We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Cal Blac a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Cal, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

In all honesty, although I have worked really hard at it for a long time, I fumbled my way into learning how to perform and produce music. When I was really young, I remember watching videos of Jimi Hendrix playing incendiary guitar solos and doing somersaults on stage. That must have left an impression on me because even in my late twenties, underneath all the accumulated cynicism of having rammed my head against the wall trying to “make it” as a musician for a decade or so now, there’s still a naive kid in me who wants to be like Jimi. My mom is a singer and my step-dad is a country and rock musician, so I grew up around drums, guitars and microphones. I started learning drums at 8, which set a good rhythmic foundation for me to start learning guitar a couple years later.

My step dad showed me how to read guitar tabs and I taught myself a handful classic rock songs on ultimate-guitar.com. I started writing and experimenting before I really knew how to play anything. Before long, guitar became the way I could best express myself, and I formed an identity around being the kid who could play. I continued learning primarily through experimentation for nearly 15 years, writing and recording as much as I could. It wasn’t until age 24 that I started taking a more focused and intentional approach to learning.

The most transformative two-year period of learning took place when I decided I was going to take a real crack at learning piano. I had tried a few times and given up on it, but this time I committed to practicing for one hour every morning before doing else in the day. I delivered for Amazon at the time, so I’d always make sure to get those hours in before going to work. I think learning new skills is easiest when you do it first thing in the morning before taking in other information throughout the day. I surprised myself at how quickly I was able to pickup complex musical ideas in a short amount of time. I’m not special; I think that’s just what happens when you focus your mind consistently without distractions.

Most of what I learned was from searching YouTube for how to play piano. In my case I was most interested in jazz and gospel piano, so that’s what I was seeking out. I think I learned fast because I wasn’t afraid to try the stuff you aren’t “supposed” to learn as a beginner. My philosophy is to learn what makes you excited… excitement is the motivation you need to learn. It drives you through the hours of focus you need to learn. Those hours don’t feel like work when you’re excited by the learning process, so I think that’s the key to learning quickly… to not be afraid to dive into whatever you’re excited by. You’ll surprise yourself with what you can learn if you’re willing to really go for the stuff you want to be able to do. Especially the stuff you think is out of reach. It’s not.

Cal, 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?

My name is Jackson Cal Smith. I perform and release music under the alias ‘Cal Blac’. Although it’s considered electronic music, my stuff is largely performance driven and it centers around what I do onstage. Right now my setup includes electric guitar, a couple of analog synthesizers, one vocal mic, and a controller for sequencing beats, electronic accompaniment, as well as other sounds and effects. I play with a drummer, but that’s likely to expand into a band with more live instrumentation soon.

I think my background as a musician in the more traditional sense makes me more interesting as an electronic act. I was a guitarist for many years before learning keys, obsessed with musicians like Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain because of the intensity and untamed nature of their stage presence. Later I discovered that electronic music isn’t limited to what you can do with a set of turntables; in fact the use and manipulation of pre recorded sound on stage can be leveraged as a powerful live performance tool. Artists like FKJ, Pretty Lights, and Exmag served as important examples that I learned from in developing the ‘Cal Blac’ project.

Genre-wise I find it difficult to classify my music, but I describe it as progressive electronic-rock with jazz undertones. My lyrics tend to gravitate towards psychological and introspective themes. Bored and sick of writing optimistically, lately I’ve found darker subject matter to be a source of inspiration. Ultimately I hope to create a focused body of work with a clear artistic identity. I often don’t follow traditional song structure, instead opting to let creative instinct dictate the structure of my songs. This creates a sense of travel, and I think my compositions tend to feel like a journey starting in one place and ending in another, leaving the listener with the sense that some new ground has been covered.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

This could probably be viewed as foolishness as much as resilience, but I’ve continued for 10+ years of my adult life to pursue the specific goal of becoming a professional touring musician and recording artist – almost entirely unsuccessfully. Starting with the decision to leave college after one year to pursue that goal, I reluctantly moved back home with my mom for a period of time. That year I released as much music as I possibly could. I recorded 50+ songs, sharing them every way I knew how at the time, which really was just uploading to Soundcloud and Youtube and posting on Facebook about it. I had no idea what I was doing. Every song took dozens of hours to write, record and mix, and I put my heart into all of them. Naturally I was heartbroken every time I’d attempt to share them with the world only to find out that nobody cared. I released more music in that first year than any other year afterwards, but I’ve continued to consistently focus the majority of my energy towards making music for over a decade now.

Pursuing music and has lead me to move across the United States three separate times, living originally in Olympia, Washington, with various opportunities leading me to living in Miami, Southeastern Alaska, and now Philadelphia. I’ve worked more than ten jobs in that time, almost all of which I hated, in order to support what started to feel like a bad habit of making music.

Fortunately, my luck started to turn a couple years ago in Philly. My hard work wasn’t all lost on the crickets; I managed to get hired as an audio engineer at a recording studio called Spit Philly, and after being laid off of my job driving for Amazon, it feels like a miracle that I haven’t had to work a “regular” job for two years now. All the work I do now is related to music, and that work is how I pay all my living expenses.

While I still haven’t accomplished my ultimate goal, I have positioned myself better than I’ve ever been to achieving it, with full access to a professional recording studio, a growing network of likeminded creatives, and nothing left to do but keep putting in the work. In the future I hope I can look back on where I’m at now, and see that it was a pivotal time in positioning myself towards accomplishing the ultimate goal.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

To create truly captivating music which reaches the audience it’s meant for.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @cal.blac
• Twitter: @calblac_
• Youtube: Cal Blac
• Other: Spotify / Apple Music: Cal Blac