Past & Present: An Artist ('19)

One of the most amazing parts of the MV community is our alumni who have gone on to create and do extraordinary things. In this new ongoing series, we'll be interviewing different alumni about their past aka how their MV experience was and how it shaped them and their present aka what they're doing now.

Part 1 - Past

Q：What do you think of your time at Monta Vista?⁣

A: I think I had a different experience from while I was [actually] in Monta Vista and [just] looking back now. I think I didn't really take a lot of time to enjoy the whole high school experience. I was just kind of trying to get through to the next day and not be too stressed out. But looking back, I had a lot of good times. I just remember being very stressed. Especially for me, trying to do music and all that, [there’s] just a community pressure and pressure from the people around me [...] But I definitely found a lot of joy in just figuring out and navigating that space, mostly thanks to the friends that I could rely on as well.⁣

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Q: Do you think MVHS prepared you for the real world and where you are now? ⁣

A: I don’t really want to give too much credit to the school itself, but I think when we're talking about Monta Vista, a lot of times we're talking about just the experience of everything combined. You know, not just your teachers, but your friends, the students around you and the whole environment. But I would say definitely, Monta Vista prepares you for college. In terms of the academic rigor of colleges, a lot of my friends have had an easy transition in that sense, but a lot of my friends in college right now also have trouble with transitioning socially. That might be a more general thing when it comes to going to college, but yeah, Monta Vista does do a decent job of preparing [students] for the future. ⁣

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Q: What’s one of your favorite memories from MVHS?⁣

A: When I was a sophomore and junior, I had this band called F115. We used to practice [at] lunch and perform locally. I remember during that time, I had a lot of things that I was very happy about, like the fun times where during lunch we would rehearse. We would just fool around the whole time and eventually, [we’d get] kicked out of the room because we were way too loud, but I look fondly on those times. ⁣

Q: What’s one song to describe your time at MVHS? ⁣

A: ‘i’ by Kendrick Lamar, and I just say that one because I remember my band did a cover of that song and listening to it so many times in sophomore year.

Part 2 - Present

Q: Who are your inspirations?

A: The first kind of music that I really got into was jazz music. Definitely artists like the Pharcyde and A Tribe Called Quest are big inspirations just because of their ability to combine different styles of music into hip hop, which is something that I try to do a lot of the time. In terms of other inspirations, [one] would definitely be Korean American rapper Dumbfoundead. He inspires me because not only is he Asian and in this hip hop space, but he kind of came into hip hop with a different perspective, [a] different story and he wasn't a typical gangster or hardcore rapper. He had a lot of humor in his music, and I also like the way that he tells stories.

Q:What type of music message do you want people to hear?

A: I definitely try not to come off too preachy in my music. I wouldn't want songs to sound like PSAs [...] But just generally speaking, I think I want people to hear stories from places that they might not have heard from before. Just being an Asian kid from some random suburb definitely does not sound very interesting on paper, but I think there are a lot of stories just from random places [...] and I think is my goal to make those stories interesting to people. As people, we do a lot of the same things. We all have friends. We have people that we share experiences with and all that. For me, I try to bridge the gap between listeners.

Q: What are you up to now after graduating?

A: I'm taking a gap year just to figure out what I want to do. The past six months [I was] in Los Angeles just working and learning to be independent. Because of quarantine, I had to come back home for now, but I’ve just been working on music and learning more about myself and trying different things.

Q: What type of music are you working on?

A: I just released a beat tape, which consists of just instrumentals. I think right now, I'm working on a rap project. I really don't know any of the details and I haven't figured any of it out, [but] hopefully I can string some songs together for that.