History | Press Release | Artists | Interviews

8-21-2003

What musician, song, book, TV show, movie or play produced in the last year has been most inspiring to you, either personally or professionally?

Without a doubt, Dave Matthews Band has had a life-altering impact on how I interpret music, how I enjoy music and most importantly how I compose music. I began listening to their work on a friend's recommendation just over a year ago. At the time (Summer 2002), I was still reeling from the Rock Rebirth of 2001, which entailed the manic success of bands such as the Strokes, the White Stripes and Weezer. I was listening to similar bands, like Smile, a small rock trio heavily influenced by arena-rock and Beach Boy-esque harmonies, who recently broke up. Much of what I was looking for was heavy, emotional, jammy. I just didn't know it. I felt it in songs like She, where Smile packed sonic distortion, rug-burn-raw emotion, a sumo-sized (well not quite) drum solo into around five minutes. I craved more. But I didn't know it.

And then, like some kind of music messiah, my friend Rob began supplying me with various albums/bootlegs by Dave Matthews Band. After some time, I found the white-knuckle, grandiose rock song I was always looking for in their regular cover of Bob Dylan's All Along the Watchtower. The song soared like an nighthawk trying to outfly an avalanche. And I consumed it with the force of a vacuum, wide-eyed and tenacious. This was not the Dave Matthews I saw sporadically on VH1, singing about juvenile voyeurism (Crash) or justified procrastination (Stay) or dancing like a folky-white boy MC Hammer (Ants Marching). This a was a Gibson-wielding troubadour, hell-bent on giving fans more than what they expected, more than what they paid for, and most importantly: more than what got on their studio album of DMB. Meanwhile, he was backed up by four musicians, each more gifted in their respective positions than Dave was in his own. Between a bubblegum-loving jazz drummer, a fiddler leaner than a two-legged cow, a "if-it's-got-a-reed-I'll-play-it"-type sax virtuoso and a youthful music prodigy that prefers to play the bass, Dave was near justified in answering any "You and what army?"-type inquisitions by skeptics and nay-sayers. I knew then that I had stumbled upon something massive. Something I could get lost in. Something I could return to again and again and have a revelation eons later. Suddenly all my favorite musicians (BT, Soul Coughing, Roots, Stone Temple Pilots, DJ Shadow, et al) were a little dwarfed by comparison, but I eventually came back to them with a greater appreciation, a greater appreciation that I learned from DMB.

Anyone not convinced, who thinks they're reading the words of another DMB-obsessed lunatic, needs to go and listen to Live at Red Rocks 8.15.95. Hell download it you selfish, cynical, fatherless child of a "music lover" if you're one of those reading this. If you can't appreciate the songwriting, musicianship, composition and live presence of the Dave Matthews Band, then maybe you need to go take up cross-stitching or something. Oh yeah, sorry, I'm a little ambivalent about it….ah I'm still young….

Do you have any religious/spiritual/philosophical beliefs? If so, how do you feel they affect your music?

I'm a Jesus-loving Christian, through and through. It's something that I'll remain committed to for life, or until Buddha or another holy figure from one of the other five main religions resurrects themselves and makes a total fool out of me. But I've grown up in America, a country that is stumbling toward tolerance of all lifestyles. At the same time, I've watched key figures of organized religions embarrass the hell out of Christianity with scandal after scandal in my lifetime. This is really nothing new. I mean open up your world history book and take a gander at the corruption dressed in holy clothing that has transpired over centuries in governments and societies.

It's an ironic situation really. Bruce Rich, aka NOVAchild, once told me in an interview that he believed guilt was the device that which religions perpetuate themselves. The man has a point. I'm a Bible-clutching individual who believes that organized religion is ultimately corrupted by man using the same device. The hierarchies and social stratums of Protestant and Catholic faiths do not strike me as necessary. I don't believe that any flesh-and-blood human being can absolve me of my sins, nor will any of amount of good works see me through to eternity in the afterlife. I believe in reading the good word and doing one's best to follow it. Faith is about expounding upon the good, learning from the bad and remembering Jesus' sacrifice absolved us of our human flaws.

