Inside the World of One of Middle Tennessee’s Aspiring Young Creatives: Jacob Watson
- Feb 5
- 6 min read
By Grace Wilson
I met Jacob Watson at a show in a friend of a friend’s basement, a venue dubbed Ryman 2. Even before forming our friendship, I was keenly aware of his presence at similar events I would attend where I’d catch glimpses of a guy wearing a cardigan, a button up, and loafers in a sea of studded belts and Tripp pants. Now, Jacob and I meet about twice a week along with our other friends to make art and eat Cook Out. I’ve gained a good idea of who Jacob is through our sprawling conversations about music and books, but I still felt like I was missing some pieces. This profile felt like the perfect opportunity to fill them in.
Jacob was born in Jackson, Tennessee. He likes it here because it feels comfortable and the landscape is lush and diverse. Jacob says he had a pretty boring childhood. He grew up passionate about video games and Harry Potter books. His earliest memory was watching Scary Movie, specifically the scene where the killer stabs the girl in the boob and pulls out her implant: “I was really confused when I saw that as a kid. I thought it was glue.”
Jacob is an optimist. He wants to be a musician or a full-time vintage seller. He enjoys making mixtapes, creative writing, and hiking. When I asked my friends to describe Jacob, many of them floated words like: unique, resourceful, stylish, and productive. Jacob is studying communications at Columbia College and he says his life is taking a good direction right now. Without any further introduction: a conversation with Jacob Watson.
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The following interview has been edited and condensed.
You write a lot in your free time and have considered going to school for journalism. How do you decide when you're writing what makes a good song and what is too personal that it remains in your journal?
Normally when I write, I tend to make it about my feelings and other things going on in my life. But I think that those can translate pretty seamlessly into the kind of music I’m writing. I’d definitely say I write about everything. I don’t spare any details when I’m writing in my personal entries. I like to think I’m a pretty open book when I’m writing and I’m okay with saying just about anything to people as long as it won’t incriminate or embarrass me, but even some things that embarrass me I’m okay with telling people if I think that it will translate well into my art
You're heavily influenced by the late 60's and early 70's progressive period. Do you ever try to emulate that in your songwriting about current day phenomena, or does the influence manifest more in sound/melody?
The way I like to write songs is definitely influenced by the music that I listened to from that era, especially throughout the late 60’s where events like the Vietnam War and social protests were underway. The lyrics were very accustomed to the times of what was prevalent while still being able to keep an objective look and maintain that musical value that’s attained to it. I definitely would say I’d like to write music about current political and economic states of the world. I really like to write music that’s more fantasy based and whimsical, like how bands like Caravan have very fantasy-esque lyrics and song structures with fairly unique chord progressions. And I think it all just sounds beautiful and that’s what I aim to do when detailing current events in my writing.
You express yourself outwardly in the way you dress and internally with your writing. How do you combine these two outlets in other ways of expression?
Style is definitely something that has been very important to me. How you physically present yourself, I’ve always understood that as a very important way to define yourself in the world. And in things like how you shave, how you lay your hair, I’ve always taken notice of that in people through observing them and you can make a good profile of people just by noticing those things. So I’ve used that to construct my individuality and with things like writing it’s a unique way to express my identity. I’ve had identity issues since I was really young and I never really knew who I was until more recently especially once I started growing my hair out more. I felt like I started setting myself apart from others.
What do you look for when shopping secondhand and what types of pieces do you feel represent your style best?
I’m always on the lookout for vintage when it comes to selling and purchasing. But the process has become much more fine tuned just because selling that type of clothing is my main source of income right now. I’ve mainly been looking at sizes and interesting styles because I only really look for stuff that I would wear to sell. So I don’t tend to look for the smaller sizes in t-shirts even though I guess that’s kind of counterintuitive, because that’s where all of the money would be.
And then I do tend to wear a lot of the clothes that I would sell and that I plan to get rid of.
But, I would say right now I’m looking for old sherpa lined denim jackets, because that’s what a lot of the bands I’ve been watching live performances of tended to wear in the wintertime. Timeless pieces like that. I’m wearing this pair of 1980s Swiss Military spray camo pants that I got yesterday and the quality of older military styles and workwear tends to be much higher since the machines they used were much more delicate and careful.
I just like crazy looking clothing. I have shirts that just have maps on them, I have one that’s just a map of the entire state of Alabama. I like the pieces that you don’t really see on anyone else because those pieces, to me, are the ones that better represent someone’s personality and individuality. I definitely believe now more than ever in the age of fast fashion that you need to put work into what you style yourself with.
How do you navigate creating art in a time where performing is so integral for notice and exposure. Does that add any pressure onto your creative process?
I’ve definitely felt pressure from feeling like I’m too late to the game because I really didn’t know a lot of people who started when they were very young. And it’s really something that I started to just pick up on like 2 years ago. I’vc had to think about that sense of competition a lot because I have people around me who are my age who are far more successful than I am in music and even other avenues. And that’s something I probably would’ve been a lot more worried about 3 years ago or so, but I’ve developed more as a person. And so I think I’ve been able to take that feeling of pressure as motivation in itself.
But I’ve realized that there’s also a lot of people who are not doing nearly as much as me right now whilst they're at a similar stage of life as I am. So I always try to just think that even if I’m not doing the best, I’m doing work and I’m always trying to add 1% of effort into something that I’m working on. So even if I’m not making a crazy amount of progress on music, I'm still getting that practice in every day.
I’m trying to set a routine and to me that's the most important part of the process. Just making something a habit and working on something constantly until you fall in love with it. It needs to be something that you care about a lot and are willing to risk a lot for if you truly care about it.
How do you ensure that a project you start incorporates all of the elements you thought of in the brainstorming process and gets brought to fruition in the creation process? I know for me a lot of the general ideas I have when I want to begin creating something can get lost in translation when I’m left with the final product.
I do definitely lose a lot of the ideas. I don’t have the greatest memory. I’m always thinking of the future so past ideas tend to disappear from me.
But I’ve gotten better at observing that and trying to amend that habit by writing things down. I always try to record my ideas.
And then when I’m working on a song I’ll watch some of my old videos and I’ll get an idea for a line or a melody and it's kind of like a collage of every idea that I’ve had and then I can put those pieces together to make something full..
So I try to utilize all of those little ideas I’ve had, even ideas from other places like certain bass lines from songs or common motifs in music that I’m drawn to. I think in general it’s an interesting thing to take material and alter it to be something that comes from your own place of creativity and that can be your own.
