Your Actual Influences

Whenever an artist gets asked about their influences, it’s a hard question to answer—if they answer it quickly, they are going with their stock response. It’s a lot to actually think about, and it’s uncomfortable to, as it’s a reminder that what motivates you to create and what you unconsciously end up creating are rarely one and the same.

It’s common for someone starting out in a particular art, or genre, to want to create something a bit like something they liked. Maybe they heard a particular guitarist, saw a particular movie, and thought that if it feels so great to listen to, or watch that, it must feel even better to make it. The truth is though, as any artist can attest to, your sound, your style, isn’t anything you can pick and choose—it chooses you. You might buy a guitar wanting to sound like Jack White, but you might find that the songs that do come out of you sound like some band you haven’t thought about in ages, and maybe forgot you even liked. The cognitive dissonance of this is what causes a lot of people to quit before they even get started, faced with an uncomfortable realization that they refuse to fully have, instead assuming they ‘just don’t have what it takes’ to be an artist. In truth, they just don’t have what it takes to learn about the nature of creation.

What jazzes you isn’t always what jazzes your muse—she has her own tastes, her own proclivities, and she will crate dig through the musical rolodex in your mind for what she wants to use you as a vessel for. You thought you were buying a guitar, but in fact, you’re the instrument. You wanted to own something, but in order to do the damn thing, she must own you.

It’s not a bad thing—in fact, it’s how anything worth a damn ever reaches your ears, or anyone’s. You bought into the idea of artists as people who make deliberate and specific choices, design every aspect of what becomes themselves and their output. You thought it all comes from their mind—their brain, specifically. It’s not like that at all. What you saw as a man swimming fast and free was in actuality a current carrying him. If you are not comfortable with the idea of being overtaken by something greater than yourself, then artistic expression is not for you.

I love her. You should too. You can start by loving everything you’ve ever loved—not thinking you’re through with the past, as the past is damn sure never through with you. An artistic journey is a journey of ghosts visiting you. You thought you were over pop-punk? Guess what—it wants to come out of your vocal chords. That’s just one example—it’ll vary per person. The point is, none of this is a bad thing. The system works—but it’s not the system you thought it was. Know your role and be a vessel.

Thank you for reading, and if you enjoyed this piece, and enjoy my films, consider contributing $2 per month to my film studio, Kill The Lion Films.