Interview: Dylan Lloyd

Dylan Lloyd was born to be a musician. Since he was a young boy, the 22-year-old multi-instrumentalist heard music in his head, and not just nursery rhymes or tunes he’d absorbed while watching TV. He would hear fully orchestrated, original, music. Until he was 12, though, he couldn’t do anything with it.

That’s when he took piano lessons – a whole three months’ worth. “It was as if I basically said…hey, how do you fundamentally play the piano? The Teach showed me the fundamentals, and then I ran with it,” he said. He also picked up singing, guitar, bass, and drums.

Three years later he was the lead singer and piano player of south side band Pangea. Although he was young the limelight didn’t frighten him. “I thrived off of being the leader and the face of the band. I lived off of feeling that nervousness right before you got on stage in front of a packed venue.”

Being that young, I asked him how he kept himself motivated. “Motivation seems to be instilled into my soul.  It’s like…even if i
tried to slack in the music business…I couldn’t.  I hunger for more
people to know who I am and what I am doing,” he said. He feels that he’s been blessed and it’s his obligation to give that talent back.

“People are very receptive to a musician’s attempt to convey inclusive
messages.  If they can sense in your music sincerity, that you are
actually trying your best to include everyone’s concerns and everyone’s ‘yeah…i’ve been there before’ then listeners will automatically
enjoy your music and can tell who you are as a person just by what you
write about.”

Right now Dylan’s writing a lot about love. He’s engaged and has penned a song for his fiance, Katherine. “Writing about love is the best thing you could ever write about because
it never gets old or mundane.  When you think you’ve felt it all, love
will come right at you and say to your face…’You think you know, but
you don’t know’…that notion is just unequivocally inspiring to me.”

He’s also had to deal with pain. In addition to heartbreaks before Katherine, he lost his best friend because of his relationship with her. “But I can assure you, it was because of no wrong-doing on my part.  I
just believe that it was those pre-destined moments, where the
unexpected happens, and you find yourself in a situation that comes out
and yells ‘here is the love of your life’.”

To this day the music just comes to him. “I never force myself to write something…I could be randomly watching TV or cleaning up around the house with no music on and then all of a sudden I start to hear fully orchestrated music.”

Dylan’s music is often classified as “adult contemporary or modern pop with a jazz undertone,” but it’s more complex than that. It’s definitely easy to listen to, but I would never call it “easy listening” with the white-bread blandness that implies. You don’t have to trust me. Listen to him yourself, and then catch him at Grape Street on March 10 and at Uncommon Ground on March 11.