Few artists move between disciplines as naturally as Austyn Gillette. Best known for his influential career in professional skateboarding, Gillette has quietly built an equally compelling body of work as a songwriter; one defined by restraint, introspection, and an unhurried approach to storytelling. His latest EP, Moments, arrives as his most reflective release yet, shaped by a year of personal transition, time spent living in Paris, and the emotional weight of embracing change rather than resisting it.
Across our conversation, Gillette reflects on uncertainty, grief, creativity, and the balancing act of pursuing multiple passions while remaining present through it all. We discuss how skateboarding continues to inform his work ethic, why success has little to do with external validation, and how travel reshaped his understanding of home, identity, and artistic purpose. Honest, thoughtful, and quietly optimistic, Moments captures an artist learning to trust the unknown; and finding peace in the process.
Moments feels like a record about finding peace with uncertainty. Do you think you’ve become more comfortable with not having all the answers as you’ve gotten older?
Well I think its just knowing that uncertainty is always going to be a passenger on this journey and if I can come to terms with that and welcome it, then it will be much easier to move through life haha. It’s definitely a new journey and the complexity of my life with owning a growing clothing company on the side, as well as being a pro skater, makes it all the more interesting. Sometimes overwhelming haha.
The EP is rooted in the idea of balance. In a culture that often celebrates constant achievement, what does success mean to you today?
Success is what you make it. Doing the thing the best you can, not compromising and being able to sleep with whatever it was that was haunting you previously or telling you to push more. If it feels good in the process, if it taps you on the shoulder throughout the day, surely you are on the right path. The outcome or how you think it will be perceived is out of your control.
You spent years building a professional skateboarding career while developing as a songwriter. What similarities do you see between those two creative pursuits?
The schedule is probably the most similar. You wake up and it’s only you who is responsible to create. Having an abundance of free time to create can go two ways. You can take it for granted, become sedentary or feel an overwhelming amount of pressure to create something original or you can look at it as the open road to hopefully not having to work a regular job. Your job is to make something that never existed before. I think thats incredible.
Was there a particular city, encounter, or moment during your travels that became the emotional catalyst for this EP?
My time in Paris last year in 2025 definitely allowed me the time to make this EP. I was taking in an experience of being able to live abroad freely and watch a new way of life. My life and immediate people in my life had evolved and maybe made me more introspective. I was so far from everything I knew to be my normal and I have no doubt that it wouldn’t have happened had I never made the leap to move there for a bit.
If Moments were a snapshot of your life in 2025, what parts of yourself does it capture that previous records didn’t?
I would say that my previous records weren’t too dissimilar in process, but I was maybe thinking more about how it would be received. ‘Moments’ captures a very transitional time in my life and I was thinking of the outcome. It was my only way to process a lot of change and kind of acted as the floor that I didn’t think was ever going to exist under my feet.
Your songwriting often feels conversational and intimate. Do lyrics typically begin as journal entries, observations, or melodies?
Most of the time it starts as melodies or things that I find captivating. Without having the vocal range of a trained singer, you can very quickly get boxed out. I do find myself humming the same words over and over, but I make an effort to dig deeper. I try to express something that I haven’t said before and tell a story that I couldn’t otherwise tell just by writing in a journal or talking to a friend.
Many artists write about change, but Moments seems to embrace it rather than resist it. Has your relationship with change evolved over time?
I seem to be on the other side of it now, but to tell you the truth I was quite scared towards the end of 2025. I didn’t know where to live, didn’t really understand my path and was worried about not being able to get out of a lot of sadness. I lost my dog of fifteen years, ended a relationship, my visa was ending. I didn’t want to crawl home. I knew that being near some family and friends would only do me good, but still didn’t trust it. My body just hopped on the plane and several months later after getting some time in nature, restoring friendships and finding a new sense of independence, I was healed haha. Simple formula I know, but im grateful for the outcome and welcomed the change. Change is just evolution. I don’t like to see it in a negative light.
