Escape Everything Podcast: Recent Episodes
James Garside
Escape Everything is a record label, artist collective and discussion forum, exploring the ways we hold ourselves back from living the lives we really want. In these podcasts we talk to musicians, artists and creators about the challenges they face in trying to escape the daily grind and fight off resistance to pursue a life fuelled by their own creative output. Find out more at escape-everything.com
We’re super excited to share that Mark Baines & James Garside’s forthcoming track, “In My Mind” contributed the soundtrack to the latest Christmas ad for alternative lifestyle brand, One Day Otis. Check the epic ad out below, and go buy something amazing for your loved ones from our beautiful friends at onedayotis.co.uk
Following the release of his new single, "Nothing Left", we asked James Garside to put together a mix of tracks that have been inspiring him recently. “My taste is quite broad”, he says. “I’ve always jumped about a bit but I guess there’s a clear lean towards the deep house/tech side of things.. Quite a few old bangers in there, and some awesome brand new stuff coming out right now.”
Listen to the mix below or download from Soundcloud.
Tracklist1. Booka Shade - Easy Drifter 2. Fort Romeau - Just 3. Lowheads & PillowTalk - Black Paradise (Acid Dub) 4. Each of Them Echoes - Don’t You See Me Go (Dharkfunkh Remix) 5. Booka Shade - Love Inc. 6. Massive Attack - Paradise Circus (Gui Boratto remix) 7. Leafar Legov - Cenote 8. Chloe - The Dawn 9. James Garside - Start Again (Fallen Future Club Mix) 10. Betoko - Before I Lose Control 11. Acid Pauli & Nico Stojan - Flying Lizard 12. James Garside - Nothing Left (Alternate Mix) 13. Ross from Friends - Epiphany 14. Maribou State - Vale (HAAi’s Requiem for a Remix)
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Escape Everything returns to the Dalston wilderness for another cabin party on Friday 22nd June! Escape the week and join us for a night of house, disco and techno, all the way through.
Featuring Escape Everything family:
James Garside
Sasha System
Lit Panda
Dan Ginn
Full details on the event page here
We've teamed up with our Soul Glo brothers to bring the fever at our very own cabin party in the Dalston wilderness! Escape the week and join us for a night of house, disco and funk, all the way through.
Full details on the event page here
In this episode, James talks to label partner Jona, AKA To Kiruna as he sets off on his own Escape Everything adventure with his wife and their young daughter.
We discuss their plans to live remotely in Central Italy to enjoy the first few months of their daughter's life in tranquility, plus Jona's creative plans for the trip. We also look into his process in completing his new EP, 'East Exist', which is out on 6th April.
Includes an exclusive first preview of ‘Young Hearts Run’ from the EP.
Show notes and more at escape-everything.com
Sadly DJing has been on the back burner for a long time, while I've been lost in work and all the rest of life. But now I'm finally beginning to build some momentum with writing new music, it seems about time to get back behind the decks and start road-testing my tracks.
So ahead of my first gig in a while I thought I should probably dig out a few records and have a practice. Just a small selection of tracks that have inspired my work on the upcoming EP and a few other random bits that are doing it for me at the moment...
Listen below or download from Soundcloud.
Tracklist1. Be Svendsen - Nabia 2. Frank & Tony - Bring The Sun (feat. Gry) 3. Alexey Union - Amalthea 4. Maya Jane Coles - Something in the Air (Bonobo remix) 5. Bedouin - Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun 6. Kerala Dust - Untitled (Late Sun) (Another Shade of DWIG remix) 7. Kora - Caddo 8. Tim Engelhardt - Maks 9. Kiasmos - Looped 10. Kiasmos - Swept (Tale of Us remix) 11. Stephan Bodzin - Strand
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Christmas is over, 2018 is under way, and we're now facing the stress of all those new year's resolutions. While we want to prove to ourselves that we can keep these promises, at the same time, we're trying to find all the reasons in our arsenal to justify putting them off a while longer. This is normal. If you're looking to find a little more motivation, you might find some of the tips in this blog post helpful. It lays out a valuable lesson I learnt from my mentor last year that helped me to take control of my life, massively increase my creative output, and generally make me a happier person.
Finding happiness in creativityI was having a haircut the other day and got chatting with the hairdresser, his name is Reece, about his creative passion. He explained to me how he spends his spare time creating animations, hand-drawn Anime with characters and storylines. He described the time consuming process, and you could really tell he had a deep interest and passion for it. I fully related to him as I felt that we shared common ground. I realised that what Reece gets out of animation is the same as what I get out of music. It gives him a deeper sense of purpose, an identity, a medium through which to express himself and tell a story, and a long-term project to work towards.
Others might derive a similar sense of meaning and purpose from baking, painting, acting, or writing. Whatever the activity, for anyone striving to make their passion a higher priority in their life, perhaps the greatest challenge we face is simply finding the time to work on it consistently, and make enough progress to take it to the next level.
