JMdotOrg Interview Section

Alt Press Interview - July 28th, 2010

2010-08-03T12:26:00.000-07:00

By Rachel Lux
Source

If You C Jordan: 10 Years Later With Something Corporate’s Andrew McMahon

ME: You mentioned briefly that your 10-year high school reunion is coming up. I thought that was interesting in the context of “If You C Jordan.”
ANDREW McMAHON:I don’t know if I’m going to go to my 10-year high school reunion; and I would imagine that we’re all grownups and nothing would happen. I never made a point to apologize for [the song] in one sense, because I felt like it was pretty fair at the time. But did I expect it to be what it was? No. We kept that song off the record. I’m going to tell you a story… It was this thing that happened when we were putting together the Audioboxer EP. We had two songs written in 6/8 [time]. Which is essentially a swing; a waltz-y time signature. Two rock songs in 6/8, and this was in 2000. And one of the songs was called “If I Were A Terrorist, I’d Bomb The Graduation.” And it was this hysterical song, with obviously none of what happened on Sept. 11 having happened at that point. But it and “Jordan” were so similar because they were these tongue-in-cheek rock ’n’ roll 6/8 numbers. But “Terrorist” was the better of the two songs. And so we were like, “Let’s get rid of this ‘Jordan’ tune on the EP, because whatever, no big deal, we’ll get it out. It’s gonna come out as kind of just this no big deal sort of introduction to the bands and fans at Drive-Thru.” And the idea was that we would sandbag the other tune for the full-length because it was the better of the two songs, and even funnier. Fast-forward: the Audioboxer EP came out in September of 2001. If we had put ["Terrorist"] on the record, the trajectory of the band would’ve changed entirely. The album would’ve been shelved, there would’ve been a bad taste in everyone’s mouth, and it would’ve been horrible.

So instead, everyone only heard “If You C Jordan.”
And this was [a song about] some childish shit that happened after my high school graduation. It pretty much boiled down to a fight over a girl, and me not being a dude that rocks the machismo thing, I spent a summer sort of hearing about how I was going to get my ass kicked. It just tells the story. I was never a fighter, and that was never my thing, and so when this almost came to blows in a parking lot, I sort of pleaded no contest and was like, “Go ahead and hit me.” And didn’t get hit, needless to say. But it was really just a disturbing experience for me because it seemed so silly. So instead of fighting with my fists, I fought with my words.

So did you get the last laugh?
I did and I didn’t. If you know me as a person and if you know my catalog of music, I’d say quite the contrary of that song, most of it is about love or finding positivity in hard spots. There is a part of me that really regrets the fact that that song ever became what it did because of that. It came from a really real place, so in that sense I never really completely regretted it. It was very honest at the time, and I felt justified. But I never wanted that to enter the public consciousness. I never thought it would. And for that, I truly really am sorry. Because I thought it would be this funny thing—again you’re processing it as, “I’m 17, and when I get mad I write some silly song and my band go and play it.” It’s not like I write it and think, “Oh, this is going to get played on the radio.” That wasn’t even the ambition for that EP.

That was pretty much the only bit of controversy I had my whole [time in] high school. And it happened the night of my graduation. I think that’s why it affected me so much and why I put it in that song. I’d gone through all of high school, not as a fly on the wall, but definitely just trying to leave relatively unscathed. When I felt too exposed, I hid, like a lot of kids. I definitely stepped out in certain respects, but in others, I did want to be a fly on the wall. So when the biggest drama of my entire experience ended up being something that happened at my high school grad night, and then yeah, this whole thing developed out of an argument essentially over a girl. And it ruined—not ruined, but it really became the staple of my summer, was this guy is hunting for me, [people would say,] “He’s looking for you and he’s going to beat your ass,” and he’s approaching all my friends and saying stuff, and here I am, just chilling, trying to get my summer underway, and everywhere I go, I’m having people be like, “You’re going to get your ass kicked?” And it’s like, “For what?” And we were the big men rolling around, we just graduated, everyone’s getting ready to go off to [college], and you’re at parties and seeing all your friends, and I’m being told not to go to this place or that place. And meanwhile, I’m this 120-pound kid going, “Who wants to fight me?” You could pin just about anybody against me and they’re going to win, unless I fly into a rage and then… [Laughs.]

Were names changed for privacy?
[Shakes head.] And so I’ve heard about it over the course of time. And some people laugh and some people think it’s really shitty what I did. I’ll defend myself in the sense that if I had written or painted a picture that was different than what had actually happened, if I tried to glorify my own position in it, but I didn’t. I just said it. That’s about the most literal song I’ve ever penned in my entire life. I think it was the quickest song I’ve ever written in my entire life. I wrote it that night. I came home from the beach where I was supposedly going to meet my doom and found it all to be a show of just this weird, macho thing that I had never really ever experienced in my whole life. I was disgusted, and I wrote a song about just being fucking disgusted. But at the core of the character involved, he’s a good person and I know that, and he’s gone on to do good things, and I think that I’ve probably in a way that I’ve never anticipated made him really regret that, and in that sense, I’ll sort of always have a little bit of guilt underlying there.

As to what will happen if I go to the 10-year reunion, my money’s on probably nothing. It will probably just be uncomfortable, which is probably the reason I won’t go. I don’t love the idea of being a “figure.” [Laughs.] And the reality of most of my success being fairly underground, it never really has been a thing. I’ll get it in the airport here and there… Every couple of days I might be someplace and people will come up [who recognize me]. But those are the people who know my music. If someone comes up to me, chances are they really know me. It’s never been a fame thing. But you go into a place where you’re notorious—your old high school—I would just feel like I’d pry be as self-conscious at the 10-year reunion as I was for all of high school. And I guess we’re probably all thinking the same thing. alt

20 Watts Interview - September 13th, 2009

2009-12-26T07:46:00.000-08:00

By Caitlin Dewey
Source

20 Watts: Some of our readers might not be familiar with Jack’s Mannequin or what you do. So could you tell us who you are, what kind of music you play?

Andrew McMahon: Well, my name’s Andrew McMahon… [and] I don’t know, I think we just sort of play melodic rock ‘n’ roll. I happen to play piano, so people tend to focus on that. It’s pretty traditional, melodic, kind of pop rock ‘n’ roll.

20W: And you’ve been playing piano since you were how old?

AM: Nine.

20W: When did you decide you wanted to be a full-time musician?

AM: Then. Well, I think it was pretty immediate for me. I discovered the piano as an act of songwriting. The first thing I did was write a song. I had always tinkered as a kid but as soon as that first song came through me, it was over, there was never really anything else after that. And I was making my first demos when I was ten years old, playing school assemblies and things like that all through elementary school and middle school and I started my first band in high school, so it was pretty much my trajectory since I was a little kid.

20W: Now, you’ve put out two albums as Jack’s Mannequin and many releases as Something Corporate. The two Jack’s Mannequin albums in particular are very personal albums, and that appeals to people. Can you tell us what was going on in your life during the first album and during Glass Passenger – what influenced your songwriting during those times?

AM: The first record was definitely – I hate to use the cheeseball term – like a coming-of-age record. But it really was, you know? I was 22, I had made a pretty seismic shift away from Something Corporate at that point which was — needless to say – scary. But it was also this very enlivening moment in my life, with ties to a lot of people and a lot of things and experimenting with this idea of living on my own for the first time – probably for the first time ever. I started my first band in high school and got away from my parents with my successful rock band. But I stepped into sort of a familial environment again with Something Corporate. A lot of the record is about a break-up that occurred during that period of time and how that really tweaked with my heart and my head – and I think – all colored with thoughts of finding myself alone for the first time. And that’s where the first record came from.

The second is a little cloudier than that because the subject matters are a myriad and equally confusing. It was a pretty confusing period of time. It was a crisis of confidence that spawned a lot of that album — the aftermath of recovering from having gotten sick, and finding my voice again against my fear of losing my way altogether. I think a lot of Passenger is tinged with the question mark of whether or not I am finding my voice and even if it’s working when I find it. It was a hard one to make, but I think it also set me free of from a lot of those demons. Hopefully it paved the way for the next thing too.

20W: Yeah, let’s talk about your next album! Are you working on anything now?

AM: Well, I’m always working on stuff [laughs]. I definitely have spent a lot of time in the studio between Passenger and now, sort of trying to get closer to those ideas and figure out what the theme of that will be. It’s very much in its infancy now, but I rented a little house down by the beach where I’ve hatched my best stuff, and I’m sort of trying to reconnect with where I hatched some of my best stuff.

20W: What do you think is your best stuff?

AM: Well, I think it’s scattered throughout the records. Transit is sort of my best collection, where my best pop music lives in one spot. I just think that clear-headedness -– those songs that come quickly and are inspired from start to finish, and you don’t have to work at one song. You spend a week or two weeks refinining so that a thought is so clear that it just comes out. I’d like another solid batch of ten that I could say were my favorite.

20W: As a longtime fan, I’m curious to know which of those songs came easiest for you.

AM: Well, you name them, I’ll tell you if they did [laughs]. In the early days, when you’re young and you’re writing, you’ll write fearlessly and just put stuff out and not even think about it. I mean songs like “If U C Jordan” [laughs] you know, that shit came in ten minutes. It probably would have been better if I put it under the shelf. But yeah on the last record, songs like “The Resolution,” “Swim” and “Crashin’,” all those came easily. Transit was a lot of easy writing, all the way through, because I had so much to say. Transit was that moment where I was like “This is you, this is your chance to speak up.”

On the Something Corporate stuff, “The Astronaut,” that one wrote itself quickly. “Me And The Moon,” there’s definitely a drug-addled Amsterdam story there. But yeah, my perception and my memory are probably widely out of sorts with what actually happens. You tend to put on rose-colored glasses when you look at your past.

20W: You also have a documentary, what can you tell us about that?

AM: Well, it’s heavy, but it’s finally a movie – something that took us years of editing and re-editing. It’s a hard thing to make a movie about recovering when you’re still doing it. In the past year, and having used Passenger as a torch to cauterize those wounds, made it a lot easier for me to look at this and gain perspective. It was really just a couple of months ago that I sat down with the directors and said, “This is what’s wrong with the movie. I know this now because it’s over.” And I think that’s what you’ll find in the movie, that I was not well in this really prolific and really satisfying period of time in my life. And sort of having to pump the brakes and watching it disintegrate and rebuild itself.

20W: It’s interesting to me that you chose that medium…

AM: Well it sort of chose me…

20W: How did that happen?

AM: A label back in the day, back when I signed – probably about halfway through the making of Transit at that point – the record company, the first thing they did was give me a video camera. They said to film in the studio. They wanted to know what was going on or to use it for extra content. And because I had separated from my girlfriend and was sort of on this new exciting journey, it became this sort of obvious thing to sort of chart it with this camera. It sort of became my ancillary best friend. I was shooting anything and everything – tape after tape of stuff that you would never even imagine – little art movies and little home movies, and I had gotten very confessional with this camera, and if you listen to the sound bites throughout Transit, a lot of them came from those videos.

When I got sick, it had become such a part of me that in the hospital, I needed my keyboard and I needed my camera. It was sort of art therapy. I filmed with my left hand as they were putting a PICC line in my right. It became this place for me to keep it all and get it off my plate and it was really natural. A couple of friends a year after my recovery said “Would you consider letting us see these tapes and put them together to tell this story, and use this story to let people know that there’s a hopeful side to this.”

It seemed like a good idea at the time. It turned into a lot more than I expected it to be. It ended up being a big part of my life, but again having perspective and boiling it down to make it a movie, it did a lot to heal me. I don’t know at what stages in the process of recovery this will be a helpful tool to people but I think that, if nothing else, it’s a good education on what somebody goes through from a very personal viewpoint. Ninety percent of the interview footage was shot by me in the midst of it. I think it’s a very honest portrayal of the disease and what it’s done to the person.

20W: You’ve really done a lot to reach out to other people by starting your charity [The Dear Jack Foundation, for leukemia awareness and research]. What can students at this school do to help?

AM: Well, you guys have a Light the Night Walk. You can join the Jack’s Mannequin team. Over the last couple of years we’ve raised a couple hundred thousand dollars just through those walks. Last year we raised over $100,000 just from that team. This year I think we’re up to $50,000. You can sign up at dearjackfoundation.com to be a team walker. Truthfully, whether it’s us or whether you do it with some other team, Light the Night and Leukemia Lymphoma Society are great places to start. If you want to contribute to Dear Jack Foundation, it’s our conduit charity to channel money to different foundations and organizations we feel are making an impact on the cause.

20W: Awesome! So I guess I have some more music questions now. You’re about to embark on a solo tour. How do you feel about that? Have you ever done a solo tour before?

AM: Scared! And no, this will be the first. It was largely because we’re going to be doing premieres of the documentary along the tour. It’s expensive for me to tour the way that I tour. It makes money when I’m going to the 2,000-seat venues, but I obviously didn’t want to do that on a solo tour, because I wanted it to be a more intimate affair. The goal was that through merchandise sales and various different fundraisers to use the tour to contribute to the walks as well. I decided to go out alone, driving the car across the country—

20W: Oh, you’re not going to have this swanky tour bus?

AM: [Laughs] No swanky tour bus. I’m going back to as basic as I’ve ever gone, actually. I’ve been touring so constantly since 2006 that I’m almost hitting my last legs. But I know that I want to be out to support the documentary, and I figured this is a good way to do it. I love driving, that’s one of my huge inspirations, just getting in my car, putting in CDs and rolling. I threw this idea out, “What if I got in the car and brought my camera again and released this documentary in a very personal way?” That’s where it came from. I still have to go home and learn all these songs — just me and a piano. Bob my guitar player is going to come out and sing some harmonies and play some acoustic stuff. But yeah, I’ve got a lot of music to learn… it’s exciting. It’s fun after being on the road — God, it must be eight or nine years now.

20W: It has to be exhausting.

AM: Yeah, but to say that I’m doing something I’ve never done before is cool. It’s a challenge and sort of a final frontier in a lot of respects as far as my abilities go.

20W: There have been a lot of Something Corporate reunion tour rumors flying around. How true are they?

AM: It’s not untrue. It’s not scheduled. It’s not planned. It’s conversational at this point. But there are conversations that we’re having. You know, I just haven’t seen the guys lately, but we’ve been talking about it. It’s just a matter of finding the right time. I mean I definitely will have one last round of Jack’s Mannequin headlining. We have to make up all of the dates that we canceled to accommodate the Fray tour. So that’ll probably happen in February, at which point we’ll open up the conversation.

20W: My last question for you. I saw your MGMT cover, and I’m kind of curious if you personally are into the more indie/obscure scene, or if you tend to listen to things like The Fray. What are you listening to right now?

AM: Well, that MGMT record was my favorite of the last couple of years. Regina Spektor’s new record is probably my favorite right now. I don’t lean towards indie music per se. I mean, recent stuff that’s come out that I really dig is like Low Vs Diamond, I love their record. And I listen to a lot of classic rock, but also, I mean The Dead Weather is something I’ve been listening to a lot lately. Anything Jack White, I’m a pretty big fan of. Dare I say, I’m having a little bit of a guilty pleasure with this Owl City record right now too.

I’m a melodic sort of dude, and I gravitate towards anything with a melody. Whether it’s signed or not is irrelevant. Yeah, but the MGMT record was massive for me. I love The Fray dudes and I really enjoy their songs, but I mean that’s not really what I listen to. It really just depends on the mood. I’m a big Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers guy, and I’m a big Beach Boys guy. So I gravitate towards those things and fill in the blanks with the modern music that really turns me on, which at the moment is Regina…

20W: I reviewed it and I wasn’t into it, but maybe I’ll give it another listen.

AM: Have you spent any time with it?

20W: I listened to it a couple of times.

AM: It’s so fantastic. I think she’s really brilliant. I really love that record. I think “Laughing With” is just one of the better tracks that’s come out recently. But you know I’ve been checking out bands like Gaslight Anthem, I listen to everything, I always have. If it’s got a good melody and a good hook, there’s a good chance it’s in my CD player.

The Audio Perv Interview - September 18th, 2009

2009-12-26T06:37:00.000-08:00

Source

The Audio Perv: Your documentary, Dear Jack, shares the same title as one of your songs about a friend’s brother who had leukemia. How much of this film is a tribute to them and how much of it was a therapeutic outlet for you when you were ill?

Andrew McMahon: You know the title in some ways is a tribute to Jack but I think in more ways it sort of speaks to the strange universal circle back through my life that he and the song and it relates to the name of the band and this moment where everything seems very kind of connected. I wrote that song for him and that ended up becoming the name of the band. All of this kind of happened over a year before I was actually diagnosed with the illness myself. In a lot of ways, that’s where the title came from and we decided to go with it as the name of the film.

The Audio Perv: What were the events that transpired to you finding out that you yourself had leukemia?

Andrew McMahon: I think that I was at an age where it was pretty easy for me to deny my body, what it was feeling, etc. For probably about a month or two leading up to me finding out I was sick, there were a handful of indicators. I was on the road with Jack’s Mannequin when I found out on and throughout the course of that tour, I was getting progressively weaker. I was starting to lose my breath walking from place to place. One of the biggest moments I recall and starting to worry that something was very wrong was going from one place to another and not being able to carry my bags farther than 100 yards without stopping to catching my breath. Eventually my voice was giving out on me and I had all these shows. Sure enough, the only thing that actually got me to the doctor was when I couldn’t perform longer. It was at that doctor’s office that they told me that my complexion was off and that was sort of how I found out. They took my blood there. The next day, they told me that I was extremely anemic and needed a transfusion. Those were the events that led to me finding out.

The Audio Perv: In the trailer for Dear Jack, you say that you were afraid. Did you ever think that you wouldn’t survive?

Andrew McMahon: I always believed that it wasn’t my time. I had a pretty positive outlook and I felt pretty peaceful during my entire treatment. I think the moment you see in the film is a couple of weeks before my transplant. It was sorta when the transplant conversation opened up and we decided to go for it. We found out all the risks involved in the transplant even though we felt confident that it was the right treatment that was going to lead to the most successful remission and cure for me. At the moment I learned all the realities of what a transplant entails and how dangerous it is for the body and what it goes through, there was a moment where I at least had the idea that there is a chance that I could pass. I had been knocked back with pneumonia at that point and there was a lot of fear that it could come back. But yeah, there were moments but I felt pretty confident that I was going to survive.

The Audio Perv: How long have you been in remission now?

Andrew McMahon: Over 4 years now. It’s been a while. I’m doing well and have been for some time now.

The Audio Perv: On your album, The Glass Passenger, you have a very inspirational song, “Swim.” What and who inspired you to help you fight and pull through?

Andrew McMahon: There were a lot of people. In some ways, a large part of my motivation was just the idea of getting back to music and the Everything In Transit record that was going to come out when I was sick. That would be my legacy to inherit should I survive long enough to play it. There was that and obviously, my girlfriend, now my wife, my family and I think that the support of a lot of my fans. In some ways, the universe was conspiring to get me well and there was a lot of love out there and a lot of people pulling for me. There’s that sorta scene of people being there, and willing me and praying for me to be healthy were all huge factors in the recovery.

The Audio Perv: I haven’t had a chance to see the film yet. Is all the music in the documentary by you?

Andrew McMahon: No, we actually had this group called the Newton Brothers who did most of the score. There is a lot of live music from Jack’s Mannequin and some myself solo that appears in the movie as well but the score was done by the Newton Brothers.

The Audio Perv: Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee narrated the film. You’ve both worked on each other’s albums. How did that friendship come about?

Andrew McMahon: It was set up by the manager at the time who worked with both me and Tommy. Tom had gotten his hands a couple of Something Corporate records and gotten really into it. One day while I was in the studio doing the Jack’s project, he called me and asked if I would come in and write some songs for his record and play on it. What do you do when Tommy Lee calls you? You sorta drop everything (laugh) and work with him! We became buds throughout the process and I spent a lot of time in the studio with him working on his album over the course of the 2004 summer into fall. By the time we got to December, we were spending so much time working together that I said “Tom, why don’t you come play drums on my record since I don’t have a drummer at the moment”. It was something formed from our mutual love of music that wedged him into that period of time in my life that I think that made us feel that he would be a very relevant candidate to narrate this movie and add a little bit of gravitas and celebrity to the story as well.

The Audio Perv: You’re going out on a solo tour this fall. What can we expect? Will you be playing any Something Corporate songs like “Konstantine?”

Andrew McMahon: There’s no “Konstantine” for sure. I’ve sort of stayed committed to the fact that song won’t appear unless I’m on stage with Something Corporate. At least not now. So no, you wouldn’t see that but I would expect us to play a few Something Corporate songs for sure.

The Audio Perv: What is the current status of Something Corporate? Are you guys on hiatus or broken up?

Andrew McMahon: I don’t think we ever officially broke up. The reality is that we want to leave the door open with the possibility that we might get together and do something again in the future. We’ve all stayed close friends and we put the band on hiatus a few years back because our friendships were starting to be jeopardized by our business. That was the moment that we all stepped back. That said, I think we all settled into much different places in our lives and I don’t anticipate that we’ll be making aSomething Corporate record anytime soon, if ever. But I think that we all open to being on a stage at one point and play some shows for the people who supported us for sure.

The Audio Perv: What are your plans for after the solo tour?

Andrew McMahon: There’s a number of them. At this point, gearing up and making some new music is an important part. There are a couple of loose tour ideas now. We had to cancel some dates with The Fray tour in the summer. We’re thinking of at the end ofthe year making up the shows we had to cancel. Anything else other than that would probably be a little premature but that’s what we have on the books now for now: making music, making the record.

SPIN Interview - October 30th, 2009

2009-11-01T10:59:00.000-08:00

By Pier Harrison
Source

What inspired you to keep the camera rolling and record this experience on film?
Andrew McMahon: It was what my gut was saying. I had been given this camera by Maverick [Records]. I was filming not just the making of the record but I would carry it with me everywhere, for months. I feel weird saying it but it became kind of friend in a way. And then I got sick. I don't think we ever intended for other people to see it, especially considering the nature of what was shot. But I think along the way we realized that having a window into that world from a first-person perspective might be of some value.

At what point did you actually decide to make the documentary?
It was about six months into my recovery. A couple of my close friends came to me and said, "Look, I don't know if you're comfortable with this, but if you let us see some of these tapes and figure out if there's a way to put this together, we would be interested in doing it." And I think because they were close friends and because I trusted them it became easier to do so.

How personal does the movie get?
Oh, it's about as personal as you can get. It's me with my video camera just trying to get things off my chest and film some of these scientific things that were being done to me, what went into putting this body back together. So, yeah it's deeply personal, but it's about the music too. We ended up focusing a lot on Transit and my separation from my girlfriend, for whom I wrote a lot of that record, who ended up at my side while I was fighting it and became my wife. And [it was] a period of time that my family and I weren't as close, and they ended up at my side, too, really getting me well. So it's a lot more of my dirty laundry than I'm used to airing.

How did Tommy Lee get involved as the narrator? Have you guys stayed in touch since you worked on Tommyland?
Absolutely. Tommy would come visit me in the hospital, and we talked regularly while I was recovering. He came out and played with us on one of our first shows back. We got close in that period of time, so when it came to finding a narrator, Tommy was a no-brainer.

What are the songs about on the Dear Jack EP?
There's a song called "There, There, Katie," which was half written during Transit, and the other half after I found out my sister would be my stem-cell donor. It's a song about and for my sister. Diane from "Diane the Skyscraper," was my nurse in the first week that I was in New York, getting diagnosed. It was really the only song that I wrote while I was in the hospital, probably on the second night that I was there, and did a demo of it a year or two later. I love the song.

With all of your experiences, what is your opinion on the healthcare debate?
I think it's horrible. We're sitting in a horrible place. I have health insurance and I went into the doctor's office the other day and got sent a bill for $1100 after they went to my insurance company. I think there's this crazy effort to stall, or accommodate the people who are robbing our entire society blind for the sake of profiting in the most grotesque way humanly possible over people's diseases and illnesses. I was lucky. I had health insurance and a business manager. But it certainly was a topic of much conversation among myself, my friends and my family, that what if I had not been in such an advantageous place? I'm scared that they're going to go "reform" the industry but make such a point to make concessions to these pigs who are robbing us blind that we might not actually get reform.

Musiqtone Blog Interview - October 13th, 2009

2009-11-01T10:46:00.000-08:00

By Cristina Carrazza
Source

For years, fans of Jack’s Mannequin and Something Corporate have praised Andrew McMahon not only for his musical genius but also his inspiring personal story. After being diagnosed with leukemia in 2005, McMahon will release the documentary "Dear Jack," a personal recollection of his battle, November 3rd. Andrew will also be doing a leg of solo acoustic shows this fall. We had the chance to talk to Andrew about his current tour and the long awaited release of "Dear Jack."

Cristina: You are currently on a Solo Tour. How is that going?
Andrew: It’s going well. We just kicked it off in Denver and it was an awesome first show. I’m very excited it’s definitely a good experience.

CC: What can people expect from it? This is the first time you’re playing acoustic by yourself since you started Jack’s Mannequin.
AM: Yeah. The first show was kind of terrifying, to be honest. Like you said, it’s the first time I’ve ever done anything like this. You know, other than growing up in High School playing song on the piano for my friends. I haven’t really done this kind of stripped down thing – or at least a whole set of it. There are a lot of new arrangements; I think we played around 20 new arrangements in the first night. I think it went really well. It’s definitely a different kind of gig.

CC: Something I know you do often is changing the arrangements of your songs. One example that comes to mind is “Kill The Messenger” which you’ve gone back and forth playing it acoustic and electric.
AM: Pretty much everything we do is an alternate version. I made a list of about 25 or 40 songs. Over the course of a few weeks we sat down at the piano with the acoustic and would run them and see if it made sense arrangement wise. We did that for instance with ‘Holiday From Real.’ We did kind of an acoustic version of that a while back and played with that version of it. It’s all pretty much new acoustic arrangements of that and some new Something Corporate songs.

CC: So tell me about the new documentary you have coming out, Dear Jack. I know you’re having a couple of screenings for it as well.
AM: As far as screening goes, we’re showing it in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. The idea behind the screening was to give the fans the first look at what this documentary is and also a chance for us to donate the proceeds of the screening back to the foundation and raise some money for the charity. The Documentary itself was sort of an accident of documenting. Before I got sick I was filming the making of “Everything In Transit” with a video camera the label had given me. When I got sick, I had been recording my life for about 6 months, so it became a sort of natural reaction to what was going on. I continued to document. I just continued to tape while I was there and through my recovery. Some friends approached me and said “we know these tapes exist, would you let us see them.” They also wanted to know if there was a story there worth telling and if there was enough footage for it. They spent a couple of years putting it together and here we are now.

CC: How is it going back to that time? I know the most personal account the fans have about it, besides all the blogs, is the song “Caves.”
AM: I have mixed feelings, obviously. Part of me is nervous to show it. I’m a pretty forthcoming person about a lot of things. There is that window into my life pretty regularly through my songs. But that’s it. But after all, I’m also a private person. I tend to tell what I want to tell, not necessarily everything else. But this will definitely be the most personal view anyone will ever probably have of me at a pretty pivotal moment in my life. It makes me a little nervous in some senses but in others, I think the best thing to do is to put it out there. I think this story has followed me for so long, and I understand why. I think where I’m sitting now, maybe the best way for me to put this all behind me and say this chapter is done – I’m moving forward – is to show just what it was. There is no need for speculation; no need to ask me what happened. If you really want to know what it was like, watch it. Hopefully you can find hope in it – it is something very true and very honest. It’s really raw. That’s all I can say about it.

CC: I feel as if your story sometimes become the focus of your career – and very wrongly so, because you’re an amazingly talented musician. Is this your way of saying I’m moving on, let’s focus on something else now?
AM: Exactly. Absolutely. It’s strange but I’ve been looking for a way to artfully tell people what happened. For my fans, people follow the music and they listen to the songs. To those who know about it, the story of me getting sick is tied closely to my music. Again, I understand it. There was a period in time where it frustrated me. It’s still a very relevant part of my life and of the last record, no question. But needless to say, it’s something I prefer to not discuss every time I talk to someone. To be able to have this movie out, there are questions I don’t have to answer anymore. If you do your research, you’ll hear about the movie. But otherwise there is nothing else to say. Absolutely, like you said this is a chance to put it behind me and say this is what it was. And also, I can start focusing on the positives like donating some money to charity and become a positive influence by continuing to play music. I didn’t come to be a hero or a survivor; it’s just a situation I encountered.

The Chronicle Interview - October 13th, 2009

2009-11-01T10:34:00.000-08:00

By Lisa DiCarlucci
Source

The Chronicle: Can you start off by giving me a short synopsis as to what your new documentary, “Dear Jack” is about?

Andrew McMahon: Basically it’s the period of time starting around the beginning of the new project with Jack’s Mannequin and I was given the camera from the record company to document the beginning of the first album. Soon after, I was diagnosed with cancer and it became something I could do to occupy my time while I was not feeling well. When I was having a really bad day I would use the camera to talk to. It turned into this great collection of footage, interviews, and family videos that just documented the entire time in my life.

TC: What was your original reasoning for making this film?

AM: It was really just the label giving me a camera to document the making of the album but it was never meant to be a full-length documentary. It was more the record company hoping to have footage to make some viral videos of studio footage as an extra to the album or something. It was actually the first time I had ever had a camera. I was 20 years old at the time and it was the first time I had ever been away from my family so I thought it would be something great to have on film and maybe it would turn into internet clips or something. I never had the intention of making a movie. When I got sick I wasn’t really able to do much song writing. It really just became another way that I could express myself. If I was having a hard day or something the camera almost became like a friend. It was a place I could get the bad stuff out. It wasn’t until later on that some friends found out I had been filming myself that I even thought about making it into a documentary.

TC: Who were the friends that reached out to you about making the film?

AM: One of my friends from the band Mae reached out to help form it into a documentary and a few other people. I explained to them that I had shot my life through the last few years and they asked if they could watch it. They had done similar stuff before and had experience. They basically did the first edit and had a few friends step in and finish it out and put the first story together.

TC: What do you hope the audience will get out of this film?

AM: I think originally as we were doing it we wanted people to see that there is a lot of hope to be found in a really scary situation. The real story is of the love of my family and friends helping me in a really dark situation. I wanted people to see a really raw experience from a first hand perspective. I think that there are a lot of other people who have gone through the same thing and it will be good for them to see it.

TC: Does it scare you to have so many people witnessing such personal events in your life?

