Apparently today is National Edge Day, so here's a screencap from the new music video of me on the edge.
I don't usually refer to myself as straight edge, for a number of reasons - first, people assume a lot of things (like I'm gonna be mad if they drink - I'm not, I genuinely do not care), and they feel some kind of judgement (they will immediately start telling me about their consumption habits and doing like a mea culpa), or that I think I'm somehow superior. Also, I have pretty much no connection to the hardcore scene from which that identity was born.
It's not my religion, it's not a political stance, it's just my personal choice.
But - for pretty much my entire life, I haven't drunk alcohol, smoked, or done recreational drugs. I don't think I'm better than anyone - but I do think I'm better OFF for it. My extended family has been plagued with alcoholism to a level that I could even see as a pretty young child, and I knew that if I wanted to do anything with my life, I was gonna have to stay away from it.
I've got
Shit. To. Do.
I think that the vast majority of people can partake in moderation, or even occasional excess, and be fine, maybe even better for it. There's no guilt trip here from me, and I know from personal experience that putting guilt on people doesn't help anyway. In fact, the central theme of the new In Virtue album "Age of Legends" is that the only way you can move forward is through self-forgiveness and cleansing of guilt.
But I also think that people should know that there is this option where you can literally just - not -. It should be a socially acceptable option to abstain if you want, but there is no other time in my life that I've been made to feel like a complete societal outcast more than NOT drinking. That always hurt.
I've spent my time (and money) working on my craft instead, and today we dropped the penultimate single and video from the album. I got to shoot in a cave in the desert and with a drone on top of a mountain with my friends, and I think all in all, it could be a lot worse.
Turns out that I've got a little bit of a vocal injury, which means I need to go on vocal rest for a while, which means no stream tomorrow.
This comes at a MOST inopportune time, since I need to be making content to promote the new album, which involves singing, but now I need to be patient (which is NOT a strength of mine) so I can heal and come back stronger, rather than pushing myself and making it worse.
I'm hoping I'll be back in action next week for the stream, I hate canceling more than one in a row but I'm hoping you understand.
I wanna tell you a little bit about what it's like for me to write songs, and why I come back to it over and over again.
Creation is always a process of discovery. And the thing that I always, ALWAYS, discover while creating is something about myself. I learn something about the process and how to make the end product better somehow, but what I discover is more of ME.
Songwriting is my usual medium of creation, but this applies to basically any kind of art, or design, video editing, etc. - creation is a series of decisions you have to make. It's kind of an intimidating way of looking at it, actually - making decisions is the hardest thing I have to do on a daily basis. But when it's making music, for some reason it's suddenly fun for me. Doesn't make much sense, but that's what makes the brain dole out the good chemicals.
The decisions have mainly to do with the choosing of building blocks of various kinds - instruments and sounds, notes and chords, words and structures. Since I'm not inventing a new language from scratch, or a new system of dividing the octave, or building a new instrument, I'm choosing from a large palette of colors created by those who came before.
And it's in this choosing that I find myself, again and again. The decision is never whether or not to write - that's not up to me.
I. Must. Make.
I make or I die. So there's only one way, and it's forward, through the song. So I make those decisions, those choices, and sometimes it's hard, and sometimes it's easy, but I often just marvel at the ones I make because - I didn't know that about myself. That I would choose this sound, or that note on that chord.
Or that I would write those words because they're not something I knew, but they're about me, and they're true. Like I'm spilling my guts to a therapist because I know they can't tell anyone, and out comes a conclusion I never came to before that moment.
Writing songs, for me, has one primary core purpose - to send a signal out to souls on the same frequency to pick up on their antennae, to find my real people. I've never felt like part of a religious, regional, ethnic, class, genre, political, sociological, or tribal group in my whole life, because those things don't connect me to anyone. But I find my people everywhere over the wire, by showing them who I really am, in my most vulnerable and true state, through the songs I write. When I'm at my most squishy.
I sit down to write a song and every single time I go down the rabbit hole, chasing after the rabbit that seems to have no destination, but it's always the same - mirror after mirror, showing me to myself, which I can then use to reflect a truer version of me in the music, which will in turn make a brighter beacon by which I broadcast to like souls.
Knowing yourself is painful sometimes, but just like making connections between concepts or synapses or people, it's always rewarding, surprising, and endlessly worthwhile. You can't know what you don't know you don't know, but you can always let in more light if you're willing to open the window and try.
Feels a bit silly shoehorning in a sales pitch after vomiting my soul into a few paragraphs like that, but I genuinely just want to help people have the same experience with making their music as I do making mine. It makes me sad to hear from all y'all that you get frustrated and give up sometimes, without getting the same catharsis that I do from each soul-diving songwriting session I complete. That's why I made Song Finisher - to help you to meet yourself the same way I've met myself, over and over again.
