We recently connected with 3DSPACECADET and have shared our conversation below.
3DSPACECADET, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Are you happier as a creative? Do you sometimes think about what it would be like to just have a regular job? Can you talk to us about how you think through these emotions?
I’ve been struggling with this recently. I long to be financially stable, to feel free, to have my own place instead of living at home. But the truth is I can’t see myself sitting at a 9-5. I can’t see myself doing work at a desk, without the ability to pick up a keyboard, or going to the bathroom to record a voice memo of a song I want to write later (which I have done many times at previous jobs, it’s interesting getting caught). Recently, I had to stop working due to a family emergency. A couple months later, my car got smashed. I used it to travel to gigs all on the east coast, carry a bunch of gear-it was the bandmobile of myself and friends. I couldn’t fix it. It was just not financially feasible. It’s been an incredibly hard year, making me wish I just had some stable job that made me feel some security. There’s a lot of lofty dreams and aspirations I have to let go of as a result of being a creative without a regular job. I find myself comparing my life to people with regular jobs that have PTO, vacation time, etc.
I don’t know if I’m always happy as a creative. There’s ups and downs as with every life path. But I know I need to do it. I have too many ideas in my own brain for them to be a talking point with a coworker at a happy hour. Being a creative is the way I stay in the present. I just want to leave a mark. I want to decorate as much time as I can, for as long as I can.
3DSPACECADET, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I’ve been writing music since I was 15. I’ve been playing piano since I was 3. It’s been the longest love/hate relationship I’ve had going on. I studied classical piano in college. When I realized that performing classical music for live audiences may not have been a possibility for the future (I was graduating in 2020), I wanted to make music that would make it to people regardless if they were in a big hall or in their car.
It took a while for me to prepare music and then go ahead and start playing it for people. I worked on an album for two years and dropped it, then I started going out to open mics and playing shows. It was a little backwards than most people but I loved the process of recording, and out of everything I want from being a creative the biggest thing is to have catalog of all my thoughts and growing experiences in the form of electronic disco bangers. When I started playing live, I impulse bought a keytar whom I’ve named Droste. Droste is my wingman for meeting people. You don’t see a keytar every day, so it’s a great conversation starter. I’ve met my best friends today through shows, and open mics. I just kept meeting up with my friends to jam. Eventually, we played open mics together, then shows, and even got around to releasing music together.
One thing I wish for my music to do is to bring back listening to whole albums. I spent a lot of time driving all across NY and always brought a crate of cds with me. There’s nothing I love more than an album that is just one continuous immersive story. My music is made for long trips, where you could stare at the mountains in the distance while listening to the reverb on the kick drum so you can feel the space from a mile away. Or live the soundtrack to your late night drive.
A part of evolving into this part of the music industry was learning to love and create music outside of learning and memorizing classical piano works, which was all I knew for a while. These days I teach piano and production lessons, focusing on students’ specific attractions to music. My middle school student who loves Minecraft? We’re listening to the background music and figuring out how to play it. Why do Sabrina Carpenter’s synths sound so engulfing? We’re gonna dive into mixing that lesson.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
Everything I write is like a living, evolving form. Songs I’ve written are way to remember what life was like at the time. It keeps the memories alive. When I listen to what I’ve created, it’s like I’m retelling myself the story of that particular moment. Not just through the lyrics, but through the mood, the tempo, the instrumentation- it’s like asking myself, what were you listening to in 2021? And I’ll hear the song and be like, yeah that was definitely a Tyler the Creator heavy month.
Every now and then I’ll come back to this album, Tako Tsubo by L’imperatrice. It’s one of my favorites. I’ve been so inspired by their sound, that I’ll listen to it, and be inspired to write something. Whatever I wrote when I was listening in 2022 is bound to be different from what I write as I’m listening today. It’s a reflection on how my ears have grown, what my mind is attracted to, and what I’m thinking about if there are any lyrics in the track. And to see myself evolve over time, by listening to myself tell a story is one of the coolest human experiences I can think of.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I used to carry a lot of gear when I first started playing. I had a huge 4Runner, so I never thought about being compact. I wanted to bring everything, (including my table!) I wanted to play everything, I didn’t want a minute on stage where looking vulnerable and not actively playing something. After a while of doing this, on top of loading my entire home studio into my car and onto the stage in 15 minutes, I realized how exhausting it was, and how much pressure and overstimulation performances became. I would start to have anxiety over how I could play everything live. I felt so uncomfortable facing the crowd and just enjoying the music I had created.
When I was studying classical piano, the thing about performance is that it is the most rigid, live experience I can think of. The music is to be meticulously memorized- the notes, the movement, the story. The performer is really formal, there’s specific interaction etiquette between the performer and the audience. It’s like, you walk into a silent hall, bow, the audience claps. Then you sit down to perform. The piano is not facing the audience. It’s like they’re watching you, but it’s all supposed to be candid, The only time you acknowledge the audience is when you stand up and leave, 40 minutes later. A lot of times the advice I thought would help me was, “Pretend like no one is there”.
I internalized this whole process. It makes it much harder to enjoy listening to what you’re performing when you’re so focused on playing being a spectacle. This year my friend Vasu got me interested in taking a waacking class. I had no idea what it was, but I figured it could help my stage presence. In the class, my teacher, CocoMotion, made us listen to specific instruments and their melodies or rhythm, and how we could move our bodies to it. Waacking is freestyle, so it really requires being in the moment to react. I’m hoping to incorporate more physical movement, reacting to and getting hyped to my own music rather than focusing on making all the sounds. I still carry a bit of gear around, but once I lay down the tune, it’s time to start getting into it.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://lvlupstudio.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/3dspacecadet
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@3dspacecadet00
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/3dspacecadet
Image Credits
Hari Nandu, Sudi Wang