AM: I go back and forth you know? It’s been a story that, whether or not I like it, has followed me closely. I can’t seem to get away from it even as a recover. I’m hoping that this film is kind of a way for me to close the tracks on this whole thing. It’s a way of closure. People will see something deeply personal, but they are always digging for it. If you really want to know, this is what it really looks like.

TC: In that sense do you feel that this documentary will give your fans a better understanding or context for your songwriting?

AM: Maybe yes and maybe no. It might shed more light on where I come from. It’s about my battle with cancer but also it’s about my family and the people who shaped me. It’s about their will and who they are have made me who I am. I think it won’t shed light on my creativity so much as it will shed light on my drive.

TC: I understand that you are doing a small solo tour currently to promote the documentary. What is it like performing alone as opposed to with the band?

AM: It’s pretty strange. I’ve only done these things a couple of times and it’s pretty terrifying to be by yourself. I knew that I wanted to do something intimate and personal, though, mostly because it was just a challenge. I’m up there alone playing songs I haven’t played in years to crowds of 200 or 300 people. I like that almost a decade into my career I’m having a brand new experience. It’s about as personal as it can get. It’s a cool moment to sort of have a connection that you don’t have when you are playing for crowds of thousands of people.

TC: So the proceeds of this documentary are going towards your charity, The Dear Jack Foundation. Can you tell me a little about what kind of work you do?

AM: The foundation essentially helps fund initiatives and various different partnerships. It’s not a full functioning non-for profit; I don’t have a staff. We raise money and donate to bigger charities. Such as the Lukemia and Lymphoma society and UCLA which saved my life. We collect money and find great places to put it so we can help find a cure for blood cancers.

TC: Is there any possibility of a Something Corporate reunion?

AM: I mean it’s hysterical how these rumors are started. No one ever said that Something Corporate is going to get back together. Me and the guys have discussed getting together for some reunion shows. Nothing is on the books, but it’s something we would all be up for. We still hold the band close to our hearts and we would never want to just let it go. People can expect reunion shows at some point, I just can’t say when.

Emotional Punk Interview - September 23rd, 2009

2009-10-09T15:46:00.000-07:00

By Matt Zimmerman
Source

Thanks for taking some time to chat. What are you doing on this fine Wednesday morning?
AM: Just chilling at my home in Los Angeles.
EP: For all this talk of fall coming, it still feels like a typical day in So Cal, ha.

Well, I guess we can start off by talking about the new documentary Dear Jack, to be released in this November. Can you describe the film and why it’s finally coming to light now?
AM: The film itself is essentially a by-product of footage I took from December 2004 through 2005 when I got sick [with leukemia]. I was given a video camera to shoot the eventual recording of my record and it was my first time on my own, away from Something Corporate. The video camera became like my secondary art project. I would document my day-to-day, shoot some short movies and whatnot. So I think the reason the process [of releasing it] has taken so long is that it’s taken a few years for me to objectively be able to look at that period in my life. It’s hard when you’re still so close to it to and trying to create a piece of art from that. When I came back this summer from The Fray tour, I had crossed the four year mark since my transplant and all of a sudden, it seemed like that chapter in my life was closing. That is why we chose to come out with the film now; any later and it would be too late. Frankly, it feels like this is a chapter in my life that is closing so [the film] serves as a nice period after the sentence, ha.

What feelings come up when you re-watch the footage? Does it feel like you are reliving those difficult times?
AM: The thing I am most proud about the movie is it is a very truthful portrayal of what it was like to be in that moment. For what it’s worth, I think the reason the film is compelling is that I’m sure people know others who have encountered something like this themselves and the film gives a perspective of how that is. For me, it’s difficult to watch. It’s definitely got a powerful effect on me. Seeing it now, it doesn’t put me back in that space; it’s more like “wow, that happened.” I’m far enough now that I can see the value in it.

EP: I guess, in a way, you can look at the event like you would a family member who has past. Not in the way that it happened to someone else but I guess what I’m trying to say is, you can look at the positives versus the hard times.
AM: For me, it may surprise people to hear but that was an incredibly positive time in my life. There’s not doubt it was hard but I learned a lot of powerful lessons about how important the people around you really are and those were lessons I was glad to learn. Granted, it didn’t feel good but there was a strange amount of peace in moment.

Your story is such an inspirational one but do you ever worry that “the story” could overshadow the music i.e. it defines your career more so than the music?
AM: It’s one of those things that I’ve struggled with a lot. I’ve had to reconcile that it is a part of my life and I would’ve had to go on hiatus for probably a decade until nobody remembered who I was, ha. Cancer is so universal and so many people deal with it, it becomes a huge part in my life and in my story. The goal has always been to focus on the music and the reality is, there is a part of that which happened for a reason. Maybe that reason is that we are out here and able to do such great work and make a difference. There was a time when I resented it but I realized I can’t help what people latch onto except maybe get this film out so people can see what it was really about versus an idealized version of it in their head. If nothing else, from now on I can say “there is a movie about it, you’re welcome to check it out but that is not where I am right now.” In large part, that is why we are doing this.

You have worked with multiple fundraising charities including Light the Night, and of course your own foundation Dear Jack, to raise money and awareness for leukemia. I wanted to give you a chance to talk about those organizations and where people can get more information on them.
AM: We’re going again for another year hoping to raise $100,000 for the Light The Night walks. There is a Jack’s Mannequin team that walks nationwide. You can find out about that at dearjackfoundation.com or Leukemia/Lymphoma Society website. You can donate to that through November. We’ve already raised over $50,000. In October/November, Macbeth will launch a Jack’s Mannequin shoe. All the proceeds we collect will go to the foundation. If anybody wants to find out more, we will be launching a new dearjackfoundation.com website in the near future.

I also wanted to talk about the video for “The Resolution”, off your latest album The Glass Passenger, which was directed by Stephanie Meyer of the Twilight series fame. How did you come about getting her to direct the video?
AM: It started out as a friend of mine whose wife was really into the books. She told me that [Stephanie] mentioned me in the ‘thank-you’s of her novels. I was flattered but didn’t know what to think of it. So we were banging our heads against a wall because none of the treatments for the video really spoke to us. One day we were ripping with my marketing directed about getting an author or actor; someone who brought a different perspective. The conversation I had with my wife’s friend came into my mind and I thought what about Stephanie Myer who was now huge due to the film. We called her and she said yes; it was pretty simple. She really stepped up and wrote a great treatment that we loved.

EP: I actually got this question from my girlfriend who is a big fan of the novels.
AM: That’s cool. I think it really opened us up to a lot of those fans who read the books. It was a good thing for us. Its funny when you go into that pop realm, you can really end up getting a lot of new fans.

EP: Have you kept in contact with her?
AM: I have actually. We hooked up at a concert in Michigan for The Fray tour. She’s really cool. It’s fun to see her out of the business aspect which we were in for the video.

You have a solo tour which you will begin at the end of this month. What made you decide to do this tour and what can fans expect from it?
AM: There were a number of components. One is that when I took stock in how long I’ve consistently been on the road. Other than the six months I took off when I was sick, I’ve been on the road ever month, to some extent, for seven or eight years. I was getting a little burned out but I knew I had to be out supporting the documentary. The idea came about of doing something really grassroots and playing some small venues. When you play those size venues, you pretty much guaranteed to get the people who have been around for a long time. That seems to be an appropriate and nurturing environment to put something out as personal as a documentary. For the music component, it made sense. It’s not really my environment; there’s a chance some songs will be really powerful and then some may fall flat, ha. It’s a new thing but it helps me do something exciting and new. I’ll make a point to incorporate a few Something Corporate songs into the set. You’re going get a chance to hear songs you know and love approached differently. There is something cool about the intimacy. I can’t say what to expect but when you get into a room with people who really want to be there, good things happen.

EP: Other than the Trouabour show right before Glass Passenger was released, the last small venue I saw you in was the last Something Corporate show at Chain Reaction.
AM: Oh shit, ha. The old Chain Reaction days...

Got to love ‘em! So what are your plans after the tour?
AM: That tour will finish out the year. After that, I will probably spend some time writing and recording which I’m really excited about. I definitely feel inspired in this moment. Like I said, with the closing of this chapter in my life, a lot of my focus will shift to new music. We may go out in the new year to do the make-up dates we canceled to go out with The Fray.

EP: Is there a timeline for the new record yet?
AM: It’s really up in the air right now. I started working on a couple songs which have taken shape and make me excited for it but the reality is that from this point until I feel the record is done, it could take a year or two years. I just don’t know. I have a good feeling that this thing is going to just happen but until we get further down the road, I would hate to attach any expectations to it.

EP: I know that happened with the last album. There was an expected release schedule and when it wasn’t met, fans freaked out when they weren’t met.
AM: Ha, yeah, exactly! It was great to have so many people excited about a record but I learned a lot of lessons from that. I learned to wait until the moment it happens to really say anything. I think that is the way we approached the documentary too.

EP: I think Glass Passenger turned out all for the better though. Obviously I don’t know what it was in its initial stages but the album turned out so well in the long run.
AM: I’m happy with the record. It was going to be a difficult album no matter what. I think some of that confusion actually added to the art of the record itself.

I was asked by a fan to make sure and ask about the always-rumored Something Corporate reunion. What, if any, plans are there in the future for that?
AM: At this point, it’s closer to the ground that it has been but to call it plans would not be totally fair. Again, this speaks to the not wanting to attach too much expectation to anything. I’ll be honest, we’ve talked about it and it’ll happen at the right time. Give me until the end of February to finish out the dates for this record and we’ll readdress it at that point.

I’ll finish up with a few quick Q & A’s. First, what is some of your favorite music right now, past or present?
AM: The album I’ve been listening to for about the past month or two is the new Regina Spektor record [Far]. I have a thing for her tunes. She has soulfulness to her music; there is something very evolved about her. Also, band we took out recently Low Vs. Diamond which I really got hooked on. I have to admit I have had this guilty pleasure for that Owl City record. It’s quirky and youthful, almost too playful, but I’m a sucker for melodies and this guy delivers some sweet melodies. I got hung up on John Mayer’s Continuum record recently.

EP: That is a really great record. I just a chance to listen to the new Paramore record Brand New Eyes and they definitely have that youthful energy you talked about. It’s a solid pop record but they really branched out I feel on this one. I wasn’t a fan of the last one as much as this.
AM: What sells me on a song is usually a good melody and a hopefully a lyric, no matter what angle it comes from, that sounds like it came from the heart. Those are pretty much the two factors. Everything else is up in the air. Haley is a total badass! I’m always rooting for her and the Paramore guys.

Other than music, any good books you’ve read lately or movies you’ve seen?
AM: I just finished an amazing book titled The History Of Love [by Nicole Krauss]. It’s a really great book. It sounds like it would be a romance novel but it’s definitely not. Movies I’ve watched... nothing I’ve seen lately knocked me on my ass. I saw The Hangover. I thought that was hysterical. I also saw a documentary on John Smith which was ridiculous. I saw it on an airplane of all places. Have you seen Lars And The Real Girl?

EP: No but I’ve been meaning to.
AM: It’s almost slow in a sense, like Lost In Translation where there is a lack of things happening but it makes you feel like you’re in the movie. I think you’ll really like it. I don’t get a lot of time to watch movies. I don’t have as much time for movies as I used to. When I’m home, I’m either writing or just taking a minute to breath. I usually just catch things on Netflix.

Yeah, same here. I’ll definitely check out Lars though; you sold me on it! Well, I’ve wrapped up my questions. Is there anything else you’d like to add for our readers?
AM: Let them know we’re going to put an EP out in the next few months. There are a bunch of songs throughout the making of the film which are featured. I went through and collected them and will be putting out a 4-song EP next month.

AP.net Interview - October 1st, 2009

2009-10-02T02:35:00.000-07:00

By Adam Pfleider
Source

You told Paul Tao back at the end of 2007 that the footage (that would become Dear Jack) was just shot to be shot, and that it was initially hard to watch. With the release coming up in a month, are you hesitant, whatsoever, to finally surface this footage?

I have mixed feelings about it...I'm proud of it on a couple of levels. It came together from a lot of people around me, and the filmmakers who put their time in and worked on edits for a couple of years now. I think it's a really good movie [Laughs] you know, I mean, it's a little bit easier to be objective with some time behind me - these guys have just done a really amazing job telling the story. I feel like a part of me is a pretty private person. I say a lot in my songs, and I've been pretty forthcoming since the experience and being in the hospital, but I still consider myself as a pretty private guy. I think that [the DVD] really shows how I live, or how I lived, and how I got through this in such a personal way - really just my personal home movies. Yeah, there's a part of me that gets nervous putting that much of myself out there. I try and hold true to the tenants of why we started the private movie in the first place. One, to show people the reality and, I think, the truth of what it's like to be in that situation from a very personal angle, and also the idea that it would instill some hope in people, that there is something positive and wonderful on the other side, that if you keep your head in it and do everything to get yourself better.

When was the first time you sat down and plugged the camera in and watched the footage? Looking back at the footage on Dear Jack, was it hard?

The first time I saw...well...we saw an initial, very rough edit, you know, that's just catalog footage essentially. It was sort of scatterbrained enough that I was like, "Wow, I can't believe I shot that," but it hadn't really been woven together in a story at that point. The first time I really saw it, I can't even pinpoint the date, but I want to say it was sometime in early 2007, I remember we went to [director] Corey Moss' house...a bunch of us went over there and watched it at his house. It wasn't finished...I remember sitting there and watching it, and it was pretty intense, and it sort of put me in a pretty strange head space. It was kind of the first time seeing all the stuff pieced together...I shot most of the footage myself, and so much of it was my perspective. I remember I woke up the following morning sick [Laughs], well not actually sick, but in a psychosomatic kind of way. My body felt like it was back in that time and place, and it sort of spoke of the power of the footage, just seeing things through my own eyes again really kind of put me back there.That said, a couple years have passed. Now I see it and appreciate it for how well it was put together and what it represents.

Have you watched it with family, and if so, what was their reaction?

My wife has seen it, and at this point, that is it. The last week that we were editing and putting together the last cuts. I've been pretty guarded about not showing this to anybody until it's finished. They're having a lot of edits, and they're having a lot of different versions come out, timing the one we're really happy with it. So I think in the next week or so I will distribute it out to my family and some of my close friends for them to see.

How did Tommy Lee get picked to narrate the movie?

There's a lot of reasons. When we went and looked back at a lot of the footage...to be clear, the way this whole thing happened, it spun out, [was that] we got a camera during the making of the [Everything in] Transit sessions. Six months before, when we looked back at a lot of the footage, we were working a lot at the time, both on his record and on mine, he was in a lot of the footage. [Laughs] He was sort of a big part of that period of time in my life. In some ways I think he represented a symbol of that period of time. I was going out with him fairly regularly, I was spending a lot of time in the studio with him, and I was just partying and having an amazing time. That was sort of the backdrop for when I got pulled off the road all of a sudden. We saw him in a lot of the footage, and we knew we needed a narrator, and it was kind of like, "Do we go hunting down a guy to do voice over work?" or, you know, we got a buddy that happens to be a big celebrity who actually was really involved and really a part of this period of time in our lives and also happens to have a very cool, recognizable voice. So it was like, Tommy Lee is like our Morgan Freeman. He's the dude who will hopefully bring a little bit of celebrity in the story - maybe perks up a couple of people's ears who don't necessarily know what we're about, but checks us out because Tommy is involved - you know, he's a good friend.

I'm a Leukemia survivor as well, but with my condition, I had ALA Leukemia, essentially spawning defective white blood cells, but you had a strand called Acute Lymphoblasic Leukemia, or ALL. Medical jargon aside, can you explain what was going on with your body?

Effectively, my body was taken over by cancer cells that were, to my understanding, I had defective bone marrow. Your bone marrow is where you process a lot of cells and shoots those cells out to the body. What happened to me, or how it lays out on paper, if you were to look at a score of my blood counts, from hemoglobin to - sorry to get technical, but all the different components of blood - everything was being processed through a cancerous organism apparently. All of my blood counts were going down to nothing...Every component of my blood was effected because all the cancer cells completely destroyed all the blood in my body. The treatment that I had with Leukemia is to essentially kill all the cancerous blood cells so you can generate new ones, but because it's in the bone marrow, you have to fix the problem at the source...so that's why we chose to do the transplant.

I had a transplant as well, and several spinal taps too. I take it you went through the same radiation?

When I started the [the treatment of possible prolonged chemotherapy to eventually get into remission], what ended up happening is that I that I had a match, and my doctor felt my odds for survival would be better should I be able to get through the process of the transplant, so we went for that. The preparation for that is pretty huge amounts of radiation, brain radiation, body radiation for several days, and I did really heavy, high doses of chemotherapy that just kills everything in your body, and then sort of brings you back to life. You know, you've been through it. I got that really specialized ass kicking from the docs, because that's what you have to do to prepare for the transplant.

Was there any point in that time where you felt like, "Why did this happen to me?" or "How could this have happened?" or was it always a positive uphill battle with yourself and your friends and family?

Definitely. There were definitely moments when you have questions. I think i was able to make peace with it quickly. I don't know if the "Why me?" thing really came into play during my illness as much as "Why do I hurt so bad?" [Laughs] And I mean, I think there was a part of me that felt upset that I couldn't be out, and I got plucked, if felt like, at a certain important time in my life. There was a point that, even really more after the fact, and after the recovery. During it, there was sort of this, bizarre coincidence. So many things happened at the period of time that I found out I was sick, that I seemed to weave this whole picture together. I looked back at [Everything in Transit], I think I was living, at that period of time in my life, in a very serendipitous kind of way. There were so many things were just coming together for me and the world was just working, and I was listening to the universe, I was just trying to follow the path that would lead me to the best music, but you know I felt so tied in and keyed into the universe, that when I got sick, in a strange way, that's just what was supposed to happen. Listening back to the album, and hearing all those references to hospitals and being sick, I think there was a lot of serendipity in a way that I found out I was sick. You almost felt like it was meant to happen. Something about it felt like, "I'm the guy for this," like it was just meant to happen - not something out of anger, like I was meant to be punished - but something about it felt like, "I'm the guy for this, this is what I have to deal with now." So I did, and I dealt with it peacefully. You have these moments where you feel worried you're going to die, then you really get scared. Those moments are hard to be consoled, even if you are treating yourself in a positive way.

Looking back on those years, I know it's cliche, but do you feel stronger because of it? Did it give you a fresh look on life that carried over into your song writing?

It's not to say that I don't feel like a stronger person. I feel as my life continues on, this will have made me stronger inherently. The couple years following my recovery, I felt anything but strong, I think I felt really fragile, kind of like I was drifting a little bit, even into the making of [The Glass] Passenger. [That album] really came about the struggle to find my confidence as a musician again. The struggle to find my confidence as a writer and as an artist. I think the cancer stripped a lot of that away from me. I think the follow-up to this, [besides] my struggle with Leukemia, is my struggle to get back to that place where I felt like I was working with the world around me, making songs. I finally feel like I'm there. I think making Passenger and getting this documentary done and doing all these things are really an influential stepping stone in getting back to this place where I can put all this shit behind me and move along. I think I'm finally at that place...I think it took a lot away from me in some respects. I think all the things I've replaced are better, stronger parts and are slowly coming back. Most of my "Why me?" and most of my anger about being sick happened in the years following [my remission].

How has The Dear Jack Foundation been going? What's been the feedback?

It's been great. We've been able to fund a lot of big research...We've raised about $200,000 if not more than that at this point, going towards various research projects. Medical research is a tricky thing. We're not going to be able to sit there and quantify every success. In general, having your money go towards these doctors that are spending day in and day out to get to the bottom of things, you might fund research that didn't work, and that's a part of what they found out. This doesn't work, then you go on to the next one. Our goal is to continue to fund that research, and help supporting doctors, so they can find cures. It's been a great success. I feel it has really roused a lot of people together in a name of a great cause. We're a little foundation. We don't generate millions of dollars, but you know, we've made a few hundred thousand dollars in the course of a few years, and I feel really proud to do my part.

Going out on tour for the first time after the recovery, what was your initial feeling? How long did it take for someone who went through the same thing to come up to you, and what was your response? Was it overwhelming?

The first time I talked to another person, a fan, it was probably a few months following the transplant. I started to feel better enough to do these kind of "incubated" shows, kind of acoustic, kind of things to give me hope, give me something to train for, get my body back, get my health back, kind of working with the transplant to feel better. That's when I started to see people reaching out. It's intense. It's sort of a weird responsibility to council somebody who is sick, or is in a dangerous spot in their own life. I think that's something where there's a feeling to look after other people who don't feel well after you've gone through something like that. You sort of are happy to step in and say, "Well, this worked for me, and try to stay positive," and I sort of think that's the natural response to recovery is to reach out to those who are in the process themselves. So it happened pretty early. Playing those initial shows, there were mix feelings. A lot of it came with nerves, because you were wondering if you would get sick before you do the show, or if my voice would hold - those kinds of things. I think if I'd recover, my performance would recover too. I didn't think I'd come out swinging, jumping on the piano [Laughs] and waving my body for the first several months down the road, but you can certainly chart my progress physically through my shows in a lot of respects. You would probably see my shows getting a lot more active as I recovered.

If there's one thing you specifically learned from your experience, that you would want to pass down onto all your fans, what would it be?

Not to say I am any sort of authority. A lot of people have idealized my situation, because I play music and am somewhat of a public figure. If I could say anything, if I've learned anything from it - you never know what's coming for you. I don't say that to instill any sort of paranoia, but the point being, you don't' know that you might not wake up tomorrow, and it's you or your friend, or some other possible road block that you might not know happen. You try and make sure that your day to day that you're living, not to that you are prepared for something like that, but you're living in a way that would make you okay with it. That could mean a lot of different things to a lot of people. For me, it's as simple as trying to live a life as a kind person, and doing things that I'm proud of, and looking after the people that I love in my life, and being as connected to the things and people that hold you in and are special to me. Trying to live a life that you're psyched on. Know that it's not always going to be around, so you might as well enjoy yourself. That you might as well be in a place where you reconcile enough that you can enjoy life a little, because none of us know what's happening next. Just live in the moment, that's all I can say. Try to be present in the moment, because the past and the future really don't exist.

Oh yeah, and I'm sure people are wondering, any new Something Corporate news, or do some of us just need to move on?

[Laughs] I think everyone should move on with their lives, because we shouldn't get hung up on a rock band. [Laughs] The only way to answer that question is to be as cautious as possible, because I've definitely gotten myself in trouble both in Something Corporate world and Jack's Mannequin world by thinking I know what's coming next. It almost speaks in some way to the last question you asked me, which is the past and the future don't exist. I don't know what my tomorrow is going to bring. At the moment, in my head, I think it's a realistic possibility that we will go out and play some shows. When I say some, I doubt it will be a full scale tour. In the interest of living my life in the moment, I have to be open to just writing new songs, and being around a lot of what inspires me artistically. That said, the Something Corporate guys are my close, close friends. We still have maintained a very close friendship even though we've moved on with other things in our lives. I think, because we have moved on to other things in our lives, the idea of getting together and getting on a stage and playing music does not seem far fetched to us. I will not anticipate that anything that happens, whether we play a few shows or whatever, is going to indicate us making new music. If I could suggest moving on from that head space, I would move on. If people want to see Something Corporate and check out a few shows, I think it is highly possible. I can't say when, because it's not on the books. There are discussions, but they're not on the books. I'm just going to have to wait until the dates show up to talk about it. So bare with me. [Laughs]

The Deadbolt Interview - September 25th, 2009

2009-09-28T13:00:00.000-07:00

By Troy Rogers
Source

THE DEADBOLT: Can you remember how it felt when you were first diagnosed?

ANDREW MCMAHON: Yeah. I mean to be totally connected to that feeling, being that it was several years ago, there is definitely a part of that that I will always recall.

THE DEADBOLT: How has Leukemia changed your sound since the diagnosis?

MCMAHON: I don't know. I guess in the same sense that any major life event is going to affect [anything]. By sound, I'm assuming you mean the art and how it comes out?

THE DEADBOLT: Right.

MCMAHON: I think any experience is going to inform your decisions. Obviously one that massive is a pretty big game changer. But I wouldn't say it has any different affect of any other major event life event, too. This one lasts a little bit longer and the halo-effect spreads out over a few more years than say maybe a break-up or something to that effect. But it's a very real. It's real like anything else and a process that needs to enter the art form for sure.

THE DEADBOLT: I'm interested to know what you wanted to tell with Dear Jack? When I first saw the trailer, I got a lump in my throat.

MCMAHON: [laughs] Yeah, it's a pretty heavy thing. I mean, I think our goal was just to tell the truth. I don't think there was an [agenda]. The idea was really, when they approached, they were like, "Look, we just want to tell the story." Frankly, I was documenting my life up to that moment for several months. So I think what compelled the guys who initially brought us the idea of turning this thing into a documentary is, "It's told from a very clear point of view in that sense of what you were doing before and how it all played out in your life. You have this perspective. You know this very personal perspective." At first it was just my home movies and I think our goal was just to kind of be able to tell a very true story about what happened in that situation. I think a lot of people face it and we had this window into it that we thought was a valid kind of point of view to present.

THE DEADBOLT: Was there anything that came out of the documentary that hit you unexpectedly in a rewarding manner?

MCMAHON: Well, it's any interesting thing. I think watching it kind of in its finished state for the first time, which happened maybe a month and a half ago, maybe two months at the most. I mean, we've been working on the thing forever. We've done edits on the movie probably over the course of two years. For whatever reason it just wasn't the right moment. It was good but it wasn't totally perfect. I think we were really sensitive about not just handing it out there but just waiting until it was locked up.

I think if nothing else, the most positive thing for me that comes out of it is just having that period of time on film and seeing how it played out and how important the people around me were to the success of my recovery. That's something that I'm glad I had it on film to be reminded. Really, it was in a lot of ways this sort support structure around me that made it possible for me to be at peace, and for me to be positive while I fought, because they really sat alongside me and did a lot of the heavy lifting in a lot of respects. So I think that reminder is a very positive thing. To see that and know how valuable your relationships are I think is big.

THE DEADBOLT: How did the diagnosis affect the other members of Jack's?

MCMAHON: Well, I think there's obviously a handful of realities to something like that. One, I think, from the human side. These are guys who I've become close with. You share a stage and play music with people, that's a pretty powerful bond. Even at that point I had moved from playing with Something Corporate, but it was sort of the same thing. You now, it's just like watching your brother get sick, in some respects, and I think there is sort of a brotherhood in playing music. So I think it was heavy for everybody.

Of course there's also the fact that's how we're all surviving, rolling around in a van together playing music. That's how we were getting paid and eating. So I think there are other questions of survival and whatnot. But again, it points to how as soon as I got sick the people in my life, my management company, my record company and everything, really looked after the rest of the band and made sure there was work playing in a few other bands that they had met through people in our world. Again, I think it sort of spoke to the positivity of having these people around you who are good people and looked after the band as well.

THE DEADBOLT: Can you talk about some of the positive elements of fear that have helped you, the music, and the band?

MCMAHON: You know, I don't know if there are a lot of positive elements to fear to be honest [laughs]. I mean, I'm not saying that it's not a completely valid emotion, but I think fear begets fear. You know what I mean? I think you have to try to keep your fear in check. There's no question I think of moments in my career and in my life when I've been afraid. But I also tend to find those moments are kind of when you check out sometimes and you can overcome them. I don't know. Maybe I'm looking at it from the wrong angle.

THE DEADBOLT: Will Dear Jack be getting a wide theatrical release?

MCMAHON: I'm sort of going around in the wagon behind the movie, going into these cities and just basically dropping it off in the theater, I guess, in three different cities. Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles will get to see it in a theater. You know, it's hard. Documentaries in general are pretty tough to get that sort of a release anyway, so I think we went down that road for a minute. Then, for a number of reasons, some of them personal and others business, I just think it made more sense for us to go directly to the fans and the people who wanted to hear the story first and then from there the movie will take on its own life. I like the idea of not jamming this down everybody's throat. I think that is the most appropriate way to go about it.

THE DEADBOLT: Since it took awhile to put this all together, what were some of the challenges? I heard that you had reservations about going back and looking at yourself like that.

MCMAHON: Yeah. It was never anything that stopped me from considering doing this movie. I think that just being too close to it, obviously, is difficult to be objective. So I think a lot of the reasons, it did take time. In the same sense The Glass Passenger took time was because there's sort of this halo effect of that kind of experience and it lasts a long time and you revisit it quite a bit. It sort of seemed like maybe the time for the movie would be when I felt those feelings had passed, like I was really in a different chapter in my life. Frankly, I think the past five or six talks after having the record released and getting it played, putting it out there it sort of moved me further and it was possible to be objective. That's why I think just within the past few months we really sat down and started looking hard at the movie again. I think in that moment where I felt finally objective about it, we really all of a sudden hit the "Go" button and it was ready to go.

THE DEADBOLT: I also wanted to know about the stem cell part of your recovery, considering the last administration was kind of against all of the research.

MCMAHON:Well, yes and no. I think a lot of people mix up the idea of the stem cell transplant with the idea of controversial stem cell research. They're very different things, different deals obviously.

THE DEADBOLT: Well, when you were given the option of more chemo or the stem cell procedure, what was going through your mind, no more chemo or was that just the better way to go?

MCMAHON: Well, frankly, it really came down to a conversation and a lot of research and a lot of talking to my doctor and whatnot. My doctor, who is one of the better Leukemia doctors in the world, that's kind of why we went to him. He felt pretty strongly that this would be the best chance at a lasting cure for me. There was obviously a whole series of risks that went a long with it that certainly made it a conversation as to whether or not to do it. But to me, I think once I sat with him and had the conversation, it seemed to make sense if my goal was to really move forward and have a life without this in it. That's how the decision was made. And it was scary, it's a new frontier. It's something you don't know a lot about. But that's why you lean on these people who know more about it to guide you. My doctor, I call him a Ninja because he found the path for me and got in there with me and made it happen. I give him a lot of credit. You'll see him in the movie, he's the coolest.

THE DEADBOLT: As for Jack's Mannequin, what was the summer tour like with The Fray?

MCMAHON: It was awesome. It was probably one of the more relaxed, sort of fun-loving events I can think of on tour. You know, when you're touring venues that size, you just have a little bit more freedom in your day. I was going to yoga everyday when I was on that tour and you eat good food and all of that stuff and the fans were great. A lot of our fans came out to the dates, which I was pleasantly surprised at, because a lot of times if they see we're opening up, they'll stay away until we come back and headline. But we had a lot of people out for us and it seemed like we were making new fans. Yeah, we had a blast.

THE DEADBOLT: Tell me about the promo spot for Three Rivers?

