{"id":216858,"date":"2021-05-27T00:00:43","date_gmt":"2021-05-27T04:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/25yearslatersite.com\/?p=216858"},"modified":"2023-01-26T21:34:56","modified_gmt":"2023-01-27T02:34:56","slug":"interview-with-joy-on-fire-the-joys-of-making-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tvobsessive.com\/2021\/05\/27\/interview-with-joy-on-fire-the-joys-of-making-music\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Joy on Fire: The Joys of Making Music"},"content":{"rendered":"

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing guitarist John Paul Carillo and saxophonist Anna Meadors of the jazz-punk trio Joy on Fire<\/a>. Despite losing the ability to gig because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trenton, New Jersey-based band kept busy by releasing a new album, planning another one, releasing an EP, and making several spirited zero-budget music videos.<\/p>\n

This was a lively and wide-ranging interview covering their origins, influences, songwriting, and album-making processes, how “joy” influences their music, and, most importantly, cats in music videos.<\/p>\n

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Nick:<\/strong> The instrumentation of the group is fairly uncommon for a rock band: bass guitar, saxophone, and drums. How did the makeup of the group come about? Was it a matter of, \u201cWe have these people who want to start a band,\u201d or were there other influences or reasons for choosing the instrumentation?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> I was influenced by Morphine, which is a bass, sax, and drum trio that a lot of people love, and deservedly so. We\u2019re big fans of Morphine. I was coming out of a group that was guitar, bass, drums, but I was playing in a certain style where I felt that I could kinda take the rhythm guitar parts and the bass parts on the bass at the same time and just do something different. <\/span><\/p>\n

So there was the Morphine influence working, but that\u2019s only part of it. Anna walked into my life without me knowing what was going to happen. I wasn\u2019t in the scene searching for a saxophone player per se. I was starting to get into the Baltimore music scene\u2014I\u2019m originally from New York\u2014but I was hanging out with people I knew already. Anna showed up for rehearsal with a different group\u2014I was living with a drummer\u2014and I happened to be home and I happened to hear her play, and I was like, there it is! So after their session, I said to the drummer, \u201cWe\u2019ve got to start a trio with Anna as the saxophonist.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

[To Anna] I\u2019m not even sure that I knew your name that first day. I heard it before I saw any of it; they were downstairs, I was upstairs, and I was just blown away. So six months later the drummer, <\/span>Cory, actually made the call\u2014I asked him because they knew each other\u2014and that\u2019s how we had our first rehearsal. And that was the first incarnation of the band that lasted about a year. On Anna\u2019s part, you weren\u2019t looking for a particular group\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> No, I\u2019d found the band that his roommate\/drummer was in on Craigslist. I was doing my undergrad in classical saxophone, and that wasn\u2019t satisfying. I found that band, and that band only played one show and then fell apart. So when <\/span>Cory messaged me, I thought it was for that band. He said \u201cHey, come over and jam,\u201d and he didn\u2019t really tell me what was going on so I was like, \u201cOh, it\u2019s the old band getting back together!\u201d So I show up and John\u2019s in the car, and I\u2019m like, \u201cHi, who are you?\u201d I think John was surprised that Cory hadn\u2019t said who he was.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Typical musician communication! You\u2019re just supposed to start playing, which I guess is what happened once we got there. I remember the first song we played because it\u2019s going to be on our next album actually, even though it\u2019s 12 years old now. Somehow it never made an album. It\u2019s called \u201cRed Wave.\u201d It\u2019s modal, so Anna just tore it up. She doesn\u2019t play the same exact solo 12 years later, but it\u2019s the same vibe. <\/span><\/p>\n