WHY DO WE STRUGGLE TO FIND THE TIME?There are many reasons for not finding enough time. We might justify our lack of progress by blaming others - our busy social lives, family commitments, or jobs. Others might sub-consciously avoid putting in the effort due to deeper insecurities, or a lack of positive reinforcement from peers. Others might simply be self-destructive or self-sabotaging, and seek out random opportunities to distract themselves from their goals. None of us are immune. We can all fall prey to these psychological traps that cause us to neglect our art. My most recent excuse was to blame my time-consuming office job.
“THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS WORK-LIFE BALANCE. IT’S ALL A MATTER OF CHOICE”It was January 2017 and my work commitments had been piling up steadily over the past few months. I was exhausted, unmotivated, unhappy. I had fallen into victim mode, blaming my unhealthy work-life balance on my company, my boss, my colleagues. I began looking for a way out, applying for other roles, thinking that I would have it better elsewhere.
It was around this time that a couple of mentors stepped into my life, Bobby Bakshi and Kent Frazier. Bobby and Kent were involved in an initiative to develop leadership skills within the company. The program required a commitment to spend time in deep self-reflection and group discussion. It was challenging, but also eye opening. A few weeks into the program, and as my friendships with Bobby and Kent grew, I began to open up about the key issue I was experiencing. It was Bobby that ultimately suggested I undertake what we called ‘The Experiment’.
My discussions with Bobby helped me to realise that I had inadvertently adopted a ‘victim’ role, and had cast my company firmly in the role of the ‘villain’. However, he also helped me to see that it was within my power to take control of the situation, revisit my priorities, and make some practical steps to fix it. “There is no such thing as work-life balance” he said, “it is all a matter of choice". The solution Bobby proposed was so simple, yet the results were powerful and enduring.
THE EXPERIMENTBobby patiently listened to my woes and clearly understood my frustrations. He could see a young man, beaten down, stuck in a rut, in need of making a change. He challenged me to conduct a simple experiment. My task was to take stock of my routine, and see where I can make more time for my passion. For two weeks, I was to make a small change to my schedule to free up enough time for two additional writing sessions in my studio. We agreed that I’d test out the new routine and report back to him at the end of the two weeks.
As a morning person, I thought I might be able to wake up 1.5 hours earlier than usual, and use that time to spend on music before going to work. I decided to begin with 2 days at first, creating 3 extra hours of creative time each week. It worked great. By the third week I had extended it to 3 days a week, and six months later I pretty much have kept to this same routine, without much regression.
That was it. That was all the encouragement that I needed, but the results have been profound. Taking control of my situation made me feel good. I became more confident and positive. I was producing more music AND became a better person to be around. People noticed the shift in my mood. The benefits also extended into my job. I was no longer resentful of my company, my performance improved, and I was having more fun in the process.
While this approach is so simple, I think there are a couple of important underlying principles that help to explain its success:
1. The Power of Empowerment
Forget about passively finding a little time here and there for your craft. The Experiment forces you to think outside the box and pro-actively carve out more time for your passion. You do not have to be a passive victim, you have the power to take control of your situation. Realising this, and living it, offers rewards far beyond your expectations.
2. The Scientific Method
Framing this exercise as an ‘experiment’ causes you to see the situation through the eyes of a scientist, or an inventor, like Edison, Dyson, or Elon Musk. Inventing a new product involves a process of experimentation, testing certain principles or processes, measuring the change, making adjustments, then going through the process again and again, refining it until a satisfactory result is achieved. Similarly, for those who employ The Experiment, if you find that waking up earlier in the morning just isn’t working, then think of what else can you test. Could you replace one gym session a week? Quit watching Game of Thrones and use that time instead? Like a scientist, you can test and retest until you find something that works.
YOUR CHALLENGEIf you’ve managed to read this far into the post, then well done. Treat yourself to a croissant filled with cheese, or a pint of amber ale, while I propose a challenge for you…
Find a moment to reflect and take stock of your situation, and ask yourself ‘Could I be doing more?’ Do you want to spend more time improving your mixing skills? Do you want to spend more time on that sitcom you always dreamed of writing? Could you do more to get your business idea off the ground?
If you know that you want to do more, then try The Experiment. Make a plan to change your routine for two weeks…. monitor the results, adapt, refine, then try again for another two weeks, and continue. Empower yourself. Escape your assumptions. Escape your psychology. Escape your routine.
Let us know how you get on. We would love to hear more about your own stories and struggles.
Jona
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In this episode, James is joined by internationally published street photographer and writer, Dan Ginn.
They discuss a range of topics including the external factors that inhibit our own creativity, music’s unique ability to unite people, becoming disillusioned with our art, dealing with anxiety, searching for simplicity amongst the chaos and how to find your own voice.
