Kieran Strange, Steamworks, 375 Water St., Vancouver, Saturday, Nov. 24. For more info visit kieranstrange.com.
AS a teenager she'd always wanted to be in a band. So when it came time to decide on a career Kieran Strange elected to pursue music and she chose to do it more than 7,000 kilometres away from her Selsey, England home.
"I packed up everything and left home and moved to Vancouver and started a band," Strange says.
Long before Strange moved to Canada to pursue a career in music, she had always aspired to be a singer. When she was a little girl Strange and her best friend would often perform shows in their parent's backyard.
"Ever since I was a little kid I wanted to be a musician," Strange says. "I was in a band with a friend of mine. We had an old drum set . . . it was just drums and vocals."
Even though Strange was academically successful throughout school, she had always considered a career in music. However, she decided to pursue another path.
"I visited Vancouver and I went to some shows. I saw my favourite band play, which is My Chemical Romance, and I started to think about my life again."
Eventually she moved to British Columbia to pursue her dreams.
"I told my mom when I came back from Canada when I was 17 that I wanted to move to Canada," Strange says.
She made good on her word and packed up her belongings and moved to British Columbia.
"I had a lot of friends in Vancouver and Edmonton who put me up while I was working on my visa," she adds.
On Mar. 31, the Vancouver resident released a three-song EP titled Adamantine Heart.
According to Strange the hardest part was convincing people to call the album Adamantine Heart.
"I sat down with my co-writer and she said if you can fit the word adamantine into a song and have it sound good then we will call the song Adamantine," Strange says. "So I took the challenge. I sat down and I managed to fit it in and everyone really liked the sound of it."
"Adamantine means to have a really hard, solid, unbreakable, substance. So the idea of having a heart made out of that is taking everything you stand for and not allowing people to take that away from you and being strong in what you believe in," she adds.
Strange says she enjoys bands such as The Used, AC/DC, and Muse. She also admires female musicians such as Joan Jett, Pink and No Doubt.
"I really love strong female musicians who don't have to take all their clothes off to sell CDs," she says.
Strange mostly writes songs about her experiences in her life.
"Mostly I draw inspirations from things that happen to me and it doesn't have to be an entire story, it can be just an idea," she says. "When I have an overwhelming emotion the only way to get it out is to write a song about it."
Strange says that she doesn't like to write about some of the more common topics that some female singers sing about today.
"I think the hardest part is being a female musician and being taken seriously as a female musician who doesn't' want to write songs about having sex with all the guys," Strange says. "I think that's the hardest part, is just being taken seriously as a female musician who doesn't want to sing those kinds of songs."
As a musician, Strange believes it is extremely important to put on an excellent performance for her audience.
"That is what I focus on. I am very energetic when I am on stage. I try and involve the crowd and I try to give them a great show," she says. "People don't go to a show to hear music they go to a show to see music."
Strange is extremely active on the social media front. She currently has more than 12,000 followers on Twitter and over 4,000 likes on Facebook. Aside from the 50,000+ tweets she has made, Strange is into video blogging on YouTube.
"I started my video blogs back up again," Strange says. "I actually did one about the Amanda Todd situation. It is just my thoughts about the situation and paying my respects to her."
Earlier this month Strange wrote an anti-bullying song. She says bullying is something that shouldn't be taken lightly in any situation.
As victim of frequently bullying herself, Strange can relate to the story of Amanda Todd.
"I was bullied horrendously throughout school. It was a horrible part of my life. I know what it is like to fake sick because you don't want to go to school and show your face," Strange says. "It really upset me that this poor girl put a video up on YouTube saying she needed help and she didn't get that help. I am not saying that people should be blamed for it but it is sad that she genuinely felt like she had nobody there for her."
For more information on Kieran Strange visit kieranstrange.com or follow her on Twitter @KieranStrange.
