5 Questions With Rags #2: Alain Williams

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I think I met Alain Williams at a staff party for the Martlet, or something and though we didn't talk more than a few minutes, we were both intrigued by each others' presence at the time. Dude is into hip-hop and stand-up comedy (My favourites!) and is some kind of kung-fu warrior. He even has balls I can only dream of, getting up on stage and doing his own stand-up comedy - How cool is that shit? We haven't really struck up any kind of real friendship (For reasons that probably don't extend far beyond mutual laziness) but Alain's a homey, for sure. Props.

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1. If you had to choose between sight and sound, which one would you take and why?

 

That’s a tough one. Oh man. I will talk myself through this and come to a conclusion for you. I’m a big fan of visual art so sight is obviously very important. I thought I was going to be a visual artist before I found out I don’t have the patience for it. So, even now, I draw and do things like that but it’s had to take a backseat to everything else in my life. Sound is so potent though. I think it’s become more important to me than the visual has. I can look at something for a short time and be wowed by it and enamoured by it but then my attention goes elsewhere. Whereas with sound I’m basically addicted to it. I need a pair of headphones everywhere I go. The first day I got here to Vancouver my a cat chewed through my headphone chord so my roommate lent me her headphones. Any other time I would have been like, “Oh no, it’s fine.” But this time I was like, “Give me those fucking headphones.” Not even just for music, which is important, but listening to podcasts and stand-up and things like that. So I’m going to have to say sound.

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5 Questions With Rags #1: Dan Bern

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Not only am I proud to say that Bern is the first entry into this new (hopefully ongoing) series, Five Questions With Blake, I am overjoyed to say that Bern himself actually helped CONCEIVE this idea in the dark of Hermann’s Jazz Club in my hometown of Victoria, BC, after his show on October 3. The questions come from myself and four other fans that I spent the evening with, including my good friend and screenwriting guy Ben Rollo. In future I'm hoping to include not just musicians, but people from all walks of life and disciplines who might have some interesting things to say. But for now we start where everything seems to start for me, music. So, without further ado, I give you the first of this simple little thing that I hope is going be around a little while.

(Note: This was conceived and executed in the most impromptu of manners. I did not have a recording device of any kind, just a notepad and pen culled from other members of the group. I pieced this back together from hastily and terribly written notes.)"

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