Includes an exclusive first preview of ‘Power Flux’ from Binary Coda’s upcoming EP, coming to Escape Everything at the end of January.
Show notes
01.20 - Early musical influences
03.00 - External factors that affect your work
04.00 - Becoming disillusioned
05.40 - Music’s ability to unite people
08.20 - Connected emotional states
09.30 - Soul searching
12.15 - The draw of street photography
14.30 - Using photography to be in the present moment
15.00 - Dealing with anxiety
15.50 - Creative challenges
18.55 - Benefits of writing
21.14 - Finding simplicity amongst the chaos
24.00 - Simplifying your life
25.45 - Finding your creative identity
28.25 - Jumping between artistic styles
29.25 - The power of a creative network
32.30 - Turning up and doing the work
34.00 - Putting our biases aside and holding people accountable
37.30 - Binary Coda - Power Flux
In this episode of the Escape Everything podcast, James and Jona discuss the journey and influences behind their Each of Them Echoes collaboration project. They also get into a discussion about how your emotional state influences your music, and how music can influence your emotional state, as well as the vulnerability that comes from releasing music with lyrics based on real life experiences. Includes an exclusive first play of Tell Me Brother from their upcoming EP.
Show notes
- Background to Each of Them Echoes project
- Polaris EP
- Influences: https://open.spotify.com/user/escapeeverything/playlist/3x2mGNm9YQJmKyLfyEdiqq
- The need for a creative output
- Challenges of work/life balance
- Influence of your emotional state of mind when creating
- Genesis of lyrics from Polaris EP
- Art as expression/a way to clarify thoughts
- "We are grateful to the artist, especially the musician, for 'saying clearly what we have always felt, but never been able to express'" - Aldous Huxley
- Music says what words can't
- New Hammock album - Mysterium
- Backstory to 'Tell Me Brother'
- The vulnerability in openness
- Exclusive first play of Tell Me Brother
In this episode of the Escape Everything podcast, James and Jona discuss their reasons for launching the record label, their musical backstories and the creative challenges they've faced along the way. Includes an exclusive first play of Polaris from the upcoming EP by Each of Them Echoes.
Show notes
- Why we started the label
- Benefits of self-publishing
- Struggles with keeping momentum
- Rebranding
- Creative resistance
- Our musical backstories/influences
- Defining musical moments
- New project - Each of Them Echoes
- Contrasting creative approaches
- Ongoing projects
- Exclusive first play of Polaris
My favourite artists tend to be those that totally break the mould. They sound like no-one else, they think differently to their peers, they challenge existing genre labels, and often inadvertently invent entirely new genres in the process. To select just a few, I’m talking about people like Brian Eno, Scott Walker, Tool, Autechre, Einstürzende Neubauten, Boards of Canada, James Blake, and Kyuss - more on them later. People often claim that there’s nothing original left in music anymore, everything is just recycled. But I believe that all the above have managed to truly achieve something original.
During the early stages of an artist’s career, while we are learning and developing our abilities, one of the key challenges is creating a unique voice - becoming a recognisable and original entity. This is something that many of us struggle with. During these early stages, finding inspiration in other artists is absolutely essential, and, indeed, this is likely the key reason why we decided to learn the craft. We fell in love with something, a painting, a style of music, a movie, and decided ‘that’s what I want to do!' However, while trying to emulate our heroes is an excellent place to start, there is a danger of slipping into ‘copycat' territory.
I cannot claim to be an expert on the subject, nor can I claim to be completely unique and original, though I am striving. We are all standing on the shoulders of giants, and many of the world’s greatest artists started with humble beginnings, simply trying to mimic their heroes. However, not all of them followed this approach.
‘If you’re trying to do something different, you can’t ask someone for help, because they will make it not different.’ - Josh Homme
One example is Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age, one of my favourite bands. Take a listen to Josh being interviewed, he is a very witty and charismatic speaker. He sometimes relays a compelling story of his formative years… It was the late 80s, the time of Reagan, the Cold War. Fashions were weird. Pop music was becoming heavily synthesised and commercial sounding. Whitney Houston and Milli Vanilli reigned supreme. Meanwhile, out in the Californian desert, near Joshua Tree National Park, a creative community was emerging.
One of the cornerstones of the desert rock scene that sprung from these dry sands was the conviction that you had to be authentic and original. Anyone that sounded like a clone was shunned, or ridiculed. This drive to originality ultimately influenced the birth of Kyuss (Josh’s band before Queens of the Stone Age). While an early incarnation of the band drew inspiration from a variety of rock and punk genres, one of their defining influences was their surroundings, the desert.
When their gigs started moving from inside local garages and living rooms, and out into the generator parties amid the vastness of the Joshua Tree desert, they found that they had to adapt their sound. The faster, more aggressive styles they were playing at the time didn’t quite seem to gel with the majestic horizon. They started playing differently, in a way that was more resonant with the scenery. They slowed down, they played longer, more hypnotic riffs, they detuned their strings way down low... and the defining sound of Kyuss was born.
