music video every week in between. I am also releasing an LP of some of my earlier music that have all been released as singles that will be out May, Friday 13.
