Life & Work with Alex Always of Santa Monica

Today we’d like to introduce you to Alex Always.

Hi Alex, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
My story is complicated because I have begun and finished so many different stories in my life. In one story I was a mildly successful political operative. In another story I was a university community activist and journalist trying to bring people together in the wake of a school shooting. In another story I was a nationally recognized corporate tech salesman with a rapidly developing void where his soul used to be. In yet another story, I was a grocery store clerk trying to lay low, search for peace, and gather the pieces of a life scattered between the life I thought I would live and the life I had actually been given.

And yet in every story, without fail, around the end of the second act, the same wave of anxiety and depression inevitably reared its head. It usually took two to three years, but it was the same unmistakable feeling: the feeling that I was spinning my wheels serving someone/something that I don’t believe in, when I felt so strongly that I had something special to offer the world on my own terms.

After a lot of reflection, I’ve come to realize that what I’ve been searching for, even as a child, isn’t necessarily a particular job or career path. At its core, I want to help people feel heard, seen, and understood through art and storytelling.

Some people would call that feeling “intuition”, a “gut feeling”, “divine intervention”, or “universal guidance”. Whatever it is, I put that feeling in the backseat for my entire life because it wasn’t practical or pragmatic. But do you know what else isn’t pragmatic? Lying on your deathbed one day and wondering, “What if?”

So now I make music! Lmaooo.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Show me any story where the protagonist arrives at their destination via a smooth road, and I’ll show you a bad story.

For most of my life, my struggles revolved around purpose, identity, belonging, and ultimately, finding a way to live a life that I could be proud of.

Despite experiencing “success” on paper in just about every endeavor I committed myself to, I never truly felt fulfilled or felt that I was living in a way that was true to who I am. In addition, I struggled to feel like I truly belonged in the places I found myself, often feeling like an outsider amongst my peers.

In the past I confronted these feelings by doubling down on efforts: work harder, be more efficient, achieve more, and keep checking off boxes. I hoped that doing this would make me feel better about myself. It never did.

What I eventually had to confront was that the problem wasn’t necessarily my ability to succeed. It was that I hadn’t figured out what success actually meant to me.

And once I began to figure that out, I became willing to embrace different kinds of struggles because I was finally doing something that I love. Not only am I learning how to be a better musician, I am also learning how to be a better storyteller, videographer, editor, and producer, all in service of a larger creative vision.

Though the struggle now is that all of these efforts do not guarantee success in the traditional sense, each small win currently feels more meaningful than any big win from my previous chapters.

For the first time, my struggles are connected to something I am actually passionate about. So if my struggles are now, “How do I put together a vocal chain that captures the essence of Alex Always?” instead of “Why do I feel empty inside despite helping this candidate win a statewide election?”, I will gladly take it.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am working on a character-driven music project under the name “Alex Always”.

I want the music and the visual storytelling to be inseparable parts of the same experience. Rather than treating content as something I have to create separately to promote my songs, I want the songs themselves to inspire the stories, visuals, and little glimpses into a larger world that surround them. The music provides the emotional foundation, while the storytelling gives people another way to connect with it.

In some ways, I’m drawing inspiration from the role music videos have traditionally played in bringing songs to life, but I’m interested in expanding that idea for the modern age. I want the world around Alex Always to exist beyond any one music video, with each piece of content offering another little window into the character and his story.

Alex Always is a character. He has his own backstory, tragedies, hopes, dreams, and coping mechanisms. But at his core, he’s not all that different from you or me. Through him, I want to explore the things that make us human, even when the world around us feels strange, absurd, or fundamentally out of place.

Ultimately, I want the music and storytelling to help people feel heard, seen, and understood, all while having fun. I want people to connect with the songs emotionally, get curious about the world surrounding them, and have a reason to keep coming back.

I also have no intentions and plans to ever use AI in my project, so I am very proud of that.

We love surprises, fun facts and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
I love professional wrestling. I think it is the most perfect art form to ever exist.

Also, I have a penchant for unintentionally ending up on the local news.

Pricing:

• Venmo: ayelegs
• An insightful conversation: $25
• Insightful conversation + jokes: $30
• Predicting your future: $5
• Putting a bad vibe out towards your enemies: $6

Contact Info:

• Instagram: alexalways.alive

Image Credits
Credits: Alex Always