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Experimental

Prince, Black History Month and The Spoken Word

by Lee Christian

Prince, Black History Month and The Spoken Word by Lee Christian


I have been a Prince fan since I was 8 and first heard Let’s Go Crazy, with its ear grabbing pyrotechnic guitar ending. Since then, I’ve learned from him, copied him and even just ended up doing the same things as him by osmosis or naturally. His work ethic, energy and diversity are three touchstones of my own ‘career’ and I have many strange ethereal intangible links to prince and ‘signs’ attached to many of my fondest moments in music so far that it’s almost as if he’s been a musical guardian angel since his passing in 2016 – an event that hit me so bad that I bought a streaming package, set up a little shrine on screen and DJ’d for 3 days straight, so fans had a place to hang, and I had some way of expressing my own sense of loss and gratitude for him voluminous output and inspiring presence in my own life. My phone went off non-stop that first day, I was associated with him so much by my circle of friends, they were checking that I was ok!

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I wasn’t thinking about what I was going to think about

by Ben VanBuskirk of Blackout Orchestra

Ben VanBuskirk aka Blackout Orchestra


I can’t talk about music.

Okay, that’s not entirely true. I have the language. I can talk about what a particular song means to me, or I can talk about what that drummer is doing on the hi-hat that makes you know it’s them. Music history is an easy one – I’ve devoured all the rock bios, read all the critical analysis, seen all the interviews. I eat, sleep and breathe music. So why does it feel hard to talk about?

Not to sound all new-age about it, but music is elemental. Larger than life. When I was a kid, like most kids, I was into superheroes. The bright colors, the high stakes, the every moment of a story that meant something important to the larger narrative. As I grew up, music was the only “adult” thing that felt that exciting, that vital, that universal and yet intensely personal.

So of course I became a musician.

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Life Is Just A Mashup

by Alex Black

Alex Black


For those who don’t know my name is Alex Black, but I go by many names. I’m Alex Black. I’m Flash The Stampede. I’m Johnny Louisville. Hence the The Man With Three Faces moniker. When I practice martial arts I’m Three Chāoláng (超狼) LOL. My main creative persona is Alex Black, however. I’m an artist in every sense of the word. A dreamer, hard worker, flamboyant, charismatic, experimental. I’m gorgeous, and one of the most dopest people walking this planet. I’m one of one, I do what I want, when I want & how I want which confuses people.

I’ve said this somewhere else but people see a 6’5 dude from Brooklyn, muscular, with an androgynous pretty boy style, constantly rocking something flamboyant. They’ll see this dude pull up in a streetwear brand from London, or maybe he’s rocking some vintage designer clothes from the 80s and 90s, mixing it with crazy footwear and eyeliner. An eccentric human being, but his talent and charisma is undeniable. That’s who Alex Black is.

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Radical Presence

by Alexander Jones aka THATS NOKAY

Photo Credit: Jake Hanson 


A few years ago I found myself banging away on a $12 Casio from goodwill in a basement in Edmonds making some weird experimental pop songs.  Soon a pandemic was upon us and I decided to buckle down and learn how to make beats and use Logic to record.  Some friends gave some pointers and drum kits to download, and soon I was off and running, making beat tapes and collaborating with vocalists over the instrumentals.

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Music is my poetry

by Mila Cloud

Mila Cloud


Music is something very intimate and personal, so it’s not easy for me to write about it. On the other hand, it is essential to me; it is something I want to share and what I want to talk about.

To describe this experience, the language of poetry would be more appropriate. On the other hand, such a language would be too hermetic and, as a result, incomprehensible. Besides, I can’t write poetry. Music is my poetry.

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Accepting Life Through Music – The Uncanny Valley

by Vincent Cecchini of Tiki Bar

The Uncanny Valley by Tiki Bar


Two years ago, at 17 years old, I would be exposed to crucial elements that would rock my understanding of myself and my place in this world.

I was first introduced to Erik, my best friend and co-founder of Tiki Bar, through mutuals at a house party. At that point, we didn’t have many similarities: He was the embodiment of a modern-day hippie, and, unbeknownst to me, I was still searching for a purpose to assign me individuality.

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A New Normal

by John Zonn

A New Normal by John Zonn


As Ralph Waldo Emerson – the great American Individualist and Transcendentalist – once said: “All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better”. And so, the new Zonn mini-album “Songs Of Truth And Freedom” started off, as many experiments do, with the inventor watching the world around and perceiving that something needed to be done. This approach, coupled with my fondness for re-writing old tunes, led to the interpretation of a 1980s new-socialist stalwart into a novel anthem for the 2020s.

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Soft Harm Patch

by Dislocated Flowers

Soft Harm Patch by Dislocated Flowers

Music is where I go when I wish to step out of current time and space.

There is no Control mechanism in there playing on my conscious or unconscious mind telling me I must, should or am obliged to be doing something or other.

It is my place of Zen or a form of meditation if you prefer.

It’s the only place where everything external stops other than the immediate Now and I feel at peace in my own world.

I like to put sounds together to see what will happen. Often with words, sometimes not. The way they synthesise is an endless source of enjoyment and wonder to me. I never know where it’s going to end up and that is the main joy.

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Creation as Healing

by Mason Andrew Freak

Creation as Healing by Mason Andrew Freak
Being diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when I was around twenty-six (being honest) was a relief. I had always known. The way my brain worked was neither sustainable nor healthy. The professionals who help me think I suffered from childhood-onset schizophrenia and that I could almost function with it for whatever reason.

My stage name is Mason Andrew Freak, but everyone calls me Drew. I have lived in my car, abandoned trailers, and isolation. And all with the dream that it was for a purpose. With hope, God had a plan for me.

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