Have You Heard? Ep. 3: Jay Towns

Episode Notes

Trevor - Welcome back to Have You Heard. The podcast where we discuss underappreciated music from different genres, artists and eras. I'm your host, Trevor. In this episode, we're gonna be talking to Northwestern artist Jay Towns. Hope you enjoy. Jay - Cool. What's up, man?  T - What's going on? Thanks so much for hopping on.  J - Dude, thanks for having me, for real.  T - Yeah, I remember …  I'm a transfer, I'm new to Northwestern. So, I remember the first, like videos, when I was just applying and everything, you were the first one to pop up.  J - Appreciate it.  T - So it's cool to finally get to talk to you and stuff.   J - Yeah, you too. T - Going back to that sort of social media stuff … It seems like you have a lot going on, just all the time, so I wonder how you balance that with school and everything.  J - Well, the great thing about what I'm studying: theater, music tech and entrepreneurship – lots of the things that I am learning in classes I directly apply to stuff I do outside of class. Obviously, there's still school work that's kind of annoying to have to get done. But I'd say like 80% of the things that I'm learning in class, I apply to some project that I'm doing currently. To me, it doesn't feel so much as school, art, work. It kind of all blends together. Because I'd love to do my art for my job, which is what I'm studying. You know what I mean? It's not too bad, actually – the balance. Obviously, you know, with my own projects, like the YouTube channel and music and things that I'm not actively endorsed to do at school, that is what I use my extra time on. Actually, I feel like this is a perfect time to do this podcast episode, because I'm right now, in the midst of planning for a music video I'm shooting tomorrow – maybe we could talk about that later. But   the balance … I'm very used to it. But I think I think it's pretty, my schedule’s always kind of, like something’s moving. But that's the way I like it. And I think that Northwestern, for better or for worse, has kind of conditioned me with the “and” is in our DNA mindset, which can be toxic at times. But for me, most of the time, it's more of like an encouragement. I feel empowered to do not only whatever I want, but, whenever I want to do it. Oftentimes that coincides with other projects. And that's just kind of the lifestyle that I want to have. Starting it early, I guess. T - Yeah that’s so dope. I guess we could just jump into the music right now if you want. So do you direct your own music videos, and how much creative control do you have in that sort of process? J - So I do direct my own videos, but I've also … I have one video up on my channel right now, that was directed by a friend of mine. But even in that case, which was a great video, that was the “Green” music video that was directed by my friend Hannah because I had made that song to be featured in her film. So that was really cool. And she actually was editing the music video while she was editing the film. And so there are actually clips of the film, like intertwined with the music video pretty seamlessly. So that was dope. And in that case, she directed it because she definitely had the vision for the project. And it was also to serve for promo for the film. But other music videos I've directed, and I'm directing this next one that I'm doing. But even when I'm not, even when in the case of “Green,” I didn't ever feel like I didn't have creative control or creative input to say the least. I think, though, that the director usually is the person who is seeing how it's going to come together in the end product. And so, more frequently than not, the director is also going to edit a music video. And so in the case of  “Green,” I wasn't editing it because I didn't have the footage, so I felt like Hannah would have been more appropriate to bring that vision together – which she