MCMAHON: It's actually kind of a funny, sort of one of those kismet kind of things. I was actually doing a showcase for CBS. I do the showcase and there's this lady who works there and is just awesome, kind of a very cool supervisor who works at the network. We were chatting and she sent up something after the thing and she said, "Oh, I just heard Jack's Mannequin and we should definitely try to get them into one of our shows." And the guy wrote back and said, "Dude, that's so wild. I've been attaching 'Swim' to Three Rivers and it really works well."

She started telling me about the show and I was like, "Are you aware I'm a transplant patient?" And she's like, "What are you talking about?" I'm like, "That's hysterical that that's the show you would put me into." Granted, it's not organ transplant. But yeah, I remember saying, "Is this shit going to follow me around for the rest of my life?" [laughs]. But it was kind of funny that it was so coincidental. But she kind of jockeyed the thing for us, and a couple of guys in my management company really helped get these spots put together, and it's definitely a good little blip for us as far as some access to the mainstream I guess.

THE DEADBOLT: I noticed you guys just released a video for "Swim". What are you guys working on now?

MCMAHON: [laughs] We're working on a really slow format of radio, as we speak, and all of us are crossing our fingers that we're able to push past - I mean, we're hovering around 40 on that Hot Indies chart. So we'll see if towards the holidays if it starts moving up the chart. Maybe that's the video we'll see a little bit more of than just the viral stuff. But yeah, in the meantime, putting out the documentary has been kind of our huge focus and I also have an EP that will be coming out sort of alongside the documentary probably in the next month or so. You are literally probably like the second person I've even told about this, because we were debating whether or not to do it, and I have a bunch of these songs that were relevant for stuff that got played in the context of the documentary. So I went in and finished these tracks this week and we're going to get them out there in the next month or so. That's kind of what we're working on.

THE DEADBOLT: I wanted to know about Stephenie Meyer and whether fans have been bugging you guys about the New Moon soundtrack?

MCMAHON: Bugging us in what sense? That's like one of those competitive soundtracks to get on and of course we didn't make it this time around. But yeah, what do you want to know?

THE DEADBOLT: Were they wondering if you guys were going to be on it?

MCMAHON: You know, I haven't talked to too many kids about it just because we've been on the road. But sort of in a very subtle manner, sneaking out for a weekend here and there or going out to Europe. So I haven't really heard much news about it. But cross my fingers, they have two more of those movies to make. So I'm hoping to make it on one of those soundtracks. So we'll see what happens [laughs].

THE DEADBOLT: I figured that the fans may have thought you guys were a shoe-in because you know Stephenie.

MCMAHON: Well, the thing is: Stephenie is the author of the books and she's really involved in the movies from a story standpoint. You know, she's on set a lot. But I think the way the deal got structured - I mean, Stephenie obviously has a lot of say and the music is a big part of those movies and it was a big part of her writing those books. But I think the way it got structured was that she sort of said I'm going to concede to the person who puts the soundtrack together to make sure they put together the right soundtrack for the movie. I would never ask Stephenie to put me on one of those things, that's a separate thing. We're friendly with each other, but I'd feel uncomfortable, you know, "Hey, would you put me on your soundtrack?" So I'll just keep submitting songs for the next couple and hope to get on there.

THE DEADBOLT: Also, since you worked with Stephenie on "The Resolution," I thought people might have thought you guys were earmarked for the New Moon soundtrack.

MCMAHON: Yeah, well, if you listen to the soundtracks - I mean, they're not really so Jack's Mannequin friendly. You now what I mean? [laughs] It's a lot of Muse, and it's a lot of darker, heavier rock bands and really kind of moody melancholy stuff. Frankly, in the Jack's stuff, I've kind of shied away from that other than a handful of moments. So it's not something I think about too much [laughs].

For The Sound Interview - September 20th, 2009

2009-09-20T13:47:00.000-07:00

By Danielle Weitzman
Source

How did Corey Moss and Josh Morrisroes approach you about the film?

Actually, we approached them. Originally, we had a couple of different guys who started kind of the first rough draft of it. Actually, one of the guys, Jacob Marshall, is the drummer for the band Mae. I’ve done a lot of the stuff for Mae over the years, who I happen to be good friends with as well… So those guys came to me and said, “You know… we think this could be a really powerful story and something worth telling.” Then we looked at the footage and tried to put something together, so they sort of did the rough initial draft of the movie and then from there, we got to Josh and Corey, who I’ve known for years… doing some Something Corporate stuff. Corey had been cutting clips together for us while working for MTV. They did kind of one of the first clips of me, that was seen on MTV, doing Jack’s Mannequin stuff for a piece that Kurt Loder introduced. And we just really liked his style and we asked him to come in and come help compile all of this stuff together.

Of all the people that could have done it, why choose Tommy Lee to narrate the film?

Well, I think a lot of it had to do with the role that Tommy Lee had been playing in my life up until that point. I think that Tommy and I were especially close during the making of the first record. He was the drummer on the first album and I worked quite a bit in the studio with him, as well. So we were kind of trying to find somebody that put in there, obviously, the idea of having some of a celebrity voice and somebody who brought in with him a little more attention to the film. My mind immediately went to Tommy. One, because he’s got a great voice and a really recognizable voice, and two, because he was definitely a part of the story up to that point.

Have you watched the film in its entirety since it’s been finished?

Yeah, we got the final edit actually about three weeks ago and then in the process, I might actually have the color-corrected, audio mixed version. But yes, I have definitely seen the final edit since it’s been completed.

Is it hard for you, on an emotional level, to watch some of the footage again?

It was definitely harder at the beginning. I think one of the reasons in taking a look back to… put the finishing touches on it is that I certainly struggled being objective in the early days when we started with the edit… I sort of lacked the objectivity to sort of sit and say here’s what needs to be cut. I think it really wasn’t until a couple of months ago when me and Josh and Cory got together and we watched the movie together and it was the first time we’d done that. And finally, I think for the first time, I was objective enough to sit down and criticize from a more analytical standpoint. That said, of course, you know, you watch something like this and it certainly brings you back there. There’s a bit of muscle memory that will kick in. And yeah, it can be a little bit disconcerting. But at this point, I’m far enough away from it that at least I can appreciate it.

In the trailer, from what scenes we’ve been able to see in it, one of the main focuses is that you’re really adamant about putting forth Everything in Transit. Why was it so important to you that the album be released?

Well, I think for me, you know, that period of time in my life and I think for the creative type that I am, getting sick was sort of the tail end of this moment where I think for the first time I broke away from my band, and from my girlfriend, and from my family, from all of these sort of elements in my life that I think I’ve been very attached to and sort of stepped out on them and onto my own. And I think that Transit was really the artistic manifestation of all of that. You know, it was sort of proof that it had happened, I guess, and I think that when I was diagnosed, it was obvious that I didn’t think it was going to take me down necessarily, but it was very real… very solid proof to the fact that whether I was going to be here or not was kind of still up in the air. And I think it was important to me to have it and have that moment for myself where I could probably say I’d been attempting (something) on my own that I was really behind and passionate about. And in a lot ways, I think it gave me something to come back to, knowing that the record was out and knowing that to really get out there and push it, I had to get well. I think it was sort of a little bit of a motivator or a huge motivator for me to fight and beat the cancer and get right back to music.

And you recorded “The Lights and Buzz”, which was the first thing you recorded after the stem-cell transplant, right?

Yes, it was the first recording after the transplant. I did a version of “Holiday From Real” in the month leading up to the transplant and I did kind of a song called “There, There, Katie,” as well. But “Lights and Buzz” was kind of the first song back in the studio after all that.

Looking back on that, and your first performance of the song, how big of a milestone was that for you?

You know, it was a milestone in the sense that it had been really difficult to write music during my recovery and that was sort of something I had written largely in my head in the hospital. I had the words to the song, I had the melody for the chorus and all of that. It was important, but I really don’t know that I viewed it as a milestone at that time… to get back into the studio, like anything, to get back on the stage after something like that… it was definitely an important thing.

On The Glass Passenger there are a lot of songs that obviously stem from your treatment like “Caves,” “The Resolution,” and “Swim,” but there are others that are independent of that theme. Was that something kind of done intentionally?

Music comes to me in mysterious ways, so I can’t say that I really ever intentionally craft anything one direction or another. I mean, sometimes when you’re finishing a record, you kind of have enough perspective to say “I really need to write this kind of a song” or something. With Passenger, I think truthfully, if there was any intention in a lot of moments along the way, I would really try to avoid that subject if anything. (Laughs) I thought in the early stages of writing the record that it was avoidable somehow and truthfully, it wasn’t until deeper into the record that I really got into songs like “Caves” and “The Resolution.” I think that sort of happened in the moment where I realized that you can’t sort of avoid that kind of subject matter. It’s a part of what the past few years have been for me, so in that sense, I think my greater intention was to avoid that subject matter. I sort of only answered the call when it just came to me. Then I had to think about it.

You spoke of “Caves,” which is the epic track of the album. Was it a song you really want to perfect, considering the length of it, the change in structure, and the subject matter of it?

There’s a lot of those kinds of songs that I think, on every record or every other record, pops up kind of like that. You know, this sort of big moment or long song or whatever. It just sort of happens naturally. Again, I think most of the material that… manifests itself in a way of talking about the recovery. Your being on the other side of it and how it affected me, I think “Caves” is really the one song that put me and put the listener into the hospital room. Again, it was a mysterious thing that was one of those songs that I woke up in the middle of the night… and that melody was in my head and I just sat down and it sort of came out. As soon as I was writing it, that kind of second bit popped up into the second half of the song. I write it when it comes. There’s really not a lot of method to it or intention behind everything that goes into a song that’s driving me. Yeah, it was important to me that I got it out there and the fact that I had a song that spoke so honestly about the topic.

Do you think that when you start work on your next album, whenever that is, you will give yourself a little more lyrical freedom because a lot of what was building up inside of you because of your treatment and your experience with Leukemia is a little bit far behind you at this point?

Yeah, I think that there’s no question that having the record out and having the documentary out has sort of put the exclamation point on this chapter of my life. I don’t think I’ll be singing about the same thing on this (next) record as what I was singing about on the last record in the sense that I wasn’t singing about the same thing on this record (”The Glass Passenger”) as I was on “Everything in Transit.” So I definitely think that it’ll take a much different turn and there will be a larger amount of freedom involved because I don’t think there will be that same elephant in the room that I have to reference to get past it. So I definitely see an opportunity for a lot more freedom with it.

You just finished up the tour for “The Glass Passenger” with The Fray and started on the new solo tour and promotion of the film. Is there any particular reason you chose to bring such an important group of shows to college campuses like my own?

The solo shows aren’t college-campus related, we’ll probably be playing full band. I’m not sure which school you’re at, but usually the college shows will be full band as a result of the college we show up at. As far as doing the solo tour, I think that there are a couple of reasons behind doing the big solo. One, obviously it’s to promote the movie, which is a pretty personal thing, and I thought maybe this would be an opportunity to do something like this and present the band in a different scenario after doing The Fray tour recently. Maybe doing something small, a little more personal. That and we’re trying to raise funds for research and for the foundation. In that sense, we wanted to keep it light and keep it inexpensive so we could generate more money for the foundation.

Speaking of colleges, there are a slough of your fans who are currently in college, like myself, who have listened to your music in some form from fifth, sixth, or seventh grade, on through college and grad school. How does it feel to know there are a lot of people out there who have essentially grown up listening to you?

It’s probably one of the things I’m most proud of, as a result of being in a band. I don’t think it was something I really anticipated starting out. You don’t even think about that kind of thing when you’re dreaming about being on a stage. Every time, somebody comes up to me after a show, and it happens to me regularly, and says “I’ve been listening to you since you were in Something Corporate and I was eighteen years old…” I’ve grown up listening to music, you know what I mean? I wrote a lot of the songs that people first clued into my music when I was fifteen or sixteen years old and now I’m twenty seven. To see that it actually translated to people and their own lives enough that they didn’t walk away from my music at a certain stage and they stuck with me through two bands. And it’s a pretty powerful bond that I’m blessed to have.

And because you have this massive outreach to different people of all different ages and of different walks of like, what do you hope that “Dear Jack” accomplishes? Is there a message that you hope people who see the film will walk away with?

Yeah, there are a couple of things. In a big way, I think we’re really hoping that this will generate money. Part of what we’re trying to do here is raise money so that we can make a difference and affect research and this is a great tool for that. When Jacob (Marshall) and Benji (Brownell) first came to me about the movie, what they felt that it had the power to do was to show people in a similar situation that there is a reason to have hope and there is something on the other side of all of this. I think that point, when this whole project started out, that meant the most to me was that we could tell a story that had a happy ending that looked like it could have gone either way. My hope is that people can find that thread of hope within the film and, whether it relates to their personal lives as far as an illness is concerned or some other major roadblock, that it is just the nature of life. You’re gonna be in the middle of your universe and everything is gonna be going well, but then something massive is going to come and knock you down. The point being, the best thing to deal with any of that is to try and get back on your feet as quickly as possible and keep your mind in a positive place. Hopefully, people get that kind of positivity out of the movie.

Is there anything that anyone said to you in treatment that you found really helped you get through it more than anything else… that if someone who is reading this interview is going through the same thing, you would want to pass onto them?

Breathe. Breathe. You know, I think that was the most important… that single word and action that was probably the most important thing that I learned in the process. When all else fails, deep breaths. As many of them and for as long as you can do it. I know it sounds maybe sort of hokey, I’m not really sure, but it’s the one piece of advice when I talked to sick people who found me because of our sort of common experience. I think it was really when I learned that it’s just like you’ve got to breathe deep and you’ve gotta focus on the positive. And that’s what will kind of empower you to push through the hard days.

How is everything going with the Dear Jack Foundation?

It’s going really well. I just finished up doing the Light the Night walk. Right now, for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, we’ve got a pair of shoes. We partnered with Macbeth Shoes and they’re coming out in November. They’re donating portions of the proceeds from the shoe back to the foundation. We’ve got the movie coming out, which is exciting, and should hopefully be a good source of revenue, as well. We’re excited. It seems like this year is kind of bigger than ever and we’ve already pushed through the $60,000 mark with the Light the Night walk and still have another couple of months to hopefully get that $100,000 mark that we hit last year. In a down economy, I’m surprised we’ve be able to generate as much as we have and I’m pretty excited about that.

We wish you, at For The Sound, the best of luck and really appreciate you taking the time to sit down with us.

It’s my pleasure.

Is there anything else you’d like to say to our readers and your fans?

Just thanks for listening and thanks for being out there. We’re always trying to make new music and new stuff for you guys to hear, so I appreciate the support.

Alter The Press! Interview - September 4th, 2009

2009-09-07T14:53:00.000-07:00

By Jon Ableson
Source

Alter The Press: You're back in the UK for the second time with Jack's Mannequin. How has this trip been so far?
Andrew McMahon: It's been incredible. We were a little nervous coming out as it's the first time we've been in a van for a long time. It's the first time we've really done this pretty much D.I.Y but, to be honest, it's been my favorite tour that I've done, even better than the Something Corporate stuff from the early days. We are having a blast.

ATP: How was it playing this year’s Reading/Leeds Festival?
AM: Reading was tough as it was the first night for us playing for a few weeks and a lot of our rental gear was malfunctioning but the crowd was amazing. It’s one of those things where the crowd pulls you through. Leeds was perfect, everything lined up perfect and we had pretty much sussed everything out. They were both fun, but Leeds was my favorite of the two.

ATP: Why has it taken Jack's Mannequin this long to play the UK?
AM: I've wanted to come over for a long time. I think it took a little while to convince people it was something worth doing but when we got to releasing 'The Glass Passenger', I pretty much insisted on it. We ended up coming out to the UK for the first run and the shows sold out which showed that we had fans over here. It's really because the kids are showing up. Working with 'Everything In Transit' (bands debut album) was a tricky point in my life considering having gotten sick so it really became a game of where to go and when to go. Frankly, I wasn't well enough to work that record probably until a year later, when it came out, we had so much work to do in the US and just introducing people to Jack's Mannequin. We had to get quite choosey where we would travel to internationally, obviously the expense of coming across is high, it’s difficult to convince the record company to spend that kind of money when they don't know if it's going to add up to anything. Now that the door is open with the response, and demand being so high, I imagine we will be coming over pretty regularly for as long as we are together.

ATP: The 'Dear Jack: The Journey Of Andrew McMahon' documentary is coming out soon, what can you tell us about it?
AM: It's finally done and the final edit has been approved. We are now just doing the credits. The story is; I had the video camera that the label bought me when I was making 'Everything In Transit' and it was in this period of time where my girlfriend and I had been separated and all of these things. So I started journaling pretty much regularly throughout my day, and increasingly during the making of the album, on this little hand held camera, which I would pull out if I was having a bad day and avidly talk to the camera. I had this sort of practice, of using this as a secondary art tool, documenting my life at that point. When I got sick, I was in this habit, so I kept this camera with me at the hospital and through the process of recovering and all of those things. A couple of good friends of mine knew that the footage existed and frankly, I have tapes I've never even looked at that I just have thrown in a drawer but, they were like: 'Is there a way you would be comfortable with us seeing some and seeing if there is a story to be told?' I said yes, and here we are three years later with a movie. It took this long for me even to be able to watch it, be objective and be detached from the events themselves but I think we'll find that we are sitting on a well made movie.

ATP: Is it going to be just a DVD release?
AM: We'll do a handful of theatrical releases in the US like premieres in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles but it is my understanding that the international label has just decided to release it as well. As regards to how it's going to be released territory-to-territory, I'm not sure yet but you will be able to order it from DearJack.com and JacksMannequin.com or my charity, Dear Jack.

ATP: Have you thought about submitting it to film festivals?
AM: In the early edits of the movie, we started throwing out some feelers to film festivals and we got a couple that came back, the timing seemed strange and again, it was so hard for me to be objective about the film at that point, I wasn't sure that I even liked it. Now, as we are in this place that we really love the movie, we started considering the idea, but do we want to put everything on hold for this chapter of my life; that I am ready to have closed? I think if we went the festival circuit, it would be another year of my life that would be committed to discussing the cancer and frankly, I am ready to move on from it.

ATP: How did you get involved with 'Light At The Night Walk'? (Leukemia/Lymphoma society fundraiser)
AM: The Leukemia and Lymphoma society is the most influential organization that deals with blood cancer. When they saw I started a charity, they knew what we were up to and reached out to us saying they were this amazing organization and donate 80-90 cents on the dollar to research, so we wanted to get involved. We built a team and every year we raise more money. Last year we raised over $100,000 and this year we are going to raise that again. It's really helpful for us, the charity but I am just one guy. It's hard for me to be the lone dude out there saying 'Look at me! Give me money!' but they really helped us facilitate the Dear Jack society as well.

ATP: How did 'The Mixed Tape' track end up being used on One Tree Hill? (US TV Show)
AM: There was a standing relationship with Maverick Records, who originally signed Jack's Mannequin, and they were in charge with putting out the soundtrack. Mark Schwarn (Creator of One Tree Hill) had heard my story and they were doing this episode that was based around them doing this cancer benefit for one of the characters on the show. They thought it would be appropriate that I would be the guy to be part of that episode. It's crazy actually because I've just learnt that's how a lot of people in the UK found out about Jack's Mannequin, through One Tree Hill. They use music in their show in a way not every TV show does so, in a way, it's been a great resource for us.

ATP: Which are you're new favorite records out at the moment?
AM: Regina Spektor - 'Far'. I love Regina. The new album, it's genius and mind blowing. It's been huge for me. I get into these modes where I find an album and I kill it till it's dead! It's the one I'm loving at the moment.

ATP: What can fans expect from you're upcoming US solo tour?
AM: I'm not sure yet. I'm going to go home and figure it out but my guess it's going to be more of a catalogue tour. I'll probably play more from the Something Corporate catalogue then I have in the past five years because it'll be solo. My guitar player Bob, in Jack's Mannequin, has been discussing if he'll come out and play acoustics with harmonies. I'm going to try and keep it really loose. I think I am going to learn as many of my songs that I've written over the years kind of in a very rudimentary way. I might just do it and say 'This is the batch of songs I'm going to play tonight' but I think it'll be a different show each night. It'll be a hang, and a chance to get on that level, from playing in 20,000 seat amphitheaters for the last six months, to be able to go and play 200 seat theaters. It's going be very cool.

ATP: Have you been working on any new Jack's Mannequin material?
AM: Yes, it's early to say what it is and how it will be presented. I have been writing and started in the studio mocking up these ideas in the last months or two. I'm close to being at that mode and I'm renting a house down by the water. For me, I had a hard time writing 'The Glass Passenger,' I think a lot of that was I wasn't next to my muse, which is the Pacific Ocean. When I head home, I'm going to head to Laguna, have my old piano delivered to this rental house, try out a bunch of songs and get ready for record three.

ATP: Any plans for a Something Corporate reunion show?
AM: It's something we are talking about. It'll probably be something we put our toe in the water for in the US and see how it goes. I've been talking to the guys and trying to find that right moment. We're sort of coming up to our 10 year anniversary, of when we put out our first set of demos, playing professionally and I know we don't want to miss that for our fans, and for us. We are still really close friends, I think we are just trying to sort out our schedules, but it's definitely possible and something that is in the works.

ATP: Anything you would like to add in closing?
AM: Keep up on JacksMannequin.com, it's where I write direct to everybody and there is always new stuff coming through. If you get a chance, check out the 'Dear Jack' movie, my charity, where we are doing everything we can to raise money for cancer cures, so if you want to get involved, we'd love to have you.

24 Hours Vancouver Interview

2009-08-28T13:47:00.000-07:00

24 seconds with Jack's Mannequin
By Joe Leary
Source

Formed by Andrew McMahon as a side project to his then group, 'Something Corporate', Jack's Mannequin are already two albums in, having released 'The Glass Passenger' about a year ago; the follow-up to their acclaimed 2005 debut, 'Everything in Transit'.

During a recent tour stop through Vancouver, Joe Leary spent 24 Seconds with Andrew McMahon.

24: What I like about your music is that despite the fact there might be some intrinsic message in the lyrics, you really seem to understand that music should be melodic and have a good feel to it. That's what you do well.

AM: I appreciate you noticing that; it's sort of my mission in a lot of ways.

24: What went into the writing process for 'The Glass Passenger'?

AM: A lot went into it. I think, for me growing up, writing music has always just sort of been an instinct, a gut reaction. With 'Passenger', I think the way it timed itself in my life and as it related to a lot of things in my personal life, it was a harder record to write. I was struggling with a little bit of a lack of confidence; kind of following up from getting sick and then getting well, it would bring so many questions into your head, I almost over-analyzed everything.

So I had to wait for these little moments of hope and these little moments of confidence where I would just breakthrough and a song would just come out and it couldn't be stopped - finding that instinct took a little bit longer.

24: You went through a relatively serious health crisis in 2005 and 'Everything in Transit' was released soon after. Was that somewhat of a catharsis for you?

AM: It was and it wasn't. It wasn't really written about that at all because the writing and recording of that record pre-dated anything that happened as far as my illness was concerned.

There was sort of this weird premonition throughout so many of those songs that referred to getting sick and doctors and hospitals and all these things that ended up really kind of being my life for a couple of years after it, so there was this sense of fate to that record.

With this new album, it was sort of the flip side; it was being on the other side of all of that. Having made 'Transit' and I was so proud of that and then being here in this strange moment and trying to reacclimatize. In a lot of ways 'Transit' and 'Passenger' are about very similar things; just handling different crises that propelled them, I suppose.

Alternative Addiction Article - July 6th, 2009

2009-07-09T11:48:00.000-07:00

Andrew McMahon Sees 'Glass' Half Full
By Chad Durkee
Source

After a somewhat slow start for Jack’s Mannequin’s 2008 release The Glass Passenger, singer/songwriter Andrew McMahon is hoping that the album will catch a second wind thanks to the band’s current tour with the Fray and release of their new single “Swim.”

“We had an interesting start to the record, we came out swinging, but I don’t think we had all the ducks in a row for the first single,” McMahon told Alternative Addiction. “But we just recently had a sort of resurgence towards “Swim” and the record, and I am really excited to see it sort of get a second life.”

McMahon is especially excited about “Swim” being promoted as a new single since its one of the more personal songs on the record.

“It’s one of the more universal themes of the album, just sort of pushing through the tough stuff and just trying to get to the other side,” McMahon explained. “That was really where it came from, and just sort of summed up the themes of the record to me.”

He says the song actually came quite naturally to him, especially the title, which he says felt like a perfect fit.

“I was feeling a little down, and I came across the word ‘swim,’ and it sort of struck a cord with me in my current state,” McMahon says of the writing process for Swim. “I sat down at the piano and wrote those first lines, and just immediately fell in love with the song. It was really one of the quicker writing sessions on the whole record.”

McMahon says he plans to start writing new material while on the road for his current tour with singer Richard Swift and melodic rockers Meese, but he says he is “always itching to be in the studio” writing new material. A trip to the studio could come as early as this spring, although that is entirely dependent on when McMahon feels inspired.

“I usually don’t sit down at a piano unless there is something I am really trying to say,” explained McMahon. “I don’t to feel like ‘Oh, I’ve [already] got a record [out], I have to write another one.’ That is just not how I work. I tend to write songs [only] when they come to me. If that means it takes a couple years because I am not going to force the issue then so be it.”

Jack’s Mannequin’s tour with The Fray wraps up August 7th in Spokane, WA.

HitFix Interview - June 10th, 2009

2009-06-21T04:31:00.000-07:00

Ten Minutes With...Jack's Mannequin's Andrew McMahon

By Melinda Newman
Source

Piano rock band Jack's Mannequin starts an amphitheater tour opening for the Fray on June 12 in Atlanta. While some groups loathe playing before dark, head Mannequin Andrew McMahon loves the light show nature provides: "For me, playing the sun out of the sky is probably my favorite [time] to play," he says. But McMahon has much more than that on his plate than the tour: he's already thinking about the follow-up to "The Glass Passenger" and is prepping the launch of his clothing line, River Apparel. Fifty percent of profits from sales will go to The Dear Jack Foundation, McMahon's charity that benefits leukemia research. He started the charity after surviving his own bout with leukemia four years ago.

Shortly before hitting the road, McMahon took a few minutes out to talk with Hitfix.

Q: Many of your songs are about coming out of the dark into the light. Is there certain music you turn to when you need to do that?

A: You know, there is and there isn't. A lot of it is sitting down at the piano and trying to write, that's where I tend to find myself when I'm at those moments...There are a ton of records that travel with me. Anything by Tom Petty travels with me. There's an old Counting Crows' record, "August and Everything After" that's a great rainy day listen.

Q: You asked for fans to send in artwork for inclusion for the new video, "Swim." Why did you want their involvement?

A: A lot of the record is very personal, obviously. That song is not really an exception, but I was trying to use what I had gone through to tap into a more universal theme. With the video, we really wanted it to be more about the human condition than my own condition. We thought a great way to do that would be to include people from my fan base and other artists and [make it a] universal meditation on hope and perseverance...We may put up a big gallery where all the art is exhibited... We'd like to do something in the fall for the foundation that I run. Within 3 days we had 150 submissions, I was pretty impressed. It's cool to see that's a common thread between myself and people that listen to my music.

Q: Jack's Mannequin postponed a leg of your Farther from the Earth headlining tour to open for the Fray this summer. You wrote a really nice note to your fans about why you did it. Still feeling any backlash?

A: You know, if there is one, it's probably contained to the internet, which is a place I visit very infrequently. From what I understand, people responded a lot more warmly than I anticipated. I was very nervous when I sent it out; cancelling shows isn't something I take lighty. ..The Fray is giving us an hour set, so if someone comes out and sees us on that tour, they're only missing about 20 minutes [of our headlining tour], and, frankly, we'll probably reschedule those dates, Hopefully, they won't hate me too much and won't stop listening to our music. It's a business and we want new people to hear our music. It gives us the chance to reach out to 10-15,000 people a night; that's not an opportunity that you pass up.

Q: Both you and the Fray's Isaac Slade play piano. Any mean duets planned on this tour of "Heart and Soul" or "Chopsticks?"

A: Right! We're roll [my piano] out and do dueling pianos. (laughs) At this point, there's not any plan, you never know. You're spending a whole summer out there. Part of me hopes that we end up working something out. Usually when we're traveling with any band, we get them up there to do something. Maybe we'll get a little duet on "Heart and Soul." Go print that; I'll be living that down for the rest of the summer.

Q: "The Glass Passenger" seems to be a way of putting your illness behind you. What are you thinking about for the next album?

A: I definitely have the beginnings of a new record hatching. That's still a pretty initial idea, but I try to wrap a record up and within the next few months start moving forward. I can't say I have dealt with every issue attached to the last few years, I don't know if that's the case. You try to clear out the residual. The hope is that thematically I'm able to pass what "The Glass Passenger" was about and I hope I will. My hope is that the next record is a more uptempo, major themed. At this point, I have a lot of ideas running around, but getting into the studio and finding the right guy to work with...

Q: Who is your dream producer?

A: I don't have that sort of thought like, "Oh I'm just going to find that guy." I've met some of the greatest guys outside of the studio that I'd love to work with, but until you're in the studio you can't tell over coffee whether you're going to like working in the studio. I would die to work with someone like Jeff Lynne; there are a few of these guys that we're talking to now. I'm a little bit manic when it comes to the studio. It will really come down to if there's someone who can tolerate me... That's why I had such a good relationship with [co-producer] Jim [Wirt]; it became easier because he was able to deal with my level of lunacy. We made five records together. I'll probably try someone else; I have to find someone else to strap onto the bomb. The unfortunate thing with a lot of these big-name producers...they want you to commit to doing a whole album after cup of tea."

Q: You do a great deal of charity work, including your own foundation, the Dear Jack Foundation. How important is it that artists who have a platform use it for good and to raise awareness?

A: It's important to me. I'd never insinuate that it's necessary or an obligation to someone else to do the same. I was in music for several years before what happened to me inspired me to use the platform to enable a charitable device. It's been really rewarding to me spiritually and personally to use some of what I do to give back. It means a lot to me, but I also see the flipside of that--if you don't have a cause, in some respects it allows you to just approach your art, but it's been a fundamental part of what I do.

Q: Who would we be surprised to know is on your iPod?

A: There's this amazing rapper named Kool Keith, who [recorded] in this other personality, Dr. Octagon. I'm an enormous Dr. Octagon fan. People would consider that a little shocking, the last few dates we've come out to stage to Dr. Octagon.

Q: When's the last time someone called you Jack?