So it worked pretty quickly, although we\u2019ve gotten to <\/span>Spinal Tap <\/span><\/i>territory with drummers. We\u2019ve worked with over 20 drummers\u2014not on recordings\u2014but at somewhat serious gigs. A lot of good drummers, but there are so many people that play in nine bands, so we\u2019ve played with a lot of them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> What is your songwriting process like? Is it mostly rooted in improvisation, or is there a lot that\u2019s worked out beforehand?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Usually, there\u2019s a lot that\u2019s worked out beforehand, but some of our pieces have spaces that open up. It might be a three-minute vamp for Anna to solo over in some of the longer pieces, then we decide if it\u2019s a double solo where Anna will overdub another sax part, and after rehearsing that, another idea may develop. But for the pieces I write, I often come in with a full structure, at least to get going. If that changes in rehearsals, great\u2014that means the other musicians are bringing ideas. In the pieces Anna composes for Joy on Fire, most of them have started on MIDI, right?<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, just like compositions for chamber groups\u2014written-out things. John\u2019s the lead songwriter, and the couple of things I\u2019ve brought in, he hears and he\u2019s like, \u201cOh, you should make that a Joy on Fire thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> It\u2019s great to get Anna\u2019s material in because there are different time signatures\u2014I go to the Led Zeppelin\/John Bonham beat 75% of the time. Anna is doing all kinds of different things rhythmically and with the drums. I think that on one of my favorite pieces of Anna\u2019s for Joy on Fire, the drums don\u2019t come in for six minutes?<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, that was one I wrote at UNCG.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> That\u2019s a piece on our <\/span>Hymn <\/span><\/i>album, and there are almost no drums on it. It\u2019s a nine-minute piece and there\u2019s like a minute-and-a-half of drums.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> Is that \u201cRhopareptilia?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, I think I just took the scientific words for butterfly and reptile and smushed them together. But yeah, I wrote that at UNCG for one of the ensembles that came through for composition readings and then reworked it. It was for bass clarinet, sax, and piano.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> That was a piece I was definitely planning to ask you about. As I was going through your discography again, that one struck me as a departure from what I expected. When I think of your music, I think about tension between John\u2019s bass guitar\u2014which is a little more menacing and meaty\u2014and Anna\u2019s much brighter saxophone. Is that a tension that you\u2019re looking to cultivate in a lot of your songs?<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Anna
Courtesy of Joy on Fire<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

John:<\/strong> Absolutely. Anna has said, \u201cWhy are you always writing battle music?\u201d I think that\u2019s a little exaggerated, but I think a lot of our music is narrative in a way. There seems to be a conflict that gets resolved, and there are sections in some of the longer pieces. I <\/span>think narrative music can mean different things. I think that the tension between the bass and the sax\u2014sometimes we play unison, and that tension changes or even goes away. Sometimes we play unison, and if I put my distortion on, it might blend with Anna\u2019s harmonics, and it becomes one big sound, but then we split off again. So there\u2019s this conversation that sometimes is an argument, and sometimes it\u2019s an agreement. It\u2019s exciting to play with those tensions and those textures, especially in long-form music. I was influenced by King Crimson and some Pink Floyd, and those are bands that do the “menace” thing very well.<\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> And then Anna, when you take out the bari sax, how do you feel that changes the dynamic?<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> I definitely feel that I can honk a little bit more\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> And it\u2019s more menacing! [laughs]<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yes, definitely. I think I solo on it differently. Sometimes, back when live shows were a thing, <\/span>Zach Herchen would sit in with us\u2014he\u2019s a saxophonist I know from Peabody\u2014and we would do double-bari stuff, and that\u2019s super-fun. The more bari the better! On some things, he would play bari and I would play alto, and just having another saxophonist\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> It\u2019s visually stunning just to see! It was going to be a little bit of a gag, but there was going to be a <\/span>third <\/span><\/i>bari who was just going to show up for three minutes just to play one of our shorter songs, and we were just going to have three baris. It wouldn\u2019t be musical per se\u2014you wouldn\u2019t <\/span>need <\/span><\/i>it\u2014but it would just be to close the show with it and have the three big horns on stage.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> If we did that, we would have to do a cover of \u201cBig Bottom,\u201d just to bring Spinal Tap into it. [laughs]<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> There is a sax quartet piece on our <\/span>Fire with Fire <\/span><\/i>album [\u201cThe Spider\u2019s House\u201d]. It comes out of a proper rock song, but all the other instruments fade away, and as they do, Anna brings all of the additional saxes in for about three minutes\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Isn\u2019t that more like eight-layered? I don\u2019t remember, that was so long ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Was it really eight parts? We have to listen to it again, I thought I knew it pretty well! That\u2019s good, we\u2019re getting a pretty big catalog\u2014to the point where we\u2019re forgetting songs.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Cover
Cover of Another Adventure in Red, courtesy of Joy on Fire<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Nick:<\/strong> Along the same lines, you\u2019ve done a couple of album releases over the last few years. What is your writing process like? Are you taking things over the course of years, do you have more condensed songwriting sessions at points? What is the process of compiling an album like?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> I\u2019ll try to give an emblematic answer. With our newest album that came out two weeks ago [<\/span>Another Adventure in Red<\/span><\/i>], it has our second-oldest song on it, which I actually did with a prototype band three years before I even met Anna, and then our newest piece, which is a piece of Anna\u2019s called \u201cAfter,\u201d which she actually wrote for <\/span>Rhymes with Opera<\/span><\/a> when it was a one-minute piece.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> And Brian Lampkin of Scuppernong [an <\/span>independent bookstore<\/span><\/a> in Greensboro, North Carolina] wrote the words for that.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Anna let me hear it, and I said, \u201cI think we can turn that into a Joy on Fire piece.\u201d So that\u2019s really our newest piece. So there isn\u2019t a single process. As we start to realize that we have material for another album, we start to think about what else could be on it that would make it a better record. Anna\u2019s piece is a great example. There\u2019s dulcimer on that now\u2014it\u2019s the first time we\u2019ve had dulcimer on a Joy on Fire record, and it\u2019s just wonderful. <\/span><\/p>\n

