Interview With ‘The Allison Mixology’

Fun pop-punk songwriter Allison Mixology has been making secret hit records for years.  From six years of age, Allison has had a talent for music, starting with the piano, and then gravitating to guitar at fifteen.  She started her young music career when she created her first band, “She’s Automatic”, in 10th grade, and wrote her first song.  Fast forward to today, Allison Mixology is still making a name for herself, has self-released two albums, “Heart Pumped” and “Shaken Not Stirred”, toured acoustic bars around Manhattan, and continues to write stellar lyrics backed with acoustic punk goodness.

Amanda sat down with Allison Mixology, and talked to her a bit about her past, present, and musical future.

Amanda: What do you feel as you play music?

Allison: What do I feel?  I guess I feel whatever it is I’m feeling that day and might mean the songs that I choose to rehearse I guess would be related to how I’m feeling, um…I guess if that makes sense.  I just play how I feel at the moment and I guess it depends on how good and bad it’s going to be also, how good it’s going to Sound.

Am: I’m going to throw another question in there if you don’t mind.  How do you feel when your writing music? Do you write about like what your feeling is that what inspires you to write?

Al: Yeah, I actually usually write when I’m having a bad time.  Like its weird like if I’m really loving my life and everything’s great because I wont write barely ever.  I’ll play, I’ll practice, but that’s not what I’m writing.  I’ll just be chilling, and enjoying everything, but when I’m having downs, I feel depressed or I’m like having something that’s happening to me – that’s when I like write my best stuff. So, yeah I guess, I just usually write when I’m having a bad time in my life.

Am: So pain inspires you?

Al: Pain and heartache inspire me.

Am: So who are your influences?  Who is your role model in the music world?  Who are you inspired by?

Al:  I’ve always been into music.  I had so many different things that inspired me throughout the years.  I guess I can say this moment in my life I considered Alanis Morrisette a huge inspiration to me, and that’s something I can say ever since I was little kid.  I’m a word person and I think lyrically she’s just amazing, I love her songs, but I always thought that when it came to words, I was like wow, how do you think of some of this stuff?  I just always loved her. Amy Winehouse, I love her to death.  I think she was an amazing musician, bass player and singer. I loved her a lot. When it comes to like band and punk world, Alkaline Trio is one of my favorite bands.  I can say I’ve loved [them] for more than half my life.  When they’re in town, I go see them.  I love them to death!

I love Bad Religion, and stuff like that.  Basically, the older punk bands such as No Use For A Name, Face To Face, those are all the bands that like, if I was a guy, this would be how I would sound in this band.

I am really into Metric lately.  They have a girl singer and a great band. If I want to feel happy, they’re my go-to band.  I started to listen to them a couple of years ago, saw them live, they were great and I got hooked immediately, so I’m really into Metric!

Am: So, if you can do a duet with who ever you wanted, who would it be and why?

Al:  I want to say Johnny Cash, or like Frank Sinatra or something.  I think that I would definitely prefer that kind of sound in a man.  I like the boy-girl duets, and just the harmonizing you can do with the two voices.  I always thought that sounded cool from a man’s voice to a woman’s voice.  I can’t say for sure who I would pick like quick off the top of my head, but that’s who I was thinking like I would do something similar to that.

Am:  When did you start playing and why?

Al:  Growing up as a kid, my dad is musical when he was growing up.  He was a drummer in a band, then he played the guitar he sings, so when he had me, he sang in a barber shop quartet, and was a chorus conductor of a big barber shop chorus.  So, when I was a kid, my family would throw parties, my dad would be there with his barbershop friends, one of them played the harmonica with one note then they all would just acapella – it was really cool. You know when your like 10 or 12, early-teens, you want to bring your friends to your family party because god forbid you hanging out with your family, so your like, ‘Can I have my friend over?’.  I kind of thought it was cool to let my friends see how my dad is and that is what we do at our parties and listen to that kind of stuff, so I was around music forever.  When I was six years old, my parents put me in piano lessons, and I was classically trained with piano until I was seventeen.  God, if there’s one thing I regret in this world is I stopped playing, and I stopped taking lessons.  I am not nearly as good now as I was ten years ago.  I was really good – I would train weekly never stopped.  I did competitions where you get judged by certain things that we would have to do.  Every Saturday, we would have to do this.  I hated it; I cried, I was really nervous, but I’m really glad my parents pushed me to keep doing it, because you know when you’re a kid and you want to go out and play all the time you don’t want to get on the bus and go to piano lessons, but my parents thought that to make my kids go do piano lessons because of how beneficial it is.