It's on sale for a little while longer for half off, and it really just exists to help you with those kinds of decisions that are stopping the progress you want to make to get deeper into the rabbit hole, to find more and more mirrors.
If that sounds like something you want to do, scary as it may be, you can check it out at this link here:
It's an unconscious expectation you have that once you do something, you'll receive something in return. Your action will result in a reciprocation of some kind from someone or something else.
The only problem? There's no real "contract", because it's based on an unspoken assumption - so the outcome is usually disappointment.
Example 1 -
You take out the trash and do the dishes this week, and you think your roommate will, therefore, do it next week.
Result:
They do not. You begin to resent them while you take out the trash and do the dishes again. They have no idea why you're mad.
Example 2 -
You think that once you have enough riffs, you'll be able to put them together into a song. You write 100 riffs.
Result:
You have 3 riff salads that kind of resemble songs, but really 0 songs.
You see how these kinds of unconscious assumptions can be very harmful to your creative process?
This is one of many default counterproductive mindsets I have observed in musicians who want to be songwriters - they wind up operating under a false belief and wasting YEARS, with nothing to show for it.
It made me SO. MAD. seeing talented artists hamstringing themselves like this that I decided to do something about it.
Result:
I made a course that won't just turn you into a song completion machine with exact, proven methods - it also corrects this and many other self-defeating mindsets you might not even realize are holding you back.
It's called SONG FINISHER
and it's available now at a HUGE discount for a short time for the launch.
Those 100 riffs? That could be 100 songs - and I'm gonna show you how.
Trey Xavier
Trey Xavier
The @InVirtue channel hit 5000 subscribers as our new video for Desolation Throne soars to 174,000 views. Have you seen it yet?
1 week ago | [YT] | 38
View 5 replies
Trey Xavier
Sorry gong gang, no stream today cuz I’m shooting the last bits of our music video. See you next week!
1 week ago | [YT] | 75
View 2 replies
Trey Xavier
Apparently today is National Edge Day, so here's a screencap from the new music video of me on the edge.
I don't usually refer to myself as straight edge, for a number of reasons - first, people assume a lot of things (like I'm gonna be mad if they drink - I'm not, I genuinely do not care), and they feel some kind of judgement (they will immediately start telling me about their consumption habits and doing like a mea culpa), or that I think I'm somehow superior. Also, I have pretty much no connection to the hardcore scene from which that identity was born.
It's not my religion, it's not a political stance, it's just my personal choice.
But - for pretty much my entire life, I haven't drunk alcohol, smoked, or done recreational drugs. I don't think I'm better than anyone - but I do think I'm better OFF for it. My extended family has been plagued with alcoholism to a level that I could even see as a pretty young child, and I knew that if I wanted to do anything with my life, I was gonna have to stay away from it.
I've got
Shit. To. Do.
I think that the vast majority of people can partake in moderation, or even occasional excess, and be fine, maybe even better for it. There's no guilt trip here from me, and I know from personal experience that putting guilt on people doesn't help anyway. In fact, the central theme of the new In Virtue album "Age of Legends" is that the only way you can move forward is through self-forgiveness and cleansing of guilt.
But I also think that people should know that there is this option where you can literally just - not -. It should be a socially acceptable option to abstain if you want, but there is no other time in my life that I've been made to feel like a complete societal outcast more than NOT drinking. That always hurt.
I've spent my time (and money) working on my craft instead, and today we dropped the penultimate single and video from the album. I got to shoot in a cave in the desert and with a drone on top of a mountain with my friends, and I think all in all, it could be a lot worse.
1 month ago | [YT] | 113
View 28 replies
Trey Xavier
Bummer news, Gong Gang.
Turns out that I've got a little bit of a vocal injury, which means I need to go on vocal rest for a while, which means no stream tomorrow.
This comes at a MOST inopportune time, since I need to be making content to promote the new album, which involves singing, but now I need to be patient (which is NOT a strength of mine) so I can heal and come back stronger, rather than pushing myself and making it worse.
I'm hoping I'll be back in action next week for the stream, I hate canceling more than one in a row but I'm hoping you understand.
Stay squishy
Trey
1 month ago | [YT] | 219
View 28 replies
Trey Xavier
I woke up this morning with NO voice at all, so no stream today Gong Gang. Have a great weekend and make some music!
1 month ago | [YT] | 27
View 3 replies
Trey Xavier
The new In Virtue video has been out for over a week now, gimme a yee haw
1 month ago | [YT] | 19
View 3 replies
Trey Xavier
Be honest - how many unfinished songs do you have on your hard drive right now?
2 months ago | [YT] | 73
View 14 replies
Trey Xavier
I wanna tell you a little bit about what it's like for me to write songs, and why I come back to it over and over again.