Another example: We put out an EP a little bit before the pandemic [<\/span>Thunderdome<\/span><\/i>], and since we put it out on a 45 record, we were figuring out what to do with the B-side, and we said \u201cWhy not remixes?\u201d Those remixes were done with a lot of hard work over a three-week period because we were on a schedule. <\/span><\/p>\n

So we don\u2019t adhere to only one process. Even when you were talking about improv before, our new record has a piece that actually involves another band named 3rd Grade Friends<\/a> [\u201c3rd Grade Fire\u201d]. We jammed with them for about three hours, and Anna and I found what we thought was a really good 14-minute section and we did some mix moves to make it more compositional. So it\u2019s like, \u201cHold on, we have this older idea, would this be good for this record?\u201d You get the foundation of the record together, and then you build on that foundation. We\u2019re almost always thinking about it that way.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, I was also just thinking that some of the older albums are things that you had written before the group or things that you had performed live a bunch before even getting into the studio. And then the <\/span>Thunderdome<\/span><\/i><\/a> EP is part of this larger group of songs. Some of it got recorded before it was performed live. That was a much more condensed writing process because it was with Dan Gutstein\u2014the vocalist who joined two years ago now, maybe more. So it kind of depends on what John has written or if we work with someone new, but the process is pretty different.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Some of our favorite groups do both instrumental and vocal material. I think my favorite album by King Crimson has three vocal pieces, three instrumental pieces, and we\u2019re getting to emulate that more and more. The new album has two vocal pieces. I think when vocals get involved, it changes the process somewhat. You make a choice sculpting enough room for that vocalist and figuring out how to let the vocals come through. If that\u2019s what you even want; I was thinking about Sonic Youth the other day and how on some of their records they don\u2019t sculpt any room for the vocalist at all, they just keep the noise going. The vocals get buried, and that\u2019s great, that worked really well for them. Usually, we don\u2019t do that; usually, we create room so you can hear the vocals, and when the vocals lay out, the instruments take over, and then back-and-forth. We want the lyrics to be heard with the lyricists we work with.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> Is it more like improvisation and album-building, where sometimes it feels right and so you add lyrics, or has there been a decision to move towards more vocal pieces?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> I guess one of the first things we did with vocals was \u201cNight Sticks,\u201d and that was an instrumental tune for a while, right?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> We played it live instrumentally a lot, and I think live, it worked as an instrumental. It\u2019s a verse-chorus arrangement, and I just felt that the right vocal part could make the song better. We reached out to a singer that we were working with in a different band called Three Red Crowns, but she couldn\u2019t really find the vocal part, and that\u2019s when we reached out to Brian [Lampkin] to write lyrics. I guess we just sent him a demo.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> We sent him a recording, and then he had them pretty much written out. I think he did them with us once and rehearsed them with us as a spoken-word part. He came up with something immediately, and it just worked so well. We love those lyrics. So that was the first thing, and we recorded that a while ago, but it\u2019s finally officially out. But then there was a big gap between it and other vocal material. <\/span><\/p>\n

