Sometimes ten minutes is all you get to make your mark.  That is usually the case for Concert Photographer Amy Willard.  When shooting a band at a concert, she usually gets to shoot for the first three songs.  Fortunately, she thrives on this.  She believes “there is nothing more thrilling or rewarding than capturing the true essence of a performer in under 9.7 minutes.”

She answered some questions for me and explained how she got her start, and elaborated on this philosophy.

On your site you say that you have been into photography for a long time. Was it someone that helped you get into it or did you start on your own?

I remember my mom always making sure I had a disposable camera for school trips, so I think that really got me into taking photos.  Then my older brothers had taken photography courses when they were in high school and college.  My oldest brother was the one who actually gave me his old SLR for when I took my one and only photo class in high school.  He taught me the mechanics of the camera and said “go shoot” and everything just kind of blossomed from there.

How did you get into doing photography professionally (in that you now get to sell your pictures to magazines like Alternative Press)? Were you already doing rock photography at the time?

Things just kind of developed over time.  I started out taking pictures for fun.  They were usually architectural since that’s where my focus was at that time– I ended up going to college for architecture.  I also started getting into music as high school went on and finally when I got to college I could start going to concerts.  It was a few years ago that I was talking to my oldest brother and he was like “you should try bringing your professional camera to shows and see what happens.”  So I called venues before shows to check their camera policy, and I ended up shooting a Matt Wertz show at a small venue.  I showed my pictures to my brother and he was impressed and he told me that I should try getting photo passes from bands for other shows.   I was either ignored or rejected by most bands simply because I didn’t have a real portfolio to show them.

So in looking online at other photographer’s shots, and being completely envious, I came across some All American Rejects photos from a concert I went to.  The image had the photographer’s name, Stacey McCarthy, and I just had to look up her work.  I found her on MySpace and sent her a message telling her how amazing I thought her photos were and asked her how she got into shows.  At the time, she was shooting for an online publication, MishMashMagazine, but she was considering starting her own site, TheMusicSceneZine.com.  I offered to contribute for her and she told me how to arrange photo passes for shows.  Soon enough, I was getting approved and I just kinda dived into the world of concert photography.  About two years ago, Stacey suggested I start my own site, so I developed BarricadeBuzz.com and things have just developed from there.  I started getting my friends to write articles, and a few photographers from around the world to contribute; it’s been great.  Now I get to shoot the bands I love, interview them, and really get to know the personalities in my frames.

About a year ago I contacted Alternative Press to see if they were looking for another contributing photographer.  It wasn’t until months later that I was asked to submit samples of my work.  Once I did that, I was added to their mailing list and asked to shoot the AP tour in April.  I ended up shooting for their Warped Tour and Blink 182 features, and will be covering the AP Fall Ball tour when it comes to DC in a few weeks.

What equipment did you start out doing rock photography on? What equipment do you use now?

I started out with a Nikon D70, because that’s what I happened to have.  I worked an entire summer and saved up to purchase a Tamron f/2.8 lens.  You really need a fast lens when shooting in low light situations.  About six months ago, I was able to upgrade to the Nikon D90.  It was a big improvement.  The sensor is far superior to that of the D70.  I still have the same lens, but I also now have a f/1.4 50mm Nikkor as a reserve, and I’m looking into more wide angle lenses.

When taking a picture at a show, what do you think is the most important thing you think needs to be communicated through your photographs?

The most important thing is capturing the soul of the performer.  You always want to get “that moment.”  The one that really says “this is him,” or “that’s totally her.”  Musicians have a lot of emotion, and spirit, and when you’re at a live show, you get the opportunity to experience that.  As a concert photographer, I always want to make sure to capture that in still frame.

Whose work in rock photography do you look up to? Whose work inspired you the most?

Stacey [McCarthy] has clearly had a huge impact on me.  She had faith in me, and I wouldn’t have the wonderful opportunities I have today if she hadn’t responded to my MySpace message.

I’ve always been one to walk her own path, so I’m not sure if there is someone in particular that I look up to.  I certainly admire the work of many concert photographers, especially those I have had the pleasure of sharing a photo pit with.  I have also joined many Flickr.com groups related to concert photographers, so I have had the chance to correspond with many photographers and see a lot of their shots.  I am, however, always impressed by the work of Todd Owyoung.  Gage Young is also another name.  He’s younger than I am, but you’ll find his work throughout Alternative Press; he has a lot of talent.

