by jon bosworth jaxvillain@yahoo.com
WHAT: 5th Anniversary Dance Party with John Vanderslice
WHERE: Café 11
WHEN: Wednesday, September 5th
Although John Vanderslice does not claim to write dance music, he is playing the anniversary show at Café 11 on their dance party night. He is not actually a Dance Dance Revolution champion, as the Café 11 website supposes, but he does admit that the lack of dance-ability is a shortcoming of his music.
“I listen to a lot of hip-hop and I would love for it to be danceable, but probably only a few times have we been successful at making a danceable song.”
Vanderslice’s music is vaguely political, deeply personal, and often based on fabricated stories, as is the case with many great musicians in his genre. His genre being something elusive that is most closely compared to a Bob Dylan or, in more contemporary terms, Mason Jennings. He is often called “indie,” but what non-categorical artist isn’t these days? Before going solo he was the front man for mk Ultra, which was named after an alleged CIA mind-control experiment. When he went solo he tried to start a public fight with Bill Gates to promote his new gig. Nowadays he runs an analog studio in San Fran called Tiny Telephone.
Although he lives in San Francisco, he is actually a Florida boy. He was born in Gainesville and spent many of his formative years in Jacksonville. When he comes to St. Augustine to play at Café 11, he will be judging a dance competition that will include a new dance from St. Augustine’s premiere dance troupe TNT Dance. EU caught up with John at his home to learn more about his music and his ego.
EU: You are originally from Florida, do you still have family here?
John Vanderslice: Well, yeah, I definitely have a lot of relatives there. I lived for 8 years in Jacksonville in Regency Lake Apartments on Monument Drive, I don’t know if those are still there.
EU: They are.
JV: I kind of grew up in the mall, you know, I was kind of a latchkey kid. My parents got divorced when I was real young. I’m not sure if that area is nice now, but it definitely wasn’t then. I’m seriously Florida.
EU: You play under your own name, you are on the cover of your own album and most of your songs are narrated from a first-person perspective. Why is that?
JV: Because I’m a total egotists (Laughing).
EU: Is there a line between honest and ego-centric?
JV: No, I don’t think it’s necessarily good or bad to be an egotist. I was flying the other day and there was a really good interview with Larry David, and I am a very big fan of him and his show, and I really can’t think of a more egocentric show than Curb Your Enthusiasm. It is, by his own admission, about who his character is and who he is and it is, in some ways, a justification for his behavior and his quirks as a person, so it’s a monumental construct all around. The thing with art and making things is that anything can add value or take away value. For instance, talking about Dylan, that is some of the most prideful and egocentric music you will ever hear. An album like Highway 61 or Bringing It All back Home or especially Blonde on Blonde, he is cataloging the slights that have been made against him in every song and responding with vitriol. And that really makes for a good record.
EU: Does making your music accessible online affect record sales?
JV: No, I would say, just from my own evidence gathering, that the more people that know about you the more people buy your record. It’s helped me that I’ve always tried to make albums. I work really hard at making albums that I feel are a coherent sort of statement, as far as I was concerned. I’ve always believed in the pacing and digestibility of a nine-to-twelve-song album. I think that that really helps you. I think that if you’re into singles it can be really really different. I think that those bands that make singles have had a big drop in sales.
EU: What do you miss about Jacksonville the most?
JV: I would say the beach. I really really miss the Atlantic Ocean. I live in San Francisco and it is beautiful here, but the Pacific Ocean is very very cold and you can’t swim in it. I mean, I miss my childhood. I miss going to movies in Regency. It was a profound experience going to those matinees.
EU: Did you go to the theatre in the mall or the United Artist theatre that was around the corner?
JV: Yeah, it was the really cheap one outside of the mall. I think we must have had summer passes that were really cheap. I went there all the time. That was really really important to me. But the beach was really key. My Mom took us to the beach every weekend and I really have great memories of that.
EU: Are you qualified to judge a dance contest?
JV: Oh yeah. Definitely. I’ve been talking to the Air Guitar Hero people about being a judge for the air guitar championship too. Maybe I’ll have a second career as a judge.
Catch John Vanderslice live at Café 11 for their 5th anniversary dance party on September 5th. Rock out with John and stick around for the dance party that he hosts after the set. To read what John Vanderslice says about some of the songs on his new album, anti-folk and Bill Gates, read the entire interview at eujacksonville.com.
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