We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Javier Arriagada (PECOS). We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Javier below.
Javier, appreciate you joining us today. 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?
You gotta just do it!
Javier, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is PECOS and I’m an artist, producer and engineer. Everything started when I was an 8 years old child and saw a string quartet playing live. Their craft made me feel something I’d never felt before and gave me the desire to do whatever it was they were doing. From that moment I asked my parents to support me with violin lessons, which I didn’t really enjoy at first but then followed up with guitar lessons thanks to my brother’s funny encouragement technique; “stop imitating everything I do!” he said, after I told him I wanted to play piano, like he was doing. He finished with a great phrase: “you’re going to play guitar!” Ever since I haven’t stop playing guitar and of course, I learnt some piano as well.
Music has been my passion all of my life and I’ve always been invested in technology, which is why I got into music production when I was 14 years old, using Pro Tools 8, an old keyboard which happened to have a midi port, a Sennheiser dynamic mic and an M-Audio interface. It was quite complicated at first but then I started to get a hand of it. Now I have my own studio in Los Angeles where I work as a producer, engineer, editor and more.
When I finished high school, I went to film school back in Chile for two and a half years. Those were some fun times, until I got depressed, for I felt I wasn’t doing what I really thought I should have been doing; Music.
I quit film school to go to music school in 2016, and two years later I was starting my first semester at Berklee College of Music, graduating on 2022 with a Summa Cum Laude honorary degree, and two majors.
As a producer and Engineer, I’ve worked on my two singles as PECOS, and I’ve collaborated with other artists such as PES in his EP Lunas, Nikki Paige in her singles BOYCOTTING, Goat, and What If God Forgave The Devil, and Maha Alkurdi on her song For We Deserve Life written for Songs for World Peace.
Starting on May of 2023, I’ve been working at one of the major studios in Los Angeles as a Second Engineer, and I have been privileged with the opportunity of working with artists such as Miley Cyrus, Shakira, Becky G and Khalid.
In addition to my production and engineering endeavors, I’ve been working as a songwriter with Daniela Arredondo who released Ingenuamente, written by both of us, and I’ve been working with a great team of artists; the producer Pablo Valda, who’s worked with artists such as Danna Paola, Christian Castro and Alan Navarro, and the songwriters Charlotte Garin and Melissa Malavasi Arce.
As a producer and songwriter I like to be a person in the room who is easy to work with and who will take the music to the next level. I’m a firm believer in listening to what the everyone has to say and be as great of a collaborator as possible, delivering a product that will be tailored to the client’s needs and likes.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
My goal as PECOS is to be able to share my perspective of life and the world with my audience, to share my truth. I want people to be able to feel identified with the things I say, to be able to feel something or have a great memory triggered by the music I make. That’s the ultimate goal… in between there are smaller goals that follow a more traditional way of life, like being able to support myself economically with my music.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
The most rewarding aspect of being a creative is that you get to express your emotions through your art, which transcends everything and can touch people’s hearts and souls. I’ve had people talk to me about my song What is the Feeling and tell me how they relate to the lyrics, how they’ve been there at some point… knowing that my music is helping someone feel understood is one of the things that makes me truly grateful of the choices I’ve made.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.pecosmusic.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pecos.music/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pecos.music22/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOK651UnZwP2HI-Mw4BGXng