Interview with Takis.

Interviewed by: Gracie Lowes

Based in Winnipeg, the artist by the name of Takis has been growing a fan base so fast. Gracie sat down with him and spoke about all things music.

G: Hey it’s Gracie from The Music Enthusiast Blog, and today I’m here with Takis! How are you doing today?

T: I’m doing great, thank you for pronouncing my name perfectly by the way.

G: No problem! Thank you so much for doing this, it means a lot to the blog and a lot to us!

T: Aw, thank you for having me. Anytime I get to share my story and talk about the music I’ve been working on I’m there. So I’ll be there every time you call.

G: Let's get into the questions, what really made you want to get into music?

T: Oh wow that's a good question. For everybody listening has a different starting point for being obsessed with music, for me I don't know what it was. I would have gone on the internet for the first time. You know my parents had a computer and I'm surfing the web and I'm hearing about these artists like early Kanye West and early Kid Cudi and I'm hearing about these hip hop mixtapes in these blogs, and to me it was just so different than what I was experiencing in my hometown in my middle school or Elementary School. I was seeing a lot of my friends talk about whatever pop music is on the radio, and I never seen these artists that I thought were dressed so cool and their sounds are so different! And literally since I was a kid surfing I just wanted to be a part of this, this music business in some way and I've been on that path ever since.

G: What do you think your favourite musical memory would be?

T: Oh wow! I think the biggest moment of my life was performing at a festival called EBC in Mexico City a couple years ago. And up until that moment I just tell myself ‘let's put on a good show!’ I was very stoic about it, I was like ‘let's focus on putting on a good performance let's be very strict with everything.’ It was all about putting on a good show for the crowd. That was my whole thing. I wouldn't get emotional about anything, the moment I got on that stage, that big stage I looked out and I couldn't see the end of people... I got emotional. I got flustered and I'm like ‘oh no’ I'm forgetting what song I’m playing next, I’m forgetting which Q point I'm trying to mix in. So, I think that was one of the only moments where I got rattled, that I was so caught up in ‘wow I'm actually on this stage’ that it was enough to kind of make me emotional at the start, and I got offstage night I stayed that way so that was that was a special one that I remember.

G: You said you had music in your early ages of life, have you always been creating music or was there a point where you just like listening to it instead of actually creating?

T: Yeah when I was a kid it was just what CDs can I share with my friends but CD can I steal from my dad? It was all just being obsessed with what can we share with our friends. I’d have a friend that would be like ‘yo listen to this!’ and I’d be like ‘yo that’s really good, but listen to this!’ There was no goal, just excitement of this new thing! And we felt like we were exclusive or we thought we are part of some Club, cuz we knew about certain artists and no one else knew about, but yeah that was my life for years! 

G: Do you think there was a key point where you realize that you wanted to pursue making music?

T: Oh that's a really good question! So, I'm from a city called Winnipeg Manitoba and that's where I was born, and for many reasons a lot of people said that pursuing music wasn't even possible. And I understand any kid listening right now is saying ‘well people say music isn't realistic to this day’ of course, but they said ‘no music is in realistic music, music is impossible just take that dream and throw it out.’ That was what they were saying, so I never thought it was going to be my job, I never thought this would be something viable. But on the like the plus-size, why that was amazing was I never thought money would be involved! So I could just do what I love, I never thought I was going to be legit, so it was literally just a hobby, a fun hobby. And there were a few moments where whether a remix went viral or a big DJ played one of my songs, there were these stepping stones that I looked around I said ‘oh wow this is actually real this is working’ you know I’m flying around doing shows this is very strange but I think probably one of the greatest blessings of where I come from I was so sure that I could never make a living making music, that it allowed me to actually just love making music. 

G: What was it like for you starting out in such a competitive industry, was that hard for you? 