As a musician, I don't necessarily want to spread concrete gospel from the pages of the Bible. I do, however, want to use my influence as a musician to spread positive messages to listeners and illustrate the beauty and ugliness of our lives. All religions provide guidelines for how we should live as human beings and I want people, regardless of denomination, to enjoy my work, for it's focus on truth, realism and understanding. That methodology has helped create songs such as A Prayer's Highway, The Quest for Identity and Theivus Harmonious and I will do everything in my power to focus on that blueprint for the remainder of my career as a musician.

Is there a fellow musician you would like to work with? If so, in what capacity?

I'm not going to answer this question directly, because it reminds me of other things I'm dying to do with other peoples music. If I were going to work with certain artists, I'd probably choose some of my favorites. I know that the relationship of Malik B. with the Roots turned sour. I've studied their music up and down and could easily rap in his place so that Blackthought (the lead vocalist) wouldn't have to do it all himself. However, I think Blackthought (and the Roots for that matter) are leaving the situation as is for a reason. They're trying to remind Malik what the Roots are without him.

I'd love to take certain Dave Matthews Band songs and remix them. I always see people dancing at DMB shows and they don't look stupid. I'm shakin my ass with 'em! The songs are actually danceable. But that isn't necessarily what I'm after. I've noticed that the wonderment and general atmosphere of DMB is not unlike many of my favorite electronica artists like BT and Robert Miles. There's a dreamy, detached and occasionally brooding element to both sides. I would like to reinterpret songs like Two Step, Seek Up, Minarets, The Dreaming Tree, Intro to Pantala Naga Pampa, Dancing Nancies and on and on and on. My goal ultimately would be to take a jam band, whose key element is improvisation and, electronica, which has a primary emphasis on composition, and make an aural double helix of the two. I think it would be something the world hasn't seen yet, you know like when in 1999, every radio song had some kind of latin twist on it. Or whatever. >;D

I also think it would be great to find musicians from DMB or similar types of artists and use their talents in tandem with my composition. I'm a huge fan of the Minibosses: an instrumental rock trio who play note-for-note cover songs from many classic videogames. Everytime I hear their version of the Metroid (Nintendo Entertainment System) opening theme song, I can hear it in a fully-orchestrated prog-rock glory. I'd enjoy working with them and rewriting the piece including an 80-piece orchestra, electronic textures, expanded melodies and harmonies and some bad-ass guitar work. Because I began listening to their music around the same time I began composing, they also inspired me to do my own electronic album of video game remixes/covers. But that's for waaaaay waaaaay into the future.

I could go on about all these plans I have, but I've probably already said too much.

At what point did you realize or were told that you had the talent to be a performer/musician?

I started composing when I bought a Playstation game called MTV Music Generator. At the time, I had given up piano about two years prior, a self-taught skill that I was too lazy to pursue. I ended up having the time of my life with that Playstation game and purchased the PC version not too long after. Once I made those songs into wav files and read the disclaimer from Codemasters saying that I was free to do what I wanted with the material I produced, I decided to see how far I could make it go. I played the music for everyone I knew and received mostly positive responses. Those who didn't like it were either not fans of electronica or they were my parents. I was 18 at the time. I met a crucial friend, whom I consider to have given me a life-affirming experience in the music world. Thomas Ash was a guy who was also an aspiring musician and wanted to rock out crowds with his guitar. Together we recorded the last two songs of the Penchant for Rambling sessions, using his makeshift studio in his house and went on to build the original website, the album cover of Penchant and just had an all around good time together. That's when I knew I could do this for the rest of my life, even if I had to keep a day job. He's another musician I hope to work with someday (again), mainly because he was the first. He helped me just because and left an impact on me that will resound for a lifetime.

What book are you reading now?

I have spent the last 8 months out of school and being an information whore. I read an amount that can probably only be described as ungodly. Current favorite publications include, but are not limited to: Spin, Men's Health, GQ, The New York Times (especially on Sunday when they include the NYT Magazine), Best Life, URB, Electronic Gaming Monthly, Rolling Stone (although it frequently irks me), and the occasional Time and Newsweek. I also slogged through the hardcover 2003 Men's Health Fitness Guide and frequently read the Bible. The sad thing is that I have not read any novels. I've only managed to harbor a gloriously overfilled tomb of equal parts trivial and relevant knowledge. I'm like Cliff from Cheers, but I enjoy Smirnoff with Cherry Coke instead of giant tankards of beer on tap. And I wear glasses.

