Teen’s music and acting affects the spirit
Jaxon Gaddis is a musician and actor. Photos submitted
By Tom Victoria
Jaxon Gaddis not only gives memorable stage performances, but creates haunting melodies.
The musician, whose moniker is ItsJustAGhost, explained his love of the craft.
“Music is important to me because it voices the feelings that I can't explain using words,” he said. “I love learning new instruments and giving them a voice to tell new stories. I think music is an experience, a feeling and a story rather than just a sound. I try to use those key ideas to write and produce every song. I absolutely love giving instruments a voice to tell my story and to express how I feel, even when words can't describe it.”
Jaxon, 18, of Florida described his style.
“I would say my music is written through my head,” he said. “I write music from the space that I'm in when I think of a melody or when I think of lyrics. But I think production wise and stylistically speaking, I would say it's very much a mixture between acoustic, ambient and kind of a soundscape. So what my goal is for when I'm producing my music is that I like the feeling of when you're listening to a song, there's a specific downbeat or a specific section in the song where it hits really hard for the listener, and it almost makes you want to feel like you want to float. I really like the feeling of when you're listening to something, it's like ear candy where just nothing is missing from a song. And I really try and incorporate a lot of synthesizers in my work because it's what I first started doing when I was learning producing, and it's honestly where my heart is. So I try and incorporate that into my acoustic style as much as possible. But I would say if I were to put it in a genre, it's mainly R&B (rhythm and blues). It has the vibe and the tempo of R&B with a little bit of lo-fi hip hop to it just because of the energy level of my music.”
Jaxon’s debut album Therapy was released in November. There are 12 songs with an intro and an interlude. He explained the thematic connection of the music.
“I think my overall goal for the album was to describe how I had been processing my life and my relationship from a production that I did after my senior year of high school,” Jaxon said. “And a lot of things went wrong socially with that, and it caused a lot of issues. I couldn't talk to anybody about it because everybody had their own opinions and everybody would be trying to push their opinions on me. And it was like I didn't know what I was thinking. And so I spent months writing these songs basically like how do I feel when I'm writing this song? And so I put them in chronological order of how I felt about certain events and certain people. And I think, overall, it has the theme of this is how I was processing life for four months amidst relationship issues and friends and just my overall transition into college. And it was hard releasing it because a lot of people were a little hurt or shaken by it because it had to do with some of them, and especially with my relationship at the time. That was really hard. But in the end, I released it because I was firm in the belief that I shouldn't have to hide my arts or my gift. And I shouldn't have to worry about what anybody else thinks, because it's my creative thoughts and writing. I'd be stupid not to share it.”
He produced the album in six months.
“The first song that I wrote was Planets, and I wrote that song in May,” Jaxon said. “I was at work, and I came up with a melody in my head, and I was like, oh, wow, I like this. And so I went on break and I recorded just a melody. And then I went home and I started producing it, and that was the beginning of the project. And that was when I was like, okay, I think I'm going to write about stuff like this because it was something that I was feeling about somebody at the time. And it was I want to continue working on that because inspiration is really good when you have a song, and it's hard to get inspiration if your life is the same every day. So that's when I was kind of like, oh, I could totally write a project on this. I mean life's been crazy for the past few months. And so I started writing in May. I had two amazing people on the album that helped me with writing songs, and it was really interesting because they had somewhat of the same experiences in life with relationships. It was just something that I could easily milk off of. This is perfect inspiration for a song. And we would write the song together and then we would produce it together, and it worked. It was just nice having the shared experience and being able to write out a thought out song that had a meaning, because we all had a meaning that was unified. So that was really helpful. Everything was done by late October. I just made some finishing touches and uploaded it to the services, and it released on November 4. My first EP was a smaller project, but it was not as heartfelt as Therapy was.”
He didn’t have to travel far to record.
“I have a studio in my room here,” Jaxon said. “We also have one that's a lot more high end here on campus, and so I'm starting to use that one more. But everything that I've made thus far has been in my bedroom. That helps.”
He was inspired by a friend’s moniker to adopt his stage name as a high school freshman.