T: Yes, that was incredibly challenging but I mean it's challenging for everyone. One of the things, man I don't want to sound cheesy so forgive me but I was talking to my team and this song All Time I was like ‘guys is it weird that I'm not attached to final results right now that I'm just proud of the package we put together. I'm proud of the song we wrote, I'm proud of the visuals we brought, I'm proud of the production quality I've gotten too’ and you know that's something that's very recent for me in the past few months where I'm able to kind of say ‘I know that results do matter I'm in the music business I have a team that cares about results but I'm really kind of just proud of the products we're putting out’ So yeah it's very challenging but I hope every day I get a bit closer to just being proud of the product I’m creating versus the results. And the result is like a circus. I don't know what's going to happen in that circus but all I can do in my little studio is try to make the best product possible.

G: How do you find inspiration for your songs, is there a process to your writing or is it just go in and figure it out?

T: Yeah I mean pre-Covid was about personal relationships you know you have a relationship that works or it doesn't work and you want to write about it you want to go with some songwriter friends or some producer friends and just vent and try to like put it all out on a song and nine times out of ten it sounds terrible but one time out of ten you might have a hit record. So pre-Covid it was real life experiences you have to go out you have to hear a lot of no’s you have to experience a lot of pain, and ups and downs. During Covid it’s been kinda challenging, and instead of being able to write about these very personal moments a song like All Time is more of a general theme of saying everything is gonna be alright, maybe just in general, not talking about anything specifically, but in general maybe as a collective things are going to be all right for everybody. So, for this song it was very unique in that way where I wasn't writing about a very specific relationship I wasn't writing about one or two people in my life and a painful moment that I could imagine perfectly it was more ‘hey last year really really sucked, it really really hurt, I feel everyone else's pain, let me write a song that's just about hope in General.’ So in this way the new record All Time is a little bit more about a feeling, a general feeling of hope, versus a very specific moment in my life. 

G: Speaking of All Time, it’s your first release of this year! How are you feeling about that? 

T: I feel great! I do feel a little nervous, and like I said earlier I don't feel nervous about end goals and results. I feel nervous about the Takis fans, the people that have heard me write sad songs, and the people that expect me to write about breakups, and about dark pain. They’re like ‘you know what you’re making a lot of Electronic/ pop records, but you're telling really really honest and sometimes sad stories.’ Those fans are about to hear a song that is very bright, a song that is not about a break-up. So, my nerves don't come from end results and what happens on charts or sales, my nerves come from the people that expect and maybe like a sad Takis. Hopefully they'll understand and appreciate why I'm trying to break out of that with a song about positivity. 

G: Did you have to go out of your comfort zone, were you worried about writing a song that wasn't your normal go to?

T: Oh I’m still worried, I’m terrified as we speak. And even further than that to be honest, I scraped a few songs that I thought were a little too dark and a little too sad and it wasn't the person I was trying to be this year. So yeah I'm scared, you know I feel like I scraped two really good songs. I don't know what's going to happen, I don't know if my fans are going to react and say ‘hey like what are you trying to do, you know that's a cheesy line’ or whatever I don't want that to happen and I hope they understand that I'm really being honest. Guys it’s not me being cheesy, I actually just had a really bad year and I'm just trying to have a bright year, so rock with me and I hope this helps you guys! So yeah the nerves never end, because the moment you start having fans that care is the moment they have expectations, then you never want to let them down. I'm okay letting the business side down in long-term performance, I'm not okay letting down a handful of kids that really care about my music. 

G: How did you decide that All Time was going to be your first release of this year?

T: Yeah it really goes back to having a moment where I decided I wanted to write something hopeful, that I wasn't going to keep putting out songs that were about bad situations in my life, and that was a tough moment and there was a really tough shift but it was a commitment I had to make. You can't exactly write the songs I was writing, whether it was Wait For Me or From The Start and then just say ‘hey guys I'm going to make this happy song’ and then the next one I go back to sad. it's a commitment it’s a real commitment and it's something that, like I said I scraped songs that I thought were really good but didn't have a positive or more upbeat hopeful message. So yeah you know that was a decision I made just feeling like last year was just it was just too much, no one had to hear a sad song to feel sad they just literally had to like go on Twitter and they were like ‘you know things are not looking good right now.’ So I just didn’t want to be a part of that anymore, and it’s a bold risk but it's a risk that just feels right you know, I'm not buying into that anymore, we’re gonna have a good year. 