Need verification? Did you know that dolphins only sleep one hemisphere of their brains at a time? That's how they manage underwater. A recent article in NY Times indicates that interactive porn DVDS are the wave of the future. Meanwhile, on average men make half of what women do in the porn film industry. Ironic how an industry that degrades and destroys the status of women is simultaneously making them viable and irreplaceable. You can quiet a squeaky floorboard by sweeping talcum powder into the cracks of the wood. Chuck Klosterman knows enough about the The Real World to make note of the fact that no one in any given Real World ever makes mention or reference to any of the other Real World's; as if to suggest that each Real World exists inside of its own vacuum. An example: No one in Real World #7 ever accuses anyone of acting like the "Puck" or the "Pedro" of the group. A better example that has nothing to do with The Real World but everything to do with the existence of fiction within fiction: Can a character in a film played by Harrison Ford go to the store and rent an Indiana Jones film? Has John Rambo watched Rocky? What about Madonna in whatever movie she was in…When she goes to the club and hears her own song being played, what is her character thinking? The top 3 healthiest nuts you can consume are the almond, the cashew and the pecan respectively. All three are extremely fattening, but because they come directly from the Earth, they are considered extremely healthy fats that control hunger and are utilized completely by the human body in weight lifting. How often you wear a black suit is strictly a matter of taste and whether or not you are attending a funeral should not have any bearing on the issue. Liz Phair believes that an ideal example of the "Alpha Male" is a member of the United States Marine Corp. Two out of 3 video game magazine editors agree that Soul Calibur 2 is best played on the Microsoft X-Box with an S-Type controller. And the average love affair costs roughly $25,664 from start to finish, including motel fees and the deposit on a new apartment.

If you could change anything in your past, musically, would you? And if so, what?

I would have stuck with piano instead of quitting at around 15 years old and learned to read music. By now I would have been a great player and a better musician and maybe even had a band.

What sound do you love the most? Dislike the most?

I love the sound of the beach. It's peaceful, atmospheric, gentle and equally a soundtrack to family gatherings and drunken debauchery. Gotta love the contrast.

Dislike. I can't stand a lot of punk singing. I don't necessarily dislike punk music. If it weren't for the Sex Pistols doing their thing on their first gig, we may never have had electronic music today. Punk rock planted those seeds, which later became new wave, which evolved into dance music. But man that dude from Goldfinger sings like he's got a severe hanger on, giving himself hemorrhoids. That singing style runs the gamut in punk music and I seldom can stand it for very long. Sorry to those die-hard punk fans out there, it really isn't anything personal. You can jock on DMB to me if you want.

What were your early influences, and what do you listen to today?

In elementary school, I thought Michael Jackson was the greatest musician ever. And Neil Diamond and Billy Joel. Chalk up to being exposed through my parents. In middle school I was a radio person who also listened to a lot of Christian musicians. It wasn't until my freshman year (in 1996) that I started discovering the types of musicians that would make me want to enjoy music on a higher level. The first CD that did that to me was Pearl Jam Vs. I'm not sure now why I liked it so much then, but I know that I listened to it ad infinitum, daily at least. I also began to discover that I could get my hands on video game music that had been rearranged by the original composers. Brink of Time was full of acid jazz reinterpretations of songs from the video game Chrono Trigger. Secret of Mana + was a one-track, world-pop reworking of several of the songs in the game of the same name. That was a pretty eclectic year now that I look back on it and those three albums basically acted at the starting points for where my musical tastes went after that. For a while, my favorite types of music were all jazz, world and rock-influenced. I would later discover Jamiroquai, Robert Miles, Live, the Fugees, Stone Temple Pilots, Counting Crows, The Teen Heroes, Reel Big Fish and finally The Chemical Brothers. Dig Your Own Hole became my new Vs in 1999. From there, I found out about Mocean Worker, the Bassment Jaxx, Fat Boy Slim and Moby. And er, Limp Bizkit. And Staind………………Moving on…Later, (2000) a good friend named Iceberg (real name Brian) introduced me to a lot of non-radio hip-hop. Not Jay-Z and Ludacris, but the Roots, De La Soul, Black Star and Mos Def. I gained a new respect for a type of music that I despised at that point. I had already been making music for a few months, and in retrospect, I see now that everything I was listening to culminated into that. I finally had something I could apply all that absorption of music into, and in effect, give back to a culture that had helped shape me.