Creation is always a process of discovery. And the thing that I always, ALWAYS, discover while creating is something about myself. I learn something about the process and how to make the end product better somehow, but what I discover is more of ME.
Songwriting is my usual medium of creation, but this applies to basically any kind of art, or design, video editing, etc. - creation is a series of decisions you have to make. It's kind of an intimidating way of looking at it, actually - making decisions is the hardest thing I have to do on a daily basis. But when it's making music, for some reason it's suddenly fun for me. Doesn't make much sense, but that's what makes the brain dole out the good chemicals.
The decisions have mainly to do with the choosing of building blocks of various kinds - instruments and sounds, notes and chords, words and structures. Since I'm not inventing a new language from scratch, or a new system of dividing the octave, or building a new instrument, I'm choosing from a large palette of colors created by those who came before.
And it's in this choosing that I find myself, again and again. The decision is never whether or not to write - that's not up to me.
I. Must. Make.
I make or I die. So there's only one way, and it's forward, through the song. So I make those decisions, those choices, and sometimes it's hard, and sometimes it's easy, but I often just marvel at the ones I make because - I didn't know that about myself. That I would choose this sound, or that note on that chord.
Or that I would write those words because they're not something I knew, but they're about me, and they're true. Like I'm spilling my guts to a therapist because I know they can't tell anyone, and out comes a conclusion I never came to before that moment.
Writing songs, for me, has one primary core purpose - to send a signal out to souls on the same frequency to pick up on their antennae, to find my real people. I've never felt like part of a religious, regional, ethnic, class, genre, political, sociological, or tribal group in my whole life, because those things don't connect me to anyone. But I find my people everywhere over the wire, by showing them who I really am, in my most vulnerable and true state, through the songs I write. When I'm at my most squishy.
I sit down to write a song and every single time I go down the rabbit hole, chasing after the rabbit that seems to have no destination, but it's always the same - mirror after mirror, showing me to myself, which I can then use to reflect a truer version of me in the music, which will in turn make a brighter beacon by which I broadcast to like souls.
Knowing yourself is painful sometimes, but just like making connections between concepts or synapses or people, it's always rewarding, surprising, and endlessly worthwhile. You can't know what you don't know you don't know, but you can always let in more light if you're willing to open the window and try.
Feels a bit silly shoehorning in a sales pitch after vomiting my soul into a few paragraphs like that, but I genuinely just want to help people have the same experience with making their music as I do making mine. It makes me sad to hear from all y'all that you get frustrated and give up sometimes, without getting the same catharsis that I do from each soul-diving songwriting session I complete. That's why I made Song Finisher - to help you to meet yourself the same way I've met myself, over and over again.
It's on sale for a little while longer for half off, and it really just exists to help you with those kinds of decisions that are stopping the progress you want to make to get deeper into the rabbit hole, to find more and more mirrors.
If that sounds like something you want to do, scary as it may be, you can check it out at this link here:
bit.ly/GETITFINISHED
Thanks for listening,
Stay squishy.
Trey
2 months ago | [YT] | 38
View 8 replies
Trey Xavier
No stream today frens, see you next week!
2 months ago | [YT] | 21
View 2 replies
Trey Xavier
Do you know what a "covert contract" is?
It's an unconscious expectation you have that once you do something, you'll receive something in return. Your action will result in a reciprocation of some kind from someone or something else.
The only problem? There's no real "contract", because it's based on an unspoken assumption - so the outcome is usually disappointment.
Example 1 -
You take out the trash and do the dishes this week, and you think your roommate will, therefore, do it next week.
Result:
They do not. You begin to resent them while you take out the trash and do the dishes again. They have no idea why you're mad.
Example 2 -
You think that once you have enough riffs, you'll be able to put them together into a song. You write 100 riffs.
Result:
You have 3 riff salads that kind of resemble songs, but really 0 songs.
You see how these kinds of unconscious assumptions can be very harmful to your creative process?
This is one of many default counterproductive mindsets I have observed in musicians who want to be songwriters - they wind up operating under a false belief and wasting YEARS, with nothing to show for it.
It made me SO. MAD. seeing talented artists hamstringing themselves like this that I decided to do something about it.
Result:
I made a course that won't just turn you into a song completion machine with exact, proven methods - it also corrects this and many other self-defeating mindsets you might not even realize are holding you back.
It's called SONG FINISHER
and it's available now at a HUGE discount for a short time for the launch.
Those 100 riffs? That could be 100 songs - and I'm gonna show you how.
Click here to enroll in Song Finisher for 50% off: bit.ly/GETITFINISHED
I'm ready to help you show the world the music you've got inside of yourself - if you are.
Stay Squishy,
Trey
2 months ago | [YT] | 29
View 2 replies
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