As a fan of music and a photographer, do you ever feel like you have to separate your fan side from your photojournalist side?

You definitely have to separate yourself, well at least for the first 3 songs of every show– that’s when you get to shoot.  You always have to remember, those first 3 songs, or about 10 minutes, in a photo pit is your time to work.  You are there to do a job.  You are not there for front row access.  You can’t be in a photo pit singing and dancing as a spectator.  You’ll end up blocking another photographer or annoying security.  You get in, take your shots, and get out.  Once I’m done, I put my camera in my bag and join the crowd as a fan to enjoy the music.

Your bio states that you are studying architecture, and you have some beautiful architecture shots on your site. How do you approach taking photos of architecture as opposed to taking pictures at a rock show?

Well, thank you.  Architecture is usually easier to shoot, because it doesn’t move, haha. You have the ability to sit and think, and examine the subject at hand.  It’s almost the complete opposite at a rock show– you’re thrown into an unknown situation and you have to think in the moment.  In both styles I aim to produce dynamic images.  With buildings, it may be turning the camera to give lines an extreme angle.  In concert photography, I may crouch lower in a pit, to give a dramatic angle looking up at a performer.

What are your top 5 (or 4 or 6 or whatever) favorite musical artists at the moment?

It’s always tough to choose, I mean, I love so many different bands.  Some of my favorites though are Motion City Soundtrack, The Daylights, The Fray, Nirvana and The Get Up Kids.

Is there a certain band or musician or singer/songwriter that you feel is underrated or ignored that you would like to give a shout out to now?

Well I always have to give a shout out to my boys in Vanilla Sky.  They’re a pop/punk band from Italy that I shot when I was in Rome.

I just recently photographed the band Fun.  and I have to say that they have to be one of the best live shows I’ve seen in a long time.  Everyone should seem them live. Their debut album, Aim and Ignite, doesn’t even do them justice.

To see and hear more from Ms. Willard, make sure you check out her personal site, Barricade Buzz! Also, check her out on Myspace!

I have had the honor to meet Marc while I was in LA. He is a true aspiring music who can put you in a state of wonder. His voice is very tender and soft and his words completely make you think about life. Marc’s connection to the guitar is simply amazing, because his skills and chord playing are smooth and emotional. I took some time to ask him a few questions and get his view on things in his life. I love his music, and I know you will too. This is my ARTIST OF THE WEEK!

1. Where are you from? What is your age?

I am from Redlands, California. I am 25.

2. When did you begin your music career?

I began to sing at the age of 2 in church. I have been singing since I can remember, and I play the guitar.

3. Where do you perform?

I perform at the Santa Monica Pier.

4. What is your favorite place to perform?

My favorite place to sing is at the beach. I have always wanted to sing and be able to go on tour and open up for Nora Jones or Brian McKnight.

5. What is your style of music?

My style of music is closely identified with the blues.

6. What has been the most challenging experience being an up and coming artist?

The most challenging experience for me is having the courage to perform my music like I feel my music.

7. What has been the hardest time in your life?

8. What schools did you go to?

I went to California State San Bernardino where I studied music.

9. What is your targeting audience?

I want to influence kids around the world.

10. What message do you give in your music?

11. What is your advice to an up and coming artist?

Familiarize yourself with yourself.

12. What do you value most in life?

You know the answer to that, MUSIC. :)                

Album due out soon!!!!!

Please Check out his music at    www.myspace.com/marcfindstheblues

Photos thanks to Amarie Darvai and Christopher Cody

Darvai.de.Cody.Photography@gmail.com

]]> http://www.meandthestereo.com/2009/08/29/artist-of-the-week-marc-armstead/feed/ 0 http://www.meandthestereo.com/2009/08/03/an-interview-with-jeanna-murphy/ http://www.meandthestereo.com/2009/08/03/an-interview-with-jeanna-murphy/#comments Mon, 03 Aug 2009 15:49:20 +0000 Neto http://meandthestereo.wordpress.com/?p=356 Singer/songwriter and musician Jeanna Murphy often mentions how music was a part of her life since childhood even though she had little training until she reached college and changed her major to music.  She stored music she heard from Disney films away in her mind to be able to deconstruct them and use what she learned later in her work.  You can hear these early influences on her debut album Magic which she is self-publishing.  In this interview, I ask about her start in music, her current album, and how her training affects her enjoyment of music.