I still think that there are great positives to musicians like Michael Jackson. The album Dangerous, is literally what all commercial pop albums aspire to be. It's firkin' supersonic as a monorail, turtle-waxed like the BMW Z3 you wish you had and well-groomed like Miyagi's finest bonsai tree. A bonsai tree prone to constant changes…I still enjoy a great deal of Neil Diamond's older work. It was very rugged, energetic and down-home. He wrote about nothing in particular except being young and romantic. In his old age he's turned into a diva. He would rather strike poses and prance around like Barbara Streisand than actually play his own guitar, which is a tragic thing. Billy Joel on the other hand is what I hope every musician turns into later in life. Joel chose to let his music age as he did, and let it reflect the events in his life without being too candid. He always found new territory to cover and made each album an education. This is why he very rarely released anything that ever sucked. I thank my mother for exposing me to Billy Joel.

Today, as in today? Well I really like this album I got for $2 called And then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out by Yo La Tengo. I'm also enjoying Emotional Technology by Brian Transeau, The Richest Man in Babylon by Theivery Corps and Park Avenue South by Dave Brubeck Quartet. In search of new music all the time……

What made you want to get involved with music?

Get this. When I was learning piano in middle school and trying to compose music, I never saw myself as becoming a musician. At the time, I was also drawing and had been for a few years already. As hard as I tried at each, I just never saw it coming together in the future ever and I gave it up. As high school progressed, I tried acting and did that a solid two years. All the while, from elementary school to graduation, I was also writing about anything and everything. I finished my senior year on the school newspaper with, generally aggravating students with my occasionally abrasive columns. I also picked up some photography training along the way. Then I took up music again with graduation looming. I suddenly felt passionate about it and the arts in a way that I, for one reason or another, could not before. When I look back on it now, I realize that in elementary school I was always dancing around and belting out Michael Jackson songs at the top of my lungs. Then it turned into DCTalk, Pearl Jam and so on as I got older. Somehow that passion never meshed with my piano playing in my middle school/early high school years and finally took over me when I was 18. I don't know where it came from, I just knew that at that age, I never wanted to deny it again. And because music's fire has been burning in me solidly for the past 3 years, my appreciation for other arts is a mainstay. My eventual return is inevitable, for the most part anyway. I think I might act again one day, not in a rapper/actor crossover, where I play myself in a movie loosely based on my life (COUGH!marshallmathersCOUGH!), but as a credible actor. I never stopped writing and I want make it in the journalism world for a video game or music magazine. I envision writing scripts, publishing a reader-written literature magazine, putting out a book or two and making movie scores. Or maybe I'll get hit by a car and the whole plan will be shot. At least I got all the goals lined up. I'm not drawing again either way. Man I sucked….

If you weren't doing what you're doing now, what would you be doing?

This is a funny question. I'd really like to be working on music. But I'd also like to be playing Final Fantasy Origins. And I could really go for a rum and coke. But now that I think about it, I still haven't finished the bios I promised I write for the compilation we're all on. And I gotta take my car to the dealer, because there's supposed to be some kind of recall on Ford Focus's. It's time to clean out the closet and box up the millions of magazines I've acquired the past few years and I've been meaning to hunt down a new insurance policy. So to answer the question simply, I'd take either a trip to the beach or settle for watching a Dave Matthews Band show, so I can forget about all beaurocratic crap clogging up my life. Good thing I got some of the more menial things like hygiene, house-cleaning, bill-paying, homework and laundry down, because that could be as far as I'm going.