A: It's so funny, it's pretty rare. I imagine I could count the times that rally stand out on a couple of hands. I really thought that was coming back to haunt me when I named the band. It's usually not all that common. It's when we open up for another band their fans will be 'You're Jack?" ... I usually just go with it.

Blast Interview - May 4th, 2009

2009-05-24T14:30:00.000-07:00

Andrew McMahon talks Jack’s, SoCo and Twilight

By Terri Schwartz
Source

Blast got an opportunity to talk at length with Jack’s Mannequin front man Andrew McMahon about the group’s new album, working with Stephenie Meyer, the Dear Jack Foundation and the future of Something Corporate.

BLAST: Where did the content for The Glass Passenger come from?

ANDREW MCMAHON: Gosh, it was sort of this weird limbo period, to be honest. I was recording a lot of The Glass Passenger while I was touring everything in transit. Obviously it’s no secret that I had fallen ill around the time that Everything In Transit was finished and was coming out. So pretty much it took me several months to kind of recover from that and deal with all the things that went along with that. And then of course you know, I wanted to get back on the road and really make sure that people had heard Everything In Transit, so I started really working that record and touring tons of dates a year to support “Transit,” while kind of concurrently starting to write and record The Glass Passenger. So there was sort of this strange limbo period where I had my hands in a lot of things and was doing a lot and obviously still trying, while my body was bouncing back, I was still sort of dealing with some of the stress and trauma that goes along with, you know, having recovered and gone through what I had dealt with and getting sick, so, that’s where the content came from, in a lot of respects; that sort of inner-personal struggle of trying to find my place in the world after a pretty traumatic event and in a lot of ways trying to use the music to propel me forward and to get me past this.

BLAST: Are you going to continue writing more mature songs or do you prefer writing similar to your earlier, lighter songs?

AM: I was 17, 18 years old when I was in Something Corporate, you know. Obviously by the time we had put it on hiatus I was turning 21 and becoming an adult and all the things that go along with it. I guess mature is a word. I’ve always, since I was nine years old and started writing songs, have written songs about what I’m dealing with at that point in my life. When you’re 17, you’re writing songs about what it’s like to be in love at 17 and what’s really more relevant at 17 than love: getting into relationships and then breaking them off and the pain of that and all that stuff. Not to say that that stuff isn’t very relevant too, but obviously the approach, when you start getting older; now I’m 26, I’ll be 27 in the summer, it’s like … I write songs from the perspective of a 26 year old now, not a 16 year old. So yeah, I think I’ll continue to grow hopefully and continue to write songs that represent who I am, not songs that intentionally hearken back to some old sentiment, I guess.

BLAST: So what are the songs that you’re writing now about?

AM: The songs I’m writing now about … it’s kind of hard to say. I haven’t really gone in and recorded too much. I went into a recording session recently that was kind of groovy. We ran a bunch of old material we had an accumulated over the course of four or five years. Two of the songs very well may make a new record, but those are obviously older tracks. I think now a lot of these songs are sort of angled around love and about relationships, but I think from a very different perspective. I think that in a lot of ways about real love and what goes along with that and what goes along with you know really being committed to someone and something and sort of how that can be idealized, but sometimes that ideal isn’t always the reality and sort of trying to approach that and analyze it from that level which is sort of the first time I’ve really gotten to do that because obviously The Glass Passenger was about something very different.

BLAST: Are you experimenting with any new sounds?

AM: The sounds I find myself gravitating towards now more than ever are really rich, warm and natural sounds. I think the studio for me is always my second home if you consider I tour anywhere from six to 10 months a year. I’ll spend the remaining months in the studio, regardless of whether I’m recording for an album or just trying to work out some new material and stuff. I find myself sort of slowly gravitating away from the more rigid recording structure, not to say avoiding pro-tools all together or things like that, but I think pro-tools have created this safety net for a lot of bands and a lot of artists to not accomplish and not achieve the sounds on their own and I think my perspective, especially after having been on the road for so long, in these past few years playing with a really talented band, I think you’ll find me going into studio recording more live and recording with less effects and you know less processing and all of these things and really kind of focusing on nailing the sounds and nailing the take and really kind of making it about the magic of the take instead of spending months and months and months and month working on the song and working in the effects. I think I’m kind of getting away from that style.

BLAST: You must have had an interesting end to 2008 — you kind of got sucked into Twilight-mania.

AM: Yes I did sort of, didn’t I? (laughs)

BLAST: Tell me a little bit about working with Stephenie Meyer on the making of the “The Resolution” music video.

AM: It was one of these things where I had a friend of mine who had notified me, this is probably months before I got involved with Stephenie, that Stephenie was a fan of Jack’s Mannequin and that she had made reference to Jack’s either on her website or in the thank you’s in one of her books as being an inspiration for a character or whatever, we were on a play list or something like that. I heard this and at that point didn’t really know much about “Twilight” and while it was obviously a huge phenomenon throughout the country and probably the world and what-not, I don’t think it had quite broken the surface yet. As the months wore on, obviously I was sort of realizing how big a deal this whole thing was and about the same time we were searching for video treatments for “The Resolution” and frankly hadn’t really found one that we clicked with. It was sort of a frustrating process and I was trying to kind of sort it out and we started talking; myself and the label, we started talking about, “Is there anything we could do that would be different and cool and clever that might invigorate this process, and maybe it isn’t just going to video treatments, maybe we reach out to the musicians from another band we like or we reach out to film directors or actors or other people we know?,” that sort of thing. In that conversation, I was like, “Well you know, this woman who writes these books that have sold millions of copies is a purported fan of Jack’s Mannequin. Maybe we could reach out to her. She’s an author, I’m sure she could come up with something cool.” And then of course, it was sort of a pipe dream, I guess, in a sense. I mean I wasn’t really thinking of it on the grander scale of how huge she really was. Sure enough, we reached out, and she was like, “Sure, that sounds great,” and she sent in three treatments and we loved one of them and she ended up coming out and co-directing the video for us.

BLAST: How involved was Stephenie in the process of filming the video?

AM: It wasn’t like she was behind the camera, you know, she’s an author. There was this guy named Nobel Jones who is a director and she was on set the whole time, she obviously wrote the treatment, and she and Nobel collaborated quite a bit as far as the execution of her vision and how she wanted it to look. She was definitely there and approving shots and giving her opinion of certain shots as we went along, so she was definitely a part of the production and the directing of the video, sure.

BLAST: When you were making “The Resolution,” were you thinking mermaids?

AM: (laughs) No, and that’s almost why I picked her treatment more than anybody else’s, you know what I mean? Like, especially when I think my story and what people perceive and, frankly, what is a legitimate perception of what that song is about, we started getting a lot of treatments that I think were just very literal, and what I loved about Stephenie’s is that it was creative. I mean, I loved the metaphor, I loved that she made it more sort of this bizarre kind of love story. There’s the water rising and representing the kind of love that you can’t escape sort of thing and there’s the mermaid at the end. The mermaid sort of freaked people out in the treatment, but I was like, “Let her do her thing. She obviously has done well enough for herself; I’ve got a crazy feeling it’s going to be okay.” And I think they nailed it. But was I writing about mermaids? Definitely not.

BLAST: Bands like Muse and Blue October, who Stephenie’s expressed interest in, have written songs for the movies. I know you wrote “Meet Me At My Window” for “Superman Returns.” Would you be interested in doing something like that for the future “Twilight” movies?

AM: Yeah, of course I would. But that’s like one of the biggest trench wars in the entire music business, just people trying to get their artists on future “Twilight”s or things like that, you know. I tend to find, when it comes down to things like that, where it’s just a bloody bath over everybody trying to force their way in the door and figure it out that I tend to shy away from it. But I would love to have a song featured in (”New Moon”), no question. I don’t tend to written from a writing assignment standpoint, I write what I feel in my day-to-day life, and if there’s something from that that inspires the person putting the soundtrack together enough that they want to use it, then god, of course I would be totally honored, you know? Whether or not I’ll go sit down and pen a song with “New Moon” in mind is maybe a different story.

BLAST: The “Dear Jack” documentary is slated to come out this summer. Do you know any more details about its release or what we can expect from it?

AM: I don’t. I’m in a little bit of a transition in my business world and everything period right now where we’re starting to find out and figure out what the best way for that to come out is. It’s sort of just this thing that the people who put the documentary together got anxious and threw a trailer out very early; a lot earlier than I would have liked to have it come out because I wasn’t sure when the movie would be released. I’m not 100 percent still when it will be released and when I do know, obviously we will send out a press release and everyone will find out. For me, it’s a powerful film; it’s something that means a lot to me. It’s also, it’s touchy for me at the same time and I just want to make sure that it’s handled appropriately and it’s not exploited in a strange way, so we’re still trying to find a home for it and the right sort of distribution angle. My hope is that it would come out sometime around (September), I think that would be sort of the most sensible time for it to come out and you know be able to use that sort of pivotal time for fundraising and those things to release the movie and call attention to it.

BLAST: Some Blast readers might not be familiar with your Dear Jack Foundation. Can you just give a little bit of information about its history and what you want to do with its future?

AM: The foundation was basically started when I realized, as I was getting better, that there was still this sort of passion and energy from my fans to be involved and to support my interest in raising money and raising awareness for leukemia and other blood cancers. I had been involved in a charity and cancer research foundation and a couple other charities and it seemed to me with the amount of money we were raising for other charities, that maybe if we got the ball rolling and started our own foundation where essentially we could collect money and distribute that money to various charities that are affecting positive change in the area of cancer and specifically blood cancer. It was something I was passionate about and it would hopefully keep my fans interested so we started the Dear Jack Foundation. It’s been going for two or three years strong now. We raise hundreds of thousands of dollars largely through (events) and walks, we toured in 2006 where we donated all the proceeds. I think it was like $70,000 we were able to donate. Obviously any money I make off the documentary will be donated to the Dear Jack Foundation. That’s the big thing that we have going on. We’re also doing a Jack’s Mannequin show with Macbeth (Footwear) this year, it will come out in the fall. They’re donating 5 percent of their proceeds from the shoe to the Dear Jack Foundation which we’re really excited about. We doing a “Swim” bracelet that will come out on this next headlining run. $2 from every bracelet sold will go towards the foundation. So we’re just starting to try to find even some passive ways — fans buying merch at the merch booth — that a percentage of those proceeds will go to the charity. So, you know, dearjackfoundation.com, the page still has to be updated, it hasn’t been updated in a little bit, but we plan about getting that much more active with it this year and hopefully continuing to raise a good amount of money every year.

BLAST: I know that you’re a big fan of covering songs from bands like Tom Petty and The Verve at your shows. Give me your favorite songs that you like or would like to cover.

AM: We’ve been doing Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire” which has been a lot of fun. One that I’d love to bring back, but we’ll see if it happens, is “Changes” by David Bowie. We did that a couple tours back. We just did it a few times. It was pretty cool. I’m trying to think of some of the obscure covers we’ve done. We did “Kids” by MGMT. That was pretty fun. The cover thing is always great. It’s something that usually evolves out of like a sound check or something like that and we’re like, “Hey, let’s give this a shot.” Right now there isn’t a cover on the books just yet. I mean obviously now having two records to play through and an hour and a half a night to get through what is more than an hour and a half of music can be challenging because then you have to wedge covers in and then people get pissed that you didn’t play the song they wanted to hear. Any of the ones I just mentioned will make their way out on this next tour and maybe we’ll have some time to work out a new one, but I haven’t really thought of one just yet.

BLAST: You need to go on tour with someone with a violin again so you can cover “Bittersweet Symphony.”

AM: Did you see that? Where you there for that Yellowcard/Something Corporate event with Sean (Mackin) on stage? That was a lot of fun. I loved doing that one.

BLAST: Originally you had said Jack’s Mannequin was going to be your side project to Something Corporate, but you just came out with Jack’s sophomore album. Is Jack’s Mannequin now your focus and what’s going to happen with Something Corporate?

AM: I mean I think it’s no secret that Jack’s has become my main focus. I’ve been doing it - pretty much breathing it - for 24 hours a day for several years now. I think it’s what I’ll continue to do. Something Corporate: it’s my first band. They’re my dear friends. They’re still my dear friends. I love the dudes to death and I love the music that we created. We definitely got to a point I think where the creative was about to suffer because we weren’t really getting along, to be perfectly honest. We get along a lot better now that we don’t run a business together 24 hours a day and live and eat and sleep and breathe in each others’ company all day long. For me, our kind of democracy is a tough thing. I think that to make really good stuff, you need to have a vision and you need to not have that vision polluted by politics and by fighting and things like that, and frankly that’s what we were starting to arrive at. And that’s I think what happens with most bands and that’s why most bands don’t play for 30 and 40 years, you know what I mean? I think that’s why these reunion tours are such a huge deal, because bands break up eventually, you know? But that said, we intentionally put Something Corporate on hiatus because I think we were mature and we were responsible and we wanted to at least preserve the potential to do something in the future. Do I think that that something will be, you know, will be a world tour and a brand new record and all that, I would probably be lying to say yes. But I think that there’s a chance that we will get together and do some reunion shows and maybe put together a great package of our favorite songs from the past and a bunch of B-sides that we haven’t released and material that people haven’t heard yet. That’s the kind of thing, at least for me, envision of Something Corporate. I mean, you’ll have to ask the other guys what their opinions are but you know, I think in my head I think that’s the most logical and sensible approach to Something Corporate next step.

BLAST: If you do go on a reunion tour, you’ll have to make your way to Boston.

AM: Boston was always good to Something Corporate, so we’ll have to make our way back to play for you guys.

BLAST: Of all the albums, Something Corporate and Jack’s Mannequin, which are you closest to?

AM: Which album am I closest to? I’d say from some respects Everything In Transit, to be honest. The place that it held in my life at that point, it was really the only thing I had in a lot of ways. I was sort of this free-floating thing at that point. There was so little assurance. Something Corporate had crushed and was so successful and frankly we were probably on our way to the next thing being huge, but instinctually (sic) I think I knew and the rest of the guys knew that if we went and make a record it wasn’t going to be as good because we weren’t getting along. So Everything In Transit was this huge awakening for me. It was like making music with this immense freedom and this ability to just say, “Hey.” It really was just the freest I’ve felt, not just musically but personally. I didn’t care about poor and spending all my money to make the album. It was like, nothing else mattered at that point but just trying to make songs that were fair and representative of what was going on at that time. So in that sense, it sort of was this sort of blistering, idealized period in my life, you know. Frankly, it was a pretty painful and hard time to do this but the underlining current was just: “Music will pull you through. This music is going to stay no matter what.” Obviously everything that transpired during the finishing and release of that record with me getting sick and all the bizarre references throughout the album to hospitals and doctors and sort of this bizarre foreshadowing that existed throughout that record, it was hard not to feel like I was writing my death in that album. I think in a lot of senses, whether I think it’s the best record is maybe a different story, but I think it’s the closest I’ve ever felt to a body of work.

BLAST: When you were coming up with the name Something Corporate, did it ever occur to you it would have the same nickname as the liqueur, Southern Comfort?

AM: Yeah, I mean, well, no. One, no, I had not even thought of it for a second, and frankly, never in our whole life. People used to call us SoCo. It kind of bothered us, because we were like, “What the fuck is that about?” You know what I mean? [laughter] So no, that was just something kids started abbreviating the name and started calling us “SoCo.” That was like a nickname penned by the fans and sort of perpetuated by them which is fine, it’s sort of the way these things go. Sometimes people have their perspective on how they want to address you and that was sort of out of our hands at that point.

BLAST: Your “Set-List Creation” video has become Andrew McMahon-lore by this point in time. When you’re performing, is it very close to the preordained set-list or do you improvise?

AM: Well I mean, yeah, the video’s just hysterical. That has just come back at me more times than any other piece of video or anything that’s been shot. I tend to stick to the set once I’ve written it. From tour to tour, sometimes we play a very similar set; sometimes we change it every night. I have a feeling on this next headliner that the first couple songs might be the same every night, because with the lighting and stuff you want to be able to create a certain intensity when you pay that much money for lighting and all that stuff, but I imagine on this tour just because we have two records worth of material and what not that we are in kind of a unique position to change it up and keep it fresh every night as we travel from show to show. Sometimes if we come out and do an encore, I’ll call out what they call “audibles” and we’ll change the set from there. When we did the small club tour in the fall when the record came out, there were a lot of audibles. We would come out for the encores and a lot of times the encore would end up being 45 minutes because we would just be having fun and we would just be playing whatever in a 500, 600 person club and we would just kind of dick around and have fun. But yeah, generally speaking, once I write the set we stick to it. There’s four other dudes on the stage and sometimes trying to holler out new songs and have everybody change guitars and different tunings and things can be a real pain in the ass.

BLAST: What’s your favorite song from The Glass Passenger to perform?

AM: That’s hard, you know. That’s one of those things that changes since it’s such a new record. I love playing “Crashin.” “Spinning” and “Crashin,” those are really fun live. Hmm, let’s see, what is another good one I’m really digging playing…

BLAST: Well, what is your favorite of all your songs to perform?

AM: God, what is at this point my favorite of all my songs to play? You know, we’ve been opening the set with “Crashin” lately and it’s just such a fun song to start the show off with. It’s got such a vibe and stuff. I’m really enjoying doing that one live. I’m trying to think of everything that we do. It’s funny because I was thinking of this the other day and I actually remember having the answers and now I’m like totally blanking on it. “Bruised” is always a fun one because people kind of go apeshit during that song and that’s always kind of fun to see people reacting on that level to anything. Like I said, it changes from night to night. A lot depends on the audience and their reaction. There will be nights where we do “Caves,” and we’ll do the first half of “Caves” and you can hear a pin drop in the house and it’s super intense and that can be the one. And there are nights where you got to do a song like that or a quiet song where you’re really ready to connect to a crowd and you’re ready to do this thing and all of the sudden you can hear the bartenders throwing old beer bottles into the trash and you’re just like, “Oh shit, there’s no vibe on this at all.” I kind of concede to the audience on that stuff and a lot of times that’s what ends up deciding what is my favorite or not that night.

BLAST: At this point in your life, are you completely sick of hearing about “Konstantine”?

AM: It will always hold a special place in my heart. People say I hate that song because I won’t play it or anything but it’s just like, “No it’s just really long and really slow and really not written for a band to be playing.” We love to have a Something Corporate song most nights on a headliner but, you know at the same time, the problem with “Konstantine” is, as I said, that song might as well have its own zip code or something. “Konstantine” might as well have its own band name. It is what it is. It is this entity unto itself and unfortunately, if I ever play it, I’ll have to play it forever, every night. If it weren’t such a big deal for me to play “Konstantine,” then I probably would play it. But the truth is, as soon as I bring that song out one time, I will never be able to walk through a venue, no matter what band I’m playing with or no matter where I’m at, and not have people chant and cheer for it. I appreciate the fact that people love the song and that it means a lot to them, but I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to go play a 10 minute ballad from a Something Corporate record every night while I’m on tour with Jack’s Mannequin. That’s why I don’t do it.

AZTeen Magazine Interview - March 2009

2009-05-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

By James Grant
Source

Andrew McMahon has been around the block. A survivor of Luekemia and lead singer of the two major bands, Jack’s Mannequin and Something Corporate, McMahon knows what it’s like to struggle. In 2004, while taking an extended break from touring with Something Corporate after releasing their second major record, McMahon started Jack’s Mannequin as a side project, putting out their first record, Everything in Transit in 2005. Within the following years, Jack’s Mannequin blossomed due mainly to the support of McMahon’s fan base. In September of this 2008, Jack’s Mannequin released its second album, The Glass Passenger, which has climbed to number eight on Billboard’s top two-hundred. Teen writer James Grant grabbed an opportunity to interview McMahon over the phone, and ask him many question pertaining to not only his life, but also his music.

James Grant: Well to start off, can you just say who you are and what you do for a living?

Andrew McMahon: Yeah, I’m Andrew McMahon and I play piano and sing for Jack’s Mannequin.

JG: So Andrew, what is it that you love about music, and playing it as a part of a band?
AM: What I love most about music is its ability to be a universal communicator. You know, for me there’s a personal element to music, and there’s a public element to music. The personal element is kind of using the song to get to the bottom of whatever it is you’re trying to get to the bottom of. You know, and then you take that into sort of a more public realm and actually get to use that connection to make a further connection is what I’ve always loved about music.

JG: I remember reading in your blogs once that, “if all else fails, dye your hair black”. (AM laughs) It was a while ago, but recently you’ve been growing out your hair in the whole lumber jack kind of fashion. Does that mean anything as far as how your life’s been going?
AM: (laughing) It was a lyric, and the lyric sort of came from that period of time when my hair was dyed black. There was sort of a reference to that in “Sleazy Wednesday”, a B-side we did for the record. But yeah, I have this thing when I tend to be freaking out or trying to figure out what my next step is where I usually start by either cutting or growing out my hair (laughs). There are some times that it can be an indicator to some extent but at this moment that the situation of my hair is more just from lack of time to pay attention to it. But I’m definitely planning on a hair cut when I return home in the next couple of days.

JG: (laughs) Well that’s good to know. So when you write a song, do you have to be in a sad mood to write a sad song or a happy mood to write a happy song. Is there any specific mood you have to be in or does it just come to you?
AM: It’s more of a gut thing, you know, you have this thing sort of arise as I do, like when I’m having something just clicks that makes me feel like I just have to write a song. I don’t know how to explain it, other than that. Sometimes it can be a lyric or a melody, or something or a set feeling, like maybe you’re having a bad day, or you’re having a really good day, you’re just some sort of thought window somewhere? The way I kind of do it is, like I said, if I find a set of words that conjures up some sort of feeling, you know, I find myself sitting at the piano just to try and sort of connect that feeling to a set of words and a set of melodies. It’s really sort of an intuition, I’m not sure where it comes from; it’s almost instinctual or something.

JG: Do you usually write the lyrics first and then the music to fit them, or vice-a-versa?
AM: Generally speaking, all at the same time. A lot of the time I’ll sit down and write some lyrics or source out some lyrics after I’ve written a song, you know what I mean? Like if I’m looking for a little bit more juice or want it to be a stronger lyric, a lot of the times I’ll sit and refine a lyric once it’s written. But generally speaking, it’s kind of a combination of sitting at the piano and working out the melodies and the words and the chord structure kind of almost simultaneously.

JG: What’s the greatest thought that’s ever crossed your mind?
AM: The greatest thought that’s ever crossed my mind? (Laughs) Oh my god I don’t know about this-

JG: (laughs) Ever.
AM: (laughing) Yeah, ever. I don’t know, I think in the context of the time that I was sick, I think things in a lot of ways became a lot more clear to me and I think I had a lot of quote unquote ‘great thoughts’ in that period of time in my life just because I think you start realizing maybe more what life is about when you’re facing your potential end. So I don’t know, I think for me, some of the greatest realizations that I made, or the greatest thoughts I had were that all people and things seem to be connected to one another. And to lead a good life, you have to sort of take care of not only yourself but all the people and things around you, you know, to have a truly great world working for you. But I don’t know if I’ve had that many great thoughts (laughing) So, I’m not sure!

JG: So I take it that’s kind of why you got “the river is everywhere” from Siddhartha tattooed on your wrist?
AM: Yeah, absolutely. You know, for me, I know it kind of breaks down to, sort of in some respects, a load of kind of existential bullshit, you know, that whatever at least could be interpreted and such. But for me, I think there’s a real truth to the ideas of karma and you know, the fact that what you put into the world comes back to you. And that can be a good and a bad thing, depending on what you’re putting out, you know, and in that sense, I keep it on my wrist to remind me that we are all sort of connected.

JG: Interesting- this is kind of a whole different realm, but have you noticed any immediate effects on the band from being played on the radio more often? I mean, I was on my way to school the other day, and your song, “The Resolution”, came on and it was kind of surprising because I’m not really used to hearing Jack’s Mannequin on the radio.
AM: Have I noticed any…what?

JG: Like is anything different, you know, because from Everything in Transit, there weren’t a lot of songs featured on the radio since it was more of an underground record…
AM: Yeah, you know, it kind of differs from market to market. On Everything in Transit, “The Mixed Tape” probably got played half as much, but the stations that played it played the shit out of it, you know what I mean? So in that sense, you know, there were markets that got a lot of love off of “The Mixed Tape”. On this one, obviously, my radio department at the label has done a much better job getting the song out there. But to be honest, I don’t really feel like anything is any different. (laughs) You know, we’re actually out, playing these shows for radio stations right now. Even in the shows themselves, there’s really not that much that’s changed. I mean, obviously in your own headline show, it’s going to be YOUR show so that is different. You know, at the same time it’s not like we’ve had a hit or anything major at this point, so there isn’t what I consider that ‘mass exposure’ that might make things change, possibly, you know what I mean?

JG: Yeah, I got you. What’s the story behind the asterisk, or the star, that’s kind of the logo of Jack’s Mannequin?
AM: Well, you know, it was from when I was doing the first record. I was definitely drawing and sketching a whole lot, and I sort of adopted that asterisk as, in that same sense that the asterisk’s on my tattoo, and I think the tattoo and everything even came before the name, Jack’s Mannequin, and the place where my head was in at that point was very much that, this idea that everything passes through some central location. I love the asterisk in that sense, that it’s like the lines are reaching out everywhere, but they all pass through, you know, one nucleus. And that’s kind of where it all came from.

JG: Cool! This is kind of a two-part question, but what advice would you give to teenagers in general, and then the teenagers who are looking to go into music as a career?
AM: I mean, for teenagers in general, I don’t even know that I’m the best guy to cover that territory (laughs). I mean, for people in general, you do your thing, and you do it to the best of your ability, and try to be yourself, that’s probably the hardest thing that teenagers deal with. For the teenagers in bands, I’m probably a little more well-versed in that: I would just say, you know, diversify your influences, and ALWAYS be practicing and ALWAYS be playing live. You know, don’t get so caught up in this idea of recording, you know, your hit record while you’re in a local band, because there’s always time for that. The most important thing you can do as a young band is learn how to be good at playing together, and constantly getting better live. You know, because I still think that the greatest indicator of whether, especially whether a band is good or not isn’t their records, it’s their performances. You know, nowadays with digital the way that it is and people feeling so anxious to get their music up online, I think a lot of times bands start focusing on like, “how can I get my demo done??!?”, before they even play the show to indicate whether anyone would want to buy their demo. So I think that’s something that a lot of bands have lost sight of and I think that’s the most important thing.

JG: Yeah… So how do you tour with a baby grand piano? I mean, is there a different piano in every different location? How do you lug that thing around?
AM: Generally speaking, if we’re on a proper tour, we travel with it in a trailer or a truck with our band, and you take the legs off and you take the pedals off every day, and you just put the body of the piano into a road case, and the rest of the tour essentially another road case. And you know, every morning the stage hands and my crew roll it over and put the legs and pedals back on, get it tuned up, and that’s how it goes.

JG: Sound like a pretty rough production!
AM: Yeah, it’s not an easy production. And before that I was on an upright back in the Something Corporate days, and we would just lug it around and we’d each grab a corner and we’d lift the thing up ourselves, (laughing) you know what I mean? It is what it is, you make the concessions for your sound accordingly, I guess, and the piano is a big part of what we do.

Buzzine Interview - April 2009

2009-05-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

By Louis Elfman
Source

Twenty-six-year old singer/songwriter Andrew McMahon has already had his share of life experience, well before the age of 30: a successful rock career with Something Corporate which led him to start Jack’s Mannequin. Shortly before the release of their first album, he was diagnosed with acute leukemia. After a full recovery and a very successful second album, The Glass Passenger, McMahon is back on the road on a worldwide tour, having just completed the European leg.

Louis Elfman: How does it feel to be stateside again?

Andrew McMahon: Ah, it’s nice. I won’t lie — it’s been a whirlwind for sure, but we’re doing good. It’s nice to be home for a minute and getting some sleep and resting a little bit.

LE: How did the first leg of the tour go?

AM: It was amazing — getting to see so much of the world in a short period of time was pretty incredible, and the shows definitely exceeded our expectations. We went to Australia for our second time, and the crowds were huge and were really responsive, so it was nice to see our work from the first trip over there paying off. It was our first time in Germany and the UK, but the shows were super fun. I was surprised to see it was probably like 300 kids in the German shows, and then around 600 or 700 at the UK shows, and a lot of fun — all of them.

LE: How is the US tour looking? Are you looking forward to it?

AM: Yeah, absolutely. It’s going to be fun — having two records to pull from now and having had the second record out for a while. I think we’re pretty comfortable with it and in a position now to make a different set night to night to night, because we have a lot more material to go through, so I think that’s going to make it a lot of fun.

LE: Speaking of the latest album and playing it live, obviously there’s a lot of deeply and painfully emotional stuff that you experience that you put into the album. Playing that live, does it feel like you’re sort of rubbing the nerve raw every time, or do you feel that it helps you come to terms with it all?

AM: Yeah, I suppose there is a little bit of that for me, and it’s been this way even before getting sick and all — just the idea…if you write a song and it deals with something heavy or whatever, does it come back when you play it? Truth is, for me, that’s never really how I perform. It’s not like method acting or something, when you’re trying to get yourself in character. I think there are definitely artists who do that sort of thing, which I think is really respectable. For me, I’ve always played shows with the energy for that show. I’m trying to play to that crowd and to that moment, so it doesn’t really come back and haunt me, in that respect. Probably talking about it regularly — it’s still a regular part of conversation in my life; if nothing else, there’s a bit of catharsis there as well.

LE: When it comes to the songwriting process, have you been doing any songwriting on the road, or have you just let that sit so you can focus on the tour?

AM: I tend to let it sit while I’m on tour, and that’s really kind of true in general. It’s hard to find time because I’m not a guitarist and I don’t have a tune that I’ve just got lying around on the bus while we’re driving. The piano element of it makes it a little bit harder on tour. Sometimes, when we’re headlining, I’ll be able to take time during soundchecks to work things out, but I definitely write every time I come home. Whether I write something that I’m in love with that I’m going to record or not is a different story. I’m usually always near a piano and working ideas out throughout the day. It’s those sorts of things that end up on records and those sorts of things that you end up recording that kind of pop up again while moving along through tour and coming home.

LE: Any immediate projects on the horizon that you’re thinking of — not necessarily a new album, but anything fans can look forward to?

AM: Yeah, I’m always working on a bunch of stuff in hopes that some of it pans out. At the moment, I recorded some music that was intended to go along with the Dear Jack movie — this documentary that circles around this whole period of time, the second to last record at least. I went in and recorded some stuff for that and ended up really liking a couple of the songs and thought maybe I’ll withhold a couple for the next record. So there’s a bunch of little ideas like that floating around, and I’m constantly writing. I think there will be some music component with the Dear Jack movie. We’ll probably start working on new music as soon as I get back from this tour.

