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thinking abt a zombie story i was writing w some friends years ago and i might just steal all the ideas and do something w it cause i dont think they ever will
#it was incredibly collaborative AKA i came up with all the cool stuff 💜#besides the main concept#being that the Group were all vidya players from around america who were itnernet friends#and when shit went to hell and the Grid went down one of them who was kind of a weirdo stalker finds them one by one#since they had already figured out where they lived (but never told them that)#i came up w the weirdo character. my beloved. their placeholder name was Vermont cause thats where they were from#also Vermont’s only friend irl who was also in the group went missing a few weeks before the initial breakout happened#and the story itself was like. YEARS after the initial boom. theres not a lot of ambulatory zombies left cause althey dont have shit to eat#so rlly its jsut a wasteland story with the occasional zombie issue#can reworkd that tho
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A N T I H E R O
Max Robinson and I are very busy people. I’m mostly preoccupied with papers, deciphering Socrates, you know, fun stuff. While I’m off doing my college thing, Max has other things in store. Things that are mysterious, things that are secretive, things that might shock people, or things that might make you laugh. Whatever they may be, It’s refreshing and comforting to see someone who takes so much pride in their work. In between our messy lives, I got the chance to meet with Max over a Skype conversation. He recounted his day to me, about how he did sound monitoring for a comedy event called “Tinder Live” and saw Rick Astley all in one night. It was quite a contrast to my night of sipping an Arizona green tea and frantically finishing drafts of papers. The conversation carried on, with musings of stand up comedians we like, musicians we’ve played with, etc. The most important part of this conversation was Max’s main project, A N T I H E R O.
Max is a person of many talents, he has so many ideas that he wants to communicate to the world. I’ve known Max for about 7 or 8 years, so it’s no secret to me he has something up his sleeve. The idea is to get down to the main objective. In this great big world, what exactly is Max trying to accomplish? What is this mysterious character he’s created setting out to do?
The story of A N T I H E R O takes off from humble beginnings. Max’s childhood was a mobile one. He recounted to me the different places he’s lived , including Ohio, New Jersey, and Tennessee. After moving around numerous times due to his parents jobs, his family settled in Huntington, Maryland . I continued to ask him about school and his life in Maryland, which yielded some interesting responses. “ A ton of crazy shit happened in my early days.” Max said to me. “In the third grade, I was really sick, so I missed out on a lot of school.” Max attended catholic school at a young age, but claimed that the overall setting and practices of the institution were “too weird” for him. It felt way too organized and pedantic, even at a young age. As a result of this, he was mostly home schooled until middle school.After that, we talked about his high school days and how he started getting into music. Every artist has to start somewhere, and every beginning is different,(albeit some weirder than others.) I asked Max about his first musical endeavors. With a chuckle and an “oh man” he told me about his first project, modestly titled “Max the band” He described it dismissively, detailing how nothing really came of it. “My friend gave a cracked copy of FL studio(a popular music software), and it was basically just me messing with presets within the program. At the time, I thought it was awesome.” “Max the band” eventually turned into what would be known as “Justabit Majestic,” in which he started to release his music publicly. I remember listening to “Justabit Majestic” regularly back in the days of Myspace,(coincidentally how I met Max in the first place.) and reaching out to him. We became really good friends as we were creating similar styles of music and we had a lot in common.
After several years of putting numerous tracks online and playing local shows, Max eventually graduated from Calvert County High School and attended Middle Tennessee State University to study music business. The days attended at MTSU for Max were a pivotal moment in his life. He eventually abandoned the “Justabit Majestic” moniker and started releasing music under his first name, Maximilian. Between studying hard, and playing shows, Max was steadily creating music and building a name for himself in the Murfreesboro music scene. At one point, Max entered in two sweepstakes to open up for mainstream acts such as “Skrillex” and “Korn,” in which he won and opened for these artists. “It was a surreal experience.” he told me “I just came out on stage[for Korn] and I introduced myself as Justin Bieber; they booed my whole set.”. While that was an unexpected experience, Max didn’t regret it whatsoever. Eventually, Max started to gravitate away from the EDM scene, as he felt it started to become “disingenuous.”. His disillusionment began when he started to notice the oversaturation of artists and so-called “rave culture” that tainted the scene and focused on the imagery rather than the art itself. Along with this, he graduated from MTSU with his BA in music business and moved back to Maryland with his family.
