Calixte shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Calixte, really appreciate you sharing your stories and insights with us. The world would have so much more understanding and empathy if we all were a bit more open about our stories and how they have helped shaped our journey and worldview. Let’s jump in with a fun one: Have you stood up for someone when it cost you something?
Have I stood up for someone when it caused me something. I would say absolutely I took care of my best friend/manager while he was fighting brain cancer and he was able to beat it. It cost me a lot of money to make sure that he was happy satisfied and had all of his needs met hundreds and thousands of dollars, but I was not thinking about the money. I was only thinking about the result of healing.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Hello, my name is Calixte and I am a RIAA Diamond Songwriter/Recording Artist/record producer. I have written some of the biggest songs in K-pop history, such as NCT 127 sticker and also Ayo, I have been blessed to work amongst amazing artists and creatives such as Rihanna, SIA, Leon, Thomas, Jason Derulo and many more. I have been able to make music my full-time career. what makes me interesting as The Artist is that I am a black alternative artist my foundation started with rock ‘n’ roll that’s my foundation. That’s my heart. That’s my love and I feel like that adds an interesting perspective to why my music sounds the way it does cause there is many different influences on my records. I also love to Jen ribbon and incorporate many different sounds and cultures into my music. What makes special artist is that I’ve been through the things I write about in about in my songs. Everything is completely 100% authentic true to who I am and to my story and I feel like my listeners can relate to because I’m talking about a lot of the things that go on in life whether it’s good or bad happier or sad. I feel like I have a voice and I’m going to use it to help people that share similar stories as myself. My music speaks to everyone, including the misfits and the ones who like to push the envelope on creativity. I’m a fun guy. I love hanging out with friends. I love traveling. There’s nothing more that I love than being on stage and being able to connect with my fans I’m always working to better my performance and my vocals. I believe that there’s always something to work on. I love going to the beach as well that’s always a plus and I even sometimes record my songs at the beach. My story is that I am first generation Haitian in America the first of my family to pursue a career in the arts and I’m originally from Maryland in America now I live in Los Angeles California and I would say my story is very unique because when I moved to LA, I took off running All I had in my head at that time was I have to be seen and that’s the way I get heard throughout my story I’ve been able to perform it many of the can’t use it LA such as the Viper room and peppermint club and many more. I’ve even sold a few out. It hasn’t been an easy road as well. Both of my managers passed away one her name is Angelica Cobb and she discovered Katy Perry and my other manager his name is Elvis Brown, and he discovered a lot of names such as Post Malone, Azealia Banks, and many more and that’s a monumental moment because I understand how extremely blessed I am to be able to study under these amazing managers and learn firsthand on what it takes and they always told me I have what it takes. Success didn’t come easy. It took many years I started pursuing music at the Tinder age of seven years old too now I’m in my early 20s and it’s just the beginning of so much has already happened. I want to bring Hope back to the world and Highlight issues that most artists are afraid to talk about I want to bring back individuality in the music space I’m going to add more theater elements to my repertoire and I’m so excited to be able to express my art freely me and my manager Elvis Brown we started a wreck label, called ice gang entertainment, and it’s a very fair label where Artist can fully be themselves and express themselves with a loving collective placed around them that will enhance anyone’s creativity involved so when my manager ascended and became an angel for us, I decided to take that one as a project, I wanted to see through because I’m very strong in firm on my beliefs in legacy so game is not only a label. It’s a legacy and the legacy expands on so many people’s greatness that might not had been seen on the scale that we want to take things and we want to be able to highlight our legends and the people we love recently ice game myself and create music group has teamed up. It feels great to have a label that understands my creative vision as create music group does it’s only the beginning with us and I’m so excited to see how this opportunity grows and what we’re able to do. Also, I’ve signed a Publishing deal with THG/Sony for some of the mega hits that I’ve written and I love my family over at THG/Sony this is only the beginning of my story and I feel like extremely blessed and grateful and I don’t take anything for granted I’m currently working on my debut EP titled boyz hurt too. It’s a project to Highlight what us boys and men go through in society in the world where we’re not able to fully express our emotions or opinions because there’s already so much stigma around men that a lot of people I feel like I don’t care hear our issues, but every human should have the right to express themselves and share what they’re going through. I also wrote this song during the time of caregiving for my manager so a lot of the songs have a spin of pure Authentic grieving and pain and also the joy that comes after the rain if you will. The project highlights that not everything is perfect, but through it all a beautiful masterpiece could be created right through the thick of hard times also standing up for myself this was a project where I feel like I grew my voice after going through so much you stop caring so much about what others think and that definitely happened to me throughout this process so I can fully say wholeheartedly that I am giving true pure transparency or eating every song on my EP.
Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
Honestly, the person who I was before is a lot like the person I am now just wiser and I feel like I’ve been blessed to not have the world placed me in a box. I feel like I’ve always been able to just authentically be myself unapologetically and I find that very thankful because that’s not every artist story I think probably because I’m a rockstar and we know what they say about Roccstar. You can’t tell us anything anyway. Lol
When did you stop hiding your pain and start using it as power?
When did I stop hiding my and started using it as power. I was saying that is a very new thing for me at least within the past four years that’s when I learned to stop hiding my pain and using it as power due to the circumstances in my life. These past four years have been the hardest years of my life as I stated before my manager passed away/ascended, and while I was taking care of him as a full-time caregiver, I noticed a drastic change in people reaching out to me or inviting me to do sessions or even check it on me. It wasn’t really happening, and I noticed when I talked about it, it made people so uncomfortable that often times they will start some kind of form of friction to kinda set a boundary. I guess not saying that that’s the right way to go about it but that’s what was going on at the time so as I started going on, I told myself my mind fuck it people that I built relationships with and friendships with are now acting like that. These were no friendships at all, and in that instant, not hiding my pain because I really stopped caring because the only reason why anybody would hide their pain is because they wouldn’t want people to see it but once you’re at a place of not caring that says it all.
Next, maybe we can discuss some of your foundational philosophies and views? What are the biggest lies your industry tells itself?
The biggest line that my industry tells itself which is an easy industry is that you can do it on your own. I’ve never found that to be true. I love having team love having a group of people. in my corner working to help the overall product, which is my music get the best exposure I can get honestly but let the industry tell it you can do it all by yourself. All you need is a cell phone and it is way deeper than just having a cell phone. That’s a great start because Tiktok is absolutely huge and it can blow you up in a night in a day at any time but even then there’s things that come after that like marketing promotion touring radio is so many different faces in his business and even coming down to Publishing you would literally not have time to do anything else or it’ll probably take away from the creative space because it’s kinda like these are peoples careers every different branch I just explain is a whole different career and then on top of that there’s so many different places you have to get your money Sound exchange you have to get the money from the DSP’s literally sometimes in this business, it can feel like a Hunte to get your money so A Team is very important and honestly A Team is everything
Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. Are you doing what you were born to do—or what you were told to do?
Am I doing what I was going to do? I would say so cause nobody told me to do this. Nobody told me to choose this career path actually before I chose music and artistry. I was a elite gymnast and I was in the gym every day every night practicing for the Olympics I was ready in the program to potentially move to taxes to train with the US team and in that time I made the cut for the show X Factor and from there I chose to continue with music
Contact Info:
- Website: https://linktr.ee/rockncalixte
- Instagram: https://Www.instagram.com/rockncalixte
- Twitter: https://Www.twitter.com/rockncalixte
- Facebook: Rockncalixte
- Youtube: Rockncalixte
- Soundcloud: Rockncalixte
- Other: Tik-tok Rockncalixte
Image Credits
DeAngelo Gardner dream pixel media
