Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Joe Billy. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Joe, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
So, incidentally enough, I am currently about to start releasing new material which will amass into my next full length album! This album has been the biggest and best project I have worked on for my solo music ever. There has been so much thought, energy, and consideration going into this entire collection of songs; from composition, to lyricism, to production, artwork, and so on. It has also come with it’s more than fair share of frustrations and hurdles haha! I began the process on this album in early 2020. My songs were written, we had them demoed, we even tracked all of the final acoustic guitar tracks. And then everything locked down here in New Jersey. Needless to say, the wind got totally blown out of my sails. Mainly because, it’s not even like I had much I could do from home. The songs were written, I already had most of it planned out, and I had started the recording process with my friend, James Stivaly, who tracked and produced the album, and so we couldn’t get together to track for months. I had said that I wanted to take my time with this one, and really consider and reflect on every aspect of it and let the creative process work naturally, but I didn’t want it to move THIS slowly!
So…after some time, we were finally comfortable enough to meet up and get back to it. I, myself, tracked the acoustic guitars, most of the electric guitars, the drums, a couple bass parts, and of course the lead vocals. I also had the pleasure of having some of my very talented friends contribute parts on Bass, Upright Bass, Trumpet, Violin, and Harmonies.
All in all, this album has been over 2 years in the making and I am beyond excited to finally share it with the world. It’s honestly the best material I’ve written yet, and unlike my other albums, this one is mostly full band instrumentation! Not only is it far more intricate musically, it’s also my favorite album I’ve written lyrically. I have always had a big passion for lyricism and have very much pondered on ever word on this album and how it was sung.
The artwork, done by Bret Salvatore, perfectly captures the overall theme of this album. This collection of songs explores the various ways we can experience and perceive division, separation, inter-personal struggle, etc. From the world around us, to social issues, to political conflicts, to the inner challenges we face within ourselves or with others close to us; I feel this album very well portrays many of the feelings I have experienced in most of my adult life at this point. I’ve poured so much of myself into this album, and I feel the world needs to hear it.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?
Well, my name is Joe Billy, indeed that is my real name! I’ve had a passion for music ever since I could remember honestly. I was always very moved by music I would hear on the radio or my parents’ cds or wherever I would end up hearing music. I found so many bands and songs that just made me feel such strong emotions, it was life changing. I eventually learned of performers and “rockstars” and such and immediately knew I wanted to do that. Life is never a straight line though, so after going through many other phases, in 2010 I landed back on music around the age of 15, when I started taking drum lessons. I am still to this day a professional drummer, and play drums in a couple bands, on top of doing freelance work for various artists for shows and recording sessions. After some time, however, I still had this urge for more. I wanted a chance to really make my own sound and sing (loudly) the things I wanted to say. Punk rock eventually became my catalyst, my community, and my outlet for all the emotions I didn’t know how to otherwise express. I wanted to start a punk band. So in 2012 I got some friends together and formed a band called “Point of Anxiety.” We had lots of fun with it, I got to scream my head off, but after about a year we realized it just wasn’t working out. We all had very different things we were hoping to do, creative differences, and my vision for the band didn’t match up with theirs. So we parted ways, with the band still being in my control. From there, I tried finding other people to join, and to fill the gaps, but to no avail. It was just too hard to find kids around my area that wanted to play the type of music I wanted to.
So, around 2015 I said to myself “ynow what, let’s just try it solo.” I had at this point been learning about many different artists in the punk scene, including artists that are solo acts; on stage with nothing but their voice and an acoustic guitar. In addition to that, I started getting introduced to the sub genre known as “Folk-Punk”; a very stripped down and more intimate take on punk rock. I was at this one show in particular watching one guy sing his songs over a three chord progression on an acoustic guitar and was like “well shit, I can probably do that!”
So I grabbed this dusty old acoustic that we had laying around from when my sister used to play guitar and took it for my own. I learned how to play a few open chords, power chords, and started screaming the words I wanted to over some simple progressions.