LE: So later in the year you’ll start working on it — after the summer?

AM: Yeah, I’m always trying to go in the studio and make new music when I’m home. I’m going to cross my fingers that a new record comes more quickly on the heels of this record than the past couple of albums I put out. Changing from Something Corporate to Jack’s Mannequin was such a huge shift, and obviously the health issues and all that stuff… I’m actually anxious to work on an album at a normal pace and try to get in the flow of putting out records a little bit more regularly here.

LE: Speaking of Something Corporate, you guys are on “hiatus,” and although it was pronounced indefinite, do you think, at this point, it’s pretty much over?

AM: I don’t want to say anything 100% for sure, because if I’ve learned anything, that’s when it comes back to you full circle and you’re ready. For me, creatively speaking, I see myself as happy in this narrative that I’m in for making new music and committing on that level. We have so many great fans and we have so many people out there that would love to see a Something Corporate concert, and I know I’d like to play one, so I think in that sense, I wouldn’t say it’s indefinite because I think we’ll probably end up getting together and doing some shows. My hope is that that scenario finds its way to the front of all our minds in the near future, and we can do it.

The Lantern Article - April 22nd, 2008

2009-04-22T11:22:00.000-07:00

By Molly Gray
Source

Jack's Mannequin frontman expresses faith and determination after battle with cancer

Jack's Mannequin frontman expresses faith and determination after battle with cancerJack's Mannequin frontman expresses faith and determination after battle with cancerSitting Indian-style on a leather couch in the back of his tour bus, Jack's Mannequin frontman Andrew McMahon gave no indication that he is a leukemia survivor.

McMahon was diagnosed on June 1, 2005, shortly before the release of the band's first album, "Everything in Transit." Four years later, he is touring with the band promoting their latest album, "The Glass Passenger," which he began writing while he was in the hospital undergoing treatment.

"It's a pain in the ass," McMahon said, referring to the process of creating a record while suffering through cancer, but it was something he felt he had to do.

"With 'Passenger' there really wasn't a lot of options," he said. "I knew what I had to do and it was a lot of hard work, but it was worth it and it was the way it had to be done."

But even so, he didn't want to make it entirely about his sickness and exploit the struggle, he said.

"It was tricky, trying to find the balance of dealing with the aspect of having been sick," McMahon said. "I'm a pretty autobiographical writer so it was a bit of a push and pull trying to figure out how much of that I wanted to disclose."

McMahon admitted that he ended up writing a lot more about his struggle with cancer than he originally intended. It seemed almost out of necessity, that he needed to address his sickness in order to write himself out of a hole. The best songs ended up being the ones he wrote about cancer, he said.

Songs like "Caves and The Resolution" on "The Glass Passenger" are obvious tributes to that period of McMahon's life, and they express a sense of determination that is easily seen in his demeanor on and off stage.

"I tried my hardest to kind of make it about the aftermath and maybe more of the re-acclimation to the world post-being sick as opposed to actually being sick," McMahon said.

When people listen to the album they should feel a sense of "hope in hopeless places" that can be applied to any situation or any struggle that you find yourself in, he said.

"For me the theme wasn't just about being sick, it was, in a lot of ways, just about the record itself," McMahon said. "The idea of just feeling like I had a huge mountain to climb and just climbing it."

Now, four years after he was first diagnosed with leukemia, Jack's Mannequin is headlining a college tour in preparation for its tour with The Fray this summer.

McMahon said that although it seems like it would be difficult to perform the songs written about his struggles, it has never been a problem for him.

"I think certain artists maybe have to re-access the emotion of a song to play it, and there are certainly some songs that I will do that with," he said. "But for me it's so much more about performance and trying to execute that it doesn't really devaluate the meaning of the track to me."

In fact, he said, some songs that they play have come to mean something completely different for him than when he originally wrote them. He called it a rebirth of his sentiment toward the meanings of the songs.

Along with touring, McMahon is also planning several benefit concerts for his charity, the Dear Jack Foundation. The foundation, which McMahon began in July 2006, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to funding cancer research.

"The way that we are set up is like a conduit, we facilitate other's charities through out charity," McMahon said. "The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society has proven to be one of our biggest partners."

The band did what was called "Light the Night" walks with the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and raised more than $100,000, McMahon said.

Other beneficiaries of the Dear Jack Foundation include the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation, the Regents of the University of California and the ULCA stem cell transplant program.

He said he started the charity because it seemed like many people didn't know where or how to donate.

"At the end of the year if someone says, 'I want to donate to a charity,' and they know that the dude in a band they listen to has one, then we would be there for them to do so," McMahon said.

As for what's next with Jack's Mannequin?

McMahon and the guys are working on writing a new record that they hope to record once they are done with touring in the next few months. McMahon has no idea what the theme of the record is going to shape into, but the band has been taking a very "bare-bones" approach in the studio lately with just piano and acoustic instruments, he said.

"Part of me is really tempted to just walk out on a huge limb â€¦ and do something that I've always want to do, which is really flesh out the songs and make sure they are great songs and then sit and orchestrate a record rather than just go in and rock one out," he said.

Jack's Mannequin and McMahon are looking forward to long successful careers as musicians in the pop scene.

"If performing like this is all there was until the end, I'd be psyched," McMahon said.

FemaleFirst Interview - March 12th, 2009

2009-04-06T13:06:00.000-07:00

By Ruth Harrison

Source

After hearing Jacks Mannequin were heading to the UK for a string of live dates, I was determined to get my hands on the hottest piano player ive ever seen - Andrew McMahon - and grill him on life in the spotlight. After all, he’s been through so much to get to where he is today, safe in the hearts of thousands of fans.

How have you enjoyed your UK tour?

It’s good, my wife is here tonight and after we’ve been here we’re going to fly to Paris for a break. But I’m loving being in the UK, I’ve been itching to get out here for years now and with Something Corporate we came out here quite a lot and then on the Jacks record I’d tried really hard to get out here but with the events of me being unwell and trying to really focus on getting the record going in the States we didn’t get chance to come so it means a lot that we’re here now.

What has been your all-time favourite gig to date?

You’ll think I’m bullshitting you but there is one obvious one which was a Something Corporate show which we did at the London Astoria. When we came here I really wanted to go back there but then they told me; “There’s no more London Astoria.” so it’s a little depressing!

You released your last record, The Glass Passenger, last year, how did you find the reception?

It’s been out for about five or six months now and it was seemingly good but I don’t make a point to go trawling fan sites or things of that nature. I try to keep my head uncluttered by that sort of thing but perception-wise it seems to have come across well and it’s selling well and now we’re getting the chance to introduce people to it around the world!

Can you sum up your music in just five words?

Melodic Piano-Driven Rock n’ Roll. Can I have rock n roll as one?

Yeah, I suppose! So is there a certain process you go through when writing?

I hate to call it a process, I think usually you end up finding yourself having a guy feeling as an idea needs to get out and that can come from a certain feeling emotion or feeling or even something you see walking down the street. There’s always something that motivates me to go and sit down at the piano and put my hands on the keys and just start making noise to see what comes out! It’s not rocket science, it’s definitely more instinctual.

And if someone was going to listen to you for the first time, what one song would you advise them to listen to?

That’s a good question! I think there’s a track of our last record called Dark Blue that has become a banner track and persists as a fan favourite and sum’s up a lot of the elements of what we do as a four-piece rock band. It has the earnestness and the sentiment of a lot of what we do.

Why do you think people should spend £10 on one of your CD’s or a ticket to your gig?

I think in anything I do I try to be honest and we all get up there with a lot of energy and I have an amazing band that back me up and we try to put on a good rock concert… my goal isn’t to beat up the competition, haha! [FF: We like that!] It’s not really my style, haha, but if you want to come watch a rock and roll concert then I think we’re a pretty good band to catch.

What three bands would you have to headline your dream festival?

Oh gosh, Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, Id say The Beach Boys, but they’re not really knocking around much these days… oh and the Chilli Peppers or something along those lines.

If you could only listen to one CD for the rest of your life, what would it be?

I’ve been asked this many times and I always change the answer, but I think it could be Wildflowers by Tom Petty. It’s one of his solo records and is one of my favourite records; it’s pretty dynamic.

And if you could join any band for a day, which would it be?

I guess it would be a band that needs me so it wouldn’t be one with a piano player! I’d like to sit in with the Flaming Lips, it sounds like fun. They always put on a fun show.

So now we want to ask you three non-musical questions…What is one thing you always wanted as a child but never got?

I have a good answer for this actually; I always wanted one of those Power Wheels cars. They were little kid cars that actually had motors in them and went about 4 or 5mph, they had Jeeps and Ferraris. I asked for one every year until I was too big to fit inside.

I used to want one of those with the holes that you could run along with your feet!

I thought everyone had one of those? Unlucky! You should talk to your mom about that, or steal one… it brings a new meaning to car jacking!

What was the most terrifying moment of your life?

I was in a car accident when I was 16. I was driving a car with my mother and rolled it one and a half times on the freeway, it was in the rain and we were upside down on the road. I would say that’s the most terrified I’ve ever been, it was my first real brush with death.

If you could take over a foreign country tomorrow, what country would it be and what would be your first law?

In these times? Jeez, I don’t know! It would be easy to say the US at this point but we’re hoping our man’s going to do a good job! If I was to take over the US though I would call for Campaign Finance reform so that no longer would politicians be able to receive money from any other source other than themselves.

I think that’s the biggest problem in politics, the fact that our politicians are basically owned by major corporations, I think it’s a terrible element of our political system.

We ask everyone we interview to come up with a question for the next person we interview and Emma Deigman wants to know; “If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you want to be?”

Oh wow, I would like to be in Bali in the middle of the jungle.

And can you come up with a question for the next person I interview?

Have you ever had an In and Out burger?

Metromix Orlando Interview - October 31st, 2008

2009-01-17T14:00:00.000-08:00

By By Lindsay Hansen
Source

Nothing fake about Jack's Mannequin

There’s a different setup than what’s usually seen at The Social. A grand piano is in the center of the stage, the drum set arranged to the left of it rather than behind. A Starbucks cup is perched next to the microphone as Jack’s Mannequin’s Andrew McMahon sings to an imaginary crowd during sound check. A line is steadily forming outside of eager fans, the lucky handful who bought their tickets in the three days before the “Hammers and Strings” tour sold out. The tour features a majority of songs from Jack’s new album, “The Glass Passenger,” a stronger, more dynamic compilation that covers a bizarre year for McMahon and the band. After a stem cell transplant due to his diagnosis of acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the tour is in full swing and McMahon stable in his recovery.

What have you been doing for the past couple of years? Since “Everything in Transit,” there’s this new album now. How long did it take to put that together?

Once “Everything in Transit” came out , the day it came out was the day that I got my stem cell transplant, so I spent at least about eight to nine pretty dedicated months just recovering from all of that, and then we got right back on tour after that eight or nine months. We started touring, and we pretty much toured all the way up until now and working our record, trying to get some eyes on it since for that handful of months I wasn’t able to promote it myself. I’d say probably about a year and a half ago or so we started focusing on the new material and kind of while we were coming off tour, we’d be stopping in the studio working on songs and kind of building it in conjunction with promoting the last record. It took probably about two years on and off, but more specifically the last year.

This album, when I heard it, it sounds like it is more mature, a more dynamic kind of sound. Is that what you wanted to do or did it just kind of turn out that way?

I think that the goal when I do any record is to evolve and you know, explore new sounds. I never really feel psyched doing the same things twice. If you listen to the Something Corporate stuff from one record to the next it was always kind of a different sound and I didn’t want Jack’s to be any different because when you go in its like “I already did that” so it’s time for something new. So yeah, I think that with the last record, I knew exactly what I wanted, I was going for this kind of hybrid of modern rock and roll with a poppy Beach Boys influence, and I wanted it to be all upbeat pop songs, you know, in that spirit. With this record, I think, it was more that the songs drove the process. It wasn’t like I was trying to write a certain kind of song; certain songs were trying to write themselves. I think it took so long to put together; I was going through various stages both in my recovery from getting well and then in my life in general, we were just coming off the road and going in between different bands that are different styles of music, so I think that it just apparently turned into a broad spectrum, dynamic album because it covered such a broad and dynamic period of time.

It seems that there’s always some kind of muse behind your music. You always talk about a “her,” a girl, there’s always a name thrown in there, like Madeline and Annie. Are those real people?

They represent real people. Some names have been changed to protect the innocent. You find your muses along the way.

Who came up with the idea to let the fans have such an input on how the album was made. Who came up with that idea?

It was more on how it was released rather than how it was made, and a part of it was how long it took to make the record. Our intention was to put the record out over half a year ago and it’s taken this long to actually get it out. It became sort of this thing where there was a lot of early press on it. We had the MTV feature in January of last year. Some people were curious of what was going to come out of me because of the fact that I had gotten sick and because I had always written autobiographically there became this frenzy to know how that would play out musically. Obviously, and especially these days, getting people excited about getting a record is hard enough and because there was a lot of early press we ended up having to finish up and getting ready to release. We were like, “how do we engage people? How do we bring people into this and let them see that there’s a whole world behind the “Glass Passenger”, it’s not just a bunch of songs. The record company and my team collaborated and came up with ideas on how to draw the fans into that world and make them feel a part of it. We tried it with the last album. Jack’s has always been story-oriented and I love the idea that we have the ability and a kind of fan base that gets excited to be a part of the story and being drawn into it. It was definitely an effort, and more than anything a marketing effort.

On your online interview, you said it took a village to make this album. What did you mean by that?

It was a bizarre period of time. I was struggling with my confidence; I was struggling with direction on the record in general. I knew that I had a lot of things inside of me. When I was committing to it a lot of good songs were coming out. There were moments that I think that had I not had this support structure and had my family and my management, and all these people from the time that I started Something Corporate to now ended up being the team around Jack’s Mannequin, including the guys who play with me live, it’s really been a gradual boiling down process. The best people give the most love toward what I do and support what I do in the biggest way; that’s really what I’ve got, you know. The team of people that are there are for the right reasons, they’re there for the long haul, they’ve been wanting to see this thing succeed so I wanted to make that statement that really is referring directly to the fact that throughout what I think was a harder time in recording and finding direction there was this infrastructure in places where I would slip and they’d be like, “Come on buddy, we’ve got you.” It’s hard in this business and I don’t like the record business for that reason because there are so few people you can really trust. For me, the fact that I have people that I can trust and who are really genuinely wanting to see this thing succeed and not cheaply.

Quiet Color Interview - December 2008

2009-01-17T12:53:00.000-08:00

By Eliza Czander
Source

Quiet Color: First of all, I just wanted to tell you that I saw you guys play at the in NY a few weeks ago and it was a great show. I brought my little sister and she was in heaven.

Andrew McMahon: Aw, that’s great. Thank you guys for coming out. That was at the Blender Theater, right?

QC: Yeah, that's right.

AM: Kinda a weird venue, with all those seats in the back and everything.

QC: For kids’ parents I guess. I can’t imagine who else would sit back there during a show.

AM: Yeah, it was a little strange.

QC: Speaking of kids, a lot of your fans are kids. Well, teenagers. They have so much access to new music. Do you feel like that's a positive thing, having everything at their fingertips? Sometimes it makes me sad that my little sisters wont know the meaning of going out and getting a new album, listening start to finish.

AM: You know, I don’t know. I mean I think with the downloading and everything kids are able to get more music and get it faster, and if an artist wants to put together liner notes to distribute with their digital download…I mean, that’s what we did, sent out some pretty heavy duty liner notes with our digital download But yeah they lose the whole opening the CD, and reading through it and everything. I still hope that our fans listen to the album from start to finish. But interesting things are happening in music with all the new technology, and I don’t know maybe I’m hopeful, but I feel like things are moving in the right direction.

QC: Like people performing live with an iPod. Is that okay?

AM: You know, I’ve seen people play with a backing iPod, and sometimes it works.

QC: Yeah, maybe. But creating a song on garage band and then exporting it to itunes doesn’t exactly make you a musician.

AM: Yeah, I think it’s just a personal choice. I mean, you have to really have a lot of heart to put yourself out there, and you know, if it’s your means of expression…I just think to be an artist, you can’t really half ass it if you’re going to be around for a while. You have to work at it.

QC: Fair enough. Let’s talk about the tour. How’s it been going so far?

AM: It’s great, you sort of saw the last leg of it there in NY, but now we’re just doing some radio promotions for a little while longer.

QC: You get a little break around Christmas time, right?

AM: Yeah, get a few weeks, I’ll head back home. And then we kick off our international tour next year in 09. I think we start in Japan and then–

QC: Australia! I’m going to be there at the same time, so I’m definitely going to check you guys out in Sydney.

AM: Oh that’s awesome. Australia is one of my favorite places to visit. I always have a great time out there. You’ll love it.

QC: A song that’s getting a lot of air play right now is resolution. Let me ask you about the video. How did it come about that Stephanie Meyers (Author of Twilight) was going to direct it? Were you a fan of hers?

AM: Yeah, you know I read the first book and thought it was great, and a friend of mine had told me that she had talked about us on her website, and you know, we were having a hard time finding a director or really just a concept for the video, so we were trying to think outside the box. So, we asked her if she’d be into it, and she said yes, and it came out great.

QC: Are you into vampires? Kinda feels like they’re taking over the world right now.

AM: Yeah, they are everywhere. I guess it’s just one of these pop culture phenomenons. She obviously knew what she was doing though.

QC: Lets talk about the new album. Do you feel like its been a natural progression up to this point?

AM: About as natural as it could be, I guess. You know, it took a really long time to get it done, but I’m pretty happy with the way things turned out.

QC: I think it’s your best so far.

AM: You do? Thanks, that’s really cool. There was a lot of personal stuff, a lot of exposing at times I think, maybe too much. There were a couple of tracks, we weren’t sure how they fit, but we wanted to show the transitions and you know, I guess how we were growing and progressing as a band.

QC: Whats the writing process like for you? Do you just lock yourself up for a couple of months? Is it collaborative?

AM: It’s agony! No, it can be hell, but rewarding too obviously. It’s completely collaborative. I usually write my own songs, but there’s a lot of people around, a lot of bouncing ideas off one another, seeing what works, what doesn’t.

QC: The Glass Passenger. Where does the title come from?

AM: It was from this song that I wrote, that I ultimately decided not to put on the album. It was just a little too personal, I guess. But it’s this idea of just being a passenger, realizing that life is fragile.

QC: That a person can break?

AM: Yeah, I’ve never described it like that, but yeah. It was just an idea and was used in that song, and I thought it would fit for the album title.

QC: What can you tell me about Dear Jack? Has it been released? I cant seem to find it online.

AM: It hasn’t. It was supposed to, I know, but with the record coming out, I wanted people to focus on the music. I’m a musician, not a documentary film maker. I didn’t want fans seeing me while I was sick and then hearing the album. That just didn’t sit right with me, so we decided to hold off for a while. It will probably end up coming out in the spring.

QC: How did it come about that Tommy Lee was going to do the narration? Did you two know each other ahead of time?

AM: Tommy played drums on one of our records and we’ve collaborated a couple of times, and you know, when I got sick and we decided to do this film, it just sort of came together, and he’s a great friend. I mean, I grew up listening to Motley Crue and watching them on MTV, so it’s pretty awesome. And he’s got a great voice for the narration, and he’s also just great guy. A great human being.

QC: Awesome. Okay, final question. Who are you listening to these days? Who’s on the iPod?

AM: Kings of Leon.

QC: Sex on Fire is my ringtone!

AM: (Laughs) Yeah, that song is pretty great. The second song “Crawl” I’ve been listening to a lot lately. That song sort of blows my mind. The new Death Cab album is great, been listening to that a bit. Um, MGMT. Also, this Canadian girl Lights has sort of been on my radar.

QC: We just did a post on her!

AM: Yeah, she’s got this young voice, those songs just kinda stick in your head.

QC: Yup! Well look, thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us.

AM: Yeah, thank you. And thanks for coming to the show!

See you in Sydney, Andrew….

Andrew McMahon Interview - October 2008

2008-11-06T12:27:00.000-08:00

By George A. Paul
Source

Andrew McMahon has no problem baring his soul in song, but fans shouldn’t assume they have the leader of Jack’s Mannequin all figured out.

“It’s not so much about revelation,” admits the singer/pianist, in a phone interview. “If you know my music, you know a lot about me - but not [everything]. In recent years, with what I’ve gone through and the way that’s been presented to people, I think there is very idealized version of me, Frankly, it’s only a small portion of who I am.”

McMahon was diagnosed with leukemia in 2005, a few months before Everything in Transit – his first release since leaving Something Corporate – was released. He endured chemotherapy, contracted pneumonia and underwent a bone marrow transplant. After going into remission and making a full recovering, the musician and his band made up for lost time. They toured with a vengeance in ’06. Both “Dark Blue” and “The Mixed Tape” received college and modern rock radio airplay, while the exceptional alt-pop album moved 250,000 copies.

Transit was often referred to as a concept album – something McMahon shied away from. “At first, I started going that direction when I was finishing it up. Then My Chem and Green Day put out concept records. To me, it almost became this mildly cliché idea. I treated it more like a storybook. It was very specific.”

Amid steady roadwork, songs for the stellar follow up The Glass Passenger gradually started to emerge. “There’s definitely a theme that is present throughout…it’s about trying to climb over the hurdles of the day and get on the other side of a heavy situation.”

Once again, McMahon co-produced with Jim Wirt (Alien Ant Farm, Live), who’s been at the studio helm since his Something Corporate days. “In a lot of ways, this was my most ambitious record…we took the idea of orchestral arrangements a little further. I really found myself having a lot of fun with the organ, synth and keyboard aspects.”

Indeed, the intense rocker “Bloodshot” features a brief synth solo a la early Rush and the dense sonic bed of “Annie Use Your Telescope” floats into the stratosphere. Utilizing nearly a dozen musicians at times (the sunny “American Love,” a syncopated “Crashin’”), McMahon learned to value collaboration and filter constructive feedback.

“We refined a new dynamic in the studio. I was working with the most people I ever had [before]. There were a lot of opinions.”

Among the most compelling tracks is “Swim,” a gorgeous, waltz-styled number with programming and an emotionally-charged vocal delivery.

Sample lyric:
You’ve gotta swim/Swim for your life/Swim for the music that saves you when you’re not so sure you’ll survive/You’ve gotta swim/And swim when it hurts/The whole world is watching/You haven’t come this far to fall off the Earth

“The tough thing about writing in that particular period,” recalls McMahon, “was people assumed because I had survived this huge ordeal and was now back at it that all the sudden things were peachy…this record and the whole process was one of the more difficult times in my life. I was forced to relive the past and a lot of situations.”

Music served as therapy, even when the creative muse temporarily shut down. “All the sudden, a song like ‘Swim’ would come out at the darkest moment” and he realized how much it was needed. “I hope people use it as a way to get through a tough day. It really saved my life. Playing it felt so real and so right. It was one of the broadest things I’ve ever written.” Initially, McMahon questioned whether fans would think “I’m pandering or trying to be universal,” then realized “I can’t think about things like that. I’m experiencing something real here.”

Diehard followers can get a firsthand glimpse during the current small club tour. McMahon says Jack’s Mannequin will do the album front to back on several dates.

“It’s going to be a chance for us to really dig in and communicate these songs…the best thing to do is put it in rooms where the people there are the ones who cared enough about the band to get on the phone that first day and get tickets - the hope being that we still have a lot of fans out there,” says McMahon with a laugh. “I want the audience to have a chance to hear these songs intimately.”

EXTRA Q&A
Talking with Andrew is like conversing with your best friend. He is so passionate about music. Here are additional excerpts from our phone interview at his rehearsal space in Burbank...

Q: You did the video for “The Resolution,” the first single from "The Glass Passenger," with director Stephanie Meyer.
A: Stephanie and the co-director were awesome...it was a really cool experience. The theme of the video is this idea of the tide kind of eternally rising. Essentially, I go through various shots, moving on from one location to the next, trying to get further inland, uphill from the tides…finally I take a plunge at the end and that’s where the mermaid comes into play. It’s not exactly “Splash.”

Q: Apparently Stephanie is a fan of your music. Were you into her vampire novels?
A: It’s funny. I had heard about her interest in our music from a friend of mine. Justin from Blue October had a similar story. She used music to help define and write her characters. I’d heard through mutual friends who really love her books that I appeared on some of her web sites. When we tried to find people to write treatments for the video and brainstormed, all the sudden it was like, ‘let’s think out of the box. Are there people we’re not thinking about?’ I’d been hearing stories about this woman who sold a gazillion books and has a huge following and I’ve heard she likes the band. ‘Let’s reach out to her.’ Of course promptly after that, I started digging into “Twilight,” the first of her novels. I’m almost finished with her first book right now. I didn’t want to go into it not knowing what she was about and where she came from.

Q: You toured with Paramore over the summer. Were their fans receptive to your music?
A: Yeah. It was great actually. I can’t think of a show that didn’t go well. I’d be lying if I didn’t say that being on the road at that moment, when we were really anxious to go home, learn the new material and get ready for another tour [wasn't hard]. There were elements of ‘oh my gosh, should we really be here right now? We’ve got so much to do.’ It was just one of those things. The material we were playing we knew so intimately, it ended being a lot of fun. It was one of those tours where we could really cut loose, have fun and change up the set list from night to night. I did enjoy being out there. Hayley and the dudes were a great time. There was a lot of jumping onstage with everyone else’s bands throughout the tour. We became really good friends with the dudes in Phantom Planet and Paper Route. It was good tour camaraderie.

Q: When you’re being autobiographical in your lyrics, do you ever get to a point where you think, ‘maybe I’m revealing too much of myself?’
A: I hope through my albums I’ve said some pretty bold things that aren’t really the stuff of heroes and not necessarily the stuff of idol worship, but the stuff of real living. For me, what I’ve always tried to do is present the real side of life.

Q: On the deluxe version of the new album, there’s a short film included on the DVD. What is it about?
A: It was an on-the-fly thing that me and the photographer for the record who did all these great pictures, James Michen, worked up. We went out in the middle of the California desert in this amazing old Oldsmobile station wagon. I said, ‘it doesn’t have to be a specific story.’ We were doing this for two days while we were out there. I ended up writing this narrative which is ultimately the story of how I ended up on the piano for the first time. The way it’s revealed is in an artful, hopefully Leonard Cohen way. The delivery is intentionally more poetic that just telling a story. And it lines up with this drive through the middle of the desert these guys shot. It’s not meant to be blown up into something huge. We thought it would be a fun part of the record. We had great visuals.

Q: Last year, I really enjoyed your cover of John Lennon’s “God” from the ‘Instant Karma’ tribute CD. What was it like having Mick Fleetwood play drums on it and how did it come about?
A: (pauses) Yeah. I’m speechless even thinking about it right now. It was amazing to be asked to do a Lennon cover that’s actually sanctioned by Yoko Ono and to have it be one of my favorite John Lennon songs across the board, Beatles or non-Beatles. In some respects, I really related to some of the disillusioned elements that he communicates throughout that track. When it came through that I could do it, I just freaked out. Then the suggestion came to collaborate with somebody. We listened to the track to see what made sense. My manager handles Mick Fleetwood. I’m not sure who brought up having Mick play the drums...He was amazing in the sense that he’s a great drummer, but also in that he was a really great human being. He came into a scenario where people were a little on edge, like ‘what’s it going to be like having this legend come in and play the drums?’ He came in and was so engaged in the recording process from start to finish. He came back though twice. When he left that day after his part was done, he walked to his car and 10 minutes later, he’s back in the room with another idea...Meanwhile, he’s telling us stories about being in Fleetwood Mac. We’re like, ‘that’s Stevie Nicks he’s talking about.’ But ultimately, what I took from it was ‘here’s a dude who obviously reached the top of the mountain and never left it and he shows up in the studio with a bunch of young guys to cover a John Lennon track and enjoyed himself. You could tell he loved being there and was so engaged and so into the process. For me, to actually get to make music with a guy that’s made some of my favorite songs ever, it doesn’t get any better. I’ve been really blessed in the past few years to get to meet and see and interact with some legendary performers that have inspired me.

Ventura County Star Article - October 30th, 2008

2008-10-31T03:06:00.000-07:00

By Bill Locey
Source

Clearly no dummy, Andrew McMahon, in a most pleasant way, will make the Gauchos dance funny during a gig tonight with his new piano-driven outfit, Jack's Mannequin, at UC Santa Barbara's The Hub.

Every campus clearly needs a bar, and every fan of hook-filled pop needs this Jack. The band, fronted by 20-something rock-star-to-be Andrew McMahon, has a new album, "The Glass Passenger."

McMahon, who's from beyond the Orange Curtain, hit it big in 2003 with his first band, Something Corporate, not long after he got out of Dana Hills High School. That corporation was a ringing success at the cash register. But after two hit albums with songs about drunk girls and punk-rock princesses, the band took a break in 2004. Evidently not feeling restful, McMahon started Jack's Mannequin four years and two albums ago.

This kid is a master songwriter of singalong songs, many of them dealing with that transitory yet temporarily real teen angst. McMahon's music has so many hooks he could go fishing with The Beatles, and the songs are so sweet, your ears might get cavities.

McMahon responded to a recent e-mail grilling.

Hey, Andrew, I talked to you once before, in '03 when Something Corporate's first album came out. So what's new in Jack world?

Lots, I'd say. We've finally released "Glass Passenger," which has taken up most of my time. It's great to finally be back on the road playing these new songs.

How does "The Glass Passenger" fit in with the first Jack album?

I think stylistically there are probably some big differences, but that's always how I've worked. I never really want to re-create the same sound from record to record, but still, I would say the ethic of the record is the same. I was really using the music in this album to chronicle a particular period of my life as well as help me work through some of the struggles that coincided with those times.

Where do you fit in on the O.C. scene?

Hard to say. I just grew up in a town where lots of us had bands. I feel like that happens in a lot of towns. The only difference is, Orange County happens to be an hour from Los Angeles, where a lot of the labels exist. I feel like there are some similarities between the bands that are found there, mainly that we create melodic, pop-driven music. But stylistically, it's hard for me to say that about my music, or No Doubt's or Sugar Ray's — or even if there's enough of a thread to justify calling us products of the same scene.

Is Elton John to blame for all this?

Not necessarily. I did grow up on Elton, but I was a much bigger Billy Joel fan in my early years. I loved how he shifted styles and every song felt like it was entirely its own production and its own story.

As a child, were you chained to the piano while the other kids were outside playing?