You’ve lived in several culturally rich cities. What are some creative habits or perspectives you’ve picked up from Los Angeles, New York, and Paris respectively?
Through living in all these places, I think you still have to maintain the same amount of discipline to create. One or the other may be more productively distracting, so you have to figure out how to hold yourself accountable. Watching these cities wake up is one of my favorite things to experience. Being able to see seasons change from the window is something new to me. California as we all know can be quite predictable. You don’t have to go far to experience it, but maybe thats the charm of it. Creativity is everywhere, observation is a free and can be used in many ways, in many different cities.
Looking back at Sensorisk, can you identify any themes or ideas that you’ve been unconsciously exploring throughout your entire catalogue?
Oh thats a hard one to answer.. ‘Sensorisk’ was definitely about the topical world we now live in. ‘Words we won’t wear’ was maybe my earliest leap towards writing love songs and contemplative songs. I know that a theme is necessary to package a project, but sometimes it’s out of your hands when it comes to what you write about. I try not to get too hung up on the whole idea and just let the songs sonically take you into a world that should be listened to all the way through.
Is there a lyric on Moments that feels particularly significant to you now, and why?
The last section of ‘Imminent’ was a set of words that I was proud of. “Sometimes a bit of change is near, but you can’t compare all the things you have and all the things that got you here. When the moments right, it stands in front of you. Just a game of choice, not a game of win or lose.” In some way it wrapped up exactly what I was feeling or what I was watching close friends experience. Let the change happen, don’t forget that every choice got you here, if it’s going to happen and it surely will, allow the experience to blossom.
You’ve worked across music, film, and skateboarding culture throughout your career. Do you view creativity as one interconnected practice or as separate disciplines?
I think it’s all separate, but the work ethic definitely comes from skateboarding. I love working, creating and doing everything possible to see the vision through. I think it’s a discipline that can’t be taught. Most athletes learn to be self competitive early on and thats the only thing to lean on for a while before the skills follow. To answer it, I think it’s separate, but I know that non of the rest would have happened without Skateboarding.
If someone who had never heard your music asked what Moments says about who Austyn Gillette is today, how would you answer?
As a new rule, that is out of my control. What anything that I do says about me cannot be controlled by me. It’s their experience. Hopefully it’s done it tasteful and listenable way haha. A friend the other day was a hotel and the whole hotel was playing my last record through the speakers and kind of made me wonder what that would do for people. Hopefully they enjoyed their time poolside and didn’t think too much about it.
Travel often changes our perception of home. After spending time abroad and returning to Los Angeles, what did you see differently about the place you grew up?
Los Angeles is a lot of things. The other day, someone told me that they thought every suburb was as complex as different countries. That kind of stayed with me. If at the end of the day I can walk up some hills after sitting at the computer and smell some pine trees im a happy man. If I can go to the beach and listen to my favorite music along the way im a happy man. Traffic is a real thing, but take a subway at 5pm in New York or the metro at 5pm in Paris. It’s everywhere anyways haha.
In an age of short attention spans and constant distraction, do you think there’s value in making music that asks listeners to slow down and reflect?
It’s one of my favorite things to do. I absolutely love listening to faster pace music, don get me wrong, but when I end of playing on piano, I mostly like hearing the space in-between the notes. The sustain ringing out and matching that feeling with all the instrumentation around that beautiful instrument. I almost don’t feel in control of it. Maybe one day I’ll write a catchy song that fits the mold of the pop algorithm haha.
Five years from now, what do you hope you’ll remember most about the period of life that inspired Moments?
I’m grateful for it. I made a choice to go somewhere new, to experience it, be open to whatever happened and learned a lot along the way. It made me walk a bit slower and evaluate my experience. We are all constantly overwhelmed and why is that. It’s a shared feeling and not as unique anymore. I don’t want to pessimistic about it anymore. Happiness is a choice and a daily practice. I don’t think I would have found this perspective without what unfolded during the period of writing ‘Moments’.
Find Austyn Gillette: Instagram, Spotify
