Balancing Acts is Metal Insider’s new column, in which artists explain the challenges within the music industry by juggling day jobs or multiple jobs while pursuing their musical careers. João Freitas, known as Freitanás, vocalist and guitarist of Portuguese blackened death metal band Aoidos, joins us to discuss the uphill battle of sustaining a creative path through freelance sound and video work, all while remaining driven to keep Aoidos moving forward.
My name is João Freitas, know as Freitanás, and I’m the vocalist and guitarist of Aoidos, a Blackened Death metal band from Portugal that has storytelling as our focus. I have a pretty good list of day jobs I’ve had through the years, worked in fast food, musical events management, as a sound engineer, and as a construction worker in a sound studio. Right now I’m a freelancer sound and video engineer, recording, mixing, editing, and mastering sound and video with a company in a small town in the middle of a mountain range called Castanheira de Pera. It’s a peaceful life. I take 2 minutes by car to reach the studios I work at, 10 minutes tops on foot (but I’m always moving equipment from there to my home studio, so, most of the days car it is), and get to make cool videos and learn to play drums when the work load is low. But, to be honest, most of my household’s income comes from the girlfriend. Somehow I’m fortunate to have someone to back me up and to help me develop this opportunity I found until it gets to the point I can provide enough and she can leave her dreadful job (and come work with me!) She really is the best, and I’m so grateful for her. The band wouldn’t exist without her.
Playing music, especially our kind of music, is not for the fain of heart. And not for people low in cash either. All of us have day jobs. Our bassist and vocalist Ekid says: “I get barely paid to be a verbal punching bag for people that don’t pay their communications services”. That and in the winter he has to face the hellish fires of AC units too hot for anyone’s good, getting his voice wrecked a lot of times. Thank the metal gods the dude has a great sense of humor, I wouldn’t be able to stand his job for one morning.
Our guitarist Ivo is a “Technical sales engineer, when I’m not hitting the road with Aoidos, I’m driving across the country selling things.” Our Engineer Excel, has we jokingly call him, has been a life safer when preparing for gigs and managing the costs involved. Awesome to have an engineer on our side.
Finally, our drummer Pedro sums up why this is all worth it, and I must say, if I had to deal with the people he does on a daily basis, I wouldn’t have the energy to beat the drums as he does. Really strong guy, both mentally and physically: “Don’t know how long I’ve worked as a security guy…but I’ll never forget the first day a picked up a guitar at twelve years old…since then, music became the most important thing in my life.”
No matter what different things we do, be it roam the country selling stuff, be punching bags for people, be it in real life or through telephone lines, or just trying to build something to bring safety and peace to our household, we’re all connected by our love of each other and of music. And that’s why, through whatever day jobs we may need, Aoidos will prevail and flourish.
