Born from creativity, Kolby Knickerbocker is a writer and musician by nature. His sense of comedic timing and musical harmony is the kind that flows as effortlessly as a river through him. After his childhood and years of schooling, Kolby began his professional career as a writer, musician and entertainer during his undergraduate career with the founding of UCSB’s only improv comedy troupe, Improvability.
Throughout his four years as a highly sucessful improv comedian, Kolby and his fellow actors at Improvability began collaborating on various musical and comedic projects.
The culmination of Kolby’s musical endeavors during his time with Improvability are represented in his first album, The Science Project. This album represents the musical and production abilities of Kolby with the added musical styles of his artistic partner, Philip Amler. The music within represents Kolby’s wide ranging taste in worldly tambres and his ear for spatial production. Many of Kolby’s tracks contain harmonious drones and eerie synths that serve to fill his sparse chord progressions. His combination of acoustic songwriting and electronic decoration brings out the best of his sounds and allows him a virtually unlimited creative space.
- “I don’t like to impede my music with any physical limitations or with trying to stick to one specific genre. The only limitation to my music is my ability to tap into the cosmic creative void of sound.”
During this same time, Kolby and other members at Improvability completed the first comedic project of the group with Traffic’s Cool. This mocumentary of short comedies was awarded second place overall in Project TV’s online competition for television shorts. While the story and overall plot of Traffic’s Cool were pre-written, the dialogue of the entire series is completely improvised. The freedom that this offered allowed each character within to truly blossom. The completion of this project set the foundation for the series of works that came later on for Kolby.
The characters and style of writing from Traffic’s Cool transferred into Kolby’s next creative work, Western Front. With minor tweaks, the creation of Western Front became a polished endeavor that highlighted a truer demonstration of the comedic style that Kolby enjoyed. The final product of this latest work dances with dry comedic humor, emotional entanglements and story lines that truly allow the audience to invest in these characters and their lives. As Kolby continues to write more episodes with his writing partners, he finds the stories of these characters more enjoyable and investing.
After completing two Masters degrees abroad from the London School of Economics and the University of Wroclaw, Kolby continually strives to create more inspiring and uplifting music and comedy. He is currently working on a new album titled “3′s and 7′s” and will continue to write, record, produce and entertain as often as possible.
“For once he discovered what he loved, there was no more keeping his feet on the ground.” – unknown
