What are you working on—on the side?
My side project is a band called Sunjacket. I play drums and electronic percussion in the band, and our music is a blend of dark, synth-driven pop and layered, experimental indie rock. The elevator pitch usually boils down to “dark, synthy indie rock.”
How do you manage to work on your side project(s)?
Since I’m a full-time graphic designer, a fair amount of evening and weekend time is reserved for my side project, as I’m sure many other folks in the creative industry have experience with. Whether we’re writing music, rehearsing for shows, or conceptualizing and designing album artwork, we all spend a fair amount of our free time working on band-related projects. We’re not on a label, so we have to be quite self-motivated in order to make things like releasing records happen. It’s challenging, but also really rewarding when we’re able to reach those goals on our own terms.
Why have a side project?
For me, having a side project is necessary to feeling creatively balanced. There’s certainly some crossover in terms of the headspace that design and music occupy, but they’re also very different, so I think I would feel a bit lopsided if I didn’t do both. Graphic design tends to scratch a more analytical itch for me, while music is a visceral outlet. Somewhere in the middle of that range is where I’m happiest.
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Diptych courtesy of Garret Bodette: portrait—Charlie Simokaitis, performance—Carl Hauck. Video by Ben Derico.
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Read more about the joy of side projects.
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