The Obelisk Questionnaire: Blake Conley of Droneroom
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Blake Conley of Droneroom
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
Well, the easiest way to describe it is instrumental guitar music. It, at this point is predominantly improvised, though before it was composed, and loop-based. This shift happened at the end of a couple of years of hard work and a feeling of having painted myself into a corner. I decided to remove the corner and just see where my brain and fingers would take me if left to their own devices, so to speak. Initially it was all electric guitar based and pedal heavy, but I’ve been attempting to shed as many things as possible to really focus on the root idea and see how deeply I can explore it with the fewest number of extras. This has unexpectedly led me to incorporate more acoustic instrumentation and occasional dips into lap steel even as a means of simplifying
Describe your first musical memory.
Probably riding with my father across the country in an eighteen-wheeler listening to Marty Robbins. Going from Tennessee to California, the twang blaring and nothing, but a road and open landscapes has really seemed to seep into my psyche.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
Hmm… I always find the satisfaction of hearing back what you played and feeling like it really landed to be one of the most satisfying. Hearing how it may have changed for the better. Absorbing the full picture after only having the pieces is always one of the best things.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
Um…as a libra, I feel like my beliefs try to remain flexible to different points of view. I really try to never say never on a creative level because there are so many directions music can go and saying you won’t do something is generally what makes you end up doing it.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
Hopefully to becoming a more well-rounded player/performer. Any project or performance or interaction with anyone should lead to progress. You learn a new trick or idea. You experience a feeling you may not have before. Maybe it helps reaffirm something you already felt. The idea is always to improve and get further down to the core of your own voice. That doesn’t mean to shed yourself of influences necessarily, but maybe understand better how to work those influences into yourself. Even if improvements or adjustments are minimal or unnoticeable, they are there and should be embraced.
How do you define success?
That’s a funny one. Success for me is just… having something made and hopefully feel like it has been heard. Money is nice, but not necessarily the goal.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
A documentary involving a live birth.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
I suppose being in an avant garde country band or a krautrock band…or some combination of that. There is so much music that one could create, and I’d feel amiss if I didn’t at least try to see how what I do fits into that. I’d also love to score a film sometime, but I feel like most instrumental musicians would say that.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
I think it serves several. It can sooth you, it can excite you. I often enjoy music that feels anxious as that can often serve to cancel out my own feelings of anxiety. Music can be the forefront of an experience or work as the background/underpinning to life and its myriad of activities. Books can rearrange your thinking as well as film. And these ideas can then seep back into your music. Art should give you a feeling and that feeling can carry over to everything else in your life
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
For me personally, a relocation. Otherwise just whatever new book, film, or conversation I may stumble into. Every day you can learn something new or feel some way you haven’t before and that is what makes living livable.
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