“I have this really good friend of mine,” Jaxon said. “We've been friends since fourth grade. His name was always on every social platform. It was just an underscore ghost. And so I was like, oh, that's really cool. And then I asked him, hey, can I use your name? I can tweak it a bit. He said yeah. Honestly, when I was picking my name, I was like, look, if I get anywhere, how do I want to be announced? I always think of the people on SNL (Saturday Night Live) where it's ‘and our musical guests…’ and then I'd be ItsJustAGhost. Has a ring to it? And I think it does. It fit the kind of vibe that my artist profile and my music and just my overall personality was when I started the project.”
He elaborated on the stage name’s current significance.
“I started creating when I was singing and writing about a darker place that I was in,” Jaxon said. “I just thought of this going back to why I chose my name. It also happens to do with just how I see myself socially. I don't usually make a lot of friends outside of my close circle, and so I kind of just seem invisible to everybody else. And I think that's what really sparked writing the songs, because I don't do well with a lot of people. I get out, but I don't really spend time with people. I have a very low social battery, so I usually spend my time with music and writing songs.”
Jaxon said it’s no accident musicians like him use aliases.
“I think more so producers,” he said. “What I've noticed is when I'm working with people or when I'm reaching out to people or people reach out to me — a lot of mainstream or not so mainstream but their main skill set is music production — most of them base themselves on YouTube, so they have a prod tag. If you produce music or you make beats, then you have a snippet of audio in your beat or in your song that makes sure that whoever buys the beat or makes music with that song knows that the producer is that person. So I think most people, especially on YouTube and Instagram and those quote unquote beat makers, they usually try and have an alias. I don't know a lot of producers that use their actual name. I do know artists like singers and songwriters that do, but more so producers.”
Although Jaxon does vocals he isn’t averse to working with other singers.
“If I were to work with another vocalist, I would want them to be involved in the project, definitely,” he said. “Maybe not so much as mixing and mastering and audio engineering, but definitely I would want them on the project through their vocals. And if they have any other experience, definitely that as well. Honestly, working with anybody would be such a great experience because I'd be building connections and making friends and learning from the person. There's always something to learn if you're working with somebody that you've never worked with before, because nine times out of ten, they're going to know at least one thing that you don't know, and it'll be really good for you in the future.”
Jaxon is pursuing his musical journey as far as it will go.
“Man, I would kill to take it to the top,” he said. “I grew up in such a musical household. My dad (Nathan Gaddis) was a Grammy nominated artist. He was one of the lead singers in True Vibe, a pop Christian boy band in the early 2000s. And he was Grammy nominated for best Christian album. And it was really cool to have him to look up to because he had the experience. It was amazing growing up in such a fun household where I could express my musical interests and they would always be supportive of me. I grew up making drum sets out of pots and pans. And it's honestly like a spark for me because that's what makes me happy. If I can go far enough to make myself happy, make my parents proud, and I know they're proud of me, but I want to have also just a solid baseline of a career of doing what I love. I don't want to be stuck doing something that I don't care much for for the rest of my life. I would love to tour. I would absolutely love living on a bus and going to different places, traveling the country and meeting new people and being able to perform in front of thousands of people.”
He knows success won’t be handed to him.
“I'm always trying to work hard for it,” Jaxon said “I know it doesn't come easy. It's really hard now, especially with how complex the industry is now. It's really hard to break into it. And I'm not going to stop trying. I don't care if I 80 and gray. It's what I love, so it's definitely what I'm going to pursue for my whole life.”
His college course load is tied to his other passion.
“I major in theater performance because I'm also an actor,” Jaxon said. “I was the first Kristoff in Frozen at Broadway in Florida. And we did that at our high school. And it sounds really bad, but it was actually a really interesting production and it got a lot of traction and we were on Good Morning America. It was pretty cool. Our director was amazing. I would love to be both a musician and an actor.”
Once Jaxon decided to act, he leapt ahead of the pack.