Piano opened me up to everything to singing, playing guitar, writing songs. Like, the first song I ever wrote was probably when I was fifteen on guitar, then I started a band in high school in 10^th grade, it was called “She’s Automatic”, and it was me and this other girl and we had our two acoustic guitars we would play in shows.  I was the singer, and my guitar skills hasn’t really improved much since then, but I had my little songs, so I guess that’s when I knew I wanted to start playing and knowing that I would want to be this; play music and sing. I own a full-length keyboard that I still have in my room, that I don’t play a awful lot.  I wish I can say I played it more and play all the things I learned, but I definitely let it go a little bit and now I just do some simple things and add stuff to my songs with the piano.

Am:  What instruments do you play?

Al:  Piano, guitar…I played the clarinet when I was in elementary school, and then I graduated to saxophone.  I only played the saxophone just when I was in school as a kid.  I still own it, I just don’t play it.  Her name is Jenny and I love her.  I got her when I was in 6^th Grade.

Am:  Do you still know how to play it?

Al:  I don’t remember notes, I probably wouldn’t remember how to read music on it, but that can be refreshed immediately because I read music. Yea, so those are the instruments I play.

Am:  Do you have any advice that you would give to people just starting to play music who are nervous?

Al:  Yes! I was always like that, and I feel like the fact that I was nervous a lot and maybe not the most confident all the time may be the reason that sent me back into doing and being what I wanted to be.  Because I was a nervous person, I look loud on the outside, but like my personality is not like “look at me!”.  If you want to be in this business, or an actor, you have to be very outgoing and stuff, and I just feel like that was the one thing that held me back from taking my music further.

As I look back now, when I first started like how I would play, I did all this stuff and I was nervous and I still get nervous ’til this day, but I remember being more nervous back then and I just feel like if you want to be that, just have faith in yourself and believe in yourself and everyone gets nervous just know if you’re performing anywhere, whether in your basement or in front of your friends, there’s a reason that you even got to that point, so don’t be nervous and just be yourself.  I wish I would have known that when I was younger because I would just let my self conscious, insecurities and nervousness stop me from being who I thought that I can be. So I would just say its normal to be nervous, and be nervous, but fuck that shit  – perform and just do it.  Life is short, embrace your young years.  If people don’t like you, that’s not your problem, that’s their problem.

Am:  Who are your heroes?

Al:  My family.  They’re definitely number one to me all the time.  I have one brother, one sister, my mom and dad.  I am grateful for my parents staying together.  That’s very hard to do and it’s not a common thing anymore, which is understandable, but like I always felt very lucky that I grew up with my parents, who stayed married and are still in love. I love my family.  I consider all of them to be my heroes because they are the only ones who really matter to me.

Am:  Where did you grow up?

Al:  I’m from upstate, New York Orange County.

Am:  How hard do you push yourself?

Al: I push myself when I was actively playing, I would do the things that you would do when it comes to going to a venue , go there and [hand out a] flyer at the venue, flyer the bars around the place, advertise – I had all the social media. I had all that stuff because I was trying to keep up with people listening to my music, and when I record something, I would put it up and would want people to listen to it.  So when I stopped being active, performing wise, I canceled all my accounts just because, to me, I just didn’t have nothing to talk about anymore because at that point, I didn’t just want to say anything.  People would post up, “Oh, I just had a salad for lunch today”, I would just write funny things from here and there, but it was good to play and share music.  It was kind of depressing to me because I just didn’t have anything to say anymore and I was just more upset with myself.  All I was, was just working as a bartender, still playing but just not, being more shy about it and not really sharing the songs I was writing I was just doing it because that’s what I do like in my room.

I don’t really know how to go on the internet with my music because a lot of my projects, when I was doing it years ago there wasn’t as much stuff as there is now like, what people are listening to, things are popular, what sites your suppose to put your stuff on – I don’t really know a lot of that stuff, so I’m lost when it comes to the internet world, but if I knew and learned about it, I would be into doing it.  My days are free I work at night like I’m set.

Am:  Why did you decide to play the type of music that you play?

Al:  When I first wrote my first song I didn’t sit down and say, ‘This is what I want to sound like and this is how I want the song to come out.’  When people ask me, “Well who do you sound like?”, “What kind of music do you play?”, I just sound like me.  I’m influenced by the bands that I like.  It’s not like any song I would write.  I can write some songs and be like, “OH YEAH!”, but like I said I love the Misfits, and when I write a song, it’s like nothing like that at all, so, but then their songs I do write that are more rock.  I just feel like I don’t know who I sound like or what I sound like-  it’s just whatever comes to me, it just comes out.  I write songs like I said in the beginning based on how I feel.

Am:  Thanks for taking the time to do this interview!

Al:  Thank you!

Check out some other songs by Allison Mixology in the videos below, and be sure to download her latest tunes at www.getconquer.com/allisonmixology :

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