GOD FORBID’S DALLAS COYLE ON ARTISTIC EXPRESSION IN ALL FORMS OF ART
Friday, May 9th, 2008 at 4:47pm by Dallas Coyle
Growth: Inside and Out
Being an artist is a rough deal. Don’t get me wrong, it’s the best thing in the world to be a creator of things, but the hardest part about being an artist is the lack of having a manual or playbook. It’s not like sports where you have a play you run or working at Borders or McDonalds where there is a set turn-key program of how the business works. Whether you’re a musician, writer or painter you make your own playbook as you create over the years and start to recognize what your voice is. Once you have your guidelines of how your art works it becomes easier to a certain extent but it also becomes more difficult to stick to those guidelines.
Take Hatebreed or Motorhead for example. They have a way they do things for years on end while establishing a hardcore fan base because they respect their general guideline for what they do. Our band is a little different. This has been our first band for the most part, so through out the years we’ve been honing our sound and changing with each album. Our newest unreleased album is the most refined record we’ve done to date because we’ve been able to establish our own set of guidelines for ourselves. Throughout doing this I’ve noticed something that this is sometimes hurtful to personal growth. When you attach yourself to your ‘idea’ of who you are as an artist it can become anchored in the art you’re doing at the time and you sometimes forget that your talent spans all types of art.
In 2002, we did a headlining tour for Determination and we brought out Avenged Sevenfold and Bleeding Through. These bands are huge now, but when we toured together none of us were well-known. The tour from our perspective was so bad that I thought about quitting the band. In those moments of thinking about quitting I latched on to writing films when we were off the road, while God Forbid was on down time. I guess it was a back up plan so-to-speak, but writing films is not any type of stable back up plan. I recognized that art is art whether you can turn an apple into a Sesame Street character or write kick ass metal songs.
If you’re currently in a successful endeavor don’t ever stop thinking about branching out and seeing how your unique talent applies to other types of art. The worst thing I see in a lot of aspiring artists is when they are so ambitious in getting that ‘one’ thing going they forget that there are other things they can and should do to add to their personal artistic growth. When Rob Zombie came out with White Zombie it was awesome. Everyone liked White Zombie when I was growing up listening to metal in the 90’s. When White Zombie broke up I was disappointed because I wanted to hear more stuff from them. But when Rob Zombie came out as Rob Zombie, something was happening for him that I didn’t see until now. When he was able to separate himself from the White Zombie brand to create his own brand it allowed him to go after the other things he wanted to do. Rob Zombie is a successful film director. Whether you like his movies or not, moving on from White Zombie to become Rob Zombie really expanded his horizon.
It’s awesome being in a band. It’s awesome to be a writer. But once your art defines you instead of you defining your art it can become a trap. I want a lot of the artists out there to think about what else they do really well. If you’ve been in a band for five years and it’s not been going to your liking, try to find something else that is exactly like playing music that you can do on your own. Music is self expression. You can express yourself in many ways as an artist. I express myself as a film writer and film junkie. I want to direct. Through learning the craft of film it’s made me appreciate music a hell of a lot more. I also realized that every artistic craft has basic principles for you to do well. If you take up something besides what you’re doing at the moment, you may recognize the things you aren’t doing in your current venture. Branching out may help you in succeeding with the project you may be struggling with. Once you’re able to see yourself as a personal artist who needs to express yourself you may see things from the outside in instead of the inside out when it comes to the project you may be struggling with.
Don’t be held down by your ambitions. Spread your wings and see what else is out there that will fuel your fire for your purpose!
HORNS!
Well, that was pretty un-controversial.
It could be argued that many artists do play by a set of rules, especially in a creative sense.
[...] God Forbid guitarist Dallas Coyle recently talked about expression ones self via art in his latest entry for his weekly column, “The Hard R” at MetalSucks.net. [...]
Dude, I’m in a band that has no aspirations other than to entertain the locals and open for acts coming through town, but every song we write is a an exhilarating joy! And I am perfectly content to keep it that way. But I would never have started the band if I hadn’t first hopped on stage with a friend’s band. And I wouldn’t have done that if I hadn’t auditioned for a play and gotten the lead a couple of years earlier.
So yes, you’re right Dallas, you do have to “spread your wings”.
Good post!
Good post, but I feel like what you said has been said in previous posts.
And what happened to the vehement controversial stuff?
Well sir, its a blog. He writes about whats on his mind or what he sees as relevant.
Good post.
Isn’t this the same guy who championed not changing your sound to harder, better, faster, stronger? Sorta hypocritical to say that then this… I mean if I were in a metal band I would probably want harder, faster stuff with every album I did because that’s what I like, and I’m not going to stop doing it just because Meshuggah can do it better than I can. That’s just my “artistic” desire. My ambition is to be a faster, heavier band. So which one is it? Follow your dreams or don’t try something because meshuggah’s better?
Dallas is the man.
Ben, I think it’s more about originality. If you want to be successful and relevant, you can’t just sound like every other band thats around. It’s about having your own identity in the sound as well, and not trying out as something thats already there and made.
I’m not in a band, or anything like that, but I do know what you mean. I am an artist because I draw and do pyrography and such, which also doesn’t have a play by play. You can buy books or whatever that teach you “how to draw,” but they are mostly teaching how to mimic. It is difficult to learn how to really express yourself through your art, be it drawing or music. You strive to find your style and take that style to new lengths, without mimicking anyone or expressing what someone *wants* to see. You have to focus on expressing yourself and who you are or who you want to be, or expressing the emotions you feel or that you want to portray…and all the while everyone around you is wanting something cute, or dark, or whatever and you are trying not to simply cecum to their expectations of you and your art. It’s hard and annoying, but ultimately worth it if you can pull it off.