Ha-ha. Hardly chained — I played endlessly. I would come home after school and play and write songs until I was told to go to bed. I didn't even start taking lessons until a year into my regular playing, and I had to ask my parents. I hated the lessons, but I hated being limited when I was writing, so I did them. Luckily, though, I just loved playing.

For such a youngster, how did you learn to write such tight, hook-filled songs?

I grew up on radio. I was the youngest of five kids and two very musical parents. There were all types of music around, especially as my older brothers and sisters got into high school, and I was listening to Tom Petty, Bob Marley, the Grateful Dead and Pearl Jam.

The one commonality the music in my house shared was the powerful use of hooks. It always seemed to me that the best songs were those that had the ability to connect you to a lyric with the use of melody. I try when I listen to classic music to understand what it is about the elements of the song interacting that make it powerful, and why it stands the test of time.

Who inspired you as a songwriter?

Billy Joel, Elton John, Tom Petty, U2, Jimmy Hendrix, the Doors, early Weezer, Ben Folds, Counting Crows, Cake, Bob Marley and Brian Wilson.

What do you know now that you wish you knew when you started all this?

Always know what you're signing. Life can change on a dime. You have to think of the future when you make agreements.

Any advice for the next generation?

Pay attention to the world around you, and don't put your faith in things you don't understand.

Altsounds Interview - September 17th, 2008

2008-09-28T10:26:00.000-07:00

Source

Jack's Mannequin are preparing to release the highly anticipated album The Glass Passenger on September 30. Although it's only their second full-length release, Jack's Mannequin has garnered massive popularity through their EP releases and non-stop touring. Two of the songs from The Glass Passenger were released last month under the title of The Ghost Overground EP as an iTunes exclusive.

The band's history and the personal history of frontman Andrew McMahon is well documented. The transition from Something Corporate to Jack's Mannequin, Andrew's struggle with leukemia, the rapid rise of what was supposed to be a side project, etc etc. It's a very interesting story. We didn't talk about any of it.

You know, from what I've read about you, you seem like a pretty serious dude. I'm not picking that up at all talking to you now..

[laughs] You know, it's probably just because of the music. The material is a little heavier and serious so when I talk to people, the conversation goes in that direction. I'm a pretty fun guy though, I think!

[laughs] You're making me smile and you haven't even answered my questions yet, so that's a good sign! [laughs] The label is only giving me 15 minutes, so let's jump right in.

Oh yeah, label people are assholes.

You're at the label right now, aren't you?

[laughs] YEAH!

[laughs] Ok, well you appear to be someone who totally lives in the moment...

Yes.

All my questions are about the past.

OHHHHHH! Interesting.

Let's go through a timeline of your life, marking it with albums, artists or songs that opened your eyes in some way.

Do you want to start or do you want me to start?

Uh, you should start. I don't know your life.

[laughs] Good point! I don't really have many memories from before age 5, so let's go there first. Michael Jackson's Bad album. I was wearing penny loafers. I was a weird kid. I wore ties and suits all the time. I was a very strange child. Michael Jackson was the first one that made it ok for me to wear blue jeans. I had this great kindergarten teacher that let us pick the music to listen to during nap time. I always insisted on the Bad album.

Fleetwood Mac- 'Little Lies'. That was a big song for me when I was a kid. Between ages 5 to 6, 7, 8, oh, for sure...ok. I got into Nelson. Remember Nelson? 'After the Rain' was a huge track for me when I was a kid. I loved loved loved Bon Jovi. Motley Crue. The Young Guns album [laughs] that was really big for me as a child. Of course there was also We Sing Silly Songs, but I was 6, gimme a break.

Moving forward, I watched a lot of MTV, so I was really into all of those bands. Once I started playing music myself in 4th grade in Pasadena, I was always into the radio. You know how it is for kids. 'That's Just The Way it Is' [Bruce Hornsby] was a huge song for me. When I started playing piano my parents bought me Elton John's Greatest Hits and Billy Joel's Greatest Hits. I lived and breathed those albums through 4th grade.

My brothers and sisters are older than me and saw how passionate I was about music. They got me into hippie records and jam bands. Grateful Dead- American Beauty. Jimi Hendrix- Are You Experienced?. I listed to that a lot. Then I started buying music myself. The first record I ever bought on my own was Pearl Jam- Ten. Then Blind Melon's first album. Bon Jovi- Crossroads.

One of the first bands I saw on TV and connected with was Counting Crows when I was in 6th grade. They became my calling card. I didn't listen to anything else for about a year. Then it was Green Day- Dookie. Dookie was huge for me. That was monumental. Middle school and into high school I was listening to pretty much anything the Counting Crows would put out. What came to be known as the early emo scene- bands like Jimmy Eat World, The Get Up Kids, Saves the Day...I was a big fan of the first Third Eye Blind Record.

When I was a freshman in high school a friend turned me on to Ben Folds Five. It was like a resurgence of piano music for me. The bands I listened to didn't really have piano in it. To hear a modern 3 piece playing piano really influenced me. That same guy who introduced me to them said 'I can't believe you don't listen to Weezer.' I had heard some of the singles on the radio but didn't really pay attention. He played the Pinkerton record for me. I heard that before I heard the Blue album. Of course I dug back and the Blue album became huge for me.

Let's stop there, actually. I don't want to get into adulthood.

Oh yeah, cause I stopped listening to music then.

[laughs] Well this could go on forever if I don't stop you here, and we don't have much time left.

True.

So let's go back and talk about something a little more. The first band you ever discovered entirely on your own. Tell me about that.

Counting Crows, definitely. I was having a sleepover with some friends, and like all kids do when they stay up late on Saturday's, we were watching Saturday Night Live. The band comes on and something about them just grabbed me. I yelled at my friends to shut up and I cranked the volume on the TV. I was really connecting to it. I ended up leaving them and going upstairs to my parents room so I wouldn't miss any of their second performance. I bought the album the next day.

At age 9 or 10, I was a kid trying to write music about my life, however limited it was. And here was this band that was clearly saying something. It was real. Heavy at times, but just REAL. I loved that. It made me re-evaluate how I wrote and how I thought about music. It definitely made one of the biggest impressions on me, musically.

How did you discover you were able to sing?

I just did it. I don't even know that I can sing. [laughs] I do most of what I do out of necessity. I play piano and I sing and I write out of a need to connect. That's how I became a writer. I had a close family member pass away when I was 8, right before my birthday. I had always written poems and things, but when he passed I sat down at the piano and just started writing songs. I did it because it made me feel better. It helped me cope with it. What I found at the piano was a chance to get the thoughts in m hear and the things that were conflicted inside me sorted out a little. Things began to make sense.

You've toured across the country numerous times now. Is there any difference in fans from region to region, or are they all essentially the same?

There are certain markets that I think are more hit than miss. You go to places like Chicago or New York or hometown shows in Orange County and people are really into it. I'll be honest, I don't feel like the regional thing is as huge in my opinion. For my band, I think we carry more weight in some areas so it will be more intense, but you never know. We'll go someplace like Omaha, Nebraska and it's like 'Holy shit, look at these kids! They're going crazy!'

Tell me about your first show.

I was in 4th grade and I played the local town fair, hosted at the high school, rocking out in Pasadena. I was 9...I played the piano at some outdoor sort of thing with my family all sitting around. The guys who were gonna play after me got all excited to see a little kid playing piano and their drummer came up and started playing with me. That was the first show, I guess. I did a battle of the bands when I was like 15. Those were the early days of what would become Something Corporate.

Do you remember signing your first autograph?

Wow. Um, not really. I have no idea. I don't remember that at all. I think it was for my 5th grade class. Nothing major.

So you don't find it at all strange that people ask you to write your name on things?

Hey, I was the first kid in line at shows. I was the one hunting people down for autographs. It's a part of me and it's something I do. I am always flattered when people ask, but it comes with the job, so I don't really think about it. I mean, it's a part of what I do.

What is the ideal time of day or night to play a show?

Outside right before sunset, as the sun is going down. You get that first song off and you get to watch it go from day to night while you're on stage. That's the absolute best.

Do you prefer outdoor shows?

I love amphitheaters. I love club shows, too. I would always prefer doing an outdoor show, though, where nature is a part of it and you feel the real air hitting you while you play. It's something that makes you feel more connected. You feel like you're really sharing something with your audience. I like small club shows because they're ALWAYS fun. Outdoor shows can be hit or miss, but when they hit, they're the best.

And finally, if you could create another type of art, what would it be?

Architecture. Something about owning a house for the first time and all that, I became grossly obsessed with the ideas of design and smart design and even interior design. I love the creativity behind architecture and the good use of space.

Excellent. Well that's all I had for you! I heard you're going to be on Loveline tonight.

Oh yeah, that's going to be fun!

You've done it before right?

Yeah, and I know those guys. Stryker is a friend of mine and Dr. Drew went to school with my oncologist, so we all know each other. It will be good.

[laughs] Well have fun! And good luck with the new album. What I have heard from it is really great.

Thank you! Thanks for all the good questions.

My pleasure. Take care.

Vervegirl Interview - August 23rd, 2008

2008-09-27T10:13:00.000-07:00

By Sharlotte Lawrence
Source

What first caught my eye about Jack’s Mannequin was lead singer Andrew McMahon’s leukemia diagnosis. Having gone through an illness as a kid, I instantly connected with their music. Although McMahon, who just turned 26, went through a personal ordeal, the second record does not dwell on the sadness of the events – but rather an emotional liberation filled with positive messages on life and surviving. Andrew was a pleasure to meet, and talking about his passion for life and music has made me a certified fan! A few hours before their performance at The Kool Haus in Toronto, Andrew caught up with me for a little chat about the new record.

The Beginning of Jack’s Mannequin:
“It started as a solo project while I as on hiatus from my other band Something Corporate. I had been going into the studio with new songs - just not really stressing about it and not even expecting to put it out. It developed into this process and gradually we brought more and more people into it – Bobby [who played with me from Something Corporate] came out and played guitar, Tommy Lee came out and played the drums on it. By the time the record was done, you knew we had to tour and so we put the band together after the fact. It began organically and we put the pieces together as we went.”

The Hard Times
“When I was on the first Jack’s Mannequin, tour before the album came out, I was feeling unwell and I had some blood work done and found out I had leukemia. I spent a better part of that year in and out of the hospital getting better and doing chemotherapy. Eventually my sister was a perfect match for a stem cell transplant. Her stem cells saved my life.”

Inspiration
“I have an amazing wife who took great care of me. She was a huge source of inspiration throughout the whole record. You find inspiration in a lot of strange places. I [get] so much inspiration from living by the beach, being near the water…A lot of myself is rooted in a southern California vibe. It’s the backdrop for my stories.”

On ‘The Glass Passenger’
“If I’ve realized anything in light of the events that happened during the last record – in the larger spectrum it’s that you don’t really know what’s going to happen. Life is a fairly fragile thing, and we’re getting carried along by some force in some respect. The Glass Passenger, for me, was accepting the fact that I’m not in control and things are fragile – and that’s ok.’

EastScene Interview - July 20th, 2008

2008-09-19T03:04:00.001-07:00

By Brennan Schnell
Source

Brennan Schnell: I’ll admit, I’m a little nervous.

Andrew McMahon: No, don’t be nervous.

BS: No man, it’s so hard because like, my whole life, like, I’ve looked up to you so much and anytime that I or anyone I know go through hard times we just compare it to your situation and everything that you’ve been through, everything that you’ve accomplished and it’s just like, wow.

AM: It’s all relative though, it’s all relative. I mean, even now, I still have the same day to day stuff. It’s like, wait a minute. You’ve got to be honking your horn. We all ain’t perfect, I promise you.

BS: I know, but…

AM: I appreciate that, thanks.

BS: So how’s the tour going? Actually, how did it go: today’s the last day.

AM: It was awesome! It’s a lot of work. Anybody that tells you that the Vans Warped Tour isn’t hard is lying. Thing is, you’re running around a lot, it’s hot all day long, like, as a singer, it’s stuff you’re not usually accustomed to. But that’s it, it’s been great. We’ve seen so many friends out here; we get on this tour with a lot of bands that we respect, that we get to hang out with every night.

BS: Anyone in particular?

AM: Anberlin guys, The Academy Is… guys are some of out best friends in the world. We’ve been hanging out since they’ve come out on the road with us. There are tons of bands that we’ve been hanging with; it’s like a constant rotating party.

BS: Now I’ve got a question for you. The last time I’ve seen you play was in Montreal with The Red West a couple years ago?

AM: Oh shit.

BS: That was the last time you were here.

AM: Whistling Long time ago.

BS: Why did it take so long? You guys went through Toronto; I know it’s a little harder; you gotta come out of the way.

AM: Truthfully, any answers that were like, you know, we would have come up. But things not shaking out the way they were supposed to shake out on the last record to be able to properly tour. Trust me, we were only able to tour around the record, then get back in and make a new record it. It was just; we never built it in. And way back, when you saw us with The Red West playing it was in front of a couple, three hundred people, at that even. So I think, truthfully, you looked at us the way we treat a lot of Jack’s Mannequin and the artists really didn’t do well. So we’re going to do Paramore. Starting the next month, we’ll be out with Paramore at the Metropolis, we’re going to play second, and then hopefully we’ll come back and headline.

BS: In August?

AM: Yeah.

BS: So on to the new record…I’ve seen the albums song list and everything for the new record. There’s some videos on Youtube, and clips of people recording stuff. It sounds pretty good from what I make of it, but…

AM: Yeah, I know, it’s Youtube. You can’t judge pretty much off of. First of all, the performance of the band is the first time performing them on stage, of course. They’re not like the best performances, I’m sure. And on top of that, it’s like you’re listening to the reverb.

BS: And in the back there’s someone yelling.

AM: Yeah, so it is what it is. I mean, I appreciate the fact that people care enough to actually populate that material. But yeah, I’m excited. I think it’s a great record. I think it’s an adventure, if nothing else. We definitely pulled a lot of different types of sounds and it’s, you know, a wide variety of styles and rhythms and approach from the first record.

BS: So the main difference between the first album and this album would be?

AM: Well, The first album, Everything In Transit, was really intentionally like a type, pop-punk record. I mean, that’s where we were going. Keep it fun. It was kind of a shitty year when I was recording. I was trying to see the bright side. Listening to The Beach Boys and I wanted to be this thing…you know, this record, to be devoid of that element. It was like, lets explore some other vehicles for songs, you know what I mean? There are more slow songs on this record that our record before. We definitely take our time on this record and it’s longer by 20 minutes. It’s almost 60 minutes long, you know, so. It’s intended to be like, that record you hear and you pick out your favorite 6 songs, for like 2 months, and then slowly but surely, the other ones start creeping up and maybe, by the end of the year, the second half of the record that’s what gets, know what I mean? I feel like it’s that kind of a record.

BS: So were there a lot of tracks maybe that didn’t make the cut?

AM: Yeah, but I’m going to put them all out. There’s like, 14 tracks on the record, and we’ll find various different vehicles to get the various b-sides out. There’s like 6 or 7 b-sides as well.

BS: Any vinyls or anything coming out?

AM: Probably. We’re doing a double vinyl that will be released that you’ll be able to order online. That’ll come out in a couple of weeks, I think. Uh, we’re doing digital directly of the Jack’s Mannequin website. You can download that and a get a copy of a big liner booklet with heavy cards and liner notes. We’re doing tons of stuff like that. And we’re going to put out a 7”, which is a song experiment I did with Doris Day, which is 2 songs with the same hook but two totally different songs. So there’s a lot of shit we’re doing like that.

BS: As a band, or as an individual musician, name influences that you have.

AM: For me, like, Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers were huge for me on this record. The Beatles. I mean like, current stuff, Tegan & Sara, their last record, The Pawn, I was really into. Even things like old REM, U2. I’m sorta like listening to classic rock.

BS: What would be on your ipod/mp3 player right now?

AM: I just got that new Steel Train record, I’ve been rocking out. Teagan&Sara are pretty good. We’re about to go on tour with Paramore so I’ve been checking them out. But then you’ll find some old Bob Marley and Jimmy Eat World.

BS: From everything that you’ve been through in the past 5 years, what’s the one thing you’ve taken from that as a learning experience?

AM: If I’ve learned anything over the past 5 years, it’s that you do not know where you’re going to be tomorrow. You have to make decisions based on that; it’s almost pointless. So, you know, whether I learned, I think I’m pretty aware, pretty conscious of that point to live in the moment. It’s a hard lesson, but it’s like, I’m trying to learn to quiet my mind down, know what I mean?

BS: That’s true!

AM: You just start overanalysing things; sometimes you just don’t let things be.

BS: On that note: downtime! When you have 5 minutes…if you even have 5 minutes, what do you like to do?

AM: Be at the water, any water. I like to be anywhere near the water, you know, it’s just where I find peace, next to the ocean.

BS: long time ago, a while back, I’d seen a video of you when you were young, long hair, rocking out on a piano. Ever since then, did you know that this was what you wanted to do, where you wanted to go?

AM: Yeah man, I’ve known since I was nine. It’s the only thing I tried to do, really, since I was not even 10 years old, when I played my first song at the piano. And that was it, done. I had figured it out. I wasn’t doing anything else. Not to say that it hasn’t been hard, honestly, but I think I’ve always known.

BS: Was there anybody, family or friends, who might have, when you were young that put a piano in front of you and went ‘here, learn’?

AM: My parents had a piano in the house. There was a point where they tried to get us to take piano lessons but it didn’t really take, you know. And then my uncle, my mom’s brother, passed away, and it was a weird. Just a couple of weeks after that happened, I learned the chords to a Jerry Lee Lewis song that my dad taught me how to play. I sat down at the piano and started playing it and that’s how it began. I started writing my first song. But my parents were always really supportive. I said I wanted to do demos, and I was 11 years old, and they would pay to let me record a demo, pay for the studio. But, you know, like, I think they knew what it meant. I don’t know, some parents are like, that’s not the way. But I think they just knew how inspired I was, how happy I was doing it that they just always were there.

BS: Well you didn’t need those lessons, that’s for sure!

AM: Oh, I definitely went on to take lessons, for sure. I actually asked them for lessons; my parents said they’d pay for lessons for 3 years. I learned classical, they hired people that did blues, jazz and things like that over the years. They’ve been huge champions of mine, my folks.

BS: That’s all I’ve got for you.

AM: Thanks, I appreciate it Brennan.

BS: Thanks man.

FRAZER Interview - August 23rd, 2008

2008-09-15T10:55:00.002-07:00

Conducted at the Kool Haus Toronto
By Mike Bax
Source

It was a scorcher of a Saturday. McMahon was in town as the main support to Paramore’s Final Riot tour. I pulled up to the Kool Haus at 1:30 in the afternoon, and saw a significant line-up of fans already sitting on the sidewalk awaiting entry. If there’s one thing Paramore have in spades, it’s a dedicated fan base. A quick call into the Warner reps cell - he was stuck on the Gardiner Expressway, and was likely going to be late. I hooked up with Casper, the band’s tour manger, and was escorted backstage to the Kool Haus green room (all decked out with catering deluxe - I was told to help myself, and grabbed a bottle of water). Andrew came forth and sat down beside me. Introductions were made.

I was kind of dreading this interview. I was told I could come down and interview them less than 48 hours prior. I’d played some of the bands music on MySpace, and trumped up a bunch of questions. But I wasn’t really a true-blue Jack’s Mannequin fan, and I always feel like I’m utterly transparent when I’m talking to bands I don’t know much about. Like a big neon sign is flashing behind my head announcing “He knows NOTHING about you – or your band” in flashing pink and blue.

Add to this fact that Andrew almost died from leukemia three years ago (three years ago almost to the month that my dad was re-admitted into hospital to eventually die of the very same leukemia that Andrew bounced back from)… I was unsure about how to dance around that particular topic, and still deliver a decent interview. Luckily for me, Andrew is a very affable fellow. Easy to talk to. Forthright even. He launched right into his stem cell treatments, and just rolled from there. I didn’t even look at my carefully conceived questions - we just blabbed for well past my allotted 10 minutes for the interview.

So, here he is. Andrew from Jack’s Mannequin. It should be noted that Jack’s Mannequin drop a new CD at the end of September called The Glass Passenger. They come back to town on November 13th to play the Opera House.

Mike:
What’s a typical morning for you?

Andrew:
Truthfully between 11:00 and noon. You know what I mean it’s, not, we have these, in the bunks like you pull a curtain and it’s like it’s a cave, it becomes pitch dark. So the combination of late nights—we’ll finish up a show and go out and stuff, and hang out with the fans or hang out together, or just go out with the other bands on tour. Usually by about 3:00 or 4:00 it’s like bed, get your 7 hours, by noon your up.

Mike:
Do you have any plans for tonight? Are you guys just going to hang out somewhere?

Andrew:
You know I’m not really sure. I’m sure we’ll go out. Today is sort of a celebration for me because of the three-year anniversary of my stem cell transplant. So we call it my third birthday. So yeah we’ll probably go and get a few drinks somewhere around town. Last time we were here we played a full house and we went to Stone’s place. He’s the guy who runs the place. He opened it up for this tour so it was just the tour crowd. But I don’t know if that’s on the agenda.

Mike:
There’s a horror movie / comic book convention on right now.

Andrew:
No way.

Mike:
Where there’s a bunch of freakish bands playing. Vendors, I think there’s some celebrities and stuff, horror movies guys, directors, comic book types.

Andrew:
Yeah, yeah. Like Rob Zombie?

Mike:
He was here last year I think. Or the year before. I don’t know who they’ve got this year. I think Wes Craven? My pal’s working it.

Andrew:
That’s awesome dude. That’s cool. Maybe it’s something to check out. Just nasty, horror flicks, I love it. That’s great, classic man.

Mike:
So I’m going to be up front, I don’t know a whole lot about your band. I was asked by a pal of mine who wanted me to check you out. And I liked what I heard online. I’m a big Keane fan and I like piano-driven music. There’s so much music out there.

Andrew:
Yeah, no I hear you dude. It’s hard to keep up on everything. I hear you, I’m the same way.

Mike:
I know you’ve got a new disk that’s ready and being prepped for release over the past few months. You must be pretty excited that’s coming out.

Andrew:
We’ve been working on it for a long time. It’s been, you know because of what today represents that three-year stem cell transplant, you know what I mean? It was like getting rebooted and getting back up and running and then doing a new record. It’s been a labour of love, we’ve definitely been working hard on it. So to have it finally come out is huge. So end of September it’ll stream and yeah we’re out here just getting the wheels turning and getting people fired up with the record and getting ready to go.

Mike:
I wasn’t even really going to touch on the fact that…

Andrew:
Yeah it’s all good. I’m pretty open about it, yeah it’s all good.

Mike:
My dad died of leukemia and I’m very familiar with what you went through. He was too old for a stem cell transplant and the ward that he was in, I just saw so many stories of people trying to overcome…

Andrew:
It’s a brutal disease…

Mike:
And just struggling through it – it’s utterly surreal.

Andrew:
I’m sorry to hear that.

Mike:
He got out of the hospital for a year and a half, so he went in, did his treatment, got out, we had an extra year and a half with him. He was 69, not a young guy. Bonus time, really.

Andrew:
Yeah, and the older you are the harder it is because they can’t give you the same dosages of therapy and all those things. And I was really blessed and really lucky to be able to get the transplant and have my sister be a perfect match. It’s pretty much as good a story as you could get out of a case of leukemia I got. I got really lucky. So you learn a lot sitting there, as I’m sure you did being there.

Mike:
It was a real experience for me to be at his side so much and to be with my family.

Andrew:
And it unites families that’s for sure, it pulls families together, there’s no question about it.

Mike:
It does. I don’t know if he would have gotten out that first time if we weren’t all there just kind of championing him through. Y’know, I think that anybody that would interview you and your band will have some kind of a story about either being touched by (or have a family member who has) cancer.

Andrew:
And that’s what we found, I mean that’s why I’ve spent so much time working on philanthropic efforts towards cancer research and things like that. It’s just because it’s like, just what you said. It’s like as soon as people realize, it’s like oh my God well I have this or I have that. Everybody’s been touched to some degree by it.

Mike:
I went on the Dear Jack Foundation website, that must have come out of your experience.

Andrew:
Absolutely.

Mike:
How did that get started and what’s involved with it?

Andrew:
Well basically, you know as soon as I just started seeing the outpouring from our fans when I got sick—to send flowers and gifts and all those things. It was like wow, as soon as I got well it occurred to me all these people are motivated, you know what I mean and they want to make a difference. So I essentially created a conduit charity where anybody can donate directly to us, we have our license as a non profit, etc. And then we dole out those funds to various different charities like the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, the American Cancer Society, Cancer Research Foundation of America. So we don’t actually administer grants or anything like that, we’re just not set up to do it and frankly (pauses) I’m in a band, I’ve got a lot to do. But we kind of work with a handful of charities that do really great work. We’re doing the Leukemia Lymphoma Societies. It’s Leukemia Awareness Month in September and already our kids have raised more than $15,000 for that. Our charity is going to donate $30,000 or $40,000. So I mean you know we’ve been doing our best ever since I got back on my feet. We just try and spend time every year just dedicating ourselves to make a little bit of money and make a bit of difference.

Mike:
Very cool. Now some music questions. As a piano-driven band, what do you think you would say are the challenges that you might experience compared to other bands that maybe are just more focused on doing straight up rock and roll without the pianos involved?

Andrew:
You know I find, there’s obviously logistical aspects of it. I mean like going out on any tour with a baby grand piano is a huge pain in the ass, you know what I mean? So there are logistical aspects. But I mean truthfully I’ve found… it’s like I always grew up playing piano, it’s just what I did, so when I started the band it made sense that I would play the piano, and that was just the way I did it. My first band, Something Corporate, when we were kids we had a motorcycle trailer we strapped an upright piano to the back of it and we’d drive with the Honda or van and bring it to shows with us. You know it’s like, the ultimate downside with that, and especially early days before when there weren’t really a lot of bands doing that, it was us and Ben Folds were pretty much the only two bands on the road that actually played acoustic piano, which was like, you’d show up and you’d definitely get the sceptics. Whatever… and some people would just wouldn’t want to be open to it. But I think I found it set us apart enough that we’d show up on stages where people wouldn’t be inclined to give the opener the time of day and because we were playing a piano, if we pulled off a show and did a good show it would stand out enough that I think it would probably turn more heads. Any downside probably met with a much greater up side, just because having something unique like that has been a good hook for us to get people to pay attention. It wasn’t really why we did it but it’s sort of ended up working out that way.

Mike:
Do you find most of your songs start with you on the keys, tapping something out or do you find some of your songs are more lyric-driven or guitar-driven?

Andrew:
It goes both ways. I mean I only play the piano and I write all the music so I write at the piano so there’s really no song that I’ve ever been a part of that hasn’t really originated in some respect at the piano. The beginning of my process can start just sitting down at the piano looking for melodies and hunting for progressions and things like that or with a great lyric idea or melody that comes to me, and sometimes if you’re not by the piano you’ll develop those ideas as far as you can before you actually get to it. So I mean it’s a lot like writing music, just cause it’s sort of a crap shoot as to how and where you’ll find your inspiration and then how it actually winds up playing out, you know? Having the band and having the resources to record, a lot of times I’ll barely flush an idea out on the piano or I’ll just work it out really simply knowing that it’s not meant to be a piano song as much, you know what I mean? There are the songs where you know that this is going to feature the piano, and then there are songs, it’s like you’re hearing other instrumentation, you’re hearing sort of other ideas and it’s not really about the piano as much and sometimes you’ll go and say I really want to focus on the guitar and stuff, or I really want to focus on the rhythm and you just do production that way.

Mike:
Piano sounds pretty epic though. Like in most songs where I think I like that piano solo. It’s a big sound or it’s like a movie sound.

Andrew:
Yeah it definitely lends itself to, like you said, sort of a cinematic sort of quality. I mean with us, with this band, and on the new record it’s like, my last record because it was sort of more of a solo effort, it was when I kind of broke away from Something Corporate and I just decided to work on my own for a little bit, it was a lot more piano-centric, just because really I was the only one in the studio doing it. Yeah my producer would play guitar and bass, but everything else was really minimalist sort of surrounding the piano. With this I had my band in the studio with me, so we definitely had a little bit more fun just, definitely used the piano but we were focusing I think on a broader spectrum of arrangement and trying to really make it more of a band sound. So there’s songs on this record that are really focused around the piano in some ways more so than other stuff I’ve done. And then there are other songs that it’s like it really takes a back seat to other instrumentation. You know I never want to be like oh I’m just the dude with piano. Now it’s like we’re trying to make cool songs and make arrangements that aren’t just focused around the piano for the sake of the fact that there’s one in the band. It’s like if nothing else I look at it now as like one of a handful of tools that we can use at any given moment for whatever is going to be the best arrangement for the song.

Mike:
During that period, did you actually leave Something Corporate? Is that still a project that you might go back to?

Andrew:
Yeah I think the way I would approach going back to it would probably be a little bit more conservative than say what I’m doing now which is like we’re on the road for a few years, you know we’ve been on the road for the past two years, supporting our last record and getting ready to do the exact same thing for another one. You know Something Corporate were my best friends in high school and my first band, well… my second band really, but a derivation of my first band, you know? And in turn I think we grew up together, we are still like very close friends and I think we all still feel like it would be good to go in and do something, and these great fans and people that we would never want to just forsake completely because we ended up doing other things. But you know, I think at the same time it’s an idea that maybe has outgrown my ambition, if that makes sense. You know what I mean? What I am ambitious towards with Something Corporate is educating people who maybe don’t know about Something Corporate and more than anything I would like to put a project together with those guys to do something that’s really reflective of the ten years we were a band. Go out and support that, do a tour around that. The idea of kind of propping up the history of the band as opposed to really making it so much about the future.

Mike:
Do you still play any tunes from Something Corporate?

Andrew:
Yeah. I mean I don’t do them in the short sets. When we’re doing like 30-45 minute sets, yeah especially with a new record and wanting to play at least one new song from the record before it comes out. But in a headlining sense I’ll do a couple songs usually from the Something Corporate catalogue.

Mike:
How did you wind up, during that time when you split from that project and started writing your own stuff, how did you wind up helping out other bands? It sounded to me like you were with 2 or 3 different bands helping them out before you put out your first Jack’s album and I’m curious a) how that happened and b) would you continue to do that?

