Art & Life with Ali Adkins

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ali Adkins.

Ali, please kick things off for us by telling us about yourself and your journey so far.
I’m just a small town girl, living in a lonely world, who took the midnight train going anywhere. Grew up in Rocky Mount, Virginia where the Blue Ridge Mountains are. It’s an “everybody knows everybody” kind of town. I came from a gospel background singing and playing drums in church. To sing in the church, you had to slay all day. I was more of a background singer than a soloist because I had cousins who could sing you eight ways to Sunday. Acting is my first love – I had a dream of becoming the first black woman to win an Oscar for Actress in a Leading Role. Then Halle Berry took my dream. It wasn’t until I got older and went through some life experiences where I found my love for singing again and found my voice.

Can you give our readers some background on your art?
I am the band leader and lead singer for a rock band called Ali A and the Agency. We let the music do the talking. Rock n’ Soul is the best way to describe our sound. Myself along with my childhood friend Travis Prillaman ( lead guitar) make up the core of the band. We’ve played together in high school and college, and once we both found ourselves residing in Phoenix we had our Blues Brothers moment and decided for one more try to “get the band back together.” Having alongside us Pedro Cortes on bass guitar, Jared Michael on keys and Reggie Givens on drums has really allowed us to hone in on our sound. We make music because we would not want to be doing anything else. We want to invest in ourselves and create our music the way we want and share it with the world with no regrets. Some of our songs like “My People Are Dying” and “Ebenezer Scrooge” hit you with a political message. Some songs like “Saturday Inside My Head” and “The Earth Is Shaking” are simply meant to make you move. We really take pride in making sure our live shows are memorable ones. People could be anywhere else spending their hard earned money doing something else but they took a chance and chose to come to watch your band and support your art, so it’s vital that we are not in the business of wasting peoples time. Everyone in the band comes from a diverse background of musical influences, so the band truly is a melting pot and reflection of the diverse world we live in today.

The band artwork in terms of our primary logo was inspired by a few different things. I always wear shades and a scarf on stage. Everyone in the group represents some form of diversity which is reflected with the tie-dye. There was also a girl I knew in high school who would wear those tie-dye Grateful Dead t-shirts with the bears on them, and I just thought having tie-dye incorporated somehow would be fun in the afro. My dear friend and artist Tori Melson of Victoricanvas Artworks designed the band logo. We have also worked with local artists such as Hamster Labs in the past to create some cool poster designs. Our merchandise was made but vendors based in Arizona so we try to push and support local as much as we can when we can.

How do you think about success, as an artist, and what do quality do you feel is most helpful?
Art is subjective. Some folks will love your stuff. Some folks just won’t get it. That’s okay. Having no regrets and putting everything you have in terms of passion and spirit into your work is what makes it count. We don’t write music and then say “okay, we are never going to record and we are never going to play live” – that’s not us. We are in it to win it. We want our art to become our careers where we can make an honest living and support ourselves. So we put in the work now for the long-term goals. Planting the seeds and nurturing them to help them grow. If it’s not meant for us to play big festivals and have world tours then so be it, but it will not be due to lack of effort.

Artists, in my opinion, need some form of structure because we are such free thinkers it’s very easy to drift away and never come back to a project. So having goals with hard deadlines set to make sure no matter what we are doing this is crucial. Plus it keeps everyone involved accountable – no one can pull the “I didn’t know about this when it was discussed six months in advance, voted and agreed upon, and updated in the band calendar” type of situation. Artists also need to not be complacent. There’s always room for growth and improvement. Take private lessons. Listen to genres of music you’d never touch in your life to find inspiration. Have an appreciation for the musicianship from genres of music you’d never touch in your life. I’m not too crazy about metal bands, but when you think about a metal show and the technicality it takes to pull off those fast riffs and be locked into time together, it’s bananas. Listen to Dream Theater and tell me you can pull that off without having your ducks in a row as a musician. There’s no way.

Just do you. The rapper Future said, “you don’t make music for the radio, you make music to change the radio.” Don’t sell yourself short and never underestimate the power of one. You never know who is going to be in the room the night you play.

What’s the best way for someone to check out your work and provide support?
Please follow us on our social media channels:

Facebook: @aliaandtheagency
Instagram: @aliaandtheagency
Twitter: @aliatheagency
YouTube: @aliaandtheagency

Our first album is available now on all streaming platforms.

You can find it here – https://song.link/aliaandtheagency (click on the link and it will take you to the platform of your choice)

Our next shows and when you can see Ali A and the Agency live:

Saturday, March 23rd – Pho Cao, Scottsdale AZ
Saturday, April 27th – Rogue Bar, Scottsdale AZ
Friday, May 3rd – 93.9 KWSS Fundraiser, Last Exit Live, Phoenix AZ

Contact Info:

• Email: info@aliaandtheagency.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/aliaandtheagency
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/aliaandtheagency
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/aliatheagency
• Other: YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjWgDqMriQAbA1ogc9XYxXA?view_as=subscriber

Image Credit:
Photographer – Luxicon Photography

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