“It was really funny because the guys in our troupe, a lot of them were thespians, so they were statewide competitors in the theater program,” Jaxon said. “But my first year in high school theater was my senior year. It was like I'd walked in beginner and I had walked out advanced. A lot of people didn't like me for that. But I think it helps that I've been doing theater since I was a little kid, and I grew up singing, so I have that already natural gift. That really helped with my audition process. And just becoming a lead right off the bat is just because I had a voice and I wasn't afraid to use it, and I was just everything that I am and that I could be on that stage. It was a really fun experience getting to sing. And it was hard because I had to climb a lot of stuff, but it's the challenges that make it interesting, and that, to me, is everything.”
He also want to pursue acting on a grander scale.
“I would love to act on film,” Jaxon said. “That's what I would want to do, for sure. Broadway is one thing, but big screen, there's so much more that you can do with film. Growing up, I'd always wanted to be in a superhero movie with my mom's camera. I would shoot little movies with me and my siblings, and that was always a dream of mine: to be a movie star. And honestly, anything where I can act, sing, just be myself, but also experiment with being other people and learning different emotions. And it's just so interesting how one can be a totally different person. And it's what I love to experience is being different people. It's really fun.”
He said some emotions are easier than others to convey.
“I do really well with internal conflict,” Jaxon said. “So I think self-loathing and sadness are my two easiest to do for sure. I enjoy yelling on stage. It's really fun because it's honestly an outlet for feelings that I can't really release anywhere else. But I think the hardest emotion for me I would say are cheer and high energy roles. If I had to be somebody super cheerful on the stage for three hours, it'd be really hard for me. I can't imagine being on stage and jumping around for three hours and smiling all the time and talking fast and being out of breath. And I've had experience with it, but I think that's definitely the hardest emotion for me to convey. But what I'm learning is with emotion, when you're acting, it's very much natural thought and feeling. And what I've learned is that it's better to not cry if you're sad, but just let yourself feel it. It's okay if you don't cry. And that's better than trying to act out a cry. That's not good. So, for me, it's a lot about the natural emotions and the feelings and the thoughts that come after that. It's very much on impulse and not so much here's what I'm going to do when I'm sad. It's very much how do I feel? Like, how does this make me feel and how am I going to put that in my acting?”
He would like to portray realistic characters.
“I like characters that are human,” Jaxon said. “We have these emotions. I love a really good movie that I like a lot. Dead Poets Society. I love that movie — the internal conflicts with the students and the teacher. Everybody in that movie was human, and they had their own internal struggles, and you could see it and the outcomes of everybody's struggle.If you can perfectly portray being human and just feeling things, it's such a beautiful moment on film, on stage, anywhere really. So I think that would be another place where I would really like to act.”
He finds inspiration with actors such as one who died young.
“I love Heath Ledger,” Jaxon said. “I know a lot of people in the theater community, it's like a taboo to method act just because it can really mess you up. But I think as long as you have somebody that is always taking care of you or making sure that you're okay, then you have a safe space to step out of your character once you're done, and you have somebody that can keep you in check. I admire his work so much and the different characters he portrays. He's a teenage lover boy in 10 Things I Hate About You and then he's a psychopathic murderer (Joker) in the Batman series. And that's what acting is to me. It's like being able to put different versions of yourself together and learning how to be the character, stepping into their shoes. It's such such an inspiration. I mean, it's such a shame that he's not with us anymore, but I don't think he'll ever be forgotten. He's such a talent. He's one of my biggest inspirations for acting.”
He recognizes some actors may go too far, such as when Christian Bale seemed to starve himself for The Machinist.
“I think when health, physically especially, comes into play, that's where I would draw the line, for sure,” Jaxon said.
He still enjoys the superhero genre.
“I loved Man of Steel and Superman Returns,” Jaxon said. “Henry Cavill is also amazing. It was so cool seeing what they can do on a screen and how they can put somebody that I read in a comic book onto a screen and make a reality. And it's so cool all the things that computers can do and the special effects. I think that movie definitely was where I was heavily, like, yeah, I want to do that. That'd be really cool.”
He also has musical inspiration.
