Formula Indie Sessions – Interview with David A
What is your earliest memory connected to music?
Getting goosebumps listening to Ferde Grofe’s Grand Canyon Suite. I think I was five.
How did your passion for creating music begin?
It jumped into me and set itself on fire. Songs started dropping into my head when I was 16. That’s still how I create. The songs come flashing in like lightning bolts and demand action from me. It’s an honor, duty and privelege to comply.
What’s the story behind your current music project?
The new album, Bootstraps, scheduled for release in October, is mostly finished, and my excitement about the way it’s turning out is growing daily. The title expresses a self-powered personal resurrection that the songs themselves only loosely convey, but that’s the guiding force that unites the collection.
How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard your music before?
It isn’t easy. I usually start by declaring myself “irresponsibly eclectic,” but I guess the sound is simpler than that. It’s rock, often hard rock, with blues and Americana influences infused with give-and-take elements of raw power and finesse, like what you might hear on a planet that orbits two suns that orbit each other.
What is one thing you’ve learned that completely changed the way you make music?
The fleeting immediacy of creation. If I have to get up at 4:00 in the morning or walk away from a party to capture the essence of a new idea, I do it. I’ve lost too many by thinking I’d remember in the morning or even five minutes later.
What tools, instruments, or software are essential in your creative process?
I usually shape newly arriving ideas with a guitar, sometimes keyboard, and record scratch demos directly into my PC. But even before that, I sing snatches and fragments of a new one into the recorder on my cell phone – anywhere, anytime, day or night.
Which indie artist or song are you loving right now?
Gizmosophy is pretty quirky and off the wall while maintaining musical integrity. The compositions are unabashedly in their own space, to say the least. I admire musicians who cut their own paths instead of sprinting straight for somebody else’s just because it looks like it’s paved with gold.
How have your personal experiences influenced your music and artistic vision?
I’m a very emotional person. The bluesy stuff, especially, bolts straight out of hurt, like all blues that’s written for the right reason. I wrote “Glamour Slain,” for example, during a time of clinging to fading hope that a separation would be rectified, and thus the song’s lament of walking nine miles for a maybe. But really, all the emotions show up in the songs, including a few that aren’t really emotions, per se, but still carry emotions with them, like conflict, perseverance and freedom.
What emotions or messages do you hope listeners take from your work?
Be ready to fight a long, hard battle, even alone. Be original. Shun cliches. Be confident, bold and fearlessly self-empowering, but only if you set your bar high and cut yourself no slack. Every time you reach the bar, raise it again. If you know not to expect an easy pass from yourself, you have to also know not to expect one from anybody else.
What’s the most important lesson music has taught you so far?
Positive visualization, faith and perseverance are strange and beautiful bedfellows. There is no full realization without all three.
What is a dream venue or festival you would love to perform at?
Much as I want to say the Tampa Theatre, it’s gotta be The Whisky. Ha! I cheated there, didn’t I?
If you could collaborate with any artist, past or present, who would it be and why?
Wow, that’s a hard one, just in terms of picking only one from so many, so I’ll limit my response to the living. Josh Homme. In part because of his work with Mark Lanegan, who is easily my biggest influence over the past 15 years, but also because of the sheer enormity of his talent as a guitarist, songwriter, singer. The labyrinthine arrangements, multiple movements through a song, many of them visited only once. Incredible, and the whole QSA band is remarkable.
Where can our listeners follow and support your music?
Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/gh/artist/david-a/1682556776
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RockDavidAlpha
Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/RealDavidAlpha
DavidAlpha.net: https://www.davidalpha.net/home-1
BandCamp: https://davidalpha.bandcamp.com/
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4Vj8SxFYbV4a17qoJsamcy
Looking toward the future, what’s your dream for the next chapter of your musical journey?
Returning to live performances after a long absence from the stage. I’d love to go on tour again. It’s been quite a while.
What do you hope listeners will discover about you along the way?
My personal life might be more eclectic than my music. I’m getting into voice acting. I’ve been a live talk radio host and a magazine editor. I’m a political activist, a former college English and journalism teacher, and an independent journalist who’s done a lot of publishing. I’m working on a couple of motion picture scripts. I guess all that must mean I like hats.
