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09/16/2022

Indecision by The Stains of Leisure: Video

Portland-based multi-media artist, The Stains of Leisure, released the new short film for the song, “Indecision,” the first single from his forthcoming debut album, ReInvention.

We are told:

Portland, Oregon-based multi-media artist, The Stains of Leisure, released the new short film for the song, “Indecision,” the first single from his forthcoming debut album, ReInvention. Production of the film was funded in part by the Regional Arts & Culture Council.

Down inside it’s hollow
Where light cannot follow
We swim out of the shallows
Into the quik and the marrow

The film opening is set to the above lyrics with Leisure drinking and smoking before donning a cheerful dragon costume to entertain a group of children at a birthday party. While moments of the short film appear playful and lighthearted, the song’s lyrics and arrangement tell a very different story.

“This project is about a crisis of identity and the negative words and actions we use to justify not following through on our vision. It’s how we abuse drugs and alcohol to cope with disappointment, or deal with our insecurities and other aspects of life that hold us back. At the time this was a real struggle for me,” says Leisure. 

Who are you kiddin’
Fuck all this dreamin’
No one will believe it
Just look in the mirror fuckin’ white man
Mic in my hand repleat with no fans
But damn I hear you whisperin’
You’re a joke man
Damn I hear you whisperin’

“The costume used in the film is a metaphor for how I felt about assuming the role of lyricist and MC and all the baggage that goes along with that, both internally and externally. When I wrote this song I was feeling super self-conscious about stepping into the role. It was easy to justify to myself that I was an outsider to the genre and would be perceived as a joke, a clown.”

Despite doubts, Leisure continually returned to the studio to work and rework the music. “I can think back and chart my life by what Hip-Hop records I was listening to, where I was, and what I was doing. So I do feel a strong connection with the music. But there was and is a real fear of presenting myself as someone I’m not, but I feel like I’ve really charted my own course in the genre. I’m not trying to be anyone else here. And I think that comes through in my work.”

Indecisions the prison
For the fire breathing dragon
That’s sleepin’ and dreamin’
deep inside of me

ReInvention originated from a project with Leisure’s previous band, Killing the Silence. The group disbanded after one vocalist was deported back to Canada and the other shifted focus away from music. Leisure was left with an album’s worth of music he’d written and produced but without any lyricists to collaborate with. “I was sitting on this really amazing album and felt like, shit, what am I going to do with this now? I wondered if I could pull it off, you know, write well enough, if my voice and flow was good enough, if people would see I was serious.” 

In the process of recording the album, he confronted imposter syndrome and criticism from within and without. “In our society, a lot of people my age work their mundane jobs and go home to sit on the couch and wonder what ever happened with their lives. As if still chasing your dreams at forty-seven is somehow irresponsible or a trope of middle age, and it’s been hard not to internalize that. This is just who I am, you know, I’ve always been an artist and had a strong need to be creative. The music is extremely personal.” 

To conceive the MC version of me?
To grind and believe in the dream?
Find my place in the hall of MC’s?
Or should I follow the underground scene?
Maybe take a note from Ace.
Should I just be me?

Like the album’s name, the concept of reinvention is familiar to Leisure. His professional life has undergone many iterations, spending nearly a decade working as a Sound Designer for broadcast television and film, including the hit TV show Grimm. While Leisure achieved a notable level of success, it wasn’t what he thought it would be. “Being a creative professional can be spiritually exhausting if you care about what you’re working on. And your creativity gets all wrapped up in paying the bills. I’m just trying to go back to my art being inspiring and spiritually rewarding, the way it was for me before all the responsibilities of adulthood,” he says. 

Never one to sit still or accept anything as static, Leisure is constantly in motion. “To be a creative person, it’s like I was made radioactive. And I have to spit this energy out; I have to get it out of my system and move towards a more stable state. Like how uranium eventually transforms into lead through decay. If I’m not creating, I’m bouncing off the walls.” 

Cold Hands of the creator
That left me radiatin’
Just disintegrating into this old man

In the film, Leisure’s use of his son as the birthday boy is less about the complexities that lie at the intersection of parenthood and artist than it is about articulating a message to his starry-eyed younger self. He’s exploring the tension between the person he’s become with the person his younger self thought he would be. For Leisure, it’s about trying to reconcile the conflict between those two versions of himself, both very real and present.

Indecision: is available now exclusively on BandCamp and iTunes, and ReInvention will be completed in the spring of 2023. 

Artist: The Stains of Leisure 
Single: Indecision
Video: https://youtu.be/gMM_qD_sYhI
Forthcoming Album: ReInvention
IG: @thestainsofleisure
Directed/Cinematography by: Elicia James

"Indecision" - lyrics

Down inside it’s hollow
Where light cannot follow
We swim out of the shallows
Into the quik and the marrow

Cold Hands

Of the creator
That left me radiatin’
Just disintegrating into this

Old Man

Who are you kiddin’
Fuck all this dreamin’
No one will believe it
Just look in the mirror
Fuckin’

White Man

Mic in my hand
Repleat with no fans
But damn I hear you whisperin’

You’re a joke man

Damn I hear you whisperin’

Indecisions the prison
For the fire breathing dragon
That’s sleepin’ and dreamin’
deep inside of me

Indecisions the reason
For the fire breathing dragon
that’s chokin’ on it’s venom
With no air to breathe

Indecisions the prison
For the fire breathing dragon
That’s seethin’ and  rippin’
Beggin’ me to let it free

Indecisions the reason
For the fire breathing dragon
That I slaughtered at the alter
of insecurity

Let’s take a walk
have a little talk
stalk the halls of
the industry’s museum of MC’s

Do you see the one’s that look like me?

A reflection of me

Self deprecating and masoginistic
A running joke obsessed with his small dick
An addict caged by opiate visions
A poet drowning in alcohol demons
Every fucking last one of them geniuses

But where does that leave us?
To conceive the MC version of me?
To grind and believe in the dream?
Find my place in the hall of MC’s?
Or should I follow the underground scene?
Maybe take a note from Ace.
Should I just be me?

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