[McHale]

For article with pictures: http://monovita.org/article/200706/id/34

Justin King


by Stacey Spencer
June 2007

Justin King’s story is easy to sell. It could be neatly packaged up, placed inside a box and labeled familiarly. It could be marketed in terms we’ve all come to recognize: a gifted small-town musician hits the road, signs a record deal, goes head to head with music-industry bigwigs and refuses to sell out. It’s “That Thing You Do,” it’s “The Doors,” it’s “Almost Famous.” We could celebrate him for being a local hero who fought the good fight against music’s ugly corporate dark side. But the truth is, King’s story is much deeper than that. It is robust and messy and far too complicated to wrap up. There are too many loose ends—some which are still in the process of unraveling. Without editing out all the parts that don’t fit into a marketable mold, without cauterizing and cleaning up all those messy fragments, this is an attempt to tell you Justin King’s story.

This summer, King and his backing band, The Apologies, are putting out their debut full-length album. Getting to this point has been a tumultuous process many years in the making. Contrary to stories you may have heard, this 27-year-old was not born a genius guitar virtuoso. Primarily self-taught, he didn’t start playing guitar until he became inspired by the band Nirvana at 14 years old. A bit of a troublesome kid, King admitted, “I got kicked out of middle school…then I got kicked out of two high schools.” When probed about his rebellious early years, he divulged some of the sordid details: “My mother sent me to a Catholic school for some reason. I had stopped saying the Pledge of Allegiance and the Hail Mary, and then stopped doing my homework, started bringing butterfly knives to school and drinking in the bathroom,” King continued, “it was purely experimental.”

During these unruly times, King said that he “just played a lot of songs,” and began to write music in high school with his current bass player, Drew Dresman. He recognized that during his impulsive youth, music was his most prized form of escapism.

“Music has really been the only thing that has ever been constant to me…that was a solid thing that I could do; it was something that I could control—it was mine,” he stated.

After getting his GED, King traveled to California and spent time studying painting and photography at the San Francisco Art Institute, but no other creative process resonated as strongly with him as music: “[music] embedded itself deeply in me as a person,” King said, so he decided to focus his energy on this passion.

In his mid-twenties, King made a name for himself as Eugene’s foremost singer/songwriter. His solo acoustic work is stunning and tender; King has a beautiful voice and has become one of the most proficient guitar players around. Over the last few years, King has devoted much of his songwriting toward original tunes for his four-piece rock band, along with bass player Drew Dresman, drummer Nadir Jeevanjee, and guitarist Ehren Ebbage. Their EP, “Rise/Fall,” is available now—but the process of putting out their full-length album has been much more arduous. Originally, the album was recorded (“by everyone and their mother,” said King) with the intent of being produced and distributed by Epic Records. But after over a year of production, followed by confusion, miscommunication, and unresponsiveness from Epic, Justin King and the Apologies abandoned the idea of putting their record out on a major label. This was a tough time for everyone involved.

“There was a period of four months where we couldn’t do anything because we were stuck in limbo with the label. They were not terribly responsive about getting our record back…we were waiting for some lawyer in some fucking high rise to sign some papers. It was horrible,” King illustrated. As King elaborates on his experience with Epic, it becomes clear that major label support was not worth the detrimental effects it had on his musical creativity.

“All the sudden it wasn’t just my own thing anymore… there’s some A&R person in New York telling me what he wants to hear and it just ripped it out of my hands,” he explained. “When I came into this process with the label, I had this life—I was recording music that I loved to record and recording it only for that reason—two years later I feel so…old. I need to figure out how to get back to actually enjoying making music again.” Reflecting on this time, he noted, “I’ve learned a lot, but I’ve given up a lot, too.”

Things have changed considerably for King over the last two years. The band has spent months on end touring around the country multiple times. While the new full-length won’t be out until August, King is currently spending six weeks in New York to write new music. The band is planning trips to Korea and Japan this summer, as well as a European tour surrounding the Rugby World Cup, in which they will be performing at the Adidas party in Paris. While the months on the road are tiresome, King is enjoying being away from his hometown for the time.


“The Eugene for me of two years ago is so completely different than the Eugene right now…the stress I’ve gone through has ended a lot of my relationships and friendships with people in this town,” he explained. “It feels like it’s time to go…people [in Eugene] are very quick to make assumptions about who I am and where I came from; I’d like to be both socially and creatively a ‘little fish’ for a while.”

More than anything else, King explains that he needs time to recover from the fiasco with Epic and rediscover his passion for music. He admits to a struggle with getting back to his roots and simply indulging in writing songs again. “I don’t know where everything’s taking me—I’m just going to follow the music, and if I can get it back, I’m never going to let it go again, that’s for sure,” he said. “Music feels a little betrayed by you, and it’s hard to convince it that you’re a nice guy again. It’s like seeing a friend after a year and being like, ‘oh I guess I’ve got to get to know you again.’”

King’s story isn’t over yet. The outcome of his upcoming overseas tours and his now independently released full-length album will help to shape the rest of this narrative. Until then, our story’s hero will continue his turbulent musical pursuit. “My whole life has been completely turned upside-down by this,” he reflected upon the last two years, “I don’t know if I would do this over or do something completely different.”

Justin King’s album will be released in August. In the mean time, you can order the EP “Fall/Rise” or listen to songs from the albums on www.justinking.com

[Tichou/Estelle]

I read it this morning !! You right it's a very good article !! The best for the moment I never read !

[auriond]

Oh dear... poor Justin. Is it really that bad, did Epic really have such an effect on him that he feels he's lost his music? That sounds terrible. I can't imagine losing my drawing like that.

But thanks for the article McHale - always glad to get such news

[Felosele]

The article makes him sound like a highschool/Art school dropout, but didn't he go to the University of Oregon? (yes.)
_________________
FEED ME A STRAY CAT

[McHale]

Look on the bright side. The VH1 Behind The Music will have a LOT of material!

-Mc