INTERVIEW : 2002-05-27 by Cucamonga.be

JA : I just have a lot of songs recorded. I'm trying to find vehicles for them. I have 70 songs recorded outside the album and the four EP's I just released. There is a lot of material there and I'm just trying to find a way to get it out.

I'd like to start releasing a record every six or eight months or at least one a year. But it is hard to do that, because there is a whole machine behind releasing a record and to get that process all up and running is very difficult as well. There's a bunch of men behind the curtains and you are the puppet in front of the curtains, many people are playing with your strings.

I have to stay busy or else self-destruction comes. No, I'm making it up. It's true you got to stay busy or else you can get in trouble. Idle time is the devil's hands or whatever. You know that whole phrase: idle time is something of the devil.

With interviews it's always hard because you're trying to explain consciously something that happened unconsciously. Things just happen. The problem with promoting is that you have to say why it just happened, when you yourself don't know why it happened the way it happened. It just happened that way! That's really the only answer, but it's too vague for anybody.

I guess it's possible that one could call an album "Redemption's son" and not think of "Redemption song". But in my case I did think of "Redemption song". But it was better than my second choice: "Exodus". The album named itself. There is a correct title for something. It's like when you get up and put on a bunch of outfits in the morning: that doesn't look good, that doesn't look good and finally you find an outfit that you like. It's the same thing with naming a record, you know, because it feels right.

If you had to break life down into a purpose, that seems where it would be. If there is a purpose to life, then it's probably something to do with your creator and your relationship with your creator.

Religion has been so perverted now. The whole concept about religious now is about somebody who is really uptight and usually right-wing and not very open-minded. I say usually, not always. People that tend to heavily put religion in their identity tend to be a certain way: anti-choice, kind of conservative and all that. I wouldn't put myself in that world. But I guess I believe in Jesus and all that and people's need for that. And I think religion has pushed a lot of people away from that, because of its uptight vibe. Whereas if they would be a bit more human about it, with a bit more sense of humor, just a bit more open-minded and open-hearted and with more fun, then you wouldn't sound like a freak saying "I believe in Jesus".

In both ways you are trying to get a sort of redemption. If you're really miserable or if you've done something bad, then you start writing a song. You're kind of trying to make yourself feel better, to redeem your spirit a bit. And I think the more necessary it is for you to be redeemed, the more vital what you come out with will be. So in some ways the more miserable you are, the more powerful your work will be. The sicker you are the more powerful your work will be. The healthier you are, the lamer your shit will be. That's not true always, but I think there is definitely truth to that. But then again, if you're self-destructive you can't write any songs. You have to be careful.

I think everybody goes through emotional rises and falls. That's part of the process of life. Sometimes you're balanced and you feel good and other times you're completely out of balance and you feel bad. You could be self-destructive by watching TV every night. That's a way of self-destruction too. Some methods of self-destruction are much more extreme and much more obvious. But you can be just self-destructive by day in and day out habits that don't really feed your soul. They can be like a subtle way of destroying your life. And in some ways those are harder to overcome, because they don't really make you bottom out emotionally as easily.

(www.cucamonga.be)