Within this tale is an important lesson. Kyuss found inspiration in something outside of themselves, something outside of their limited universe of musical references. They didn’t simply mix and match musical styles, they crossed a boundary. They used a completely different frame of reference to inform their development, which ultimately helped them to discover a unique sound.
Adopt a New Frame of ReferenceThe concept of borrowing notions, influences, or ideas from outside your usual frame of reference seems to me to be a pretty solid way to generate an original approach or creative aesthetic. This approach can be applied no matter what type of music you create, be it minimal techno or Latin jazz. It can also be applied to every other creative discipline, including glass blowing, script writing, or ballet.
Think about this for a moment in relation to your own creative endeavours. Do you find yourself striving to develop an original approach? Are you struggling to find a unique voice, or aesthetic? Is there anything in your external environment that you can derive inspiration from? Dwell on this for sometime, and think about other frames of reference you can draw from. What about your upbringing, or cultural beliefs? Is there something else that you are knowledgeable about, that resonates with you, that you could use as a source of inspiration? Could you use woodwork skills to invent a new instrument? Or have ancient religious teachings inform your approach to composition? Could you create a new piece of software that specialises in generative art? What about employing the latest scientific technologies to invent a totally new art form? When you look outside of your usual frame of reference, the possibilities are pretty expansive.
There’s so many more examples we could add to this list, but what about you? Are you struggling with the issue of originality? Have you used any interesting sources for creative influence, or heard about someone who has? We’d love to hear from you.
In the meantime, keep at it.
Jona
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Defining success on our own terms
“To be an artist - actually, to be a human being in these times - it’s all difficult… What matters is to know what you want and pursue it” - Patti Smith
A few weeks back, I spoke about how society has us preconditioned to chase certain goals that we think we’re supposed to want. The universal symbols of success. I wonder if I sound a bit like a conspiracy theorist when I say things like that - as if it’s some plot by the government to consciously manipulate us to behave in a certain manner and stay in line. I don’t think that.
Instead, I think that we humans keep ourselves in check through our evolutionally-derived desire to fit in. It takes a certain sort of person, an outlier, to start questioning the actions of the rest of the tribe and explore new directions. I’m sure this is an evolutionary trait too - a sort of mutation - having a handful of individuals who thought differently from everyone else would have helped our ancestors to find new, better ways of doing things. But for the rest of us, it’s only natural that we start off down the path that we see people around us most commonly taking. And right now that usually means following these recent, and very much western, societal benchmarks without really thinking about if/when/why we really want them.
A few years ago, I noticed an uncanny domino of marriage proposals that cascaded through my friendship circles as soon as one couple in the group got engaged. I think we’ve all experienced that year when everyone we know got married? I’m not for one moment suggesting that the couples who followed didn’t love each other dearly, but the pattern of break-ups that occurred soon after did make me wonder if perhaps some were at least influenced and rushed into their decisions by the number of marriages going on around them.
In the same vein, I recently had a conversation with some friends who were telling me about their property investment success and found myself thinking about how I would go about starting a portfolio of my own. Not really in line with my focus on simplifying, minimising my outgoings and trying to live a freer and more flexible lifestyle! It’s funny how one conversation with a convincing speaker or validation from someone we respect can influence our thoughts and derail our ability to focus on our own priorities. When we see the achievements and life events of those around us, this fresh awareness in our minds can so often make us covet the same so we don’t feel left out.
When people tell us about their major life events and achievements we’re obviously going to become more aware of the state of our own lives. But, in reality, comparing yourself to others in any way is actually just comparing to your own perception. The moment/situation/item in question, the part you are aware of, is not the important bit. You never have the full story - you don’t know what’s happened behind the scenes, how much time and effort went into that project, the full details of that huge deal - what foundations this apparent success is really built on. People brag, exaggerate and edit their stories. I don’t blame them for that. Our memories are bad. Sooner or later, we’re only remembering the anecdote of the event, and it’s human nature to keep refining our truths, wanting to paint ourselves in a good light. Our entire knowledge of human history is grossly skewed for this very reason. Anyway, I digress... My point is, it’s easy to be influenced by the apparent achievements of others, but this is so often based on incredibly limited information.
