Interview: Der amerikanische Singer/Songwriter Joseph Arthur

Wer Joseph Arthur nicht kennt, kann schnell von den Details erschlagen werden. Musiker? Singer-Songwriter? Maler und Bildhauer? Dichter? Liebling zahlreicher prominenter Kollegen wie R.E.M., Coldplay, Peter Gabriel oder Ben Harper? Hätte fast den Titelsong für „Shrek 2“ geschrieben? Und immer noch praktisch unbekannt?

Vor allem in Deutschland konnte Arthur sich nie etablieren. Seit 2002 ist er hierzulande praktisch von der Bildfläche verschwunden. Dabei hat er sich Europa sonst ganz gut erschlossen: Frankreich heißt ihn immer gern willkommen, BeNeLux und Schweiz ziehen mit und England kennt ihn immerhin ganz gut. Mit seiner Platte „The Graduation Ceremony“ im Gepäck wagte Arthur sich letztes Jahr dann doch auch zu uns auf Tour.

Im Interview zeigte sich kein abgehobener Künstler, sondern ein nüchterner, übermüdeter Mann. Die Wendungen in seiner Karriere sah Arthur nicht nur von der inhaltlichen, sondern auch von der markttechnischen Seite – mit ein wenig Resignation. Dabei ging es ihm doch eigentlich ganz gut: Die amerikanische Öffentlichkeit hatte gerade erst den biblischen Weltuntergang unter dem Stichwort „The Rapture“ prophezeit, wozu Joseph Arthur sich scheinbar sehr ausgeglichen geäußert hatte…

Campus-Web: On your Twitter account, you commented on the Rapture…

Joseph: Oh, the Rapture, yeah.

Campus-Web: ...that if the Rapture were to come the next day as announced, it would be okay for you because everything was balanced out for you – something like that.

Joseph: Well, I didn't quite say that. I said that if it comes, I guess it would be okay. That’s a little different. (laughs)

Campus-Web: But you are actually quite happy with the place you are in now?

Joseph: It depends on the day, it's like everybody else, I guess. But I think I'm in a good place. There's definitely some things… you know, I'm not free of worry, but I'm pretty cool. I've been in worse places. Definitely in a pretty good place now.

Campus-Web: Speaking of now and then and taking a look at your career, you haven’t really been on tour in Germany for a decade. There’s been a lot going on, but we only had a few of your records over here. We've had "Redemption’s Son" back in 2002, and then "Temporary People" in 2008. But you’ve done a lot between and after those.

Joseph: I know, it's a drag! This is what being in a good place would mean. This is the area in which I’d like to instantly fucking change everything. I'd just have my career well organized. It's just like a perpetual pain in the ass. Getting things out properly in Germany and other places. I feel like I do everything I can to make that happen, but still somehow it is difficult. It's difficult for a lot of people though, at least I'm not alone. (laughs) But it's definitely frustrating. And I wish all my records would come out in Germany and I wish there had been more promotion for this tour. And I wish this wasn’t the first time I'm doing a tour in Germany.

Campus-Web: You also had a few other firsts while touring this time: You've been to Australia with Fistful of Mercy, and you’ve played in China.

Joseph: Yeah, I was in China for the first time, I was in Australia for the first time. I’ve actually been to Germany before but I feel like this is a first, somehow. Because this is the first time I’ve done a few dates, more than just one or two, on my own.

Campus-Web: Your career has been through many changes. You started on Peter Gabriel’s Real World label based in the UK, then your fourth record, “Our Shadows Will Remain”, came out first in the USA and became kind of a hit in the UK afterwards, with larger shows…

Joseph: Yeah, that’s right.

Campus-Web: And then you started your own record label and started playing with a full band, the Lonely Astronauts, so you evolved a lot. Are there times that feel like logical conclusions of what came before? Or is it just happening like that?

Joseph: It’s just an opening to creativity and experimentation. It’s like looking at people like Neil Young or Dylan who did different things. That’s the way I look at it. If you’re gonna do something for a few years… I can’t imagine just repeating the same thing over and over again. Or just repeating versions of the same thing. I prefer this as a center you can return to. I feel like I’m returning to the center right now. And from there I can expand out again in different ways. That approach has definitely made things more difficult. I think people are less open to artists experimenting and changing and evolving than maybe they were. Or maybe that’s always been the case.

Campus-Web: I just read a theory in one of your fan forums – someone thought that the “Let’s Just Be” record was either a conscious or a subconscious self-destruct button for your career. That your career was gaining momentum after “Our Shadows Will Remain”, and the “Let’s Just Be” phase was a reaction to that because everything was getting too big. Is there something to this…?