Andrew:
Yeah I mean when I split with Something Corporate I was really just looking for anything to, I was in this kind of very prolific creative mind space, it was finally, I’m not saying I was free of the band I was just free of any limitation that having a band creates. When you’re in a band it’s like it’s a democracy and it’s a trade of ideas and that’s what makes a band great. But for me it was like I’d gotten to the point where I wanted to hear a song from start to finish the way I heard it in my head when I started writing it. And Tommy (Lee) and I – we share a manager and he had gotten a copy of Something Corporate’s second record North. And that album had a song called “Me and the Moon,” which is truthfully one of my favourite songs, when I hear songs from my career period, but definitely my favourite with Something Corporate. And Tommy loved this song and I had heard for months, you know like after that album came out, it was like Tommy loved “Me and the Moon,” and I was like “yeah that’s awesome”. And then one day when I was in the studio working on new material, just starting to develop, the early stages of Everything in Transit we were just programming drums and building beats and things like that, it was really just more of a creative whatever, we’ll see what happens with it – I got a call from Tommy and he was like “Dude it’s Tommy Lee.” And it was like “Hey Tommy!” you know what I mean, like are you serious? He’s like “yeah Carl gave me your number, I’m doing this record” and he was working on his record called TommyLand: The Ride it was like his sort of solo thing and he was collaborating with a bunch of different writers and singers and things like that. And he’s like “Dude I have this song and like it means a lot to me. I haven’t been able to finish it, it reminds me a lot of you know ‘Me and the Moon,’ it’s sort of where I got some inspiration. Do you think you’d come and help me work on this track?” I was like “okay I’m getting in my car now man!”You know what I mean? I was like alright guys cancel the session. So I went over there and then he and I just totally clicked. He had the song, and I actually to this day I really love the song. He had this verse and a portion of this chorus written for this song called “Hello, Again.” And I thought it was a great song. It wasn’t something (not knowing Tommy and just knowing just the reputation of Tommy that I’d grown up watching on MTV and hearing about through media sensationalization) expected – our first interaction he’s telling me this really heartfelt story about a dear friend of his who had lost two of his loved ones in a car accident, and that’s who he had written this song about. And like that was my first interaction with Tommy was this very soulful, very heartfelt thing, he said “I just want to make this song so good, it means so much to me.” And I was just like “Dude, I’m fucking I’m in, whatever.” So we started working together and I finished the song, I went home with the song and I rewrote parts of it and came back and we collaborated on it and I sang on it with him and then ended up writing a couple more things for that record, I contributed a song I wrote for the record and then I helped rewrite some of the lyrics on a couple of other things. I really became invested in that project with them and we became good friends during that period of time and then the Jacks thing was sort of at the same time taking shape and it started, okay man maybe we’re going to put this out and then we got a deal for Jacks. And I was like “yo Tommy, I’ve been programming all the drums on this record, it would be awesome to have a live drummer on it. You know I can’t help but think I’ve been in your studio for the past 3 months so can you maybe help me out?” He just jammed out the whole record, he played everything, like in one night. We brought him the whole album, he just came and jammed out. It’s fun - and my most rock and roll sort of connection through the years with Tommy but he’s an awesome dude.

Mike:
Was that hard for your drummer to then step in and say I’ve got to follow in Tommy Lee’s shoes? That’s a BIG pair of boots to put on.

Andrew:
Yes and no. It’s funny actually, when I got sick Jay Mac [McMillan] went and backed up Tommy and played drums for Tommy in his project that he was singing in. You know, my drummer is like whatever, I stand behind my band, they’re the best musicians, some of the best rock and roll musicians I’ve ever come across. So I’m sure in some ways he was like wow Jay Mac is such an impressive drummer I think it was just more like it’s cool. And he’s done that, you know we did a track with Mick Fleetwood last year and Jay Mac is like, I think he knows how good he is and he’s also I think so inclined to sit back and watch these guys work and take from them what he can, just like any of us. It’s like this is the most ego-less kind of band I can imagine working with.

Mike:
The bands that stay together are the most fun.

Andrew:
Yeah they love music and they love all musicians who are bringing something good to the table and rarely would I ever see any – I think two of his tracks are the best on the record and Jay played on two of the tracks on the record. I brought him in like pretty much after the record was done but the label was like oh we need another track, we need another track, and so like “Dark Blue” and the song “La La Lie,” which were two of the biggest fan favourites are Jay Mac playing drums on those. So… he holds his own (smiles).

Mike:
I really like coming in and seeing bands set up. All of the fucking gear is laid out everywhere and I see bikes, sleeping bags, and sometimes I see workout material. You certainly look like you’re in pretty good shape.

Andrew:
I’m doing my best. I’m going to the gym after this.

Mike:
Is that something you factor in every day, like diet and gym and just trying to keep on top of staying healthy?

Andrew:
It’s a balance, you know what I mean? It’s still a rock and roll tour, there’s an element of unhealthy living but I think truthfully like, especially considering what, you know that I got sick while I was in the middle of a tour, you know I try my best. We don’t finish a night and get plastered every other night, you know what I mean? But we’re not saints either. Actually I became a vegetarian during this tour, which is a hard battle to fight. But I try and go to the gym three times a week and work out every morning, push ups and sit ups and do my best to eat out. You’ll have a day where it’s pizza all day and then you’ll have a day like okay I’ve got to tailor it back. You just gotta, you learn to walk a line out here.

Mike:
I don’t, in general, interview a lot of out of shape band members. When I think back on everybody that I’ve talked to, I mean they’re all pretty lean, and they don’t look like they’re eating bad food all the time.

Andrew:
Well it keeps, yeah it depends, from tour to tour it depends. It’s like we’re lucky enough in this tour because it’s a bigger tour, it has a caterer and all that so you a little bit more regularly are able to choose what you eat rather than just having to eat like a deli tray every day. Yeah it’s a part of it so you’ve got to stay in shape to get up there and actually give a good show is hard. And like in this past year alone it’s like I’ve had to really focus cause it took awhile – I got radiated and my lungs shrunk, it’s taken me years to get back to a place where I can actually maintain the level of energy on stage that I did before I was sick. So and that takes work, you have to be willing to wake up in the morning like I said and do your push ups and do your sit ups and go to the gym – we call the gyms when we get into town and say can we come through, and try to work it out for the day. But you’ve got to think of yourself for sure and think of your health. It’s a big deal.

I take a moment to look around here. I was supposed to get 10 minutes with Andrew. The Warner rep was tied up in bad traffic… and the next interview was late.

Mike:
I know you’re on a schedule today…

Andrew:
No it’s all good dude.

Mike:
I’d like to know what you think is the coolest tune for you on your new disk that’s coming out.

Andrew:
There’s a couple. I mean there’s a song called “Annie use Your Telescope,” which I think is like inherently maybe the coolest song, you know what I mean? There’s songs that I think are maybe bigger accomplishments and might even be more musically evolved but that song is like, just from it’s writing to it’s recording, everything about it was very natural. You have these songs that you struggle with and you spend months figuring out how to work it out and make it happen. That was a song that was just like from the second I wrote the first words till it was done, to the second we were in the studio - there was no resistance anywhere. We just charged right down the path and when it was done we were all just like “yeah it sounds so good.” So I have to say that one is pretty cool, it’s a pretty simple song. You don’t have to fight for it sometimes if you appreciate it that much more. There are songs like a song called “Bloodshot” and songs that were real work songs that for me I’ll always carry the element of work when I listen to them. No matter how anybody else listens to it it’s like the point is you put the record together and it should sound effortless and it should sound like you just cranked them all out. The truth is it’s not how it works. And so some songs that maybe are your best songs, and could even be better than anything else you’ve done because you’ve spent all that time, I won’t lie - some of the songs for me are tainted but it takes a little while before you shake off how much went into the actual creation of it, you know. A kind of song like “Annie,” it was like it’s really an evolved piece of music, it’s probably one of the lushest, coolest sounding arrangements, the chorus has this really cool, all fourths, so really like a bizarre eastern or Asian-sounding theme. You know but it came so naturally that I can’t help but love it. You know what I mean.

Mike:
Do you like to meet your audience before you play?

Andrew:
Oh yeah we were parked right outside a bus stop and like waving, or right outside the lot and waving as we go. Every night at the end of the night, I have family in town or my wife comes out or something like that, pretty much every night I’ll sign for anybody who’s waiting at the end of the night. Truthfully I’ve learned to appreciate fans that much more.

Newsweek Interview - August 15th, 2008

2008-08-17T05:08:00.000-07:00

By Susan Elgin
Source

In 2005, everything seemed to be coming together for Andrew McMahon. His band, Something Corporate, had done well with their sophomore album, and he was ready to release his first solo effort, "Everything in Transit," under the moniker Jack's Mannequin in August.

During a tour in June, McMahon was exhausted and suffering from persistent laryngitis. He checked himself into the hospital and was soon diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia at age 22. "Everything in Transit" was still released as planned on Aug. 23, the same day the singer received a bone-marrow transplant from his sister. The album sold 250,000 units, despite the fact that McMahon was in the hospital, unable to tour to support it.

Now, three years later, the singer is in remission and ready to release the next Jack's Mannequin record, "The Glass Passenger" on Sept. 30. He spoke to NEWSWEEK's Susan Elgin. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: "Resolution" was just announced as the first single off "The Glass Passenger." Why did you choose that song?
Andrew McMahon: To be honest, I took myself out of the equation for single selection. I've been working on this record in various states for a year and a half now, so I'm at a place now where everything seems like vertigo. But seems like a sensible introduction.

"Caves," the last song on the album, directly acknowledges your battle with cancer. Did you intend to pack everything into that one song?
Absolutely. It's the last song on the album, and in some respects, it probably should have been the first. Pretty much everything covered on the album is the aftermath of what is being spoken about in "Caves." The piano hook, the monochromatic rise you hear throughout, haunted me. I woke up with that in my head at 2 in the morning. It was a huge breakthrough on the record because I tried to avoid writing that song for a while. I am glad I did, because I think it came in the most natural way possible. The second half of the song, I guess, represents the aftermath of what came following being in the hospital.

Why did you avoid writing a song about having cancer?
I'd lived it, and I wasn't sure I wanted to live it again, you know? I've always tried to write in the present moment about what's going on at the moment. With this record, there were obviously some unavoidable things and some things that were definitely hanging over my head. I wasn't aiming to capture that as much as I was aiming to capture what the fallout of all of that was, and where it put me in the present day. Being a dude who tends to write from a fairly therapeutic standpoint, there were certain elements in what I had gone through that I had never been totally honest about or spoken about. Music is where I tend to do that. I think, as we go toward the second half of the record, songs like "The Resolution" or "Caves" started popping up out of a necessity to reconcile a past that I hadn't gotten a chance to reconcile.

What do you mean by fallout?
It's one of the things you don't hear about when you're going in for your first treatments. When you survive the big battle, there's a whole life after that that can be a little confusing. Having walked right up that door and knocking on it, whether or not you're staying here or going, is pretty heavy. There's a shell shock that comes along with getting re-acclimated to everyday life, and integrating back into the real world was not necessarily as easy as I had expected or planned for it to be.

"Swim" definitely has some political references in it.
At this period of time, it's impossible to not have that permeate in some respects. But I try to be sensitive about that, and I don't want to create a scenario that draws a dividing line across my fan base either. There are things that are bigger than partisan politics, and there are problems in this world that have nothing to do with what side you align yourself with. This record wasn't meant to take those head on, but there were times when I felt that so strongly that I had to write about it. Cancer and politics are heavy topics, and yet the record still seems overwhelmingly optimistic.
I try, as both a writer and a human being, to use songs to help me get past things. What I'm trying to find at the piano is the feeling of hope. If this record wasn't hopeful, I might be in a little bit of trouble, personally. I was trying to use this record to bridge that gap and get push past these feelings of being overwhelmed. And I'm glad you're picking up on those lines of hope and if it brings that into my listeners' world, I couldn't be more pleased.

You say you're using this record to "push past" and yet you have journalists like me asking you about being sick.
Believe me, I anticipated it. It's OK.

How do balance trying to promote and focus on your music, while trying to move past the huge back story behind it?
This record is where my real life and my music merge with each other, so sometimes it is hard to draw that line. I try everyday to find the balance, but when part of your gig is airing out your dirty laundry, separating yourself can be hard.

Are you worried that people who know about your struggles with cancer will bring expectations to the record?
Yes, there's always going to be that worry. But at the end of the day, I can't change who I am and I can't change my experiences. I've tried to communicate any sort of struggle I faced in a way that can be related to on a larger level. There were moments I just wanted to put it all out there, and other moments where I felt I needed to find a way to communicate a feeling without detailing the story exactly.

You recorded your experiences with cancer into the documentary "Dear Jack." When will that be out?
I'd started a video diary in late 2004, when I started doing the first Jack's Mannequin record. At the time, I was separated from my girlfriend, so I was a lonely dude looking for a place to vent. That ended up finding its way into the hospital and I documented a pretty large portion of what went on in the hospital while I was being diagnosed and treated. A friend heard I had this footage and asked if I'd feel comfortable with him seeing it and possibly putting some interview footage together and editing a documentary. MTV came on board to do the final editing. I'm not sure how and where it will be released, but it is finished. The goal is to do what we can to raise as much money and awareness to help impact cancer research, more specifically blood-cancer research. We're in the process of trying to figure out when it will come out, but there's potential for a broadcast release of it on the music networks in the next couple months.

Have you seen the documentary?
Truthfully, it's hard for me to watch. It's a heavy thing. It communicates what goes on when people say "cancer" or any major illness. I made it out, so people who see the film will hopefully know there's light at the end of a very dark time.

Will this tie into your charity, the Dear Jack Foundation?
Yes, any monies that are made on my behalf will obviously go directly into my foundation, which acts as a conduit to various charities that impact cancer research and blood cancer research, so we deal directly with Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation, which is based out of Orange County [Calif.] where I live.

Buzznet Interview - July 18th, 2008

2008-07-25T01:31:00.000-07:00

Source

Warped Tour '08: Jack's Mannequin Singer Andrew McMahon Likes Baby Corn, Hiding in Buses
Jacks Mannequin singer, Andrew McMahon, has a busy summer ahead. After finishing its stint on Warped Tour in Montreal on July 20, the band will meet up with Paramore for the "The Final Riot!" tour. Facing a tight schedule, McMahon kept his answers about Warped short and sweet.

Buzznet: Who is your favorite band that you have seen perform on Warped Tour this summer?

McMahon: The Academy Is

Buzznet: What band on Warped Tour do you expect to blow up?

McMahon: Treaty of Paris

Buzznet: What is your favorite food in Warped catering?

McMahon: Baby corn.

Buzznet: What is something you've overheard at Warped?

McMahon: I'm not one to start rumors.

Buzznet: Can you give us one tip to survive Warped Tour?

McMahon: Hide in the bus.

Buzznet: What is the best part about Warped Tour?

McMahon: The shows have been fun.

PopWreckoning Interview - July 2nd, 2008

2008-07-18T10:05:00.000-07:00

By Bethany Marie and Joshua Neal
Source

Andrew McMahon, Jack’s Mannequin/Something Corporate: How are you doing? I’m Andrew.
PopWreckoning, Bethany: I’m Bethany.
AM: Bethany, pleasure to meet you. Is this us here?
PW: Yeah, I think so. I saw your set today. Sounding good.
AM: Oh, thank you, you know it’s the first couple of days–working out the kinks, but we’re having a good time.
PW: You guys have a new album coming out pretty soon?
AM: September; the middle of September.
PW: The Glass Passenger?
AM: That’s correct.
PW: How does it differ from Everything in Transit?
AM: God, you know, there’s a million different things. That would probably be a better question to ask somebody other than myself because I’m probably the least objective.
We did Everything in Transit as sort of a jam. It was us playing all the instruments and it was us programming drums–kind of building tracks from the inside out. But with this I had all the musicians there when I would work on a track. I would have my guitar player, my drum player, so you know we really developed the parts. The parts and the music were just a little bit more evolved.
Then as years go on you listen to different music and I think Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were a huge inspiration to me. I got a huge drive off of listening to their catalog.
PW: You covered “American Girl.”
AM: Yeah, I covered “American Girl.” A lot of people know that. So I like bands like that and I started listening to different styles of music as well. So, I don’t know, we’ll see what people think.

PW: What were some of the artists you listened to while making this one?
AM: God, I mean, I think my last record was like a big Beach Boys record and this record was a lot more varied–I think a lot more Beatles, more Heartbreakers, Rolling Stones and a lot of pop stuff. I was listening to old 80s pop–Madonna stuff. I really dug into the Madonna catalog, of all things. Even her newer stuff.
I’m trying to think of some other big influences that I could give credit to throughout this record. I mean there’s tons of stuff, and I think back, I used to listen to Billy Joel a lot. There’s some Pink Floyd influences and stuff. You definitely dug into a couple different areas with the band in mind when trying to make a great band record.
PW: Now this is Jack’s Mannequin’s second album, but with Something Corporate you had several albums. Is sophomore slump something you’d be worried about or not since you’ve done it before and made it through the second album?
AM: It is one of those things I sort of consider. Some people would consider this my sophomore album or second with Jack’s Mannequin, but I kind of consider it my fifth album. You know what I mean?
I think I’ve been making records for awhile that I think everything along the way has been part of the process. Of course, there’s always the idea that you bring something new to people and they haven’t heard it and they’re hearing it for the first time. There’s something that’s really going to excite people about that and attach them to it, you know? So sometimes, the second time you have to really win them over again.
The truth is, this is a really different sounding record. I try to evolve almost to the point where it sounds like a different band every time I put out a record, even with Something Corporate with Audioboxer to Leaving Through Window to North. It was a different band, really. So this is no different.
We’re kind of teeing up a real different sound. All I can say is I hope people give it a shot. I think there will be songs on the record that everyone can relate to, though.
PW: Was it hard to transition from Something Corporate to Jack’s Mannequin?
AM: It was easier than I thought it would be. I mean it happened, it definitely happened at a very turbulent time in my life. There’s no question that it was sort of blissfully turbulent, you know what I mean? It was just like, ‘I’m doing this.’ I just had this confidence and this thing where I was ready to move on. And I felt justified in moving on and everybody I think felt that was what was best for everybody. And I went for it.
I sort of never looked back. So by the time I got sick and the train had already been rolling, luckily all that confidence carried me through a tougher time.
PW: Yeah, I’m really glad that you’re doing well.
AM: Thank you. Me, too.
With the first Jack’s Mannequin, you had to deal with your sickness a lot at the beginning when you were getting ready to release that and go on the road, and it kind of messed up your touring. But you didn’t really have to deal with that for this new album. How did that effect the process?
AM: Yeah, right. You know this process…and that’s a really good question… Everything is sort of really attached, I feel like, too. Every one of these experiences is linked to itself, you know?
From Something Corporate to now to my getting sick to the way these records have come out, I think everything is so attached. So like in the making of this record, I sort of had to dig back. I had to dig back a few years and put those things together. So this process was in a lot of ways harder. With the first Jack’s record, I was living it and writing it and recording it and just moving. You know what I mean? I was living in that moment and always writing in that moment.
With this record, because I think I was sick when we started working the last record, I wasn’t really well enough to write about a lot of these experience that were so impactful on my life and took such a huge impact on me. Those are the moments that I’m usually sitting at a piano and I didn’t have that because I just couldn’t do it physically. I just wasn’t well enough and so I had this commitment in a lot of ways and sort of this block when I was doing this record that I had to keep trying to dive back to reconcile the past with the present. Does that make sense?
PW: Yeah, that makes sense to me.
AM: I think for a guy who wants to be in the moment and living in the moment, that’s sort of my philosophy to try to stay right here in the present moment. It was almost unnecessary for me to try to dig back into this past that I haven’t totally resolved and that was really the challenge of the record from start to finish. The first song I recorded for this record, I recorded two summers ago. I’ve been working on this on and off for two years. It was a harder process, but now that I’m well and we’re out there and we’re playing, it feels great. It feels amazing.
PW: The new songs that you guys played today are sounding really good.
AM: Thank you.
PW: On Everything in Transit, like in the title, you talk a lot about moving, you’re kind of in a tumultuous time, your real life is kind of in turmoil. Now The Glass Passenger is the title of the new album, where do you get that from?
AM: You know, almost pretty much the exact same thing. Just a different year. I think I have this confidence about me at the point that I was starting this project that it was just go, go, go, go, go and don’t look back. And I think the way I got sidelined and all that stuff, I think, is pretty much the theme for this record and the thing I kept on touching back on.
The idea that really we don’t have that control, you know what I mean? And the moments when you think you have the most control and you’re the most empowered, to push your own destiny forward, tend to be the moments where all of a sudden it’s like, “No, sorry, I don’t think so.”
I think The Glass Passenger is sort of the way to describe it. That some things can sort of be fragile and you might not have control, but it isn’t necessarily meant to conjure up a negative image as much as it’s just I was really conscious of my place while I made the record.
PW: Stacy Clark recently sang backing vocals on the new album.
AM: Yeah, Stacy. I love her to death. She’s amazing. She’s brilliant.
PopWreckoning, Josh: Yeah, I’m really good friends with her. (Whoa, sneaky. Josh just appeared out of nowhere. Actually, he kept wandering in and out of this interview as he ran off to take more Warped tour photos. He talks a little bit more in the second part.)
AM: Yeah, one of my closest musical friends I have out there.
PW: How did you guys meet up?
AM: Actually, through a charity that we both were doing work for. She works for Music Saves Lives with Russel Hornbeek, who was managing her at the time, and they came to me. They host blood drives and connect it to music, alternative music and kind of the younger music because that’s where the blood supply really comes from in America: the youth during blood drives.
So, he created this great charity, she was working for it and I got her CD. And I was just like, “Whoa. This is like done. These are hits. These songs sound amazing. I love this music.” I just played it for everybody and I still do. Now that she is getting closer to having a deal coming and everything, it seemed like the right time to put her on some tracks and start introducing the rest of the world to her. She’s really special, really talented.
PW: That’s awesome.

PW: How is the Warped experience different than other tours?
AM: Oh God, it’s just…it couldn’t be more different than anything. It is like this moving festival that takes on this circus sort of thing where people are just…it’s very loose and nomadic and communal.
And the people! You are always saying hi to this person or that person and you’re out there with the fans and people really are integrated into the experience. They’re backstage. They’re loose with security, which is OK, for me. I don’t mind. You end up meeting a lot of people. You can’t go out and meet 10,000 people a day as much as you’d like to, but at Warped the kids make their way back and you can have real conversations with people regularly throughout the day about music and about what people are listening to.
It’s a much more integrated, connected, community kind of experience.
PW: What’s the most extreme, favorite memory of any tour, any show?
AM: Any tour, any show? You’re talking about the last 10 years?
PW: Warped or not. The show you’ll never forget.
AM: You know, I have a couple of these stories that I tell, that I try to tell at different times. You have those moments all the time, that’s why we do it. Because those moments are regular in a lot of ways.
I think that probably my most overwhelming moment that I had on the stage, I had after I had been cognizant. There’s like a year after you’ve been on stage when you were just totally new and you’re just like, “WHOOOOA!,” freaking out.
Eventually, it just settles down and you learn how to be a performer and you learn how to pull it around on your bad nights, you know what I mean? So in that period of time when I was with Something Corporate, we did a show at the Astoria in London and it was such a big deal because we were an American band. We never had hits — to this day I’ve never had a hit — but we made connections. And that was a really cool thing because it was a sold out show, 2,500 people, sold out in like a day, and it’s in London.
So we’re from California and we’re in London; people are losing their mind. We go out and we open, I think with “Konstantine.” I think it was a slow song. I just remember sitting there and having one of those out of body experiences where it was just like, almost like the movie where the fucking crane of the cameras is circling the stage. You’re just out of body.
I’m sitting there at the piano, I’m totally numb, watching this crowd, this huge 2,500 people, and I’m like 19 or 20 years old, playing. We’re opening with this most soulful, quiet moment that you wouldn’t want to open a set with because people like to freak out, but it’s like pin drop. But that was just from sitting in my chair. It wasn’t like anything amazing happened other than just feeling good, you know?
PW: That’s a cool story. Now, Warped is all about discovering new artists. Have you made any new discoveries being on Warped?
AM: You know, I mean to be honest, I got here yesterday. So, it’s been this period of acclamation and whatever. I did get to see my first Paramore set, a band that I’m about to go on tour with right after this. We all leave this and jump on tour together, so I got to see her, see Hayley and the band play for the first time and I was really fucking psyched.
It’s funny. I have the kind of fans who will be questioning if anything is too commercial, but I intentionally make commercial music. I like commercial. I make pop music. I’m into it. I grew up on the radio, even though I haven’t had anything there. I remember when I first heard one of those songs. I really dug it, but I have the fans who would be like, “The MTV thing and blah blah blah,” and I’m like, “Oh. P.S. I would like to be on MTV.” Her band is really good and it was cool to see that today. I’m psyched to go out on tour with them now. I saw them really kick out a sweet show.
PW: Well that’s awesome. [looks to Josh] Do you have any questions, Josh?
AM: Oh, I’m Andrew by the way (like he needs an introduction)
PopWreckoning, Josh: I’m Josh. I’m the editor. Is Something Corporate is completely done?
AM: I wouldn’t say completely, no. The thing about Something Corporate is, well, it’s hard to explain how each one of us has our own lives and the people in our lives. That is me and Something Corporate. We have our own lives and how we interact.
They’re really dear friends of mine. We see each other all the time and talk all the time. There’s definitely always discussions of when are we going to put something together. And when I say put something together, I don’t envision for me personally, that we’re going to come back and make a new full length record. At least not any time soon. And go on a world tour and be out for a year working on a Something Corporate record.
That’s like the dudes and friends I grew up with in high school and we had this amazing experience and this huge connectivity on stage and it was undeniable. It was really special, something I’ve never experienced on stage. But we were also all 16, 17 years old and as you grow up, you get older and you start liking different things and you start going different directions. It just made sense for me and everybody’s got their own things that they’re doing.
It’s like we’ll do something because love each other, we respect our fan base and we know that we have the ability to really make cool stuff together. There’s all these songs that never really got to see the light of the day that I would love to do a huge package of. And music, there’s a whole different world of music now.
Commerce and music are two totally different things. It’s not like you make a CD and it sells. So, I kind of believe in this idea of making other things that sell. Like if we collected all these amazing b-sides that we’ve done that nobody’s heard or stuff that’s been kind of scattered. “Konstantine” was never on a fucking record. It was never on a record. That song has its own area code and it has never been on a record. So to find a home for this and something that really shows people what the experience of being in Something Corporate was really like–there’s pictures of us being babies on stage, high school, it was really a cool thing. I want to do something to celebrate that and throw some new tracks on there and these handfuls of demos and songs that we had never put out that I’d love to finish that are really cool songs.
I think the biggest problem with Something Corporate was that there were so many people around with so many opinions outside of the band that some of our coolest shit that was really groovy would have to be put on the back burner because we’d been pigeonholed into this Drive-Thru punk rock thing. But I mean I loved everybody there and I loved everything about that. I wouldn’t trade that experience. Sometimes in our own head, I think that we didn’t let our selves be as free, we didn’t let ourselves put out these songs that maybe were a little more challenging and not just straight up the main vein, but were really cool adult communications that got lost along the way.
PW: You have your own label now, don’t you?
AM: Yeah, I do.
PW: Would you put that out through the label?
AM: Yeah, that would be possible, but truthfully we’re under contract with Universal and whatever version Universal decides to be. I mean, we got signed through Drive-Thru through MCA. MCA became Geffen. It’s my understanding that Geffen is now Interscope. So, there’s people in that system that I’m really close with that care a lot about our music that I think when it’s time, they’ll probably be the ones to put out the release.
PW (Josh): That’s the only other question I had.
AM: Well, that’s the most honest I’ve been about it since. So, you have your own little goldmine for you.
PW: Thank you so much.
AM: Yeah it was a pleasure. Great to meet you guys.
PW (Josh): Nice meeting you. I’ve seen you like three or four times and never gotten to meet you.
AM: Yeah, it’s nice to meet people.
PW: I actually got a chance to meet you one other time before, but you were in a sour mood.
PW (Josh): Don’t tell this story. (I have to tell this story, it is a good story.)
AM: No way, what? What happened?
PW: I don’t know if you remember the Lincoln, Neb., show where there was a decibel rule? You couldn’t go over a certain volume.
AM: How could I forget? Did you meet me before or after the show?
PW: It was right after the sound check.
AM: Oh, so you met me at the worst moment.
PW: You were actually really cool about it. Yeah, everybody was just sitting and we were like, “Oh my gosh, he’s not going to want to come over here and talk to us.”
AM: Yeah, with that, it was just about not giving a show. I mean when we do it, it’s for you guys.

PW: I thought it was amazing that you were like, “Fuck it, we’re going to pay the fine.”
AM: Well, you have a business choice. You either cop to the man and give less of a performance or you say, “Fuck the money tonight, let’s put on a show.” You know? It was cool and it was a good lesson to them because they didn’t tell us about that sound thing. You have 2,000 people ready to see a concert and they literally couldn’t. I mean our guitar amp was breaking the decibel. The guitar amp! Without even being in the speakers of the house. It was like, “Whoa.”
PW: I just thought what you did there was amazing.
AM: Yeah, well I’m glad you got to see me in a better mood. I appreciate it. Thanks for doing the interview.
PW: Yes, thank you.
AM: Take care of yourself. Have a good one.
PW: You, too.

Alternative Press Article - December 10th, 2007

2008-06-22T12:54:00.000-07:00

By Annie Zaleski
Source

McMahon is sitting at 4th Street's grand piano in complete darkness, his white-collared shirt seemingly glowing as he works through a new song that's tentatively titled "Annie, Use Your Telescope." McMahon's long-time studio confidants-producer Wirt and engineer CJ Eiriksson-are there to offer suggestions and guidance as McMahon performs chord progressions and harmonies on the gorgeous, Ben Folds-esque song. At one point, McMahon playfully vamps on Bruce Hornsby's ultra-cheesy 1986 hit "The Way It Is," causing everyone to groan and chuckle. During another take of the tune, Wirt plucks out the riffs to David Bowie's "Space Oddity." McMahon laughs when he realizes the similarities.

He does take after take of the song, stopping when he makes a mistake, or to test out ideas that pop into his head before recording them. (McMahon doesn't like to re-record things, choosing to commit perfect drafts to tape.) The painstaking way he discards what sounds like good takes is often maddening, although completely unsurprising. When new music takes hold of McMahon (and right now, it certainly has) he has a singular focus and drive, to the exclusion of almost everything else.

"I don't think anybody could ever apply the kind of pressure to me that I apply to myself," McMahon says. "It's more been about educating the label of that being the reality of me as a person. I know that I'm a hard artist to work with-I get it. But that's who I am. I tried so many times to reshape myself for the benefit of other people when it comes to creating things, and all I've found is that it just dilutes my output."