At this point in his life, Max found himself self reflecting. He graduated from college, moved away from the Tennessee back to his parents, and started working some not-so-glamorous jobs, including valet service. He eventually began working at a nightclub doing sound on late nights. In between all of this, Max felt a bit confused about his future for. I remember sometime at the beginning of 2015, I got back in touch with Max year and half hiatus. I was going through a pretty bad breakup and he was in his post-college slump, so it was nice to rekindle an old friendship. In between talking about the current state of our lives and other weird experiences, we started to talk about something we both loved, producing music. He started telling me about a friend he saw perform in Tennessee who utilized a Super Nintendo to produce some weird projections on-stage. Apparently, this is something called “VJ-ing”, and is very popular among the electronic music crowd. It’s essentially the same as DJing, but there’s a visual aspect that accompanies the auditory experience.The music performed by artist is typically synced visuals that one would associate it with. Max was inspired by this innovation of technology, and while he spoke of it briefly, I could tell he was motivated to create his own virtual soundscape. Fast forward to a year later, Max started performing regularly again, but there was something different about the image. He started posting links to new music he was producing on Facebook, along with weird visuals that seemed to accompany said music. Then out of the blue, there was a significant aesthetic change in which he donned a mask and started posting mysterious videos of himself. This is what would be the beginning of A N T I H E R O.
There are many words you can use to describe A N T I H E R O. At first glance, it seems mysterious, surreal, creepy, mystifying. Fortunately for Max, these are some of things he’s trying to accomplish as an artist. Max has many plans he’s concocting as A N T I H E R O that have yet to be unleashed onto the world. “I’m making my own dope Kool Aid, but I’m not letting anybody drink it yet.”, he jokingly described it. According to Max, A N T I H E R O started out immediately after he moved back with his parents. He found a collection of old VHS and cassette tapes and began incorporating them into his music. From there on, he started to experiment with video editing to develop visuals for his sets. As he worked on his craft, Max decided he needed a name for his artistic endeavors. “Initially I was trying to use the name of some company or start a lawsuit to get it popular,” Max told me, “I wanted to see how much of a big deal I could make something out of so little.” Unfortunately, Max didn’t stir up that kind of controversy, and decided to use an idea that he had in college. From then on, he decided A N T I H E R O was the personality he wanted to create.
The aesthetics and musical style of A N T I H E R O are an eclectic blend of sound and imagery that take listener on a journey to a different dimension. A lot of his music borrows elements of old school “boom bap” style hip hop, very much in the vein of notorious acts such as J Dilla and Flying Lotus. But what separates him from the bunch is the incorporation of a visual aspect. “I made a couple beats on a laptop here and there, and wrote a couple of raps.” Max explained, “But I didn’t want it to become a rap project, but I didn’t want it to become that.” Max then went on to tell me what changed the game was when he had access to different mediums, including VHS and old CRT TVs. Utilizing these resources, he repurposed these platforms and created this magnificent spectacle that he uses to create a sense of wonderment among his audience. Most of the shows that he plays usually contain him on stage, donning the signature A N T I H E R O mask and using his different set pieces to control the environment. He plans on turning his brand into more of a performance piece rather than something just strictly musical. Max told me of a time where there was some discrepancies between him and the promoter of a DIY venue. “Sometimes, if I don’t like the promoter, I’ll usually do things my own way. There are some people who get it, and some people don’t. There's supposed to be an element of irony or cheesiness to it that helps me get my point across.”. The irony of Max’s character is that hes essentially mocking these performers who take their alter persona way too seriously to the point where his character and performance borders on surrealism. In our conversation, he went on to tell me that he released about seven beat tapes last year and has an album written that has yet to be released. A lot of his music is released via different mediums, including VHS tapes. The main idea is to carry them in excess and leave them in certain places for people to enjoy and hopefully become inspired. Funny enough, the last time Max visited me he gave me a free VHS of his music that I still have yet to listen to, mainly because I don’t have a VCR. You can also find some of his music online for free that he releases regularly. Theres an extreme emphasis on accessibility with Max’s music, as he wants people to enjoy and bond over his work. Max continues to release music and do freelance video work for different clients, as well as himself. Whats inspirational about A N T I H E R O is that it’s a reflection of Max’s personality and work ethic.
