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The following is the
transcript
of Jeff Hayford's recent interview with Jason:
INTERVIEW
JH: You have some exciting news from the Falcon
Ridge Festival folks, can you tell us more about it?
JS: Sure...well,
last summer, my bass player and good pal Andy Rice
and I headed down to perform in the Emerging Artist
Showcase at the festival. It's something that I've
submitted to for a few years now. 24 songwriters
perform 2 songs each throughout the afternoon. The
audience is then polled and asked to vote for the
top 4 acts out of this group that they'd like to see
return to the festival. I honestly walked away from
the performance having zero idea how we went
over...you feel sort of "far away" from the audience
on a festival stage, we weren't used to that. In any
event, they emailed me a few months back and said
that we'd made the top 4 which gets us a spot on the
annual Falcon Ridge "Most Wanted" preview tour. It's
a 3 week spin up and down the east coast coming up
in May of 2006 that gets us into some very cool
venues and festivals. We also get to return to the
festival this coming summer for 3-4 different
performances over the weekend. I am thrilled. Falcon
Ridge really has a wonderful tradition of providing
a visibility platform for new and emerging
songwriters...it's a gem of a festival.
JH: What do you think of song competitions
and have you entered many?
JS: Hmmm...well,
I suppose they are a necessary evil in some ways.
I've always been leery of combining art and
competition but I suppose they can help people with
visibility and whatnot. Some appear to be closer to
scams...(like that competition where you send in a
drawing of a cartoon turtle head and if it looks
like the original, you win huge cash) but others are
genuinely interested in helping people. I think you
need to be selective. Generally, if songwriters you
respect are using competitions as resume pieces,
then those are probably decent ones to enter
provided you're into the contest thing.
The web has really made submitting to these things so
much easier. I'd say I submit to a few every 6
months, especially for festivals & that kind of
thing. Once I started having some luck with them, I
started to realize that people actually listened to
the submissions. I look at them as a means to an
end...as a performing songwriter, I know that it
comes down to the gig...contests are meaningless if
you don't pull it off live.
JS: How often is
your guitar in your hands? Do you play any other
instruments?
A: I gig fairly often during the busier months so I
certainly have the guitar around a lot in that
respect. At home it varies. I go in phases where I
play all the time or phases where I will go a week
without touching it. There's no real formula.
Other instruments...not really, I putz around on
bass, piano, percussion but I wouldn't call myself a
player in any of those cases. I play harmonica when
I perform...I love both blues and straight harp.
JH: Do you make a special effort to work on
lyrics or music first?
JS: It always
starts with a guitar part or a melody...every once
it a great while I'll peck at the piano and
something will start there. I rarely sit down with a
blank piece of paper and write lyrics. Every once in
a while I'll hear a word or a phrase or a concept
that I jot down but the songs tend to come from the
music. I generally find the vibe and then the words
sprout from there.
JH: How would you describe your writing
technique? Would you say you lean more towards
structure and discipline or "stream of
consciousness" when working?
JS: I've written
a handful of "story" songs which can be interesting
way to communicate but I definitely think the vast
majority of the tunes I end up with tend to be
broad-strokes vs. very literal accounts or thematic
"songwritery" songs. I try and keep the concept of
poetry in mind regardless...some poems are powerful
in their starkness and others are powerful in the
breathing room that reader has to process a series
of words.
With songwriting, I view it as a spectrum between
the stark and the broad-stroke as well. A writer
like Johnny Cash for instance; there's really no
time or need for songwriting devices, cleverness or
trickery there. It is what is it. The poetry and the
power is in the honesty and the starkness of it. I
think of a great line (albeit a Kris Kristofferson
song delivered by Johnny) like "There's just
somethin' 'bout a Sunday, that makes a body feel
alone." There's no reason to candy-coat that...it's
simple, cold truth. Candy-coating it would dilute
it.
On the other end of the spectrum, I think of bands
like R.E.M. or Radiohead. I am a huge fan of both
bands and their lyrics but it's such a contrast to
the literal stuff. Things are far more shrouded and
murky but tastefully so. In these cases, I enjoy the
mystery of the listening experience because I can
inject some personal experience into the process.
One of the most powerful songs I've heard to date is
an R.E.M. song called "Sweetness Follows." I am
positive that I do not know what the song is
specifically about but I know what it is about for
me. It's a very personal thing. It would almost
detract from it all if I had the song explained to
me. Leonard Cohen's "Famous Blue Rain Coat" is
another of my favorite broadstroke pieces. It's a
masterpiece of just enough detail to completely
ignite the listener's imagination. I think it's one
of the most profound and honest relationship dynamic
songs ever written.
So when I write, I think I present a framework but I
try not to hit listeners over the head. I generally
don't enjoy songwriting where the metaphor is
overwhelming or where the you can see the
puppet-master's strings everywhere. It's almost like
watching Soap Opera acting.
JH: Do you record while writing?
JS: I really
don't. I generally have things mapped out before I
worry about recording something. I do benefit from
hearing live recordings of new songs though so it
may be something to consider.
JH: What tunings do you use the most?
JS: I used to mess with bluesy slide
tunings but not as much anymore. Every once in a
while, I'll learn a song that requires something out
of the ordinary but I'm generally performing in
standard tuning.
JH: Have any special tricks for getting past
writer's block, or is that not ever a problem?
A: I tend to have spurts of writing when the seasons
change actually so I'm not terribly disciplined in
that way. I do find that having new sources of input
is always good...reading, new experiences, new
places, travel, changing it up...that all helps me
out.
JH: What artists have had the most influence
on your writing and performance?
JS: Neil Young
is a big...all around. CSN, The Beatles, Simon &
Garfunkel, Johnny Cash, Dylan, Floyd. Even stuff
like Jim Croce was an eye opener when I was a kid. I
had a big blues phase as well...Sonny Boy
Williamson, Muddy Waters, Luther Allison, BB. Blues
is a nice contrast because it's less heady and more
in the delivery. I worked for small blues record
label right after college, helped out at a few
sessions and watched blues greats that had played in
the Muddy Waters' band. That experience put a lot
into perspective for me. Martin sexton is always a
trip on both fronts...the songs plus the
performance.
More recenty, songwriters that I dig are; Patty
Griffin, Sarah Harmer, M. Ward, Jose Gonzalez and
Kathleen Edwards.
JH: Have you ever found that you really like
listening to music very different from what you
write and play? I've always found it interesting
that many great songwriters prefer listening to
music very different from their own. Pete Townsend
once said that his hearing loss is due to cranking
AC/DC in headphones rather from years of playing
very loud live with The Who.
JS: I think it's
crucial. The whole introspective songwriter thing
can get a little weighty after a while. I find
myself getting antsy at open mics after a few
strummers and even with my favorite national acts,
too much of a good thing can be a bad thing.
Playing in a band has really helped me on that
front. The guys I play with are all fans of
songwriting but their influences are all over the
map; jazz, bluegrass, reggae, funk, rock, pop, etc..
They've really turned me on to new styles of music
and new ways of looking at music. In the past, I'd
hear a Peter Gabriel song and think the songwriting
made the song what it was. These days, I realize
that the mastery of the world-class bands that he
puts together plays a huge role as well.
JH: Ever shop your songs?
JS: I have not. Just hasn't really been a
focus.
JH: Write specifically with commercial
success in mind?
JS: I've reached points where I realize
that a song really needs a bridge to work as a song
for example but not much beyond that.
JH: The one we always ask; what song(s) do
you really wish you had written?
JS: "Don't Let
it Bring You Down" by Neil Young. Shivers every
time.
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