We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Dvan Lucaylucay. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Dvan below.

Dvan, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

I truly believe taking risks are an essential part of being a creative/artist. The reason we have a lot of the artists we have today that we look up to is mainly because they dove into the deep end before they dipped their toes in. For me personally, the risk I took for myself is is just setting myself apart from the world/people I was around. A lot of my following consists of dancers from having a prior life in the dance industry. Moving onto the things I am currently doing as a guitarist don’t typically line up with their interests which is completely understandable. There’s no reason to watch things that don’t engage with you unless you are GENUINELY interested. The type of music I play (Metal, Punk, Heavy Rock) is definitely more directed to a specific audience and isn’t very universal as hip-hop or R&B would be in many different settings. You play my type of music in a club in LA people will tell you to turn that sh*t off as its not suitable for the masses. Some may even judge someone’s character based off of music preference because unfortunately that’s the type of world we live in today, but the best way to overcome that is to honestly stay true to your art, and simply not give a f***. If it’s something you genuinely love doing that should be a feeling you have from the jump. You don’t do it for attention & you don’t do it for money. All that stuff comes along the way without you even realizing it. The second that starts to become your motive I personally feel, isn’t genuine intention and therefore won’t go the way you want it to. All the judgement, all of the criticisms, all the bad stuff is inevitable and maybe is even a necessity. Even the greatest artists of all time deal with it on a day to day basis. Without risk there really is no reward. I absolutely love what I do and if that’s the case then I’m willing to risk it all.

Dvan, 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?

Well, I will try to make this as simple but understandable without writing my whole life story, but my name is Dvan Lucaylucay. I am a musician (guitarist) based in LA. I have a prior background in other arts such as dance, photography, and videography. They are not completely out of the picture as I will occasionally dip my fingers into them here and there or when it is necessary, but they are no longer my primary. As for my main hustle/passion, I have been playing guitar since I was a kid. It is definitely something that has ran through my veins to this day even during the times I have put it aside to try other things. It always came back like it never left. I would say it wasn’t up until last year where I had really started to apply pressure into being a guitarist meaning, getting into studios, being in some music videos, recording for different artists, live performances, etc. Since then I was (and still am) posting covers or renditions to songs for content and to also show what I am capable of playing (also just because I enjoy it). My primary genre would definitely be Metal or Heavy Rock. But I’ve been diving into different genres to demonstrate versatility which I feel is a key trait to grow as a musician. What I feel sets me apart from others is a hard question to answer simply because what I’m doing is no different than any other musician out here. But I guess I can only point out my versatility and my ability to adapt to specific environments. Maybe even what I am capable of collectively being a photography, videographer, or dancer. Most times I am my own photographer, videographer, and well dance ehh cant really incorporate that one, or at least not yet. Eventually I want to combine all of that together to create something huge/different.

I am most proud of what and who I am currently working with because I feel it is a PERFECT mixture of everything I explained earlier. I’m working with two people who relate in almost every way. Both having experience in the same industry’s either being music, dance, photo/film. We are currently combining all of those together to create the music we do even when it comes to our own music videos. Everything is done in house. The fact that we all click, have the same exact dreams, and just relate to eachother, makes this art so much more enjoyable and easy. Being surrounded by these people and having the honor to work with them is what I am most proud of simply because I just know were going to make it.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

My goal is the same as a lot of other people’s goals in my industry. I want to make this the main thing I do for the rest of my life. I want to tour, I want to be on huge stage in front of thousands of people and I want to do it with the people I love most right next to me. Without making money the intention, I want to be able to live off of this, I want to be able provide doing this, I want to have a family, support my own, support my friends, and I want to inspire everyone just by doing what I love the most. But the one selfish goal I have for myself is just getting to experience the euphoria of playing in front of thousands of people in huge stadium who came to see our performance and our art. Not gonna lie, I’m probably going to cry lol I can man up and own that, just because that’s when I know all of our hard work has paid off and we made it.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most rewarding aspect of being an artist in my opinion isn’t the reward for all the hard work, it isn’t the validation, reputation, or stuff like that. It’s so cliché to say, but its true and its the journey or the process to the “reward” that’s more rewarding. That consists of many things like, the people you meet and relationships you build, finding the ones who stuck with you the whole times, the memories created, all the growth that happens from when you first started, how much of a learning experience everything was. I can go on and on about what the journey consists of but the most rewarding things are the things you cant touch or replace.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mister_palmtrees/ or @mister_palmtrees
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5uRON_-HpDNQqTk2b7wrBQ
• TikTok: @mister_palmtrees https://www.tiktok.com/@mister_palmtrees?lang=en

Image Credits
Image of live performance: @jayceealcala Image of 4 people: @josem_demira