Joseph: Whoa... For one, I had a record between those two, Nuclear Daydream. And for me, it wasn’t self-destruction. I’m an artist open to the momentum of the creative spirit. So, we had “Our Shadows Will Remain” and there was momentum gaining there, and then “Nuclear Daydream” came out and the same label that put out “Shadows” wasn’t interested in it. For whatever reason. For me, “Nuclear Daydream” is a completely worthy follow up, in every respect. They were interested in selling huge amounts of records, and the first one wasn’t big enough for them. Or something like that, I don’t know why the whole thing panned out that way. But the same happened after my second record, “Come To Where I’m From”. I put in “Redemption’s Son”, which I feel is a worthy follow up in every respect. I feel like time bears that out. With hindsight, you can see. And Virgin Records didn’t want to put it out in the US. I got dropped, pretty much.

It’s always been like that. One step forward, two steps back, or two steps forward, one step back. And then, the Lonely Astronauts came together through “Nuclear Daydream”. I was hanging out with some friends and we put together this band. Just, to my way of thinking, this exciting and interesting rock’n’roll band. It was an explosion of enthusiasm and rock’n’roll creativity. After the tour for “Daydream” we went in to make “Let’s Just Be”. And the first review I got for it was a four star review from someplace in Canada, I went and did a satellite radio thing for them. The DJ said this could really blow up. But then, it started getting bad critics. And I think things have a momentum, so that’s the way it went. But I certainly don’t think this record is a self-destruct record. It’s full of great songs, it’s got a loose vibe. But if you look at somebody like Neil Young, records like “Harvest” and then records like “Tonight’s The Night”, they’re just different modes. That’s more of what I’m thinking of. Creating in different modes and from different inspirations. People’s resistance to any creative impulse that’s outside of their expectation is profound. More so than back in the day, I think.

Campus-Web: That’s the business side, the career side. I’d also like to talk about the creative side. The record you’re touring, “The Graduation Ceremony”, is about turning points. Points in life when you realize that something has to happen, something is going to happen, something’s changing. Would you agree with that?

Joseph: Yeah! It’s sort of built around a long-term relationship ending. That’s the impetus for the whole thing. So, everything you just said makes sense in that context.

Campus-Web: One of the songs, “Someone To Love”, is from back in the Nineties, when you were touring your debut record.

Joseph: I wrote that at the same time I wrote “In The Sun”. I used to write songs in pairs, like a brother and sister. And that was the brother or sister of “In The Sun”. “Someone To Love”.

Campus-Web: Is there a point when you say, now this is the time for this song? “Someone To Love” already resurfaced some years ago, but it only got on a record this time around.

Joseph: I always thought this was one of the best songs I ever wrote. I just never put it on a record. Certain songs can never find their way on a record. ”Mexican Army” is not on a record yet, hopefully that will come out eventually on a record, or as an “official version”. In terms of this record, “Someone To Love” just fits so perfectly with the theme. Also, there’s the way I made the record: I just sang and recorded, singing and playing through about ten songs. That was one of them. Basically, I just wanted to do all songs that I knew could work this way, just sitting there with an acoustic guitar and singing. And that also fit the bill for me, so…

Campus-Web: You’re working on several records right now, and some are taking a bit longer. You were just about to finish one called “The Ballad Of Boogie Christ”…?

Joseph: I think it might be done. I mean, it’s mastered. But now I’m starting to think about other things I could do with it, so…

Campus-Web: It’s some kind of concept record. Where did the idea come from, is there some kind of song at the center of it that you also had for a few years?

Joseph: Well, there’s lots of songs that I never played live, that nobody knows exist. I hope I never play them live [laughs]. So that it can be a moment of “Oh, this is the first time I’m hearing this song”.

Campus-Web: You also wanted to do a spoken word project, based on your poetry?

Joseph: Yeah, I’m thinking about blending those two things, that’s the whole thing. “The Ballad Of Boogie Christ” centers around lyrics. Long, sort of lyrical songs. And then I have this other, sort of spoken word stuff coming out. And a lot more. So I wonder how to get that stuff all out in a timely way. But without subconsciously pressing a sabotage button on my career [laughs]. The thing is, I was coming from a place of creative freedom. Just believing in that. Believing in putting out records in a frequent way. There’s like… [pause]

I don’t think I have any desire to sabotage anything. There’s… I don’t know. There’s no blueprint for what I am doing. I have a different way of going about doing things. How people are gonna react or respond to it, you really just have no idea. It’s really hard to tell.

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