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of proportion that allow for an integrative, unified experience.
Used in the proper context, music can also be a reminder to the
nervous system to slow down and breathe. Most people, including
me, find silence uncomfortable when they’re reflecting inwardly. The
right music really slows down my nervous system and enables me to
be present with my breath, especially when I’m practicing at home.
I think music also acts as a cross-cultural bridge, an accessible
way into spirituality. So if people hear music that’s different from
what they’ve been exposed to in mainstream culture it allows them
to start drifting towards where that music is coming from. Whereas
spirituality may seem like a bit of a lofty concept, music can be a
profound entryway into accessing the deeper states of yoga.
How did you first make the connection between
music and yoga?
I started playing guitar when I was 12. When I was 19, I nearly died
in a head-on car accident. The force of the impact caused my
intestines to literally burst open. It really woke me up and drove me
towards Eastern philosophy. I needed to understand what happened.
Not long after my accident I went to university here on Vancouver
Island and took a degree in jazz. I also met a few more people that
were steeped in some level of awareness of what was going on in
the East.
When I got out of music school, I was beginning to wake up
out of the dream-like state of our culture, which is generally in
a profound state of denial. I was looking for a way to integrate
everything I’d experienced.
Through a series of synchronicities fuelled by my desire to learn
more about the harmonic overtone series, I met David Goulet, a
yoga teacher here in Victoria who was offering music and yoga
therapy for cancer patients. He had a massage table with built-in
speakers. I went over to his house, lay down on the table and he
took me on a musical journey, acting as a DJ and supplementing the
music with bass waves he was generating: low sine waves that sent
my body to a deep place of relaxation. He was also playing some
shamanic music.
David was doing a lot of work outside the music and cancer
research to do with breathwork, including yoga. I was so turned on
to see music and yoga put together. This experience was extremely
profound for me.How did Desert Dwellers come about?
Life showed me a path down to LA. I was really intrigued by what
was happening in the realm of electronica at that point. I found my
calling there and wanted to find a way in. This brought me together
with two music producers and kindred spirits, Craig Kohland and
Amani Friend. Interestingly, like me, they had similar experiences of
deep life wounds and had found a healing path in blending music
and shamanism.
It was such an ‘aha!’ moment in life. We were immediately
magnetised together.“I started playing guitar when I was 12.
When I was 19, I nearly died in a head-
on car accident. The force of the impact
caused my intestines to literally burst
open. It really woke me up and drove
me towards Eastern philosophy.
I needed to understand what happened.”