“Our lives are frittered away by detail … simplify, simplify” – Henry David Thoreau
In that earlier post, I also touched on the fact that it’s so hard to know what we really want because of the unlimited possibilities we ‘enjoy’ today. If we don’t know what we want, it’s easier to follow the crowd and trust that, collectively, we have the right idea. But I’m not convinced we do. And the torrent of books, articles and podcasts I come across discussing why we’re all unhappier than ever would seem to suggest I'm not the only one to think that. If we’re relying on the same benchmarks of a successful life as everyone else, we’ll always be in competition - coveting whatever achievements and milestones draw our intrigue at that moment. In this system, we can never be satisfied. There will always be something that we haven’t seen/done/owned. The only antidote is to do the incredibly hard work of identifying what we, individually, really want and what is truly important to us. The clearer we can be with that knowledge, the easier it becomes to focus our time and energy on the things that matter and realise that everything else is a distraction that’s stopping us from achieving the life we want.
“If you want a golden rule that will fit everybody, this is it: Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.” - William Morris
I’m aware that I’m becoming a major proponent of minimalism as the path to freedom. Minimalism to excess, sometimes... I can be obsessively utilitarian, but can equally contradict myself in the click of an Amazon ‘Buy it now’ button. Thankfully, minimalism doesn’t necessarily mean ‘empty’. We live in a world of material things - there’s not much we can do about that unless we go wandering off into the wilderness and abandon everything, and consequently everyone, we know. It’s crossed my mind a few times but I’ve not quite reached that tipping point yet... It’s about finding a balance between the enjoyment we get from things and the pleasure we get from the freedom from things. It’s about identifying the priorities in all parts of our lives and not allowing ourselves to be distracted by all of the other exciting/endless possibilities that we are bombarded with every day.
In its simplest form, that means identifying:
- What are the most important things in my life? What do I love to do?
- What else is going on in my life? What other non-essential commitments do I have that are taking up my time?
- What possessions do I have that are not useful or don’t in some way enrich my life?
“What you decide not to do is probably more important that what you decide to do.” - Tom Peters
Billionaire investor, Warren Buffett, talks about a 5/25 rule to clarify your priorities. The idea is to write a list of the 25 things you want to accomplish. From that full shortlist, you then take your time to identify and highlight the 5 things that are the most important. Clearly this can be a challenge in its own right, but it’s worth spending the time to think about exactly why certain things are important to us. Once you’ve identified your top 5, Warren suggests making the remaining 20 items your ‘avoid at all costs’ list - at least until you’ve been successful with those you’ve identified as your priorities. Every behaviour has a cost. The time we spend experimenting with lower priorities is simply a distraction and the reason we have 25 unfinished projects rather than 5 complete ones.
To give you an example, below is a list of 25 activities that I’ve been working on, experimenting with or at least researching recently. They are all time-consuming activities and any of them will need sustained, focused and committed practice to achieve any level of proficiency. I’ve highlighted what I think my top 5 would be, but I’m still a long way from having enough willpower to focus my energy.
Compose music every day
Film and edit music videos
Record a podcast series
Grow record label
Speech coaching
Singing lessons
Read books every day
Music mixing course
Jiu jitsu 3 times a week
Yoga every morning
Run every day
Learn to program synth patches
Learn to play the piano
Learn to play the guitar
Sell photos online
Launch photography meetup group
Write every day
Social media marketing course
Develop live music show
Go climbing regularly
Volunteer regularly
Improve my swimming
Learn to ski
Work exchange at wilderness retreat in Canada
Backpack around South America
You might have noticed that I’ve experimented with quite a few different techniques to try and figure out what the hell I really want to do with my life. Another technique that worked well for me a couple of years ago - which coincided with the start of my pre-turning-thirty panic - is to write out what my perfect day would look like, in as much detail as possible.
This wasn’t something I’d ever really thought about before. I was intrigued though, so I combined it with another technique I use when journalling, which is to write as fast as possible without thinking or editing and just let my stream of consciousness hit the paper. So often, this technique has led me to discover my opinion of a situation when I hadn’t previously been consciously aware of it. As I read it back, I couldn’t deny it sounded spot on. Here’s my perfect day - dated 13th January 2015:
I wake up around 8am, in my coastal cabin in northern California. It’s a single storey wooden structure on a hill overlooking the coast, with a veranda that runs right around the outside. My wife is a stunning, tall and slim brunette. She wakes me as she leaves for work. She’s an artist, but she also teaches at a nearby school.
I listen to the waves for a while as they crash along the rugged coastline, before walking out onto the balcony with my pet beagle. The sun’s out but it’s not too hot yet so, after a quick cup of coffee, we head down for a 20-minute jog along the beach. Sometimes, if the sea is calm, I might swim instead. Either way I use this time to recap on the previous day and make plans for today.
I return to the house for breakfast, usually eggs or maybe a smoothie, which I consume back out on the balcony. I also listen to music now, something new that I’m getting into and pretty chilled. I’ll also check my emails and reply to any other messages at this time.
Once that’s done, I’ll head into the studio to practice for an hour before lunch. After running through a few scales and rhythm combinations, I usually try to play a few of the melodies I’ve just heard from memory, either on the guitar or piano. Then, if I’m in the mood, I’ll bust out a few old classics for fun.