“I love Joji,” Jaxon said. “He's one of my biggest inspirations and one of my favorite artists to listen to. Also, his journey is just very inspiring. He started out with a YouTube channel, and he grew and grew and grew and started making music and then left the YouTube channel and started touring and becoming a mainstream artist. And he produces all of his own stuff, writes his own stuff. If I can see somebody that starts off a nobody and does all of their own stuff and ends up to where thousands of people are waiting in line for a concert, that's where it's like, see, I can do it. It is really motivating. One of his songs went viral on TikTok, and that was where I first heard him. And I loved the song because it was literally the exact type of music that I wanted to create.”
He explained having social media content doesn’t guarantee an artist will be exposed to the masses.
“If you want to do something creative, connections are mandatory,” Jaxon said. “Knowing people who can vouch for you and who can tell people about your talent, that's what matters, because that gains traction and that gains engagement with people. A talent manager from L.A. was very clear on the fact that it is not any easier necessarily with social media and making connections, because it's like you still have to be seen, and that takes a very long time especially with how complex the algorithms are for social platforms. It's really random because I know people who start a new account fresh and make one video and they have hundreds of thousands of people watching their stuff. I'm certified in professional video editing software and I learned how to edit and to color grade and to make films. And so my content is very high quality and I can confidently say that because I see people on TikTok with just their phones and they're getting crazy views. It really is such a lazy video, but the algorithms are pretty picky with what it wants to share. And in some ways, I think it's easier to be seen because you have more people watching you from across the globe. But at the same time, I think that it's about the same level of difficulty to be noticed and to be thought of and pursued by other people.”
He relies on inspiration for motivation.
“if I have no ideas or if I'm just in a production or a music block, I can't really do much and that's really hard,” Jaxon said. “If I try and sit down on my computer and try and make something, it's not as high quality as it could be. And that's why I kind of rely on writing about life and things and feelings in moments, because it's really hard for me to write a song about something or someone that I have no personal connection with. I feel like that's where I would want to work with a songwriter or somebody that may or may not have those experiences, but also just the level of experience where they can write a good song about stuff like that. If I lose motivation, most of the time, I just take that time to rest. I don't really push myself to go any further if I'm not getting anything, because then it'll burn me out. So I try and step back from that and take breaks, and if I think of something, I think of something, and then I'll be able to work on that. But I don't try and force stuff out because then it's not very good, and I don't think that anybody would really appreciate it because it's not as hard work and thought out as a normal project would be.”
He dispensed advice to aspiring actors and musical artists.
“The biggest piece of advice that I could ever give anyone is that you should never give two craps about what anybody is going to feel about your art,” Jaxon said. “Because in the end, that is going to stop you and that is going to wither you out and that is not going to get you where you want to go. Because me personally, I've gone through a journey of caring what everybody thinks of me and what I can do and how I can limit myself so that people cannot get hurt. And that has done nothing but stunt my growth. It pretty much ended my relationship. And it's just you should always be yourself and you should never, ever care about what anybody thinks of you and who you are as a person. Because in the end, they're not you and they don't make your own decisions and they're not in charge of your path and what you want to do in life. Critique is always wonderful. And I always want people to tell me something that I could do better. But if someone tells me they didn't like it or they don't like something that I've made or performed, that's an experience for them. And if they don't have anything that can logically be taken into consideration and worked on, or if they have something that they don't understand about something that I do and they don't have anything to explain, like if they don't understand why they don't like it, I can't use that. And so that's just an opinion to me. And that is, honestly, I can say I'm sorry that they didn't like it, but it's not going to change how I do things because it's one person, and one person shouldn't stunt anything that you want to do in your life. So, yeah, I think just never, ever give up and always remember that you're in charge of your own path and you shouldn't let anybody else stop you or get in your way.”
Jaxon’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChnes0CPra8tY9VQm6BfcMQ
Jaxon’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/astrllzz/
Jaxon’s TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@itsjustaghost_
Therapy on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/03GTAnwmriAHb1THewMn26?go=1&sp_cid=8ef701661d9893a265e560c01064b88a&utm_source=embed_player_p&utm_medium=desktop&nd=1&dlsi=ce1a2f707b534135
Therapy on Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/itsjustaghost/1560947856