We met Dan maybe three-and-a-half years ago at a show. He was playing with a D.C. band that we shared a bill with. John and him hit it off immediately and started working on some stuff. John drove down to D.C., so I think that process was a little different because the songs weren\u2019t set yet.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Dan sent me the track \u201cMcFlurry\u201d by the British duo Sleaford Mods<\/a>. Our list of inspirations\u2014bands we love and music we love\u2014is obviously an important part of the band. There\u2019s a lot of instrumental music in there, but there\u2019s a lot of vocal music, too, and there\u2019s a lot of bands that do both. The live performance of that song is particularly great, it\u2019s really vibrant, performative, aggressive in a way that\u2019s enjoyable\u2014I wouldn\u2019t say threatening, but very in-your-face, a little bit muscular, but very funny, too. A lot of their stuff is one- or two-riff songs. When a one-riff song works, I really like that. <\/span><\/p>\n

I just started messing around with the bass. I came up with a riff that I thought would work, and we just kept texturing the riff differently, and gave Anna a two-minute solo [laughs]! So that kinda started our path of working with Dan, and Dan and I wrote the majority of the album\u2014six songs out of nine\u2014in two sessions. The future of Joy on Fire is both in instrumental material and vocal material. I have some pieces that I know are instrumental, and double sax\u2014I want to get Zach involved again. So there\u2019s not one process. We\u2019re not going to write the perfect pop song.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"John
Courtesy of Joy on Fire<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Nick:<\/strong> You\u2019ve also released a few music videos in recent years. Have these been your first forays into making music videos, and what has that process been like?<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> \u201cNight Sticks\u201d must have been the first one we did, and then \u201cPunk Jazz\u201d was the second one, so there was a big gap in between those first couple videos. When we started working with Dan, his brother and sister-in-law<\/span>\u2014Mark Isaac and Gabriela Bulisova\u2014<\/span>are video and multimedia artists, so he asked if they would make something for us. They\u2019ve graciously made two videos now and are starting a third, so we\u2019re really grateful to them. The first video they did for us was for \u201cUh Huh,\u201d and they made a really powerful video. <\/span><\/p>\n

After that, Chris, our drummer, knew a director and filmmaker through his job, Damien Davis, and he made the video for \u201cThunderdome.\u201d That was filmed here in the apartment. That was a super-fun process, it was very different. We\u2019re not in the one for \u201cUh Huh,\u201d it\u2019s all kind of found footage and animation, and the \u201cThunderdome\u201d one is more traditional. Once we had those we were like, \u201cWe want to make videos for a lot more things.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> We filmed one four days ago in the room we\u2019re sitting in. We turned it into a cheap movie set. We cleared all the furniture out, and we got the cat involved in the video! We actually got her to be in the whole video, with a little editing magic, too. I grew up on MTV, back when they had music videos, I\u2019m not even sure what MTV does anymore! But when I was watching they had good shows like <\/span>120 Minutes<\/span><\/i> which had some interesting bands on smaller labels. So I grew up on it, so to come back to videos and with YouTube being the format, the nice thing is that you can do things with no money sometimes, too. The video we just did is probably going to cost basically zero. We had to pay the cat in food!<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> John wanted the cat to be in every scene, without really thinking about what that would be like! And then the funny thing is that she was sitting on the amp while we were setting up, and that\u2019s what he wanted it to do for the video. So of course before we\u2019re ready, she\u2019s sitting on it, 10 minutes without moving. We get started and she jumps down immediately.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> No noise was being made, the amp\u2019s not on, we\u2019re playing to the pre-recorded track, she just sensed it! The pay scale was too low! [laughs]<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> I think it turned out OK. I just started learning how to edit videos last year because I made a simple video for \u201cHymn\u201d<\/span> for fun since that seemed like everyone was doing, since there were no live shows. We\u2019re working with a couple of other people to make things, but we\u2019re trying to DIY it.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Counting ourselves, we\u2019re working with four different video artists, which is cool because we get different takes on it. Some are hands-off, like \u201cUh Huh.\u201d Our singer, Dan<\/span>\u2014<\/span>it was his brother and sister-in-law<\/span>\u2014so he talked to them about certain ideas, but we didn\u2019t give any ideas, we just said go with it. I had a one-page script for the video for \u201cThunderdome,\u201d and then the director Damien Davis and I worked on it and changed some things up, and Anna also made some changes before I even scripted it because the original idea took place outside and it was cold [laughs]!<\/span><\/p>\n

