Jonathan Keyes plays concerts at Westwood Brewing Company and in
dorm study lounges, and he serenades passersby in the Westwood
apartments. While his ubiquitous presence around school may be a
bit overbearing, you can’t fault singer-songwriter Keyes for
a lack of vision. Ever since he was a kid, he’s been working
toward one goal, to be heard.
“I made my first demo when I was 13. I funded it and
produced it all on my own,” said Keyes. “I had a really
small budget so I called around a bunch of drummers to find out if
anyone would do it for free, but everybody kept trying to charge
me. Finally, the 49th one I contacted said,
“˜OK.'”
“So, I guess persistence pays off,” said Keyes, who
performs a free concert at the Northwest Campus Auditorium Tuesday
night.
Keyes, a fourth-year ethnomusicology student who began his
college years as a music business student at USC, isn’t
another walking cliche, writing his music with an idealistic career
trajectory that steers clear of corporate labels. The prospect of
signing on to a major label hasn’t been an issue yet, but
signing on to a independent one hasn’t been an issue either.
As a 21-year-old who is actually working on establishing his own
record label, you can safely say he’s someone walking his own
path.
“It’s a sacrifice,” said Keyes. “I
don’t spend money on what other kids spend money on. I spend
it on making records and trying to distribute them.”
Keyes, a native Sherman Oaks resident, has had a busy few
months. Responding to an e-mail sent out to all the ethnomusicology
students last year, he landed a gig playing at a five star resort
in Bora Bora, performing six times a week, all expenses paid.
Since his return, Keyes has been busy making a name for himself,
performing throughout Los Angeles, but mainly at UCLA. Since his
arrival at the school and departure from the USC music business
program, he’s acted on the fact he’s mainly the
artistic type.
“I had a professor tell me that he basically thought I
didn’t really need the program,” Keyes said. “He
suggested that I go out there and really go for the music, and
(concentrate on) playing and touring. So I took his advice and came
to UCLA. Now I’m a lot happier.”
In his recent studio sessions, Keyes has been eager to
incorporate new techniques into his sound, using the studio to
explore new avenues of recording, implementing sitar loops and
recording sounds backward. Playing live provides an atmosphere
where he has a similar sense of creativity.
“If I’m playing something live I can record it right
there and have it play back, and I can layer things on top of it
one after another,” Keyes said. “So it can basically
sound like there are six or seven guys behind me playing. Sometimes
I like to bring up people on stage and have them speak into the
mic. Secretly I’m recording them, and when they leave the
stage, I press play on my pedals.”
Now working on his third album, Keyes eventually hopes to make
time for other artists to thrive under his own record label.
He’ll embark on a tour in the spring, making stops at various
college campuses throughout the nation. It’s quite a change
from his earlier days recording as 13-year-old.
“It’s tough to listen (to those first recordings)
sometimes, because obviously I was really young at the time,”
he said. “But it’s enjoyable at the same time, because
I can see how I’ve grown. It’s kind of like looking at
old photo albums.”
Jonathan Keyes performs at the Northwest Auditorium with guests
DJ Dez and the Grizzly Peak Tuesday night 8 to 10 p.m. Admission is
free.