Hamilton's Aron D'Alesio is going it alone. His self-titled debut record is a lo-fi celebration of simplicity created in an isolated basement from 11 p.m. to six a.m. After a decade in Young Rival, here are five ways that Aron D'Alesio is a totally different beast.
1. He just let the songs flow through him.
"I end up being a conduit for some sort of outside energy that just borrows me to make a song," D'Alesio tells Exclaim! "When I would be in that mode I would [think], 'This is kind of weird, sort of obsessive.' I wonder if I would describe it as unhealthy at the time? It probably was."
2. It was created in its own time-altered headspace.
"Working as a bartender, my whole schedule as a human being was flipped, so morning, night, none of it meant anything to me. That's a big part of the record — I was really feeling alienated at that time, completely isolated. Everybody else is living this 9 to 5 sort of thing, and for some reason I've been afforded the opportunity to sit in this studio every night of the week. Why am I able to do this, but everybody else is working? Everybody's stressed, and I had no worries."
3. The real challenge was work/life balance.
"You have to wake up and think, 'What do I do with today to make it meaningful, to lend it some value?' I literally felt like I had retired, because I didn't have to do anything. But I'm not the kind of person who can hang his hat on that, that drove me nuts. I felt pressure to take advantage of it, and to enjoy it. But that's not me, I have to move forward in one way or another, and this turned into a manifestation of all of that."
4. The work was all-consuming anyway.
"It became a total meditative experience. I'd [start work], make a tea, and then I'd have a sip and it would be ice cold. The last time I touched that thing was three hours ago, I had one sip, put it on the table. Time just disappears for me. It's like a mindfulness, a meditative process for me, on all the fronts — from the production to the writing, and then the output is just ahh. All part of a process that I really enjoy.
5. Album promotion on social media has been much less serious than all this.
"I thought I [could] showcase an aspect of my personality. I find that people are interested in that, makes you more human. It's not posturing. I don't want to try to be all, 'I'm super cool, you gotta buy this record.' It's a tough line for me to walk. It's funny, I looked at the video I did for "Diamond Ring," and then at the amount of hits that these stupid videos have gotten and they had thousands more. One is a major production, and the other is me being an idiot at the grocery store."
Aron D'Alesio is out now via Paper Bag Records.
1. He just let the songs flow through him.
"I end up being a conduit for some sort of outside energy that just borrows me to make a song," D'Alesio tells Exclaim! "When I would be in that mode I would [think], 'This is kind of weird, sort of obsessive.' I wonder if I would describe it as unhealthy at the time? It probably was."
2. It was created in its own time-altered headspace.
"Working as a bartender, my whole schedule as a human being was flipped, so morning, night, none of it meant anything to me. That's a big part of the record — I was really feeling alienated at that time, completely isolated. Everybody else is living this 9 to 5 sort of thing, and for some reason I've been afforded the opportunity to sit in this studio every night of the week. Why am I able to do this, but everybody else is working? Everybody's stressed, and I had no worries."
3. The real challenge was work/life balance.
"You have to wake up and think, 'What do I do with today to make it meaningful, to lend it some value?' I literally felt like I had retired, because I didn't have to do anything. But I'm not the kind of person who can hang his hat on that, that drove me nuts. I felt pressure to take advantage of it, and to enjoy it. But that's not me, I have to move forward in one way or another, and this turned into a manifestation of all of that."
4. The work was all-consuming anyway.
"It became a total meditative experience. I'd [start work], make a tea, and then I'd have a sip and it would be ice cold. The last time I touched that thing was three hours ago, I had one sip, put it on the table. Time just disappears for me. It's like a mindfulness, a meditative process for me, on all the fronts — from the production to the writing, and then the output is just ahh. All part of a process that I really enjoy.
5. Album promotion on social media has been much less serious than all this.
"I thought I [could] showcase an aspect of my personality. I find that people are interested in that, makes you more human. It's not posturing. I don't want to try to be all, 'I'm super cool, you gotta buy this record.' It's a tough line for me to walk. It's funny, I looked at the video I did for "Diamond Ring," and then at the amount of hits that these stupid videos have gotten and they had thousands more. One is a major production, and the other is me being an idiot at the grocery store."
Aron D'Alesio is out now via Paper Bag Records.