Interview CosmoGirl

CG is psyched for tonight's Degrassi movie The Heat Is On airing at 9pm ET on TeenNick. And of course CG is ecstatic that Degrassi is airing on TeenNick four nights a week for the next six weeks at 9pm ET. After our revealing chat with Charlotte Arnold, of course, we had to get the scoop from Raymond Ablack who plays the adorable Sav Bhandari too. Raymond dished about the big changes in Sav's social life, the charity that changed his life and the truth about his love life.

Cosmogirl: Tell us what we can expect from Sav this year!

Raymond Ablack:  Sav's in grade 12 this year. Not unlike a lot of grade 11 kids, Sav was friends with kids in grade 12 from the former year. Those kids are gone now. His best friends are now no longer at the school. Sav should be the head honcho ruling the school this year but he doesn't have any friends to share that power with, so he's trying to find some friends and find his way back around the school that should be so familiar - but these halls aren't. 

CG: What do you think Sav should do?

RA: I think he should just stay open minded and not get up on this high perch where he's going to be a loner and be too proud to be friends with kids who are younger or in the same grade. He just fell into the crowd with the older kids there, and now they're gone. He's an overall friendly guy, so he's going to make new friends, no problem. 

CG: What's going to happen to the band?

RA: I don't want to break anyone's hearts out there who was really loving Studz but I feel like we're going to break up. 

CG: But you're still a band called SpeedSound in real life. How did that happen?

RA: It's beautiful. We were on set, and Shane's just tapping away on the drum kit on set. Jamie's plucking away some little thing that he was thinking about at home on the guitar. I was just watching us all twiddle our thumbs at the instruments that we're playing, and I was like, ‘You guys, we all play these instruments. Why don't we get together and jam some time?' And we did. The next week we got together at Shane's basement, where his drum kit is, and we just had a jam. I brought over my best friend, and we just busted out tunes that we had in a former band. It was instant and then I scheduled a show without telling them. 

CG: How do you schedule that without telling your bandmates?

RA:   Well, I talked to this girl who we know, and she was booking a show at the time, which was just coincidence. I came back, and I was like, ‘Guys, we got booked to play a show.' They're like, ‘What?' And I was like, ‘Yeah, we better come up with a band name pretty quick, eh?' We came up with the name SoundSpeed, because on the Degrassi  set, we hear ‘Okay, lock it up. Rolling sound, sound speed - action,' everyday.  How fitting a name for a band of actors is the name SoundSpeed? 

CG: When did you start singing?

RA: My favorite singer, and you're going to just cringe, is Celine Dion.  A lot of Canadians don't like Celine Dion, but I love her. My mom and I love Celine Dion. She was my first concert ever. Then I saw Titanic when I was really young and at my grade three talent show, I sang "My Heart Will Go On." Actually, I went up with a puppet, and I did a comedy routine first.  Then I sang "My Heart Will Go On" and won the talent show. 

 CG: You're really involved with the charity Free The Children and traveled to Africa with them. Tell us more about that.

CG: I can't even enunciate how real everything is when you're there. The culture is rich and vibrant. The people that you meet are instant friends, instant long-term friends.  Some of the issues that you do see when you're there, like poverty and things, are things that last with you for a very long time. 

CG: What were you like in high school?

RA: I was average in every possible way. I went to an art school, so I was a choir boy. The only leg up I had was at choir rehearsals I could never get in trouble because there were only like five guys in the choir. So what are you going to do, kick me out of the song?

CG: What's your dating life like?

RA: I'm a one-woman man, for sure. I can't even handle one girl very well.  My hands are full with one girl - I do have a girlfriend right now - but for a long, long, long time I didn't have one. 

CG: How did you meet?

RA: Free the Children. Cool story. She used to go to my school. She was a year younger than me and she also was working with Free the Children. I just met her at one of the events that we were volunteering at through Degrassi. I was like, ‘I know you from school' and then we just started talking and stuff. 

CG: What's your dating advice to girls out there just starting to date?

RA: Keep the clothes on. Take the makeup off.

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