But yeah, having different people do videos is really cool because you get different textures, different styles, and different ideas. When we do it ourselves, we have to rethink the space we live in: How can we turn this into a movie set? How can get away with one angle being the majority of the video? I think that the video Anna did for \u201cHymn\u201d was the perfect video for that song\u2014that\u2019s the feeling of that song. I find that a less menacing piece. There\u2019s a lot of nature in the video. My favorite videos\u2014this is not very profound\u2014bring out the music\u2014the overall feeling, the structure, or both. For the videos that we\u2019re doing ourselves, that\u2019s where the initial ideas are coming from. Let\u2019s bring out the music.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> You have a lot of \u201csequel songs,\u201d where sometimes across multiple albums there will be \u201cParts 1 and 2,\u201d or the title will be similar, like in \u201cIf 3 was 8\u201d and \u201cIf .3 was 8 Billion.\u201d What is some of the thought behind some of these sequel songs and behind some of the naming decisions that you make around them?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> I\u2019m glad you mention \u201cIf .3 was 8 Billion,\u201d because that was just a lot of fun. The second part of that was an in-studio process. The song I\u2019m going to talk about is \u201cThe Complete Book of the Bonsai,” Parts 1 and 2. I used the same bass chord to get both pieces going, and I felt that there was enough personality in that bass chord that even though the songs go in different directions, there\u2019s the feeling of how each one begins\u2014there\u2019s enough similarity that they seem to be of a sequence. Structurally, they both have three big parts, so there\u2019s a structural similarity, so just to me, it made sense to use the name to point out the similarity.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> There\u2019s also something funny about \u201cThe Complete Book…Part 2,\u201d that\u2019s just a dumb joke thing [laughs].<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> There used to be a \u201cComplete Book of the Bonsai Part 3,\u201d but Anna was like enough of that, so we\u2019re going to change the name of that. I think I might just call something \u201cThe Complete Book Part 4,\u201d but leave the bonsai out!<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Naming instrumental pieces is so hard. Whenever I write a composition, I\u2019m like, \u201cJohn, can you listen to this and help me come up with a title?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> She never uses my suggestions! She\u2019s just weeding out the bad ones!<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> I used one, but then I took it from this one piece and gave it to another one [laughs]! But whenever we\u2019re doing a show and I\u2019m like, \u201cThis one is called whatever,\u201d it feels weird to say that this instrumental song has this title…<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> In all seriousness, you start to understand \u201cUntitled #7.\u201d Anna and I are both fans of what people like to call minimalism, and that naming gambit is something easy to make fun of: \u201cMusic for 18 Musicians,\u201d \u201cMusic for Changing Parts.\u201d They say \u201cNothing changes in Philip Glass\u2019 music, haha, why\u2019d he call it that?\u201d Jokes aside, I really like those names. It\u2019s kinda like\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> It\u2019s just about the music, and you can come up with your own story for it.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Nick:<\/strong> You\u2019ve gotten some really good publicity lately through NPR, with \u201cThunderdome\u201d premiering on <\/span>All Songs Considered<\/span><\/i>, <\/span>and you have a Tiny Desk concert scheduled, right?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> We had a date, but it got canceled because of COVID. We\u2019ve spoken to Bob [Boilen, host of <\/span>All Song\u2019s Considered<\/span><\/i>], and he said he\u2019s going to reschedule everybody, so we\u2019re in the books, but we don\u2019t have a new date yet.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> How exciting has it been to see that relationship develop with a major outlet like NPR?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> It\u2019s great. We want the music to be heard, and the video component, since that\u2019s a part of <\/span>All Songs Considered<\/span><\/i>, is cool. That kinda gave us a little kick in the ass to make more videos.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, the first time we were on there we didn\u2019t have one, and we were the only band on the blog without one, and we\u2019re like, “We\u2019ve got to get on this.” I\u2019m so grateful that he featured two things on there. We met because we shared a bill with him and Dan\u2019s band in D.C. I was so nervous to meet him, to be honest, because we kind of knew ahead of time that he might be there, and then I saw him and we were talking, and he was like \u201cI\u2019m Bob Boilen, you may…\u201d and I\u2019m like \u201cI know you!\u201d [laughs] Luckily I didn\u2019t scare him away.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> Anna was telling me that you have some live shows coming up. Obviously, you\u2019re excited to get back out there?<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Yeah, we have a show in Ocean City [Maryland] in June, and that\u2019s a real show with real people there. First time playing Ocean City.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> I used to go there as a kid every summer, so this will be fun for me to reminisce. I have no idea what to expect, but I feel that way about every show. We never know how people are going to react to long-form instrumental music.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nick:<\/strong> My last question\u2014I’m not sure that I’ve come up with the best way to ask it. I guess…what has being in a band based on \u201cjoy\u201d been like during a really pessimistic era in our history over the last five years? I know that\u2019s a meaty question\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> That\u2019s such a great question. It\u2019s funny, I think that yes, a lot of our music is intense, and maybe some of it has more battle-y sounding things, but I think like John said, there\u2019s a lot of narrative, and I think there\u2019s a lot of celebration of making music. There\u2019s just the joy in being loud and in-your-face and having sections that are a little more open and reacting. Everything is structured out, but when John opens it up to solos, we can really feed off each other. <\/span><\/p>\n