By that time I’m ready for lunch, which is usually just a mixture of vegetables, olives and bread. A couple of times a week I’ll walk down the road to a little restaurant in the bay. I’ll sit outside with my dog and chat to the owner, perhaps meeting up with a friend for a bit too. We’ll eat fresh fish and drink good wine, and chat about the projects we’re currently working on. There’s a strong creative community in the area, my friends are a mixture of artists, photographers, film directors and craftspeople, and we often get involved to help each other out.
After lunch I’ll head back up to the studio to compose for a while. I record a lot of my own samples in the area around my house, and often use these as a starting point for my productions. I spend a lot of time thinking about the emotion in different sounds and like to complement or contrast these with a combination of analogue and electronic instruments.
I’ve produced a number of commercially released albums, but my music is also often used in film or TV because of its emotive nature.
In the evening, when my wife gets home, we’ll take a walk through the woods or along the beach before dinner while we chat about the day.
Dinner is simple; mainly vegetables and perhaps fish, and we eat on the veranda. Often we’ll have friends over to join us, and we’ll sit out around our fire pit for hours talking and playing music.
Photo by Sonja Guina
It’s funny looking back at the overly specific, granular details in there, which I was obviously experimenting with at the time of writing. My interests have moved on a little now. I don't think I'd want to spend all my time in the woods and there are a few other minor things I might change. That’s fine though. Everything’s a prototype - we’re all evolving all the time so our dreams are going to shift a little. The trick is to just set our course in the general direction, start building momentum and adjust our sails as we go.
“To know what you’re going to draw, you have to begin drawing.” Picasso
We'd love to hear about your own experiences and challenges with your creative work. If you have anything to share or questions you'd like us to explore, please comment below or get in touch through the contact page.
- James Garside
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The long road to escape everything
“Someone has a great fire in his soul and nobody ever comes to warm themselves at it, and passers-by see nothing but a little smoke at the top of the chimney,” - Vincent van Gogh
We set up our record label on a bit of a whim back in 2015, in anticipation of my 30th birthday. I’ve never been phased by getting older before, but this particular culturally-invented, arbitrary numerical signifier had me taking a cold, hard look at the achievements of my life to date. In that moment of panic, I felt like I should have achieved more by now. Not that I had any reason to be ashamed or anything. But regularly releasing my own music has long been an ambition of mine and, with long working hours and other commitments, I just hadn’t got around to making it the priority I wanted it to be. So that felt like an appropriate goal to help me chase this poorly defined, irrational idea of success.
The label launched on my birthday weekend, with three original albums and an awesome launch party. But once the initial excitement died down we soon realised we didn’t really know what to do with this new entity we’d created. Soon after, we were sucked back into big projects and long hours at work, and our bold ambitions rapidly dissipated.
Performing at Escapism launch party, July 2015
Fast forward more than two years and we're finally revisiting the label with renewed focus and direction. But my experiences in the intervening years have taught me some important lessons:
1. You’ll do it when you’re ready
- Crossing the tipping point into action usually happens when you’re in a sufficient amount of pain or discomfort, or when you reach a powerful moment of realisation and are inspired into action. The initial motivation to launch the label came from a belief that I hadn’t achieved what I wanted in my life. That thought, combined with the approaching deadline of my birthday caused enough discomfort to get me started. But, once the label was finally live, I’d surpassed my ambiguous metrics for success and quickly ran out of steam.
- In the time since, I’ve thought a lot about our initial intention for the label and what it should stand for. I’ve noticed just how many people are going through similar experiences trying to reconcile following the life path that’s expected of them with pursuing their own creative dreams. So, this time around, my renewed motivation comes from the realisation that our quest for escapism through our art is such a universal experience and our label could grow to be an opportunity to explore and discuss this theme with all creatives. Which brings me on to point 2:
2. Define a goal
You need something to give you a direction to focus your energy towards. It’s inevitable that your goal will continue to move and evolve, but it’s easier to adjust your course when you already have momentum. We now have a framework for Escape Everything based around forging your own path and doing what you really want with your life. That’s a useful lens that we can hold up against all aspects of our output. It now drives my musical ideas, but equally influences these blog posts, and our new podcasts - where we'll be talking to creators from any and all disciplines about how they use their own creative output to build the lives they want. Music is such a powerful motivator, source of inspiration or escapism for so many people, it seems the perfect starting point from which to begin these discussions.
Passion vs purposeThis is a concept I learned from Ryan Holiday. In short, it’s about finding a deeper reason for doing something rather than relying purely on motivation for your own interest. It’s about building laser-sharp focus by seeing how you’re contributing to something greater - externalising the factors that drive your output. As much as what we as artists create should be honest and completely authentic self-expression, watching how things live, evolve and inspire when released into the world is, in my opinion, where the value really is.
