Today we’d like to introduce you to Fleece Kawasaki.
Fleece, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
My story begins as a boy in Bed-Stuy Brooklyn, NY, the second youngest of six others. Growing up, I’d always felt a sense of alienation from my peers. Hip-hop dominated the radio, and while I found some of it palatable it didn’t truly speak to me, music overall didn’t speak to me until one day I’d heard ‘Sliver’ by Nirvana. That song made me freak out. Suddenly I knew guitar music was where it was at for me. Still, though, it seemed far removed from where I was. Nobody that I knew played. Instead, art, in general, became my passion. I fell in love with anime, and from the time I was seven years old until I was fifteen, I drew and read every day, resigning myself to the ambition of becoming a graphic novelist. Eventually, my siblings and I moved Upstate, New York to live with our grandmother in Woodstock. Suddenly music and especially classic rock came to the forefront of what I was listening to, and the guitar became an object of desire for me. I found that my grandmother had a cheap one lying around in the attic and I tried to play it. It sounded awful; I figured I’d have to tune it. I popped a string and decided that maybe this music thing wasn’t for me. Then in high school when I’d moved back to the city, I met a group of musicians who took me under their wing and suddenly music was not only possible, but I was doing it. Every day we’d jam out on songs, playing during lunch, gym, skipping afternoon classes to play at Coney Island, playing after school in one of the empty classrooms, playing at each other’s places. Throughout the years we formed bands and played shows, suddenly I was living the pipe dream of mine that I never thought would come true. Eventually, after a horrific breakup, and after the bands, I was in broke up, I realized that I was unfulfilled doing music, and decided to move out west. I tried working normal jobs, but it turns out my blood boiled from the boredom, and I always wanted to play music on the clock. One day I was busking on the Metro and met this guy Jeremy Jones, and we started busking and making money, and we even got in trouble with the cops for doing so. It seemed pretty rock n’ roll to me, so here we are now. I’m both working on a solo EP, and we’re working together along with another guy named Dion Lovelle as Fleece Jones.
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
I create because there’s nothing else to do. There’s not much worth living for if I’m not going to be a creative, a regular 9-5 is torturous at this point to me, I mean, I’ve done that already. Resisted pursuing my dreams for fear of failure. Now all that’s left to do is attempt to fly. A lot of musicians hype themselves up these days, talk about their glory and splendor, but for me my faults and failures interest me a lot more, so I think people should take away that things don’t always have to be splendid or great, when you’re down and out that’s perfectly fine, write about that too. Art is honesty. We have enough gold chains and bling-bling, let’s hear about your last break up and eating cup ramen.
The sterotype of a starving artist scares away many potentially talented artists from pursuing art – any advice or thoughts about how to deal with the financial concerns an aspiring artist might be concerned about?
Find a way to make it work for you! Find a way to get paid doing what you love, I think no matter the path AC/DC said it best “it’s a long way to the top if you want to rock n’ roll” meaning anyone who’s successful, even the guy who played Barney at one point was probably just some dude at UCB trying to make it. Just find a way, don’t rot another day at some unfulfilling corporate affair, you know your worth.
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
I’ll be booking some shows throughout the summer in LA so follow me at @fleece_kawasaki if you want to stay updated. Also, you’ll find me busking on The Metro or at Universal City Walk most days so you can literally support me that way. Lastly, I have an EP coming out called ‘The Desert Flower EP’ so look forward to that!
Contact Info:
- Phone: 347-372-1477
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: fleece_kawasaki
- Facebook: Fleecekawasaki
Image Credit:
Gia Azevedo @giazus – rooftup
Lauren Tussey – flower portrait
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