Jamison who goes by the alias Teen Daze, told me this story, while comparing his small town of Fraser Valley, BC to the closest metropolis city, Vancouver:
“Early one morning a couple of my friends were woken up by the sound of screaming in downtown Vancouver. My friends got up, looked out the window and noticed it was a single person standing there that was making the noise. For no apparent reason, this person was screaming at the top of their lungs,” said Jamison. “The most I hear at home is trains in the distance, or coyotes,”
Perhaps his serene upbringing around this natural sound is why Jamison’s music (and personality) is so comparable to its calmness, and organic ambiance. His ultra-chill music is finding it’s way into the larger cities like Pittsburg, Montreal, and Toronto.
I had the chance to speak with the insightful Jamison before his Toronto show at The Drake on Sunday July 8th. We decided to go into The Drake Underground to chat. As we talked, Radiohead’s In Rainbows album exuded from the speakers and a lit disco ball slowly spun illuminating the room with tiny light beams.
So I just wanted to start with you telling me a little bit about yourself.
In 2008 I spent about three months studying in Europe in probably like four or five different locations. The most amount of time I spent was in Switzerland, probably about two hours from Geneva. It was right in the mountains in this really isolated community. It was a very self directed study so I just read all day and then it was sort of a community focus too, so there was only like 30 students maybe at the most, so we’d work half the day and study the other half and that would sort of switch. Work was you know, clean the chalet or if any sort of landscaping needed to be done, or any of that kind of stuff. Yeah, it was pretty peaceful experience I’d say.
Where did you hear about the program?
So it’s a part of the program I was taking at the school that I went to outside of Vancouver. It’s actually one of the draws for why I even wanted to go to that school in the first place. It was really cool, it wasn’t like an exchange program it was almost a semester of travel class basically because we were studying at these different places. We also learned now to travel basically. Which now is very useful, considering I spend many months out of my year travelling.
Do you feel like your music changed before and after you experienced that?
Yeah totally, I had been making music and playing in bands and doing that whole thing for years before. But with that experience I found I learnt a really valuable lesson about taking the things that I was studying and the things that I was trying to work through in my mind and using music as a way to sort of help answer those questions. So studying postmodern philosophy in Switzerland is an example of that. If I spent four hours in one book I have all of these things going through my head and like, for some people the process of dealing with that would be to, for example, write a paper. If it’s your thing, writing a paper is a good way to formulate all of your thoughts and organize them, and for me music is how I deal with those big things going on in my head. (As Jamison is saying this, the eerie opening guitar notes in Radiohead’s Reckoner beam through the house speakers, and Thom Yorke’s seductive voice makes me smile).
You seem like a pretty deep person.
I suppose I mean I’m just, a normal 26-year-old like everyone else I guess. Those types of big questions have always sort of challenged me. I’ve always been more interested in getting deeper into things than just letting it be just this passive sort of you know, experience.
Yeah, I’ve noticed a divide of those kinds of people that are looking for a deeper meaning and those that are happy with the way things are.
I went to high school in a really small town and you see those people that will literally never leave that town. And people find happiness and they find peace in that and that’s great. I mean I’m in no position to critique someone’s life choices but at the same time it just wasn’t for me and I understood that there is a bigger world out there and I’ve always sort of had this wanderlust. Now I basically get to pursue that for a living. I’m feeling pretty thankful about that.
So you just released your first LP titled, All of Us, Together.
Everything that I’ve made before, I probably wouldn’t have enough material to put out a full length album. I’d always get really choppy at the end of it. I would have ten songs and say like four of these are bad, they don’t work so I’m just gonna put out an EP and for this one I made like 20 songs and said ten of these are bad, I’m gonna make an LP sort of thing. I had to teach myself how to edit basically because for the longest time I would finish ten tracks and I would be like, okay it’s done there’s the record, on to the next thing and I guess. I’m happy that it’s a virtue I’ve sort of learnt over the years because I think I’m getting better and I hope people are liking it more and more with every release.
The blurbs on your website under your album A Silent Planet, you said that you hoped your old fans enjoyed this new album because it’s different than the others.
I’ve always sort of done that even when I was just making stuff in my bedroom for no one to hear basically. I just really admire those people that can just reinvent themselves with every record. Like Davie Bowie or Beck, or Radiohead. I just really like that concept of always evolving or always changing things up and I just tend to jump around with what type of music I’m listening to. So if I’m listening to a lot of electronic music I’m going to be more inclined to just write electronic music and if I’m listening to folk music then I’m going to want to write a Fleet Foxes record or something like that. And so because I’m always hearing different music, and it’s I feel more comfortable switching things up than doing the same thing over again.
So what were you listening to when you made this new album?
There’s a guy from San Francisco under the name Tycho, he was a big inspiration on this record. (Cue the opening riff from House of Cards). I’m a huge fan of his. And there’s a house producer from Sweden called The Field, and his sort of vibe is like, taking songs and cutting up really short samples and just putting a really soft pulsing beat behind it. It’s very repetitive but he creates these incredible atmospheres. Anyone that could take a medium like making music and turn it into something that evokes or stimulates other senses, which is what both of those artists do very well I think. That’s always been something I tried to do is just create a vibe or some sort of moment or something like that.
So when I was driving down here, my sister asked, I wonder if he’s doing drugs right now, or what he is doing right now. So do you have any rituals you do before you play a set?
(As he laughs) Not really no, no I’m pretty straight laced guy. I like reading National Geographic. There’s one on the merch table I was reading it earlier. I’ve been really lethargic tonight for some reason. It was one of the longer drives that I’ve done on this tour so far. So I was pretty tame tonight. Normally I’ll maybe have a beer after my set. I’m more inclined to drink after I play rather than before. Just because I don’t want to be one of those like sloppy like (drunk face) artists. But it’s normally pretty simple, there’s nothing like doing blow off of the green room tables or anything like that. It’s quite chill.