"Passion is about. (I am so passionate about ______.) Purpose is to and for. (I must do ______. I was put here to accomplish ______. I am willing to endure ______ for the sake of this.) Actually, purpose deemphasizes the I. Purpose is about pursuing something outside yourself as opposed to pleasuring yourself.” - Ryan Holiday
Having a theme that’s of interest to me - a motivation to build my own self-sufficient, independent life that runs right to my core - that I can continue to explore and discuss with people through my work is a powerful motivator. I have no idea what Escape Everything will become - it will continue to evolve as we continue to experiment. But I'm hopeful that the ongoing conversations and opportunity to research and analyse our processes will inspire others as much as it inspires me.
We'd love to hear about your own experiences and challenges with your creative work. If you have anything to share or questions you'd like us to explore, please comment below or get in touch through the contact page.
- James Garside
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How we can’t help but get in our own way
"One should want only one thing and want it constantly. Then one is sure of getting it. But I desire everything and consequently get nothing. Each time I discover, and too late, that one thing had come to me while I was running after another…” - André Gide
Unlimited possibility. Simultaneously the golden opportunity and greatest peril of modern society. If you can have/do/be anything at all, how do you possibly make a choice? And even if you do make a decision, how can you avoid major FOMO and know for sure that this one thing is what you really wanted after all?
It’s long been a major goal of mine to focus on and consistently release my own music. So much so that I’ve quit my job - three times - to make it my priority. But, in the two years since we launched our label and I released my first album, I’ve not publicised even a single further piece of music.
Judging your life by the standards of others The truth is, repeatedly, job opportunities came along that I knew people would tell me I’d be foolish to pass up. On paper they ticked all the boxes of a perfect career progression. Interesting clients, more money and extra responsibility… textbook stuff. Deep down, though, I probably knew it wasn’t for me. But I went along with it anyway because I assumed that everyone would tell me it was the right thing to do.
We are social creatures and have evolved to try and fit in. And evolution is a tough opponent to fight against. When everyone we talk to speaks of their unfulfilled dreams, we feel guilty striving to realise ours. Why should we be so lucky? We’re built to crave acceptance, and often that means we’re willing to hold ourselves back to ‘be’ with others. That job we took isn’t really that bad - our colleagues are still persevering. It might even be pretty fun on occasion. Good perks, easy, comfortable. And so many of us are snared by increased responsibilities in our lives or the ‘Golden Handcuffs’.
I count myself lucky that I endured a rocky year of insane hours, strained work relationships and threats of lawsuits because it pushed me to a tipping point of wanting to make a change. I’m nowhere near out of the woods but it made me think hard about what my priorities are and start looking for ways to build my life around those.
“Often people attempt to live their lives backwards, they try to have more things or more money in order to do more of what they want so that they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are then do what you need to do in order to have what you want. ” - Margaret Young
The Four ObstaclesSociety has us preconditioned to follow certain paths because it’s in the interest of the greater good, or it limits the unpredictability of people working to separate agendas. In 'The Alchemist', Paulo Coelho talks about the four obstacles we face in life that stop us from following our dreams:
“There are four obstacles.
First: we are told from childhood onward that everything we want to do is impossible.
The second obstacle: love. We know what we want to do, but are afraid of hurting those around us by abandoning everything in order to pursue our dream.
The third obstacle: fear of the defeats we will meet on the path.
The fourth obstacle: the fear of realising the dream for which we fought all our lives.”
These are broader obstacles which will take a fair amount of bravery and grit to overcome. You can’t please everyone, things won’t always go to plan, and you just have to decide to stick with it no matter what. But even if we get down to the point of actually doing the work, there are other examples of how we can get in our own way.
The Importance TrapOften we imagine our procrastination stems from things like fear of failure or concerns about the opinions of others. But it can just as easily be the result of biases we build up in our own minds. The more status and importance we bestow on a particular activity, the more we start believing that we need perfect conditions in which to do it. This is something I’ve been battling with consistently this past year - going so far as to repeatedly book secluded cabins, hotel rooms and camper vans across the globe to provide the focused, uninterrupted and distraction-free periods of time I thought I needed in order to create. When it came down to it, though, the novelty of a new location was often just as much distraction as the things that hold me up at home. Really, all we need to do is make it easy to get started as the process feeds on momentum. For me, that currently involves using a Self-Control app to block access to distracting websites irreversibly for a specific length of time. Knowing I can't just have a quick check on social media during the next 3 hours is an invaluable help to keeping me focused.