John and I have played with each other since 2009, and then Chris, our drummer, for several years, too. You get to the point where you know what the other people are going to do. We could come in, even after not playing for a really long time\u2014even before the pandemic, if we went a couple of months without shows if things got busy\u2014you come back, and it just feels like returning home. You get to just shout through your instrument with these people that you love. It just feels great! I think it comes across in the music\u2014I hope it does. People usually tell us that they like the name, so that makes me feel a little bit better about it.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> Sometimes they ask if Anna\u2019s name is Joy [laughs]! Along with what Anna is saying, I don\u2019t think that art should always respond exactly to the times. The pandemic came, does that mean that the group has to drop its whole aesthetic? That doesn\u2019t make sense to me. But on the other hand, with Trump, we responded directly to certain political issues with lyrics.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Dan is just so good at that kind of thing, too. He just did such a good job.<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> So \u201cThunderdome\u201d has a political element, \u201cUh Huh\u201d has a political element, both of the videos brought that out to an extent, but not <\/span>only<\/span><\/i>\u2014there are other aspects. For the \u201cThunderdome\u201d video, we build a sort of mural on the wall as the video goes, and there are political figures\u2014some of whom we\u2019re against, but there\u2019s also John Coltrane and Jamie Muir from King Crimson. <\/span><\/p>\n

All of these things still exist; to try to get an exact angle on the world, like, \u201cHere it is,\u201d for me, isn\u2019t exactly how it works. I think we all felt the depression, but I felt more of the depression that to me, Bernie Sanders was unjustly shoved aside. To me, as depressing as Trump is, the fact that we had a candidate of that ethical caliber pushed aside by the system twice…if I wrote lyrics, and I\u2019m not good at it, so I rarely do, but if I wrote lyrics, I might try to write something about that, because if there\u2019s something that I want to speak to directly, it\u2019s that. You know, the problems in this country go beyond Trump, obviously\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna:<\/strong> Yeah, the pandemic highlighted everything that has been wrong all along, and people say, \u201cOh, maybe things will get better,\u201d but…I think we all want things to get better, it just feels hard when Wall Street\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

John:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know if you\u2019re watching these Adam Curtis documentaries on the BBC. They\u2019re very much worth checking out. But yet another thinker who has really said that the bigger problem is the financial industry. He points out politicians who maybe had a good idea, and had their minds and hearts in the right place for a moment, but the financial industry just steamrolled them. <\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to Joy on Fire\u2019s music, I think that we can joyously celebrate that we\u2019re angry at some of these things. Like Anna said before, I think that the lyrics\u2014at least for the way that we write\u2014are the better way to get at that. The way I write, I pick up a guitar or bass and I start something, and if I like the way it sounds, and feel like I can develop it, I do. I\u2019m not sure if there are politics in my chord or texture choices, at least not in a conscious way. But then when we work with Dan, he might hear an inkling of something where we\u2019re talking about a band we both like, whether it\u2019s the Mods or an old Clash song or something, then that can come out in the lyrics, and I think that\u2019s wonderful. <\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s plenty to say politically lyrically, and there always will be. We\u2019re excited that that\u2019s part of the music now, because political punk is part of the music.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Note: this interview has been edited for clarity and concision.<\/em> \t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing guitarist John Paul Carillo and saxophonist Anna Meadors of the jazz-punk trio Joy on Fire. Despite losing the ability to gig because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trenton, New Jersey-based band kept busy by releasing a new album, planning another one, releasing an EP, and making several spirited […] More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":318,"featured_media":216885,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5474],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nInterview with Joy on Fire: The Joys of Making Music | 25YL<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"John Paul Carillo & Anna Meadors from the jazz-punk band Joy on Fire sit down for a wide-ranging interview that is as lively as their music.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tvobsessive.com\/2021\/05\/27\/interview-with-joy-on-fire-the-joys-of-making-music\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" 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