by Alexander Jones aka THATS NOKAY
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.
When I stepped out of LAX and into the warm evening air I suppose I fell in love.
Kansas City, as much as I adore it and feel proud to represent, will never be as warm as Los Angeles was that night in mid-December, nor will it evoke the feelings of excitement and hope that still exist within. So when you grow up in a rural place it’s not uncommon to dream of bigger things – in the back of my mind LA was always the destination.
For me making music has always been about finding hidden lumps of pain, lighting fire to them and watching them disperse into the ether…
WEIGHTLESS/SINKING is the sonic representation of one of the most confusing periods of my life: I was simultaneously getting to grips with how much I had suffered from / attempted to forget the fact that one of my parents is a double cancer survivor, helping my family move out of my childhood home and trying to find my place in the mind-boggling metropolis that is London. I thought that the paradox of feeling like I was weightless yet at the same time sinking perfectly described the emotional soup I was in.
(I’m) a sparrow’s feather
on a lake: weightless/sinking
by Weston Smith
Weston Smith, which is my actual name, is a Solo Synth Pop project I started in early 2016 as a way for me to cope through my mental illnesses. For years I had been battling with enormous waves of anxiety and depression, I had gone through multiple treatments to balance my life with various medications, but there wasn’t really any success with said attempts.
by A Naked Kiss
When recording music, the spirit of the moment is much more important to me than any kind of perfection. Much more, imperfection can be fun in itself. I tend to let it flow, and often I am surprised by the result myself.
by L. Valerie
Music is a strange medium of expression. I feel a need to articulate something, but often am not sure what it is I’m trying to say, even after I’ve completed a project.
by A Naked Kiss
As a home recording artist, my budget for making music is rather low. Much more, I can’t afford to spend money on a music video. Therefore, I decided to mix several royalty free videos for A Naked Kiss’ first single Water Goes, Where Water Flows. I like the result very much, and believe it matches very well the spirit of the song.