My 'mobile studio' in New Zealand, May 2017
I have no doubt that there are people out there who work far harder than I and still have time to create their art in their spare time. I know it’s completely irrational to give so much weight to an activity, and a side-effect of that is that it takes so much of the fun out of it. Art of any form should be enjoyable for the artist - an opportunity for unbridled self-expression, experimentation and introspection. Years ago, when I was at my most prolific, I set myself a daily creativity challenge to write entire pieces of music in under half an hour. I kept that system up for a couple of months and, listening back, some of the musical ideas that came out of that process were as good as anything I’ve ever written. The reality is you only get better by sustained practice and, if you can stay consistent with even the smallest window of time every day, your learning and development will snowball. We think that if only we had the perfect conditions we’d be able to create our masterpiece, but really it’s by sitting down every day and making a start that we develop the motivation, energy and concentration we need.
I’m not suggesting I’m anywhere near being able to maintain that sort of habit just yet, but by getting clarity on my priorities, defining my own terms for success and identifying my purpose, I’ve been able to greatly increase my motivation to keep making progress. I’ll expand on those processes in later posts.
Whatever your discipline, we'd love to hear about your own experiences and the challenges you face in your creative process. If you have anything to share, or to suggest questions you'd like us to explore, please comment below or get in touch through the contact page.
- James Garside
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You know how it goes. Life is busy. You're working at the office for most of your waking hours, you commute each way for up to an hour, you put time into keeping fit and eating well, you try to stay up to date with current events, you make plans to go out and see friends and family, all the while maintaining a steady relationship. Finally, with your paltry amount of spare time, you try to practice your craft and nurse your dreams.
Before you know it, 2 years have passed by, and you have that moment where it hits you… “Wow. How did that happen? Why have I made so little progress?”
I had one of these moments when I was asked to write a blog update for the 2-year anniversary of the record label.
It is frustrating, but we should not be so hard on ourselves. Making time for creative pursuits is a challenge, and we should try to acknowledge any progress and realise that even small steps are at least moving us in the right direction.
So, what exactly have I been working on?Well, quite a bit actually. Apart from writing and recording more music for To Kiruna, 2017 so far has been a great year for collaborations. I continue to learn much from my creative partnership with James (Fallen Future) Garside, and we're excited to be finishing up some material imminently. Keep a look out for that.
We’re starting to work with a talented female vocalist on a couple of 80s influenced electronic tracks, and I’m also beginning to collaborate on a longer-term experimental project with a friend in L.A. It’s a little too early to say exactly how that project might evolve, but it could be very interesting.
Additionally, I've started working independently on another side project that combines my love of ambient electronica with more guitar and vocal-driven alternative genres. That project will be a bit more of a slow-burner, but definitely excited to see where it might take me.
Finally, I'm looking forward to sharing a new To Kiruna EP with you in the near future. The EP will consist of a small collection of tracks that I'm currently working on. It remains firmly in ambient territory similar to my first album, Embers, but I'm mixing it for finer detail to create a more immersive impact. More news will follow soon!
We'd love to hear about your own experiences and challenges with your creative work. If you have anything to share or questions you'd like us to explore, please comment below or get in touch through the contact page.
- Jona Rousseau
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It was early evening, the sun was shining, we were taking turns to look through a telescope with numerous filters that enabled you to look directly at the Sun. The clarity of the sun spots were amazing, and we actually saw solar flares (which the scientists called 'prominences') shooting out of the top right-hand corner of our humble star. We carried on standing all around the telescope, beers in hand, while the scientist told us more about the research program at Jodrel bank observatory. Though we were excited by this awesome experience, it was time to run. Shoebaleader One, purveyers of pounding alien jazz-funk from the future, were about to unleash thunder on the Orbit stage. We caught them just in time, and what an amazing set it was...
This is just a small taster of what's on offer at the incredible Bluedot festival. Having had a couple of weeks to reflect on it, I decided I should write something about it as I just can't recommend it enough.
This little festival has everything: Top musical acts. Highlights included Orbital, Pixies, Shoebaleader One, DJ Yoda, Mr. Scruff and Soulwax, who played one of the most mind-blowing sets I've ever seen in my life! * An awe-inspiring setting. You are greeted at every turn by the mega-structure of the Lovell telescope, home of the UK SETI project (search for extraterrestrial intelligence). The grounds also have landscaped gardens and firepits, which host late night gatherings. * Science!!!* Forget the mid-morning malaise of some other festivals, when you're feeling ropey, not quite up for pounding beats at midday. Instead of having a lie-in at the campsite, nursing your hangover until the early evening, here you can relax in a cool tent, listening to fascinating panels of speakers. University professors, researchers, and activists speaking about all sorts of interesting and topical subjects, such as artificial intelligence, data protection in the digital age, climate change and trans-humanism. There was actually a Q&A session discussing the ethical dilemmas involved in trans-human (cyborg) immortality. How cool is that?
I will certainly be looking out for this one next year - fingers crossed the line-up is as awesome as 2017 was.
Well done Bluedot, I salute you.
We'd love to hear about your own experiences and challenges with your creative work. If you have anything to share or questions you'd like us to explore, please comment below or get in touch through the contact page.
- Jona Rousseau
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