Jam Space Confidential with Chastity
Inside the emo-alt-rock frontman’s creative space where fashion and music collide - with our friends at Brixton.
by Maggie McPhee
Photos by Stephanie Montani
- Published on
Jam spaces come in as many shapes and sizes as the purposes they fill. Some bands use their sacred zone to demo tracks, others host parties to build energy they can channel into an album, and some just enjoy getting swept away by the endless permutations of improv.
For Brandon Williams, frontman of the Ontario emo-alt-rock outfit Chastity, his jam space is a haven where he seeks the solitude needed to woo his muses. He uses his corner of the shared artist space Fort Rose, located in Hamilton’s historic Beasley neighbourhood, to write lyrics. “It’s in the city, but it feels like a retreat,” says Williams. “It’s quiet enough that you can hear yourself think.”
Poetry got Williams into music as a teenager trapped in a conservative suburb, and it sustained his foray into punk and skateboarding culture. He pulls inspiration from phrases discovered in public, films, or memories, and jots them into 6700+ documents on his notes app. Like a lyrical doctor Frankenstein, he sutures these snippets into whole songs.
Chastity’s Brandon Williams is outfitted by Brixton Apparel.
“I start organizing and realize, ‘Oh, this thought actually belongs to this thought that I had in friggin’ summer 2021.’ And I can just map it out,” says Williams, noting that sometimes, “a verse is from five years ago and a chorus is from five minutes ago.”
Williams also used his jam space to prepare for Chasity’s upcoming Trilogy Tour. The show pares their albums, Death Lust, Home Made Satan, and Suffer Summer into a devilish 66.6 minutes. The set also runs synched to three short films Williams directed, scoring the visuals like an orchestra in the pit. Audiences will witness Williams’ lyrical motifs — suburban malaise, death, cop hatin’, and skateboarding — made visual.
The rest of Chastity is anything but a solo venture. Williams describes the recording and live band as a “rotating cast of pals.” Whether hosting a jam sesh or hitting the road, any number of Williams’ talented crew can sub in.
Community, after all, is what got Williams into the grunge scene as a teen. The music, lifestyle and people provided a much needed antidote to his church upbringing. It’s a world in which he lives and breathes, and like all of his friends, it shows up in his unique personal style. Williams combs Value Village for anything black, torn, or lived in. His look keeps him at arm’s length from mainstream society, in a place where he’s found his niche. “Yeah,” he shrugs, “I got rips in my clothes.”
Chastity kick off their Trilogy Tour April 4 in Portland, OR with dates in Vancouver (April 6), Edmonton (April 12), Calgary (April 14), Montreal (June 6) and Toronto (June 8)
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