I feel like your music reflects that vibe.
Yeah, I’m a homebody. When I’m at home I’m not like, out clubbing. I’m sort of just a nerd that sits at home on my computer and you know, makes tracks and stays home.
So what are some of your other interests?
In the last four, five months, when it hasn’t been raining at home, I’ve really gotten into playing tennis. Which is sort of like a weird thing. My girlfriend has a court really close to her house so we play tennis a lot. And I like the idea of cooking. I really like good food, but I’m not really good at cooking. I’m more of like an assistant in the kitchen.
So your girlfriend cooks and you’re the one that passes over a spoon?
Yeah, yeah, and she is a really good cook to so I try to help when I can and also stay out of the way as much as possible. But yeah, anything like digitally related. I really like shooting 35mm film and any sort of design work. A lot of design work that you’ll see in any Teen Daze stuff I usually do by myself.
Was that your work on the new LP?
Normally for the bigger releases I’ll go to friends that I respect and I think they’re really talented. The new record art was done by my friend Nathaniel who does a lot of collage work. I was a big fan of his work before I became friends with him so I feel pretty lucky. The process of getting that was the most amazing thing for me because he had e-mailed me and said he’d been listening to the new record literally nonstop, he’s said it’s the only thing he’d been listening to for two weeks and he’d been working on something. He sent me this e-mail with this really long story telling me he went through 20 different drafts and he said it’s last minute and I know that this is probably gonna be it and if you don’t like it then you know we’re sort of at a standpoint and I just really you know put all of my… It was really emotional. So I opened the link hoping that I’d like it, and I saw it, and thought it was perfect; that it was exactly what I wanted.
Did you voice what you wanted to him?
I told what I wanted visually for the record and yeah I think he killed it. Every little detail about it I just love. Even the writing on it, he got a friend of his that studies type to do all of the writing. Even the type on it I think is perfect.
It just fits.
Yeah it might sound weird that I’m nerding out over my own album art. I’m just such a big fan of his that I feel really honored to get to work with him.
Do remember exactly what you said to him about what you wanted?
I knew that there was this sort of running theme. I wanted to write a record that had this vibe of what would music sound like that was sort of envisioned by people in the 60’s, you know that sort of like Jetsons utopian future. Like if that’s the future that we were living right now what would a record in that day in age sound like. I wanted it to be really optimistic and really hopeful and yet still synthetic at the same time; still a digital album but you know having emotion and positivity in it.
I think that’s another part of music being an extension of things that I’m working through and just the idea of getting to the philosophy side of things. I studied postmodernism and I think we’re living in a postmodern world and I think that that’s a great thing and an exciting thing. But I really like the idea of this theory that called postmodern constructivism. With postmodernism it’s all about tearing down everything, it’s a reaction against modernism. It’s all about completely destroying the hold and deconstructing. But I really like the idea of individuals retaining that individuality which is a modern trait but using it together for something good, which is a postmodern trait. So it’s just this weird conjuncture of two very different ideas but we’re living in a world where different ideas are completely up to the individual. Everyone has their own ideas of what they believe and what’s right and what’s true and even though that creates individuality and separation, I like the idea of all those individuals sort of coming together and working. That’s why the record is called All of Us, Together because it’s this idea that because we live in a postmodern world and because the internet is the way it is it’s so easy to be isolated. But there’s a lot of value and a lot of positivity and good that can come out of a live show.
It’s really cool to be playing music at this time where everybody is so friendly and even doing interviews or meeting up with bloggers and stuff it’s all like, everybody is just fans of the music. Being a good person goes a really long way in this day and age.
Positivity seems to be your mantra.
It’s definitely my own personal thing to do what I can to just bring some positivity and to do something that’ll bring people together. There are definitely some artists that that’s their mantra as well but at the same time everybody’s got their own story, sometimes people have the right to be jerks to other people for whatever reason, I don’t know.
When did you start making music?
I just finished by BA wen I started, so I was 24, so I’ve been doing it for about 2 years. I had just graduated and was working on music as a procrastination tool I guess, and put some stuff online and then the next thing I know this opportunity to do music presented itself. It was great timing, so I’ve been running with it ever since. I quit my day job at the smoothie stand and here I am. I could go for a booster juice right now. I actually really dug it. The summer before I started doing Teen Daze stuff I worked like 2 shifts a week and I literally just got enough. It was the first summer I was doing teen daze and I would play like one or two shows a month to pay for bills and rent and then I would work 2 shifts just for the free smoothie basically.
So you had a little card when you’d go in?
Oh not even. After I quit they were so excited that I was doing music that every time I walked in there they’d just be like oh, we’ll make you one don’t even worry about it. It was amazing. But now I don’t think I really know anyone that still works there.
So no more smoothie hook ups?
Now I have to pay for them, and it’s a total drag.
A man then stopped by and told Jamison he had about three minutes until he had to go on stage and do his thing. We finished by talking about the weeks ahead, and even when he found himself thinking about the late nights and early flights, he had this aura of optimism that seems to be conveyed in the whole package of Teen Daze from the music to the album art. Even the name itself could mean something different to everyone. Like that freeness you felt when you were young, or that growth you realize after you leave your teen years. Or maybe it’s just an inside joke. Either way, I’m sure Jamison would appreciate the listen.
You can find more Teen Daze at the links below
https://www.facebook.com/teendaze
You can also check out his music video for Treton below
Interview By: Stephanie DePetrillo