Funny enough, at first this wasn’t even something I wanted to take seriously. I was just hoping to let some energy out, write a few songs, maybe play some open mics for fun. But without much thought at all, I just kept writing songs; to the point where I had written almost my first full album. I desperately wanted to play shows and get better at doing it all by myself. So I decided to actually give it a real shot. I decided to put together a short video explaining the solo project I was going to start, with a rendition of “Bury Me In Analog” by Mischief Brew who was one of my main influences at the time, just for some taste of what’s to come. In 2016 I released my first album “Censor This.”
Since then, I’ve explored the world of being a solo artist, on stage by myself, writing songs by myself, releasing music, booking shows, going on tour, etc.
In more recent years however, I’ve been incorporating a full band into my live shows. I call it the “Joe Billy Collective.” Mainly because as opposed to having a set in stone line up of band members, I have a decent roster of very talented friends that I can call up for gigs. It makes it pretty convenient considering how everyone’s busy at different times, so I just call up someone else and see if they’re available. So nowadays, most of my shows are played with the Collective, with occasional solo shows in the mix too. And I’ll say this, it’s been such a blast.
As I say all the time, my main hope for my music is not only to entertain listeners with fun, energetic and angsty performances and songs, but to also help them feel like they belong somewhere. No matter who you are, what you look like, who you love, or where you’re from, you will always have a place in my community and you will always have a place at my shows. In addition to that, of course with the introspective and thought provoking way I write lyrics, I always try to invite the listener to think a bit more outside themselves. It’s far too easy to stay comfortable in our own little bubbles, so it’s important to me to constantly try to check myself and think of things from many angles and perspectives, which I hope my music motivates others to do so as well.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being creative in your experience?
Knowing that something I created or did touched someone in some significant way. It means the absolute world to me. It’s like reassurance of what I hope to do with my art. I’ve written songs about my experiences in Catholic school, which have helped some people open their eyes on deeper aspects of religion they had never really known about. I have a song about Columbus Day, which is very informative and thought provoking, which has helped some people reflect on their views of Columbus and the day we “celebrate” him. This one time in particular always comes to mind. On my first album I had a song called “Selfie This” which is basically about how exploitive and manipulative corporate marketing and media is and how it affects young peoples’ perceptions of beauty so that they hate themselves and buy whatever they are told will make them feel pretty or loved. Well after I played this one show in south jersey, someone I had met at the show messaged me a few days later, saying that that song really resonated with her. Apparently it motivated her to think less about how she looked and not spend so much money and time on makeup that never made her feel any better, and how she started realizing she’s beautiful the way she is.
Stuff like that, hits me really deep. It affirms that I can actually make some small difference in this crazy world.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
Practice makes perfect. There’s probably a lot of instances I can pull from where this became relevant in how I approached things, but basically put; practice does NOT make perfect. Practice makes PERMANENT.
However you practice something is how you are going to naturally do it eventually. If you practice anything the wrong way, clearly it won’t be perfect, but now it’s ingrained in your muscle memory so now it’s permanent. If you wanted to learn it the right way now, you have to UN-learned the first way.
This can be said about almost anything. Because of how I was taught something, or how I was doing certain things, I’ve had to unlearn and re-approach the way I sing, the way I play, the way I perform, the way I practice TO perform, the way I think about certain issues, the way I think about how my words can be perceived in certain ways to other people, various ways I’ve been conditioned that are more unhealthy than healthy, the everyday things I do that could mean nothing to me, but harmful to someone else; I could go on.
This has honestly changed so much about how I approach life and how I teach things to my students.
Practice does not make perfect; practice makes permanent.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.joebillymusic.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joebillymusic/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joebillymusic
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joebillymusic/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/JoeBillyMusic
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCH_da8RbvQXPi5CgIBj6LEw
- Other: Bandcamp: https://joebilly.bandcamp.com/ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3C8bLulQZAZ6EpoXLHmCNJ?si=cNpCssWsSPWzjcECWSITVg
Image Credits
Paul Pollio.