You Versus the World. Who Wins?

Have you ever wanted to be someone else? To change your name, throw on a disguise and conquer the world? In this episode, we meet Jude Aston and hear how many of us have already created characters… whether we realise it or not.

Connect with Jude Aston here.

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TRENDHIM: Welcome to Trendhim’s Tell Your Story Podcast. We're joined by Jude Aston today, a French singer/songwriter marking his 10 year anniversary with a new sound and a return to the stage.

So Jude, happy 10 year anniversary. You've been making music for a full decade now. Is that right?

JUDE: That's right. And thank you. Thank you very much. And yeah, it's been a decade now and a lot has been going on with this project. For this anniversary, I wanted to reinvent the project and the character, that I've been developing through this project.

TRENDHIM: You mentioned a character, so Jude Aston and is actually the character that you've created as a performer right?

JUDE: Yes, it's kind of like… it's a character of a, of another. It's not really me. It has to be someone that everyone can identify too. It makes it possible for me to have some distance between my personal life and my music. But it also makes it possible to transform myself into someone that I'm not able to be in my current day to day life.

TRENDHIM: Can you give an example of that? How is Jude Aston's day to day life or what he expresses during his day to day life different than something you would in a personal way?

JUDE: Judas Aston has very few boundaries and is very direct. He’s a very sensitive guy. And so everything that goes to his mind, gets right out into music. While, you know, in your personal life, you have to make some adjustments and try to be maybe less complicated. Jude Aston is about really expressing yourself and letting go.

TRENDHIM: So how has he changed over, if this is 10 years that you've been making music? How has Jude Aston – has he grown? I mean, if this was a child, he would be, you know, a 10-year-old child is a lot different than a one-year-old.

JUDE: Yes, actually, he has been changing very fast. When I started, Judas Aston, I was 20 years old. Actually, I was a bit younger. I was 17. And Jude Aston was actually already a bit more mature than what I really was. You know, he was a bit of a revolutionary guy. He wanted to change the world. He wanted to start something and make people change the way they behave and the way they face the world that sometimes seems a bit rigid and imposed to you when you're a young, young person starting your life.

So it was full of great hopes and wanted to inspire people into change. And after 10 years, it felt like I had said enough about it.

TRENDHIM: We've talked once before and you said that when you were younger it was really you versus the world. So when you were in that phase at the very beginning, did you know that he was going to evolve? Did you know he was going to change or, or is it like most people when you're in the moment, that's the moment? That's your truth at that moment.

JUDE: Yeah, yeah. Sometimes I even thought of Jude Aston as some kind of hero whose trajectory was short. You know, something that asked to pass through the stage and vanish. Had to end at some point. I came to understand that you can't work with a character for 10 years and then drop it. I just have to make it so that Jude Aston evolves and grows and blooms into something else.

TRENDHIM: But that's really how life is, right? We've all had a different, a different point of view when we were 20… or if you're 20 now, I can tell you that your view will probably change in the next 10 years. And it's interesting that you originally thought about that, maybe Jude Aston had an ending, but instead, he's able to find a new identity. He's able to evolve. Just as you, yourself, I'm assuming, have evolved.

JUDE: He needed to evolve because at some point I felt too much of a gap between him and I. He was still stuck 10 years ago and in some way, I had moved on. And I think a lot of guys in their thirties are looking for, for meaning and for something else past their dreams that you could have in your twenties and the reality you faced then. And it's an important time to take time to just breathe, think, and find your way in the world.

TRENDHIM: Especially in these times right now where we are. I think finding the time we, we've all been given the time. When you really have the time to sort of look at your story and rewrite your history if you need to.

JUDE: Exactly. It's a good time also to try to be as positive and as humanist as possible. It's way more interesting to just challenge yourself and try to find another path when what you wanted to accomplish, failed, or just didn't go as well as you, as you thought it would.

TRENDHIM: Well. Speaking of that at the very beginning, what was it that made you decide you wanted to express yourself this way through a character? Did you realize at 17? You said that you already had needed to have that separation– That's quite a mature thought for a 17-year-old to realize, I need a character to really separate this.

JUDE: I'm not sure I really realized it. I was coming out, I was changing a lot of things in my life. And I felt like creating Jude Aston was at this time… a rebirth. A way to extract myself from the teenager I was.

TRENDHIM: I mean, I think being able to create a character, being able to separate yourself in that way. Letting this person say the things maybe you really wouldn't say. I mean, I think it's genius, but what about for a guy who's not an artist or who's not a recording artist at least... do you have any advice for, can you separate that in reality or is it only something for performers?

JUDE: I think everybody's doing it actually. Everybody's creating a person now on Instagram on Soundcloud. It’s kind of.. yeah, something people are doing without thinking about it. It can feel great because it's a way to really, say things and show things that they would not, in another way. things that are not what they have been told to do. Things that, maybe they were dreaming of doing. And yeah, we are all creating personas as we are all artists. I think it's something very inspiring and great about our current society.

TRENDHIM: Yeah. An interesting way to look at it, that everyone, the person that you're portraying to the outside world on Instagram. You know, that can be your character, that can be your moment to express yourself in a different way, and it really comes to believing that what you have to say is valid.

I've heard a little bit of your music from some of your live episodes and from your social media, so we'll be sure to keep up with that. And thank you for talking to us today for sharing your story. Really appreciate it.

JUDE: Thank you. It was my pleasure. Really.

TRENDHIM: And thank you for listening. Here at Trendhim, we believe that every man has a story worth telling. What's yours?