G: Do you have any future projects coming up that you can tell us a little bit about?

T: The big focus, All Time is the third single off the upcoming project Welcome Home and this year is going to be about consistent song releases that have a hopeful messages, leading up to this album that I really care about and I'm really proud of called Welcome Home.You know hopefully that comes out in summer, we have a rough goal for the release date, but I'm going to take it step-by-step my main focus right now is letting people know about all time and I really hope they enjoy it. 

G: Have you seen any changes from your first release to All Time, has your music changed in anyway that you can see?

T: I think sonically I try to dial in on the sounds. I like using guitars. I like having more of a chill down tempo music, so sonically I don't think I'm going to change much. I’m really just going to try to refine and just perfect the sound that I've been pushing since the first release on the project, but like we talked about songwriting-wise and stories  I'm for sure trying to be a more optimistic artist. 

G: This is more of a personal question but if you could describe yourself and then your music in three words what would they be? 

T: Oh wow that’s a really good question. Three words? For myself: introvert, nerd, oh no can I give you instead? Introvert and nerd, I watch documentaries and I don't like leaving my house so that is my personal side. And musically, I guess before I was just like raw and honest it was like I will tell you guys about my most personal moments and try to wrap them in a pop package. Moving forward I'm going to say honest but hopeful.

G: Those are all good words.

T: That’s a tough question.

G: I feel like documentaries have been a big part of 2020 and 2021 so I get you with that.

T: What are your three words by the way, for yourself?

G: No one’s ever asked me that!

T: Well here we are.

G: Um, Probably, wow I don’t know!

T: See it’s a tough question! Now you know how it feels to think of words.

G: Probably: Hopeful, positive and kind.

T: I like that.

G: Back on track, thank you for throwing that at me. Do you have an ideal collaboration that you would want to have? 

T: Oh wow, yeah there's a bunch in mind. This is the weirdest part I think back when I was first starting I would love to answer that question because it felt like it would never happen, now I probably don't want to answer it because there are conversation actually kind of happening in real life. So that's probably my interesting answer to that if you ask me that question 5 years ago I would spitball a bunch of names, but today I'm really trying to get those names, and I'm really starting to have those conversations and send records, send ideas in and try to coordinate. So I won't give an answer because I have a few but all three I’m actually trying to do in real life and I don’t wanna ruin the surprise. But that's a really good question, I'm not going to say it because I really want to make it happen this year. 

G: Well I’ll be watching for any collaborations. Do you have any favourite songs at the moment?

T: You know how I'm really excited and hoping for Drake's new album. I think Drake is an incredible artist, huge fan of his, there’s an artist named St. John I’m a really big fan of him as a songwriter. And I mean I’m a fan of like a million DJ's you know, Frank Walker and Loud Luxury I think have a really amazing song. I've been listening to Ryan Shepherd's new song ‘Hello Sunday’, if you check my liked Spotify, I think I have my Spotify on private because my manager was like bro you listen to the most random stuff cuz he could see my activity. But if people got to see my Spotify history in public they'd be like ‘wow this guy listens to every genre 24/7’, so it's hard to pick one specifically, I have too many.

G: Our website is basically about up-and-coming artists or local artists. Are there any artists that you have your eye on right now or that you would recommend?

T: Oh wow yeah, I think some of the names that I just mentioned. I think Frank Walker's a really great electronic DJ I’m a big fan of his, you can't say Loud Luxury is up and coming but I think those guys are incredible Canadian DJs, and then you know I just mentioned Ryan Shepherd as well, he has a song called ‘Hello Sunday’ it's very bright record and I think he is born raised in Toronto so I’ll shout him out as well.

G: Well, that’s all the questions I have for you but thank you so much for doing this!

T: No thank you, that was fun.

G: Have a good day!

T: You too!