Shane Philip calls Vancouver Island home and with his drums, guitar and didgeridoo will be taking the stage at the Spiritbar tonight.
What inspires the music you make?
My family. My wife and child I would say, and my home. I live on Vancouver Island and I’m surrounded about mountains and ocean and nature. My songs are about nature and human nature.
Why do you think that has influenced you?
Because that’s the life I live. We’re influenced by the things that surround us. My family is very important to me and nature is very important to me. I’m just really aware of it.
Was there a defining moment when you decided to be a musician?
Yeah. It was when I used to be a school teacher. I gave that up for music. The moment was when I was playing some music in my class and one of the kids said to me ‘Mr. Philips, why are you a teacher? Why don’t you play music for a living? You’re really good at it.’ I didn’t have an answer for him, so I decided to be a musician. It’s way better.
Were you just playing the guitar then or were you playing a bit of everything like you do now?
I was messing around with everything. I had written songs before here and there because I like that form of expression. But I was learning to play the digereedoo and I played drums and all of these things that I picked up when I was in high school, so I went back to those again. Just kind of messed with it. I was a very mediocre musician then and just kind of dove into it and then decided I can play this song and just went for it.
What has the response been to your latest album life.love.music?
The response has been great. People are into it. I do a Bob Marley cover on the album and people are really liking that. It’s getting a lot of hits on YouTube.
If you had to pick five words to describe your music what would they be?
I call it island soul music. How can I fit that into five words for you? Music from the soul, but that’s only four.
If you weren’t a musician do you think you’d go back to teaching or would you do something else?
I don’t know what I’d do. I would probably just do something that would allow me to play music. If I couldn’t make money doing music I would do something that would let me do as much music as I could. The music I play is a natural progression from when I was an athlete and I actually trained to play the music I do.