Further into the conversation, I asked Max what A N T I H E R O meant to him personally. While this question didn’t pose a concrete answer, the response I got satisfied what I was looking to learn. He started talking about how A N T I H E R O is essentially a “personal business endeavor.” Hes looking to remain completely independent as an artist, but at the same time, help conduct business and build a community. He wants to be able to help provide for the different artist’s he plays with and create a name for himself. I asked him if he would ever consider partnering with a label, to which he responded “Right now, I’m just associated with people. I don’t like labels that are exclusive because it feels like you’re signing your rights as an artist over. Labels are cool for getting clout, but I don’t want to do that right now.” An important thing Max also stated about his personal brand is that he’s trying to make it as personal as possible. For a fair majority of 2016, Max was traveling up and down the east coast trying to promote himself and perform his work wherever he could. “ I really don’t give a fuck about making an impression on the internet anymore. I’ll post a picture here and there and promote a show, but when it comes down to it, I’m elsewhere.” Max is looking to travel more and eventually play with bigger acts, but right now hes still trying to build more of a reputation and perform his character wherever he feels is necessary.
As we talked on and on about his work as an artist, Max and I began to enter a different territory within the conversation. I learned that the ideas of the A N T I H E R O persona contained a little bit of philosophy within itself. Max started talking about the power of being an underground artist and how that influences others. The world we live in today is hectic, especially considering the current political climate. Max however is hopeful that we all can one day achieve some type of unity. He believes that there needs to be a “shift in lifestyle” and “maturity” in order for there to be some type of social change. These ideas that he holds are connected to A N T I H E R O as a whole. He wants to create a sense of collectivism with this character, and most importantly his art. “We are gonna be the generation that stirs up the racket. A lot of people have been singing the same songs, but I think that we are the people who finally heard it and are learning from it.” He proudly boasted to me. In conjunction to this, I feel that the number one idea that Max wants people to walk away with is the importance of self fulfillment. “For a while I just wanted to do music strictly, but I slowly learned that you need to be able to support yourself as well.” While doing art is important and a way to learn about yourself, you need to be able to sustain yourself under the thriving economic climate. Max was out of work for a while doing A N T I H E R O, but eventually found a way to sustain himself monetarily.
Max and I joked some more about our current situations and started to wrap things up. Within the next coming weeks, I hadn’t heard from him in a little while. I’d check snapchat every now and again, and I would see him at some obscure location enjoying himself. Where Max goes, he is always having a good time in whatever he does. I feel like I learned a lot from Max in our discussion and he continues to inspire me as an artist. Thats what I love about his personality, its so inviting and encouraging. If I were to name someone who has helped me find my footing as a musician, I owe a lot of that to Max. We’ve both been keeping at this whole music thing together and we’ve both grown a lot. Thats the beauty of it; if you keep at something long enough, you eventually get better. It’s also important to hold onto the people that helped you along the way because everybody’s trying to “make their own special brand of Kool-Aid.” While I’m trying to get through school and get my career off the ground, Max is continuing to build a name for himself. I know one day hes going to hit it big and find all the success in the world. Theres are plenty of tricks that Max has up his sleeves, he’s waiting for the right time to reveal the grand scheme.
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