First off, let’s get this out of the way… musicide’s real first name is Kevin. He is fancy so he sometimes capitalizes the “V”. Go figure, a pretentious Kevin. It’s mostly because he thinks it is a spiffy looking letter. He sometimes ditches the “i”, as well, so it winds up looking like “KeV_n”. It seemed cool at the time he started doing it, so whatever. Regardless, KeV_n gets to write his own story, so he can type in the third person with funky spellings if he feels like it. Anyway…

Kevin began his journey as a musician at the young age of five. He was not a child-prodigy, so that’s where we’ll end that.

KeV_n, on the other hand, began his journey as a musician at the age of ten when he composed his own arrangement of James Horner’s Star Trek II theme song. And yes, he is also a Trekkie, because he’s metal like that. Also, he apparently identifies as a Romulan. Whatever, KaVok.

In spite of his many years of piano lessons, he displayed an incredibly feeble inability to read sheet music. Nor was he what you’d call a “technically proficient” musician. However, he did often receive praise from teachers, and peers alike, for his ability to “play with a lot of emotion,” and to… wait for it… wait for it… improvise!!! With that, he now had a word that served a dual purpose in his musical life. On one hand, people thought it was very impressive. More importantly, it was an amazing excuse he could (and would) use anytime he’d screw up. He was improvising!!! Little Kevi totally meant to do that!

Though he took a great deal of pride in this newly-named ability, it didn’t change the fact that, like most kids, he still hated taking piano lessons. After many years of minimal improvement (an eternity to a kid), his first musical instrument would fall by the wayside.

Flash forward to age of 15, when Kevin discovered Metallica. There was just something about how James Hetfield played guitar that made KeV absolutely desperate to play music again… just not piano. For nearly an entire year, he begged his parents for a guitar, and he was finally gifted one for his 16th birthday. Fun fact, it is still the only electric guitar that he owns. It is his preeecioussssssss.

While Kevin loved playing Metallica, many of the riffs proved a bit challenging for a self-taught noob. Thankfully, on the eighth day, God created Nirvana! This is the band where he would hone his (lack of) skills as a guitarist. Add interests in artists as diverse as like Enya, Vangelis, Michael Jackson, Prince, Extreme, Nine Inch Nails, Pink Floyd, Living Colour and John Lennon’s solo work and there you have a really f’ed up group of creative seedlings which would ultimately sprout… KeVicide!! Thank god he didn’t call himself that. I mean, can you imagine using a made up word for your band name? ::shudders::

Kevin’s father was especially supportive in these early years, and once joyfully referred to his son as “My little Bobby Dylan”. Dylan was his father’s all-time GOAT, so that was a compliment he never forgot. To support his boy, KeVin’s dad put a great deal of thought, time & effort into building a small recording area, into the corner of their basement. This would provide a lab and a canvas for his son to grow in. The father would be the engineer, and the son would be the artist. A perfect pairing.

Sadly, just weeks after completing the little studio space, and hearing his son’s earliest attempts at composition, his father passed away. In the year following his dad’s death Kevin recorded nearly 800 minutes of music, pouring his heart and soul into songs, demos and conceptual fragments. From this point on, music would become KeV_n’s primary emotional outlet. For him, it was a true catharsis that would reflect whatever he was feeling in the moment, genre be damned.

And thus, musicide was born.