I got to hang out and talk with Alexander 23 before his opening set for Alec Benjamin at The Variety Playhouse in Atlanta last weekend! Check out the Interview below!
(Q for question A for answer)
Q: How has tour been so far?
A: "It has been amazing. Insane really because I didn’t ever play these songs for anyone before tour so playing it for shows of like a thousand people right off the bat has been just insane."
Q: So what’s the backstory to your name?
A: "So, I was born on the 23rd and also, I wrote almost all songs when I was 23 and I just turned 24 so yeah, it just kind of worked out that way. I’m also from Chicago and I love basketball, so I like to say I’m just doing music because I wasn’t good enough at basketball ha-ha like this is my only shot at playing the all-star game, so I mean whatever works."
Q: Talk a little about how you got into music and your path to where you are now.
A: "I was in like second or third grade and I saw my dad play guitar and I was like that’s super cool let me try that and then I tried it and hated it ha-ha then I tried it like a year later and then was like ok yeah no this is super cool. Then I just kept playing like in and out of bands and started my own music and stuff in middle school and high school and then dropped out of school to play in a band and was writing for other people and stuff which was super cool but it just wasn’t very fulfilling for me personally. So I wanted to start making my own music again and about 6 months ago I started writing this music that I’m playing now and yeah."
Q: Who are some of your biggest music inspirations old and new?
A: "As a kid growing up playing guitar, I listened to John Mayer a lot and I still do I’m a huge fan and um with recent stuff I love Tame Impala, Rex Orange County, Vampire weekend, Alec I’m a huge fan of, Nao omg Nao. She’s like the best singer of all time. You know when you hear something and half of you is super inspired and half of you is like well, I should just quit ha-ha yeah that’s how I feel about her."
Q: How would you compare performing as a part of a band V.S. solo?
A: "It’s wildly different, and I feel like the best way I could say it is the highs are higher and the lows are lower, so like if I mess up it’s so much worse but if I’m alone on stage and I make a crowd of a thousand people go insane then it just feels so good because you know that you did that personally."
Q: What has been your favorite part about touring?
A: "I think meeting all these people, and what’s cool for me is like well - there’s people who of course did their research and know the song that is out, but for me what’s really cool is most of these people don’t know who the heck I am and so I get to win them over in real time and I get to see the progression of people being a fan of me and liking the first song then the second song and being like ok I can get behind this then the third song and they are like ok yeah I like this guy. You know so yeah it’s very cool, I feel like it usually takes much longer to get to that point in a relationship with people but real time just makes it so much more fulfilling."
Q: What can we expect from new music? Anything coming soon?
A: "Well first of all, a lot of it. We have a ton of new stuff that is ready to go that I’m really excited about and it’s all just super honest stuff you know I never really write about stuff that hasn’t happened to me or I haven’t thought about for a really long time so yeah, I’d say it will be quantity and genuine. I feel like a lot of life happened to me in these past five years since I dropped out of school for music so until that runs dry I guess I’m just going to keep hitting it."
Q: What were you in school for before starting music?
A: "Mechanical Engineering, yeah so, it’s wildly different yeah but music is probably the only thing I wanted to do more than that... but I wanted to do it by so much more."
Q: Is there anything special on your mind you’d like to put out into the world?
A: "Hold on… I was saying something stupid earlier, but I think id like to put It out into the world… oh yeah, I think that backpacks should have hoods on them. Like if your walking from class to class and it starts raining then you’re set man. Except I don’t have time to do that right now so if someone sees this and they can make that happen that’d be dope. It’s been a dream of mine for a long time."
Speed Round:
Favorite Netflix show?
A: "Afterlife the new Ricky Gervais show."
Current Favorite song?
A: "Harmony Hall by Vampire Weekend."
Favorite dance move?
A: "I think uh… the worm, I’m a fan of commitment and you really have to commit to do the worm you can’t like half a** the worm then you just look like a dead fish."