On your website bio you tell about how you got into music as a child, but had no training in it.  You talk about listening to Disney records, mentally recording the sounds you heard only to use them later when you changed your major to music in 2000.  My question is, what was your major before and what was the inspiration behind switching to music?

In high school I was really into drama and choir.  I got into assistant directing and all that backstage stuff for a ton of our drama productions.  So, because I had no other ideas, I became a TV Production Technology major when I entered college in the fall of ‘99.  I thought it was going to be a bunch of directing and stage blocking…it was not.  It was a whole lot of info on cables and wires and lighting…it was very technical and not at all what I was interested in. 

So during spring break I did some soul searching.  I was terrified of never going anywhere or being anything in life.  I’d never felt passionate or driven towards anything and a life lacking importance was not what I wanted for myself at all.  So somewhere in the mess of my confusion and prayers I re-discovered my love for music that I’d taken for granted all those years.

I’ve been writing poems since I was 6 (I actually found one that was dated as such so that age is not an exaggeration).  Sometime in high school I started humming a tune to one of my poems randomly and all of a sudden I had a melody.  I thought “Hey that’s cool, I just wrote a song” and then completely forgot about it.  By the time I started my soul searching I had 3 of these “accidental songs”.

Music had always been a huge part of my life but up until freshman year it had been something that I had deeply taken for granted.  I had always loved listening to music but I hadn’t realized its profound effects on me.  With music I would escape to the words or the music and float away for the 2 or 3 minutes that the song would last.  It was beautiful, ugly, real, whatever it needed to be and it took me over.  I’m actually pretty surprised that it took me as long as it did to choose music as my career.

Ever since that decision I’ve never looked back.  There really was no other option but what my life turned into.  It’s either music or bust!
What is your creative process like? Are you the type of writer to sit yourself down for however many hours during the day producing material?  Or do you go about your day doing other things only sitting down once you have been inspired?

I used to have to be in the perfect mood before I could write.  If the song took longer than a half hour to create then I’d get antsy and set it aside, sometimes for years, until the perfect mood presented itself again.

In 2005 I started to realize that that would never cut it if I really wanted music as more than just a hobby.  I was going to have to figure out how to concentrate and really perfect my craft.  You’d be hard pressed to find someone who wakes up one day and says, “I’m gonna be an amazing musician” and then actually become that!  It takes a lot of practice as well as a lot of bad songs before you get that “ah ha” moment where the pieces all just fall into place.  So I slowly perfected my work regime giving up a lot of free time in the process.  I learned that my most efficient creative time was between 7 and 9am and began training my brain to roll out of bed and just do it. (Not an easy thing when you work swing shift)

Since January 2009 (the release of my album and the beginning of my production company Dreamr Productions) my creative process has changed.  I approach it as a business rather than a hobby and I have disciplined myself to sit down at my computer or piano for at least 2 hours a day and write.  Maybe I come up with something, maybe I don’t, but at least I try.  And more times than not it’s worked.  Now it’s got to the point where if I can’t be creative musically that day then I advertise or market my tunes.  I find something related to my business to accomplish.

It wasn’t easy and it takes up pretty much all of my free time but I love what I’m doing and I wouldn’t give it up for the world.  I know that eventually all of my time and effort will pay off so I’ll just keep going.

Tell me about putting Magic together. From looking at your myspace one can tell that you’re coming up with songs all the time so how did you choose the songs that you would include in Magic?

Magic has been a work in progress for years and years.  Somewhere along the line, I got it in my head that I had to finish everything before I could release a CD.  We’re talking everything; every song, every song idea, every lyric line, everything!  In mid 2008 I finally said “Jeanna you’re being ridiculous”.  I would never be finished with everything, or at least I would hope not, so I just needed to get over myself and finish an album.

So I looked at all my songs and decided which ones were “done” by my standards and the 9 tracks on Magic were what I came up with.  I’m very methodical about the arrangement of songs in albums and I was worried that those songs wouldn’t all fit together.  They all are very different from the next.  But after stepping back from the project I realized they were a perfect collage of my progression from singer/songwriter into composer.  Magic, in my opinion, documents my journey in a wonderful way that I’m very proud of.

The album really shows off your range with very complex compositions at the beginning to these simple songs at the end where its just you, a guitar, and someone playing the bongos. Was there a reason behind the almost linear progression permeating your album from those complex compositions to the more simple, acoustic songs?

