We recently connected with Vater Boris and have shared our conversation below.

Vater, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

It’s hard to pinpoint the exact moment that I knew I wanted to pursue the artistic path. I almost feel like I never had a choice. I still remember being (guesstimate) 4 years old, in a purple wig, screaming into a “microphone”(a magic marker) along to my parents Queen in Concert VHS. Music is everything to my Dad and my Dad has always been my best friend and idol. So, of course music became just as important to me.

With that being said, I would say 7th grade is when I really thought “I’m going to make music for a living” because that is when my Dad bought me a guitar and we started taking lessons together. Before then, I loved music and wanted to draw comics heavily based on music. Now that the guitar was in my hands and I could play 3 power chords, I knew it was time to sell my soul for rock n roll.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Well, after playing guitar for a couple months I began to get frustrated with finding a band. EVERYBODY PLAYED GUITAR. And I did NOT fit in with the guitar world. I was voluntarily a rhythm guitarist in a world of people trying to be the next Van Halen, Steve Vai, or John Petrucci. So I saved up allowance, birthday money, etc. etc. and bought a bass. Once again, the stars aligned, It was a very natural transition.

Since then, I have tried to learn a handful of other instruments. I’m self taught on drums, keys, and ukulele, And I’ve played pretty much every genre of music under the sun. Everything from folk/bluegrass to straight up noise sets and everything in between. I would play with anyone and everyone any time I could. I just wanted the experience. I wanted to try everything. Whenever I’ve been asked advice about bass/music/bands I will ALWAYS tell them to play with anyone and everyone. Get all that experience in. It helps drastically.

In the past I was more of an active gigging musician. At one point I was in 4 or 5 bands at one time. I was constantly practicing, gigging/touring, and in the studio. Nowadays, I’m pretty much a strict home studio musician who releases their own albums just to stay sane. I’m still open to helping friends musically; live or in the studio. But otherwise, I just record/write whatever I want, whenever I want. I did music as a job for awhile. I’m content now with just waking up and deciding I’m making an industrial song today with the possibility that tomorrow I might wake up and want to write a sea shanty. Maybe the day after that I’ll write a punk EP or stay in bed and re-watch Twin Peaks for the 75th time. There’s no pressure from other band members or labels. I set my own goals/release dates and I set them for me. What a weight off my shoulders! What freedom! What a damn fine cup of coffee!

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The most rewarding aspect of creating would be: peace.

Creating music brings me peace. Even if I’m cursing at myself for messing up the 20th take of a guitar part that session, upset about equipment breaking, or actually giving myself a hard time about release dates, at the end of the day, creating music brings me peace. It gives me a place to express my emotions. It is my main outlet of any and all emotions.

With that being said, I’ve been complimented by people who have told me my music brings them peace. Whether it be lyrics of an punk band I used to front, my newest solo experimental track, or another sludgey number from DejaGravy, I have been told many times that my music has helped people during the lowest points of their life. That’s amazing. It feels nice to pay it forward after all these years of other bands keeping me sane. I’m forever in debt to the bands that gave me light during the darkest times. It feels nice to pay it forward and be someone else’s light. I hope one day, maybe they can pay it forward too. We’re all in this together.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

I have a few ideas on how to help musicians. But it involves a lot of destroying and rebuilding so I doubt it’ll happen.

One would be for labels to stop scamming artists. You can have a number 1 hit in the country with a sold out tour and still be making crumbs compared to the record execs. ALWAYS read your contracts. These labels will take all your hard work, claim ownership, milk it dry, and leave you with the leftovers.

Either Spotify starts paying people fairly or we destroy it. How the world let some schmuck who cant even write music make billions off other peoples music while the actual musicians make fractions of pennies is beyond me. But, we need to fix this.

Venues need to stop taking cut of bands merch. Period. There is NO REASON that a venue needs to get a cut of the merch. In some cases where bands don’t make money off of album sales, they will make their living off touring merch sales. Venues are literally stealing the only money bands are making. Either stop taking cuts of the bands merch sales or give the bands a cut of your alcohol sales.

We need to get rid of (unnamed ticket provider). Its all a scam. The surcharges are as much as the tickets half the time and they are totally selling a portion of the tickets directly to scalping websites that are charging 3 times as much and getting a cut of it. Everyone wins except for the bands and their fans.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://vaterboris.bandcamp.com/
• Instagram: @dejaglue
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dejaglue/
• Other: https://dejagravy.bandcamp.com/music
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