Review Fix chats with Perhapsy, who discusses his lo-fi, reverb drenched indie tunes that combines the grandiosity of Smashing Pumpkins with the homespun sounds of early Alex G.
Review Fix: How did you get involved in music?
Perhapsy: I first really started playing music when my Ohio friends from middle school and I used to sneak into our church chapel — where all the worship band instruments were held — and play improvised post-rock type jams for hours and hours. It was a nice way to learn how to play music/guitar and felt only mildly sinful. :)
Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?
Perhapsy: It definitely has changed over the years but it usually begins with some kind of melody or chord progression on guitar. I’m a big fan of trying to “sabotage†one’s practicing or writing process — for me, this is usually accomplished by putting my guitar in a random tuning where I don’t know exactly what I’m doing. It tends to feel a lot more exciting and fresh that way. Usually the melodies and lyrics come afterwards in pretty quick, slight-revision processes. Lately, however, I’ve been starting with lyric ideas first and doing a lot of revision. It’s a new experiment, I suppose.
Review Fix: What inspires you?
Perhapsy: I’m inspired by a lot of things — in terms of creative inspiration, I think a lot about the similarity between making songs/albums and the idea of making a painting, writing a short story, making a sketch, a sculpture, choreographing a dance, etc. I really believe all these things come from the same place and are just different outlets for the same thing. When things like that seem connected it makes me excited again to work on music and art stuff.
Review Fix: What does music mean to you?
Perhapsy: I think music, specifically, is such an immediate way to experience creative thoughts, feelings, emotions, etc.
For me, there’s a special kind of immediate pleasure to be found in music — which isn’t to say music needs to make you feel great or something. Obviously, a full range of emotions are possible in music. I do believe that’s true in other art forms, but, for me, music seems to be one of the most immediate of the forms.
Review Fix: How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard you?
Perhapsy: That’s always kinda tough because I’m not entirely sure how I would describe it in a neat or tidy way. I suppose there’s definitely a connection with pop music. However, I’m very much interested in creating music that is immersive in some way and hopefully not “safe†or boring. In that regard, all of my favorite music, art, etc tends to be very immersive or of its own world. I guess the one thing I’d include is that the guitar is an important part of what I do — while I do sing and write lyrics and melodies that might be based on pop forms, my goal would be to keep things a bit more off-kilter.
Review Fix: How are your live shows different from your studio work?
Perhapsy: They’ve always been pretty different. It’s fun to play music live — especially with friends. Although what with COVID, it’s almost hard to remember what that’s like! But with recording songs/albums, I feel like I can create my own little musical world and having control over the sounds is a very exciting and insular experience. Over the years, I’ve learned that live shows are more about broad strokes. I think sometimes my music can translate well in the live setting but it is pretty different. Either way, I definitely miss it.
Review Fix: What inspired your latest single?
Perhapsy: Like most of my songs, it started with a chord progression that felt exciting to me and has some slightly unusual movements. The lyrics, however, are mainly about this odd memory I had of vacationing on Lake Erie in Ohio with my family when I was really young. Somehow, I got left accidentally on the beach with no way of getting back to the cottage where my family always stayed. Apparently, my mom, who wasn’t initially on the beach, had felt some “spiritual” or otherwise presence letting her know I was lost. This was all before anyone knew or told her I’d been missing. Eventually, some nice person helped me get back home. Because I was so young, it’s hard to know how accurate this memory really is, based on the other-worldliness of it. It still feels much more like a dream.
Review Fix: What are your goals for 2021?
Perhapsy: Well, in terms of music, I’ve been working on writing/recording new songs for another album — something I’m pretty much always doing. I’ve also been doing quite a bit of animation work, commissions, etc. I’m also looking forward to doing more music and art collabs.
Review Fix: What’s next?
Perhapsy: I hope to just continue to make as much art and music as I possibly can and try to find more and more ways for the music side of what I do to overlap with the art side of what I do.Â
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