Not really.  Like I said before, they just worked themselves out that way.  I never know what kind of song I’m going to write before it’s written.  Songs have a mind of their own and mine definitely have a sense of humor!

Personally, my favorite track on Magic is “A Wrinkle In Time.” I’ve read that your inspiration behind it was the cover to the children’s book A Wrinkle In Time, and it’s this great piece of music that is both electronic but also classical.  What, if anything, else can you tell me about what inspired that track?

Really that’s about it.  I started writing it and these pictures popped into my head that I knew I’d seen before but couldn’t place.  They fueled along the rest of the song and it wasn’t until it was complete that I realized the origin of those images were from that children’s book by Madeline L’Engle.  After that it was a no-brainer what the tracks’ name would be.

As an independent artist, after recording your album you were largely responsible for getting it out there.  What has that experience been like?  What have you learned that you would impart on other artists?

One word comes to mind- exhausting.  I am the whole thing.  I recorded, engineered, produced, wrote, played, and sang on the album.  I found my album artwork designer, I shipped out the CD’s to the duplicators, I set up my account at CDBaby and I put the album in consignment CD stores in my area.  I continue to post ads on craigslist, message boards, websites, blogs.  Wherever I can get my hands on free advertising through the internet I’m there.  All of this while working a full time job!

What I would say to anyone out there that wants to do everything on their own like I’ve done is go for it!  It’s exciting and I’m proud of myself for being able to take credit for all of the work that I’ve done on my own.  Just know that it’s more work then you can possibly think of until it’s all around you.  I’m pretty much totally obsessed with trying to find the next great way to market my songs or what great inspiration I will draw from next for my next song.  My brain does not slow down.  My last thought at night and my first thought in the morning is what should I do next to get my music further.  It’s exhausting and exciting all in one.
As an artist who also has a Bachelor’s in Music, when you listen to other music are you just constantly deconstructing what you are hearing to see how it could inspire your own work?  If so, is there any music that you listen to simply for pleasure where you can just turn that part of your brain off?

Absolutely!  There are plenty of songs that I listened to just to listen to.  It’s the ones that throw me over the top either one way or another that I start picking apart.  If I hear something that I absolutely abhor I have to figure out what it is that makes me hate it so much.  I don’t want to be that person that hates a song “just because”.  If I listen to something that is perfect to my ears I have to know why; what did they do different that shook me so much more than the song before?  And how can I incorporate that great new method into my music?

And then, just like everybody, I have my guilty pleasure songs like Apple Bottom Jeans. I just love that song!

What are your top 5 (or 4 or 6 or whatever) favorite musical artists at the moment?

Any musician will tell you that this is a really tough one.  Really my favs change daily because there is just some really good stuff out there.  Especially since the bubblegum pop era is over and the “real” musicians have returned.  But the ones that I’ve stuck with for a good amount of time would be Tori Amos, Paul Simon, Jude, Ray Lamontagne, Sarah Slean, Sarah Mclachlin and Imogene Heap.

Is there a certain band or musician or singer/songwriter that you feel is underrated or ignored that you would like to give a shout out to now?

Sarah Slean and Jude!  I love both of them but they seem to be my little secret.

Sarah Slean is this beautiful lyricist from Canada that just has this wonderful way of combining her words to the melody.  It’s amazing how I’ll love one song for years because of the words and then one day just tune into the music and my outlook changes.  Her song “My Invitation” gets to me every time.

Jude I’ve seen live a couple times when he’s come to Portland and I just love him!  His song “Indian Lover” is one of the sexiest songs out there in my opinion!  He’s such a good show and plays forever!  The first time I saw him he got about 3 encores and just kept coming back again and again.  I swear he played for at least 2 and half hours.  I don’t know how his fingers weren’t bleeding from playing his guitar for so long!

Thanks for your time, Jeanna!

Jeanna is currently enjoying the artsy life in Portland, Oregon. You can find out more about her on her website or her Myspace page and pick up her debut album Magic on CDBaby and itunes. Go, listen! Thanks for the tunes!

Between Failures is based in a retail store.  What has your experience been in the retail industry?

I worked retail for many years.  My assumption is that my experience was typical.  Whether it was or not I really can’t say.  They tell me I have a unique reaction to the world, so maybe my experience was atypical, and I’ve been operating under a false pretense this whole time.  I guess it doesn’t matter either way really.  The long and the short of it was that people were angry all the time over what amounts to nothing.  The companies I worked for were controlled by faceless people who govern in a way that seems arbitrary.  It made me sick of humanity.  Eventually I came to a point where I couldn’t tolerate it anymore, so I walked away.  It all must have tainted me in some way though, since I’ve spent so much time essentially working through how I felt about all of it; through various forms of creative expression.

