In this interview spotlight, I chat with Kevin the Persian about the latest music, surviving the pandemic, technology and more.
Full Q&A along with links and music below.
Where are you from and how do you describe your style of music?
I was born in Lafayette, Louisiana and now live in New Orleans. My songs are old-school hard rock. The feedback I’ve received so far on my debut album Southern Dissonance is that it is stylistically diverse, drawing comparisons to Alice in Chains, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Patti Smith.
How did you get here? As in, what inspired or motivated you to take on this journey through music and the music biz?
My path to making music was long and circuitous. I got my first guitar when I was 13, a knock-off Les Paul made by a brand called Masada. My friend Scott Clayton picked up the bass around the same time and we eventually formed a band called Synergy Park with a drummer named John Kangas, playing classic rock and metal covers at high school keg parties. But due to pressure from my parents, I ended up going a more traditional career route and went to law school. I have been a practicing patent attorney now for over 15 years. I also owned a craft beer bar in Dallas for five years, which I sold in 2017 and is still in operation. But two major events happened when I was almost 40 that altered my path: (1) my mother passed away and (2) the pandemic happened. Feeling an urgency I’d never felt before, I finally committed to making an album, which was just released on January 19, 2022.
In Southern Dissonance, were you setting out to accomplish anything specific, follow a specific theme, or explore different styles of creation?
To write and record Southern Dissonance, I rented a room that looked like a prison cell in a dilapidated industrial building in New Orleans. Then I made a few rules. There would be no internet and no contact with the outside world when I was in the studio. I haven’t owned a cell phone in over four years, so I made myself completely unreachable when I was in the studio. Then I committed to going to the studio most mornings at about 7 am to write and record music for the album. I also had a morning ritual in which I would practice zen meditation in the studio before I began working on the music. In fact, the song “The Regulations of the Auxiliary Cloud Hall” was inspired by zen. The purpose of these draconian rules was to go deep on each song with zero distractions for several hours at a time. Since most of the music I grew up loving was composed in a pre-internet world, I wanted to replicate that creative process as much as possible for Southern Dissonance to explore unorthodox musical and lyrical directions. The album is self-produced, but was mixed by Austin Deptula and mastered by Marc Frigo.
Name the biggest challenge you faced as a creative during these unprecedented times? How did you adapt? How have you kept the creative fires burning during all this?
Since I still practice law, making the time to write and record the album was the biggest challenge. I had to adhere to a strict schedule of music in the morning and law in the afternoon. As far as keeping the fire burning, I had to have faith in the daily schedule, meaning I would get in the studio and record whether I felt like it or not…no excuses. You’re not gonna feel inspired every single day, but the key, for me at least, was to adhere to the schedule anyway.
What was the last song you listened to?
I’ve been getting into a band named Green Lung from London. I was recently jamming their song “Let the Devil in.”
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? 8-tracks? Cassettes? CDs? MP3s? Streaming platforms?
Vinyl all the way! But I’ve been getting into cassettes lately. I prefer physical formats over streaming because it forces you to listen to entire albums. It’s hard to appreciate an artist when you’re skipping from song to song on playlist to playlist.
Where is the best place to connect with you and follow your journey?
I really appreciate your time. Anything else before we sign off?
I plan to start going to my little studio again soon, but this time to rehearse a live acoustic set for local shows later this year (2022). The set will consist of acoustic versions of the songs from Southern Dissonance. If I get any traction, I will recruit some band members and we will play the album full throttle as they were intended.
