Daily Inspiration: Meet Arian

Today we’d like to introduce you to Arian

Hi arian, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I started mad little. I had my first song memorized at around 3 when I used to sing wit the radio on long car rides where me and moms measured distances in her favorite albums until we found ourselves somewhere remote. The mountains, the jungles, or just sitting still among what seemed like every species of car battling for a piece of road. My moms was adventurous and I was always curious about decorating time with something.
My moms raised me but I would see my dad semi regularly, and he was a methodic man, he was precise about his listening experience. And im prolly underselling it. Half surgery and half ritual, he had this stoic living room with big towering speakers and organized his collection of CDs in these lanky wooden shelves that made the living room seem like a miniature, futuristic city. He would delight not only in me liking a record but in me being confused, or intrigued, or sometimes downright scared. I would sit down in this crinkly leather couch and while the vibrations invaded my space, I would relish in reading lyrics and taking in the pictures in the CD Booklet. Nothing else mattered to me when I was living in the world of Miles Davis or Lauryn Hill or Pink Floyd or Sade or (the one that truly raised me along wit my moms) Mariah Carey. I was an anxious, angry, melancholic mf kid so for anything to carve out space for my lil mind to burrow and feel nothing else but present was a feeling I would be chasing for a life time.

As a young teenager I sang everywhere I could. My teachers were understandably tired of me, I was irreverent, a clown and wouldnt shut up singing so I got put out of class often. It was deemed as some of my peers as a superpower so they called me ‘superboy’. I auditioned for choir at about 11. I was sure I didnt fit in anywhere else except in front of a mic, the choir director was a reserved, very small, and sometimes tempestuous woman who instilled in me the love for gospel music and gave me my first solo. I prolly sounded terrible half the time but I would float my voice into the stratosphere and back down in imitation of the freedom I heard in Mariah, Pace Sisters, Whitney, The Clark Sisters, Darryl Coley and many many other incredible Black geniuses who paved the way for so much music today, and saved my life by nurturing a faith in me that would keep me from giving up on myself. I learned how a string of air and the right amount of pressure could make a sound, or a high note permeate peoples hearts and return to me in the form of tears and applause.

At 15 I moved to NYC and sang everywhere I could, I decided if I really wanted to do this I had to prove myself I couldnt be discouraged. So with old hand me down pants, raggedy shoes and white dumb determination I stood in front of every bar and club I wanted to sing at pestering the security guard. Eventually it paid off, they either were impressed with my drive or they got so annoyed that they would go get the manager at which point I would blurt out how bad I wanted to be a singer and how much it mattered to me to sing even though I was underage. Shout out to them, they saw sum in me and let me in. I got to watch, learn and polish myself in front of some of the greatest talent I had seen thus far. Vanessa Ashford and Cheryl Pepsii as the respective hosts of these open mics. No matter how great or terrible I thought I did, after working sometimes for 12 hours I would take the E train, quietly sit in the unforgiving but welcoming seats and hum my chosen song on a way to another performance.

At 17 I embarked on my Berklee College of Music journey and was lucky enough to get a scholarship. At the time, living in Queens, I had a neighbor called Ruth, a woman who trembled with every step and I worried a brisk New York breeze would cancel her life subscription. She would let me practice on her piano, who she said nobody had played since eggs where 2 dollars so I wrote a sad lil song about failing to feel at home in myself and I booked my lil ticket to Boston, found a distant family friend to stay with for a night and auditioned.

At Berklee I struggled balancing catastrophes in my family, finding ways to help pay my rent and my first real life lil tussle wit death. I made it by a lil and that led me to borrow deeper into romanticizing my life through music to be able to convince myself to keep on living. And so far, its worked not too badly.

Ive released 2 works that im proud of and feel like I haven’t even gotten started yet. My goal is to share myself with as many people as I humanely can, and be a proud branch in the generation of artists that moved you with a mic and a spotlight. So now I live in LA under the façade of another yung artist wit big, heavy, spine bending dreams.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Ive been privileged in some ways, but I come from broken families, and I also accepted and co-signed many ill beliefs about myself really really young so ive come to terms with that being something I will prolly never get rid off. But I hope to learn one day how to treat my damage as a coo lil roommate.

Its been times where the struggles were financial, others where they were extraordinarily circumstantial but most of all it’s been a question of fighting myself until my knuckles are purple and I ran out of weed lol.

Apart from that its been some interesting stuff but I would feel less compelled to reveal it anywhere else but my music.

Right now the biggest struggle is to keep surviving in LA and keep convincing myself im worth the rejection to put myself out there

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Imma singaaaahh

I specialize in wrapping up melancholy, encouragement and love affairs in a flurry of runs backed up by banging, leap out the speaker beats.

Im most proud of the journey me and my instrument have had, its like I was given something really expensive but completely indecipherable, and ive spent the brunt of my life learning the right combination to move the people around me.

Im proud of my influences and how hard I carry them with me, Frank Ocean, Mariah, Nippy, Clark Sisters, Bey, SZA, Smino.
Im proud of my ability to craft something that sounds like nobody else but is deeply malleable to everyone and everything.

I dont think im set apart from others, I think I exploit every drop of courage I can muster, I have an interesting/rich voice and a willingness to tell my fragmented, wild, 2 country, 4 state story. Would want nothing else than to get paid for being sensible/tive for the rest of my life. In a flurry of airy runs lol.

If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Empathy, a slim ego, discipline and patience

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.arianthelighthunter.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arianthelighthunter/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@arianthelighthunter
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/arianthelighthunter

Image Credits
Matt Mahjoub

Marcostills