Since you started the comic you have been able to post a new page at a fairly consistent pace.  You were even able to post daily for a while there.  How do you manage the time so that you can write, draw, and still have a life?

I don’t have a life.  Certainly not what most people would consider a life anyway.  I sink the best part of my time into making the comic, or creating something.  I live quite far from any kind of cultural center.  That being the case I don’t add new people to my circle anymore.  All of the friends I already have live at least 2 hours away, so I only make the trip to see them once a month or so.  As you can imagine that leaves me with a good portion of time to chase what dreams I still have.  Even without as much distraction, once I changed the pages to color I simply couldn’t keep up with everything anymore.  My skill, sadly, does not match my vision.  In order to maintain a consistent posting schedule I had to cut back.  Everyone was very kind about it though.  For the most part, as long as you try hard, and keep producing consistently, people will give you a lot of slack.

Your audience has grown at a moderate pace since you started but you said recently that you got it to the point where the comic is paying for its own webpage.  How did you promote your comic to get enough people reading it to be able to get the word around?

I really didn’t do much promotion apart from making it and putting it up on a few free websites.  Once people became invested in the characters they just sort of stuck around.  I think the bulk of them came on when I got featured on Drunk Duck.  That site has changed somewhat since then and I’m not sure that other people would get the same benefit that I did at the time.  Of course you can never be sure that a free service will be around forever, so I decided to consolidate it all onto a single site that I was ultimately responsible for.  I tried to give people enough warning so that they would slowly get into the habit of coming to the real site before it stood on its own.  I still use Drunk Duck as a lagging archive in case of emergency.  The lag gives new readers an incentive to go to the home site.

Getting a webcomic to pay for its own space isn’t much of an accomplishment.  Webspace is relatively cheap and there are a lot of ways to monetize, even for someone as tech illiterate as me. That said, it took at least a year to build up enough money for the next.  It’s really kind of pathetic.  The comic is still a substantial loss of time and money for the return.  It just managed to get enough back so that I didn’t have to find new money to keep it online.  I sincerely hope it does well enough this year to pay for the next.  New people are finding it all the time, so I’m optimistic.

The characters in your comic are very pop culturally literate and your comic is reference heavy.  What role did pop culture play in forming your worldview?

I’m not really sure how to answer that.  I mean, at what point does pop culture deviate from culture?  Culture is the sum of our shared experiences.  I watched the same television as the rest of America; saw the same movies.  For whatever reason I remember all sorts of random things.  As a kid I was incredibly shy, but found that life was easier if there was some kind of common ground to reach people with.  When you take your first steps into an unfamiliar social situation how do you gauge what sort of crowd you’re dealing with?  You talk about movies, television, or what have you, until you figure out how to fit in, or if you even can.  Everyone wants to find other people they can relate to.  I’m not sure what role pop culture played in shaping my worldview, but I do know that it helped me relate to the world, which is still difficult for me to do.

Who are your pop culture heroes?  How have they inspired your writing?

Pop culture hero…  I don’t know if that’s a label I’d willingly attach to someone I had any kind of respect for.  Hero isn’t even a word I like to throw around casually.  I’ve been influenced by legions of people, but I wouldn’t necessarily characterize them as heroes, pop culture or otherwise.

I loved Sesame Street when I was little, and The Muppet Show.  No one has even come close to the kind of genius Jim Henson exhibited in recent years.  His shows could be entertaining for kids without being condescending.

I read everything written by John Bellairs as a kid.  His work combined with Edward Gorey’s illustrations, left a pretty deep mark on me.  Douglas Addams is another author that I think my style tends to emulate, especially comically.  Tolkien, Pieres Anthony, and C.S. Lewis took care of a lot of the fantasy portion of my reading list.  I didn’t do much reading once I got into my teens.

