One of my standard ways to start an interview is to ask a musician what their earliest memory around music is. The first thing that popped into my head was when I was,
let’s see, we lived in Northern California, so it had to be around third grade. I had one of those Casio keyboards, you can hit the button and it sort of just starts playing a song. I wrote a song about climbing a mountain. “I’ll climb the mountain if you do too...” Or something like that. I remember trying to perform it for my parents. I’m gathering that your first forays in music were basically by ear and lessons? Yes. I started picking out by ear and started playing in church. Sort of cliché, it is such a common thing… I was in Texas and started there, then I started taking some jazz lessons. I always quit lessons though, just when I felt I had gotten enough. I’d be like, “Okay, I’ve got what I need” and would just stop. Now, I kind of wish I hadn’t. My brain is not as nimble as it used to be and when I try to do it now, it’s more difficult. You seem to have found a successful format that works. And by the way, some of the most creative singer/ songwriters didn’t start out reading music…look at Aretha Franklin. Thanks for that. I’m learning more and more to trust my whatever this method is I’ve ended up with. One of my best friends grew up in a conservatory and he’s so brilliant. He can sit down at the piano and play anything. I can hum something and he’ll sit down and play it. I’m like, “That’s so annoying!” (Laughs) My manager always says though, “You know more than you let yourself believe.” I’m like sure I do…fine. Years and years in therapy. (Laughs) You are very entertaining. (Laughs) Do you see yourself as a songwriter or more as a performer or are they intertwined? They’re kinda both intertwined. I guess I would maybe
say that I’m a songwriter first, because that’s really what drives everything for me. I wouldn’t be performing if I wasn’t writing. When I first moved out here, I’ve been in L.A. for ten years now—I can’t believe that—in this same apartment too.
There’s something to be said for stability, right? I guess. Stability or insanity, where is the line? (Laughs) Anyway, I have a lot of friends who wanted to be artists and had “put in their time.” Jumping in vans and driving across country, playing songs and kind of grinding it out that way. I moved out here and just started writing and writing and writing, with anybody who would compose a song with me. For years and without any sort of break or seemingly no kind of direction, just writing. That’s where I wanted to put in my time and developed that muscle and brain power. So, I think I would definitely consider myself a songwriter first. The performing is almost like a gift I get to give to myself, once I really land on something. I can’t remember the book title, but Matthew Syed writes about talent being more about practice rather than it necessarily being a “gift.” It’s an interesting concept. It’s such a weird thing. Anything creative, anyone doing something creative can relate on the level of how weird and mystical and magical it can feel. Then, how truly awful and empty it can be too, when it feels like that muse, for lack of a better word, is not there. The idea of “Where did you go? I told you that I’m writing at noon today, so like, where are you?” (Laughs) It’s something that comes through in your music, you are able to communicate vulnerability and the emo- tions around what you’re experiencing. It’s a rare gift and has made listening to the EP very poignant. Are you planning a full-length album, soon? Thank you very much, Joel. I’m working on a full-length
album right now. Even in the last couple of weeks I’ve been having the feeling that I felt five or six years ago when I was, wait, maybe it was only three or so years ago. I really have no concept of time— Who is time, I don’t know her—especially when I travel. (Laughs) She’s a fickle one. The EP has kind of an unfinished feel, I’m really proud
it can feel. Then, how truly awful and empty it can be too, when it feels like that muse, for lack of a better word, is not there.”
anyone doing something creative can relate on the level of how weird and mystical and magical
It’s such a weird thing. Anything creative,
of it, but I just really wanted to get stuff out there now, now, now. For the full length, I really want to make it something cohesive and I want it to look like my identity right now, versus scattered snapshots. There is nothing wrong with that, but I’m looking at a full length differently. I find myself looking more deeply at where I’m at, writing for it now. I write songs about things that I wouldn’t necessarily think about or feel comfortable expressing. It kind of becomes my safe space to explore. It reminds me a little about Adele’s music and albums, in that the music of each album is such an expression of where she was at. You did it with your song “11 Blocks.” Being able to put emotion to page and take people along for the journey, it’s one of the coolest things about music.
JULY 2017 |
JULY 2017 | RAGE monthly monthly
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