During the comic book years it was almost always manga, so Katsuhiro Otomo, Hayao Miyazaki, Johji Manabe, Rumiko Takahashi, & Yukito Kishiro bear a lot of the blame for the way I am.  I read a lot of typical American comics too, but I never cared enough about them to learn many names.  J. Scott Campbell, and Joe Madureira, are the only two that spring to mind  I really liked Johnen Vasquez’s stuff, and list him separately because I doubt he’d want to be mentioned in the same breath as most other American comic artists, or other humans generally.  Jim Mafood was another guy who’s stuff I liked.  Though I have no idea what he’s done recently.  The last thing I remember seeing was a Gen X one shot.  Jolly Blackburn’s Knight’s Of The Dinner Table showed me that you can make a fantastic comic even if you can’t draw.  Very important to remember every time I sit down to draw…

I’m a child of 80s television, so everyone involved in that bare some blame for who I am and how I write.

Honestly I could list so many people no one would have the time or inclination to read it all.  Steven Speilberg, Kevin Smith, John Hughes, Harold Ramis, the list for movies would just go on and on.

In the blog for the end of the first part you mention three songs that you imagine playing during that emotional scene.  Was that a holdover from when you imagined your script as a television show or movie? Do you always score your scenes in your head? Is it in anyway related to the music (if any) you might be listening to while writing or drawing it?

The real beginning of that habit is a little nebulous, but there is a reason why I articulate it.  Years ago, when my circle of friends was just discovering the magic that is blogging, (A word I hate, but that’s a different topic entirely.) I came up with the idea of making a soundtrack for your life.  So we all posted these soundtracks and explained why we picked what we did, and all that.  Now, I’m not anywhere near as into music as my friends Justin and Joey.  I kind of did it  once in a while and that was an end of it.  They took it to a whole other level.  Justin made these epic theme mixes for every month.  Sort of chronicling the events of his life in series.  Joey started compiling these collections that laid out the event of his life in song.  Each track having a deep personal meaning and significance that only he could truly understand.  I haven’t spoken to Justin in ages, but I expect, as much as music means to him, that he probably maintains some sort of musical convention similar in some way to the soundtrack for his life.  I know for a fact that Joey still makes music collections for all manner of life events.  He’s even working on a definitive soundtrack for my comic, which is very flattering.  It won’t have a practical use, but it’s still neat to see how he would score it.

Anyway, it’s just sort of a habit to make up soundtracks for things that don’t necessarily need them.  Music means a lot to people in general, so if you talk about it in a post it generates comments.  I think most everyone must have some idea of what the soundtrack for their work would be like.  Even if they’ve never put it to paper it exists inside them, just waiting for someone to ask them about it.  Experiencing music is very personal, so you can learn a lot about someone by asking them what the soundtrack to their life would be like.

I have at least a vague idea of what sort of music I would want for any given scene.  Incidental music, like sitcoms have, and that sort of thing.  I prefer to let the scene dictate the music rather than the reverse.  I avoid listening to music when writing because of that.  Music tends to influence the tone of what I write, so it’s important to be aware of that.  Taking it out of the equation simplifies things.

What kind of music do you listen to? Has it always been this type of music or has it changed as you have matured?

Soundtracks have always been what I’ve been drawn to the most.  Obviously they parallel my taste in film.  You’re going to find a lot of John Williams and Danny Elfman on my CD rack.  There’s also a lot of Nobuo Uematsu kicking around.  He did the music for the Final Fantasy games when I was growing up.  Video games occupy about the same amount of space in my brain as movies, so their soundtracks get equal time.  Getting actual physical copies of game soundtracks is an expensive chore, but they still have a decent showing on my shelves.  After you take away the soundtracks you’re left with a smattering of other music.  Everything else is quite random.  Compared to most people I own very little music.

My taste in music hasn’t evolved all that much as I’ve matured, but that may well be because I haven’t achieved a very advanced level of maturity.

What are your top 5 (or 4 or 6 or whatever) favorite musical artists?

If you cut it down to artists other than composers I’d probably go with: They Might Be Giants, The Beastie Boys. Gorillaz, Reel Big Fish, and Weird Al.

Are there any artists you feel are underrated or completely ignored that you’d like to give a shout out to now?

I would say that Al Yankovic’s original material is underrated because the subject matter is comedic.  I think if he chose to make an album of “serious” music, for lack of a better word, it would do well.  If he put his own name on it that probably wouldn’t work.  Kind of like Stephen King.  Would you think he could write Shawshank Redemption if you didn’t know it was his?

Look for more of J.T. in the future as his comic increases in popularity on the internet. Thanks, J.T., for taking the time to chat with us. Check out Between Failures, which updates M-W-F at http://betweenfailures.com/.