From the control room, Wirt suggests "Telescope" go longer; at this point, the song is going to clock in at just two-and-a-half minutes. "Dude, 2:30 sounds sweet!" McMahon exclaims gleefully from the piano, his voice booming into the control room. "The fucking Beatles wrote songs that were 2:30. Why not go short?"

But this isn't a rough dismissal; McMahon trusts Wirt and Eiriksson implicitly. The men are part of the extensive family of music professionals and friends he's built around him. The circle seems like it functions as a security blanket for him, grounding him in ways that growing up didn't-and allowing him to be comfortable enough to branch out creatively.

"He surrounds himself with people he trusts," says Bobby Anderson, Jack's Mannequin's guitarist. "Everybody around him is his influence, really-even for lyrics and stuff like that, you'll end up in one of his songs. We're kind of all the best friends we have here in Los Angeles."

As a testament to McMahon's commitment to friends, neither he nor Brian Ireland thinks that Something Corporate is finished; "suspended animation" is a good term for the band's current status. Both Ireland and Mcmahon have remained on excellent terms as friends, feeling the band will do something again, even if McMahon says that right now he's "not creatively charged to go do a Something Corporate record; I'm nostalgically charged towards [that]."

Absolute Punk Interview - December 8th, 2007

2008-06-22T12:27:00.000-07:00

By Absolute Punk

Source

Obviously, everyone wants to know about the new album. Why don't you tell me about how it's going?

It’s going good. We're getting close. The track “Cell Phone” has been around for a while- that track was recorded in the Everything in Transit sessions at the very end. We didn't have time to finish it, so that one's been around for a while, but we sort of started with the song "What Gets You Off" which was July of last year. It's been a work in progress since then. Obviously we've been doing lots of touring since then and we didn't really get into the bulk of it until this summer, but it's been a long road. Here we are, early/mid December, and we have about ten songs. It'll probably be a ten-song record. There are ten songs that I'm really in love with, which we played you earlier. Now we’re just kind of tidying things up, doing new vocals, hoping that maybe another song comes up. I'm always in the mood to keep recording until the last minute possible so we're doing that. I just have some vocals to clean up and overdubs here and there. We're getting there though; we'll probably start mixing in January. It's close. Obviously, that's barring any major feedback that scares us, you know, that people really don't like it but I feel pretty confident about it. It's a good representation of where I'm at right now I think.

For those ten songs that you were talking about, when did you start writing those?

I write constantly and it tends to be that when I'm writing a record, I tend to write all the songs while I'm in the process. I mean, most of the songs that you heard were written this summer or later. Even some of my favorite stuff- like there's four or five songs that we just started working on in the middle of October. Maybe even a few more than that. I tend to write for the record. I've been in and out of the studio, there's a lot of scratch material or things that we've ditched. Probably as many songs as there will be on the record are ones that we’re not going to use. I mean… I've lost my train of thought. Sorry, repeat the question and I'll answer it again.

Oh the question was just about when you started writing the songs.

Oh right. Forgive me. So like I said, most of it has been written post-this summer. I think the first few songs, like one of the first songs I played you was originally called "Doris Day" but I rewrote the chorus so it's not actually called "Doris Day" anymore. I think in the Alternative Press article, they have "Doris Day" listed as a song. But yeah, it's all been this summer or later for the most part.

Is this album going to have a linear concept like the first one?

I'm still deciding. I tend to write mainly in a very autobiographical way as most people already know by now. There are some songs, like on the last record, that are a bit of a departure from being purely autobiography, that venture into other themes or tell more of a story. There's a song called "Bloodshot" that's much more of a character study of other characters other than myself but I mean, that I possibly relate to. There's a chance that it will be linear. I mean, I want it to be a little less visual as far as the album packaging goes. The last one was more cartoon-like and it kind of had that vibe of putting all the pieces together for people to decipher although it didn't take much to decipher it. It was very obvious what the themes of that record were about. This one is a little more cryptic. I mean, I'm very upfront but I think that I took the chance to explore different methods of communicating as far as the lyrics are concerned in this case. Some are really obvious and some are really heart-on-sleeve when it comes to what I'm talking about, while others are a little more mysterious. That's why it's kind of a toss-up right now as to whether I'll go in that direction completely. It's still, in my opinion, a continuation of the story in the first record. I mean, it's my story and it continues to be so, but it all depends on what happens when we start moving the songs around and seeing what sounds good next to each other.

When you were writing these songs, did you have an objective in mind or did you have a goal or were you more just writing your thoughts down and seeing what came out of it?

You can only do so much as a songwriter for my songs. You know, you have to come to a place that's spiritually connective. I think the way that I approached writing this record was really just to let the songs come. Let the songs come, see what they're saying and then once all the pieces fall into place, see how they're speaking to each other. A lot of that didn't come together until this last month. It wasn't until now that we've really started diving into the older material and things that had been around since the summer. Finally when these new batch of songs came along, themes started to develop and I started sort of writing into those themes a little bit.

For me, I was scared of writing, you know, "the cancer record," and I was scared of writing, you know, I mean I'm not in the middle of a breakup so I'm not going to write a breakup record. It was so easy to be thematic on the last record because it was very obvious as to what I was going through. You know, it was a dude in the middle of a tough time with a girl. I mean, that was really what it was about. The themes that have developed in my life since then have become a little more complicated and I wanted to approach it and be tasteful in my approach. I wanted there still to be fun and upbeat songs on the record, granted that the things I've been up again the past few years have been a little bit darker. I took my time writing the music for the record and trying to find, if nothing else, a thread of hope through most of these songs. I think a lot of the themes that have developed in this record are like, yeah, it's been a struggle, and life is a struggle and the idea of kind of finding… using the songs to get through the struggle and finding light in the struggle, and I think that's a pretty common theme in the record. It was one that developed naturally; it wasn't one that I found just kind of off the bat. It took me sort of to find the hope to find the songs and then record them.

You said you were scared of making "the cancer record." Did you purposely avoid the topic? How did you integrate major events like the cancer and your marriage and things like that into your songs?

Well, it came about naturally. For me, in the beginning, there were a couple of songs that existed before all of this. I definitely hit a period of writer's block and it definitely had to do with the fact that I wasn't sure how to approach the sick thing in the songs. I wasn't sure how to approach a completely different relationship that I was used to, in sort of a high school relationship sort of thing, which is what I was used to writing about. You know, the make-up/break-up thing is a pretty easy source of material when you’re young and single. One of the things that got me through was this song "Crash" which I played for you. I was like "Ok, maybe you'll figure this out." It was a song about trying to find my voice again and trying to find how to talk about these things that are a little more complicated. That song helped me to break the ice a little and it kind of spawned a lot of the sessions that followed.

From there, the song "Caves" which is the long, symphony thing that's on this record, it's a seven-minute three-movement piece of music, and that was the song where I woke up and it was in the middle of the night and I heard this piano melody in my head and I went to my piano and started writing it. It was kind of the first time that the words, as they related to what I had gone through, started emerging. That was… [plays piano at this point]. It's like, I played that and it kind of got scared because the first thing that came out was [more piano]. It was real operatic and, you know, it really got high and did a lot of things that I had never really done when I was writing a song before. That kind of just helped me break through and write honestly about what that was like, and that kind of just got it out of the way for me, I didn't feel like I needed to focus on the past as much, since I had finally written the song that had blocked me up a lot. It was hard, I didn't really want to write sad songs about being a sick dude. I just don't think that's what I'm here to do. Writing one that was sort of this big symphony and got it out of the way for me, it really helped and it opened me up to writing on other subjects and more complicated subjects and I think I got through one of the more complicated ones in one song, so that helped for sure.

Briefly, while we're kind of on the topic, let's move away from the album for a second. How are you with the sickness as of now?

I've been in remission for two years now. Over two years now. That's something that will never be a thing of the past and especially since, it's not like I'm a big public figure or anything but in some way, I do have an audience and I think it's something that I find that at least some people are interested in, and I can't avoid being "that guy" because people won’t exactly let me. It's something that I'm always going to be connected to in some way or another, but I'm feeling healthy and great now and there's nothing really on that front. I mean, I could sit and worry about it but that's no way to live, so I just keep pushing on. I've been really lucky and grateful for my health.

Back to the album…is there anything that you want people to get out of it? How do you imagine their reaction to it will be?

It's so hard to say every time, and it's kind of terrifying actually. I had been working on the record and playing live shows in tandem for so long, and it finally got to where I was finally writing these songs that were a stretch as far as what people had heard me do before. Obviously, it's a scary thing, going into a new record. Even going back to Something Corporate records, going from Leaving Through The Window to North, that was a bold undertaking and I don’t know that it necessarily went over as well as Leaving Through The Window, but it was a huge point of growth for us and it was a huge point of growth for me. You have to accept that in this business, people might end up seeing you grow or hearing you grow over the course of your records, and I think that it's scary for what reactions might be. I mean, I don't know and I want everyone to love what I do. I consider myself a pop musician and I want to make music that hopefully will be popular. I mean, I try and make myself happy first. I try not to put out anything that I'm not totally satisfied with, and you know that's the biggest struggle, to please myself to be honest.

From there on, we're playing songs for you guys and we're playing stuff around. The reaction that we're getting from playing stuff around seems to be really fantastic. I just want people to pick up the record and hopefully it plays into their own story and what their life is and what their happiness and struggles are. I consider myself a person like everyone else and I take my time writing my records because I feel like it captures more of who I am if the period of time that's captured in the course of an album is a year or two of your life as opposed to two or three months. I think that you have a much greater chance of hitting on themes and points throughout those couple of years that could play into someone else's life in a larger way. You know, all I ever hope for with the records is that, whether everyone likes every song on there or, you know, people would prefer me do this or that, at least they pick it up and find a handful of songs that they really connect to, and if they're having a great day or a bad day, just that somehow, a handful of those songs finds them at that place and time and really speaks to them.

I think this record has a really cool universal message and I hope I'm right. I guess that's all I can say is that I hope I'm right.

You admit yourself that you consider yourself a pop musician. Do you ever feel pressure to make something sound more pop? You said this album is a little more complicated and dark at times; do you feel like there is pressure to keep things more lighthearted and fun?

No, definitely not. I mean, I sort of have created a scenario where I have to operate and I have to be able to write the songs that are in me. When I say that I'm a pop musician, I don't mean that I'm not willing to go and make songs that are not just like your stereotypical radio pop songs. I think that'll be reflected in this record, there's a lot of “trippier” moments on this thing and a lot more experimental kind of stuff that happens within the pop format. My biggest pressure is always from me and it's usually to please myself in my writing and in my growth and in my development as a writer and as an artist and as a live band and all of those things. That pressure can never be superseded by anyone else's.

There were definitely ideas going into the record, not to say about how the record should sound but you know, how to work on it and how to approach it. I've dealt with my label directly on these things and they were really great about working with me and the kind of musician that I am, which is a real blessing especially in this business. I see a lot of bands pawned off on the same producers and the same scenarios to make these records and I've been blessed that I have a record company and a management team who I think want to see me on my own journey and they want to see me make my own music on my terms because frankly, that's how I've made it since the beginning. I'm not some big celebrity and I haven't sold a million records, but the people that work with me, I think that they like what I do and they like to see me really succeed. They sort of would never want that forced because it wouldn't be satisfying for any of us, you know, eight years of making music and our fourth record, or well, counting the Something Corporate EP, it's my fifth release, and you know to cash it in all of a sudden and try to be some act that makes some cheesy song to get on the radio, it's just not the path I'm on right now.

Are there any guest appearances on this record?

Not yet. Since the first record was recorded, I put my whole band together to play live and they're some of the best musicians out there. You know, really, they are, they're just fantastic, and my recording team, Jim who's my producer, plays bass and guitar, and CJ, who is engineer and co-producer, he plays drums. So we have so many musicians and we have this kind of extraneous family that all filters in. I mean, you've seen it today, this is like a normal day and we'll just be hanging out and somebody will show up and a lot of times it'll be like "Yo, get in the booth and sing!" And you know, that's what I love about Jack's and that's what I love about this process is that it's so free. We involve a lot of different musicians. I think there's one song on this record that has about fifteen different people who contributed something just because they were in the room. It's been mainly my band; it's not to rule out that there won't be any guest appearances on the record. There are a couple of people who I've reached out to who most people wouldn't even know, but some things might pop up and I have some friends who might come by and sing for a little bit, but you know this really has been more about, in my opinion, this group of people who helped make this last Jack's record happen, which was assembled from a huge pool of musicians and just music people that I've worked with over the years. On this record, it's like all of them are involved and it's kind of like a big community making this album right now.

You're obviously the main songwriter and composer behind the songs, but since you say that there are so many musicians and others who contribute to this, what degree of creative control do you have over everything?

Yeah, I mean, I write all the music and myself and Jim produced this stuff and I think that everyone involved in this record understands how I work. I mean, it's not easy always to work with me. It can be tough because I have a really specific vision and a really specific goal in mind when I bring a song to the table, and that's why this really works. I think people know I have that vision and they play into it and we all vibe off of each other and we have this great dynamic. I'll bring a song into here, I'll usually have a couple of verses and a chorus or something, and I'll bring it to the table and I'll say "This is what I have today." We'll all listen to it, and I'll take feedback from people. You know, maybe if we're doing a really upbeat kind of drum thing, it'd be cool to break it down in this section or something like that. We kind of feed off of each other in that respect, and to some extent, everyone knows that when it's all said and done, my goal is to leave here with me happy. I know it sounds horrible, but I really believe that having a unified vision and having someone behind a vision really helps in whatever you're doing, being pointed and all. We all have a mutual respect for each other that allows songs to develop and allows everyone to give so much input and help develop the songs once they come through the speakers.

For the album, what are the plans for release date, touring, etc.?

We're going to have most of the record mixed by the first or second week of January, but it's my understanding that we're hopefully looking at an April or May release date, and then having the band headlining and touring in early May, doing a full headlining tour then. I'll probably do some college shows in February just to get out playing and to play some of these songs live and start getting used to them before we get going and play them out full scale on tour. The hope is to have the record out by April or May and that would leave me having the record done by the end of this month and mixed in January. Like I said, I always like to provide for "What if a great song comes in the next few weeks?" We have a little bit of a window so that we don't have to have anything submitted until the first week of February, so there's a chance that two or three songs may pop up. On the last record, I thought I had the record done in December last time, in 2004, and I ended up writing "La La Lie," "Dark Blue," and "Into The Airwaves" after the record was supposedly finished. There's still always a chance that it might get pushed back because my head might insist on pushing out more tunes, but I think April/May.

I assume there's no title yet?

There is actually! I put it online yesterday, I put it on the website. I'm calling it "The Glass Passenger."

And what's the explanation behind that?

Well, it's rooted in a lyric that, when in my first attempts to wrestle mortality in the form of a song, I wrote a song called "Hey Hey Hey We're All Gonna Die" which was a little bold, that ended up not making the cut, but there was a lyric in there that referred to the glass passenger. I think it's just behind the idea that, well, if it's specifically referencing myself, I can't necessarily say that, but I think it's more referring to the idea that things are fragile, but we're all being carried and I think we're all on our path in that sense. As fragile as things are, we're still getting there. I think that's a lame layman's on-the-spot analysis of the record title, but if nothing else, it rhymes.

Tell me a little about Dear Jack.

The charity or the film?

I meant the film, but both I suppose.

The charity was an idea that just came when I was in recovery. We had so many people who came out of the woodwork to help and donate money and people, our fans, they were doing fundraisers on their own, just because I expressed to people not to send me things or money but just to take care of people who have this disease. If nothing else, that would make me feel good that we're contributing. I mean, when I was sick I had these great doctors and people who took care of me when I was sick, and if we were in a position where people were excited to get on board and make a difference, I might as well start a non-profit myself and help wrangle funds via my fans and other interested parties and then, each year, we sort of sit back and find a handful of charities to dole the funds out that we've collected. It's more of a conduit to charities. I don't sit there and we don't have an office and specific initiatives or anything. We collect money and find charities that are making a difference in the way of blood cancers and cancer in general. A lot of them are geared to children's cancer as well, because that's where a lot of research is done in cancer and obviously it's just sad to see kids sick too. Dear Jack was the name I came up with, it was rooted in the name of a song I had written for a friend of mine, the same friend who I named Jack's Mannequin after, not knowing that I was going to be sick and also a friend who had childhood leukemia just by coincidence. I had written this song long before I was sick, so it seemed like a shoe-in for the name of the charity. We've raised well over $100,000 in the past two years or so and continue to do so. Obviously when I'm on tour and when I'm back doing things like this, we'll do more heavy fundraising push as well. But yeah, it's something that makes me feel good to know that my life was spared up to this point, and I survived my cancer. It seems like most people who dealt with something like that find themselves really motivated to help other people to survive. I think that's what it stems from, and my manager, my booking agent, everyone contributes and helps. It's cool to see a cynical business and a lot of people you wouldn't expect to be reaching out and helping, they're all reaching out and helping. It's nice to see people's hearts and see people really care about something other than themselves. That's what the charity does.

And the film?

The film… that's a whole heavier subject, haha. I imagine it'll probably start surfacing in 2008.

Well, where did it come from? At what point did you decide to do a film?

It's kind of a long story really. If you go way back to the beginning of Jack's and if you look on the website, well, it was on the old website anyway, but I was given a video camera by my record company, when Maverick signed me, and I was in the process of finishing the first Jack's record. They said they would buy me a video camera and told me to videotape the record, while you're in the studio, we'll cut clips together, it'll be cool stuff for the internet. It just so happened that during that time, I was separated from my now-wife, we were on a break, and I was kind of lonely to be honest, so I spent a lot of time, once I got the camera and I was in the studio, at least once or twice a day I would just sit in front of the camera and talk to it. I know it sounds fucking retarded but I did! I would sit here with this little Canon camera and I would say "well, today this is what we're doing in the studio," but eventually it turned into more of a dialogue with my video camera where I would just say like, "It was a weird day today." If you listen to a lot of the stuff, the little blips in the Jack's record, the sound of the boardwalk and the little dialogue at the end about how the record is done, all of those were just little clips off of my handheld. A lot of the sound effects were just clips from my video camera that I had as my little companion in the front seat. I took it with me on tour and I documented this whole period of my life. It just so happened to be there when I got sick, and I kept talking to it and I kept using it as a sort of art therapy or something. If I had something that was on my mind and I didn’t want it in my head anymore, I'd tell it to the camera.

When I got sick, I just started filming everything with no intention of it ever seeing the light of day but it was just there and I was filming things. I filmed procedures being performed and me and, getting really sick, I insisted that other people film. They would say "I don’t want to film this" and I'd tell them to film it, it helps. I just kept doing that and I amassed just dozens and dozens of tapes. I put them in my closet and called it a day. Then I was having a conversation with Jacob Marshall, who plays drums for Mae, and I can't say 100% how it unfolded, but somehow he knew or I had told him that these tapes existed, of the things that I had filmed. I was just shooting the shit or catching up with him, and he and Benji, who also tours with them, approached me and said "Hey Benji is a filmmaker and he did all the Mae DVDs and would you consider letting us put together a documentary?" To which I said yes, and it's been through various incarnations, you know. We had two great guys on the team who came from various different sources in the entertainment business, one guy named Corey [Moss] and one named Josh [Morrisroe], who are great editors and filmmakers, they got involved in this project. They sort of helped us take what we had started, and they turned it into this pretty powerful movie, and I commend them because they did an excellent job. It was weird, it was hard, I couldn't watch it initially. It made me sick at first because it was BEING in the hospital, you know, it was BEING sick. So we have it now and it's close to finished, and we're starting to prepare for submitting it to some film festivals and things like that and find a debut for it and hopefully find a home and some distribution and things like that.

I think it's a powerful thing, it's a weird thing to put yourself out there like that, it's pretty intense and pretty personal but in the same breath, to have something like that on film, it's just an accident that it even happened and even seeing the footage, I've never seen…it's pretty dark. It's really hopeful though and I thought this could really help somebody, if I were in my situation and it helps, I think it would help someone who is dealing with the same thing or who is dealing with that. It'd help them get through it to see someone who has deal with that and has made it through to the other side. I think it's almost an obligation on my part to show people who are facing any sort of sickness that they can get through, even when it looks like you cant. There are definitely some moments in this movie that show that, so we'll see. I'm curious to see how people react, it's really heavy to watch and it's powerful. It's powerful to watch.

What are the plans for its release?

There's no plans as of yet. This is one of those things that I gave them the tapes, I let them put it together, I obviously checked it to make sure I believed in it and thought it was great, and that it was a great movie for what we were trying to accomplish, which they did and I sort of take my hat off at this point. I don't know anything about the film business, I don't know anything about making movies, I'm not in that world. We have a great agent who is working with the film and these great filmmakers who have made it, I've conceded to them to find a great home for it. Obviously, I'll make sure that I sign off on where it ends up of course, so it doesn't end up in some bizarre spot, airing in a porn theater or something like that, but that's really it. I don't know anything about this business. It took me years to learn the music business, I don't need to learn the movie business. I'm letting the movie guys deal with the movie, but hopefully we'll get some updates in the next couple of months that will indicate what festivals it'll debut at, and hopefully from there we'll secure some distribution for it.

The past couple of years, you've been working on so much – where did the Airport Tapes & Records label come from?

Airport came from a couple of friends who were working with a record label in the valley, an upstart little indie label. They asked me to come in and do some A&R for the label, it sort of developed from there. Now, Casper, who a lot of people know who works with me and actually tour manages Jack's, you know, has been working with me on the label side of things. He found this great band Treaty of Paris from Chicago, and I got a whole bunch of their acoustic demos and really fell in love with their ambition and songwriting and their live show. I was excited, I saw a lot of what I saw in myself when I was in Something Corporate in these guys, you know what I mean? Their level of hustle, their dedication, level of writing good songs, it really turned me on, at a time when frankly, I wasn't planning on…I had the outlet where if I wanted to find a band and sign them, and Casper was so passionate, he brought me their music and I felt in love with their songs. I said, "Let's do this and let's take a band under our wing and try and get them out there."

Really, the idea behind Airport was to give bands a place to hatch and to give bands a place to find their feet and find their sound and develop and, you know, working on this Treaty project, I'm glad that my responsibility actually played out into what I felt like what turned into a really great record and a really great opportunity for this band. You're talking about a band who, before the record, had done their own touring, had been doing all their own tour dates, and then watching them, they're out now with The Spill Canvas and they're going to do dates with Yellowcard and MxPx and All Time Low. It's like seeing a band from being a local band to touring as a national act, it's really kind of nostalgic, truthfully, to remember that period of time when the band is just starting. My goal with the label is to give some cool bands a home and in this music business, as it is now, not to make these promises like "We're going to get you all over the radio!" You know, it's not how it happened for me, we had to fight tooth and nail for what we got and my goal is to find bands who are willing to fight that fight. We signed Treaty, obviously I've been working on this record, but in the new year hopefully we'll look towards making a new signing and bringing someone new into the fold as well.

Rolling Stone Interview May 3rd, 2008

2008-06-22T12:22:00.000-07:00

By Rolling Stone
Source

Best part of playing a parking lot:
Andrew McMahon: It's beautiful [laughs]. If it's filled with 40,000 people, then it's beautiful.

Best set seen so far:
Say Anything. I've been a fan of Max's for a really long time and it was cool to see them play last night. When Max was in high school I was recording Leaving Through the Window [with first band Something Corporate] and I got a copy of his demos and flipped over them so he came and hung out with us in the studio a few times. I've always kept tabs on him since, and he played his first couple of shows opening for SoCo back when we were all kids. I think he's one of the better young songwriters out today.

Bamboozle vs. Warped Tour:
It's sort of the same thing, isn't it? I bet some kid is going to slap me in the face for saying that, but I find the same sense of camaraderie with the other bands and the festival environment ... and, let's be honest, it's the same bands, but I like both events.

What's it like being a veteran out here?
Something Corporate was always the odd man out on the Warped Tour, but we did well. But it was always like, what are we doing? In a strange way, the scene got shaped by bands like ours who started favoring the the pop side and not the punk side. I think you see a shift, not to give myself credit, but bands started moving collectively in that direction. So now it's a little more similar to what I've historically done. But yeah to be the older dude at the gig is a funny thing for me when I've always classically been the youngest guy at the gig: I was doing this when I was 16. I'm really pleased with the way things have been developing. I think gradually a scene that has maybe been discounted as sophomoric or young is slowly evolving into more credible rock & roll, which I think is a big step.

The Montclarion Interview - April 17th, 2008

2008-06-22T12:16:00.000-07:00

By Bernadette Marciniak
Source

It's hard to believe that just three years ago, Andrew McMahon was lying in a hospital bed fighting for his life against leukemia. Despite the subtle frailty of his slim and slightly huddled shoulders, a Jack's Mannequin virgin would think he's a rookie when he performs. You can still see the glimmer of pride in his eyes when his devoted fans sing along and know every word to his songs. He belts each of his songs with such passion that you would think it was his first time on stage.

And with the upcoming release of Jack's Mannequin's second studio album, The Glass Passenger, it's a good thing McMahon still has this type of energy.

In a recent interview with The Montclarion, McMahon took us through the new album, some of his experiences from the past three years and what's to come in the near future. This will be a good one, folks.

The Montclarion: So, Andrew, congrats on the new album.

McMahon: Oh, thank you! Don't congratulate me yet. It's not out yet.

Soon, right?

Yeah, no, there's no official release date yet. It'll be end of August, beginning of September probably. I hate to string people along, but the truth is, it's not done yet. It's close; it just has to be mixed, and the guy I'm mixing it with isn't available until the middle of May, so the reality is just that you have to get it out to press and radio and all that stuff, two or three months ahead of the release. So we won't have a finished product until the end of May.

Okay, so how much of the album would you say is completely finished?

Most of it. Almost entirely. I mean, I always hold out hope, up until the mix is done, that maybe another song pops up, and I'll go into the studio and do it, but the record as it stands right now is pretty much done.

So I know that you scrap a lot of material. Are you 100 percent satisfied with what the result is looking to be, or is there anything else you would still want to change [on Glass Passenger]?

No, I'm pretty close to 100 percent. For me, I've gotten to a place where until I'm sitting with the 10 or 11 or however many songs it is mixed and mastered, playing it in my head, sitting with headphones, and doing it, I won't ever know if I'm 100 percent, and for me, the mix is a huge part of it. We've been working on these songs for over a year now. So you know, there are so many layers, we still have to kind of go through that. Just to go through that final presentation is a huge part of it. Yeah, but I mean, I think there's no question that a lot of these songs are the best that I've written, and for that I'm happy. It's been a strange period of time in my life to try to capture on record. So maybe to some extent, I'll never be totally satisfied in that sense, but I'm really proud of what we've accomplished so far.

You said in a recent interview with Alternative Press something to the effect of being afraid that your artistic creativity might be hindered because of your marriage and the music might not come as easily.

I think I was afraid of that beforehand. When you're out there and you're single, and you're just kind of a satellite doing your thing and running around, not necessarily romantically speaking, but just in general, and not being accountable to another human being, you can kind of go on tangents that you may not be allowed to go on so much when you're shacked up or something to that effect. That said, I have a pretty amazing wife who's pretty accepting of the fact that I'm sort of partially out of my mind ... Part of what I've learned in the past couple years, and from the past year especially, is to try and maintain that edge, to keep moving forward and not get too comfortable in any one spot. But you know, everything in life, all the good things and the bad things, come with their own set of challenges. I think a lot of people wouldn't say it, but I think that's what a lot of us worry about … I think it's sort of the weaker artist who feels the need to completely destroy their relationships and their lives on a regular basis to be inspired. And I'm trying desperately not to be that guy, because I was that guy, and I ended up a sick man in the hospital as a result of it. I try and learn and keep myself accountable and learn that art is not always something that you have to find in the terms of reckless abandonment.

Any sort of new sounds we should look forward to hearing [on The Glass Passenger]?

Yeah. I mean, I would say the whole thing is just a big experiment ... this record sounds completely different from [Everything in Transit]. I think there are always going to be threads that probably maintain some sort of similarity in my writing and my presentation; you know, I think with The Glass Passenger, the approach was so different from the Jack's Mannequin side of things that the first record was sort of conceived in a studio and without a lot of musicians around other than myself and my producer, so we really kind of pieced everything together, and it was sort of one of these things where we were flying drum tracks in from other sessions and cutting up samples and things like that just to get the songs in a state that we could hear them and be excited about them, and then we brought in musicians after the fact. On this record, my band, they were all just a phone call away, so when we got going on something, it was just like, "Hey, come down and play this drum track," and so in that sense the approach was much more organic as far as the music was concerned, and I think it left us taking a lot more chances on the parts, and I think the musicianship on this record is quite a step up just because we had musicians in the room with us when we were conceiving the songs. And, yeah, I mean, I think in general, every time I do a record, enough time seems to have lapsed, influences change, approaches get forgotten and found, and new things kind of come about.

How often do you find yourself writing really great one- or- two line lyrics that you have to toss out because they don't go with the rest of the song?

All the time. I say I encounter poetry and words that move me a lot more often than music.

Really? So for you, the words are almost more powerful.

I think for me to really enjoy a song of my own and for me to even move forward, it's gotta say something that's going to speak to me in the long-term, yeah … Without the words causing me to grow in some respect or pushing me beyond whatever I've done in the past or just connecting me in a way that I said something that I need to say, there's really no song.

So I know that you never went to college. Do you ever regret it?

Haha, right. I've done a lot of dates in colleges, but I've never actually attended ... Regret probably wouldn't be the word. I would still probably like to go. I think there's no question that for me, with my playing music professionally, it was the only thing that I wanted to do since I was nine years old. I think that college didn't really interest me at all when I was in high school, when I was focused on the band and whatnot. And I think now as I get older, I see my friends who really enjoyed college ... I see that, and I obviously thirst for knowledge like anybody else does ... in some ways or another, living on a tour bus and going and playing college shows and partying every night, you get that side of the experience, if not a multiplied out version of that experience, but just to be in a class and be getting information that I don't have is something that I hope in the future I can find time for and do and learn from that.

Do you have any idea what you'd want to study?

Probably political science is my guess. Or music. You know, for me, that's probably what will be in the caveat to me actually jumping into college at some point … to study music more in depth.

So you're doing this small college tour now. Any plans for a bigger tour after Glass Passenger is released?

Oh, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Do you know who you'd be touring with yet?

There are a few things floating around that I can't exactly say. In the next couple weeks, those things might get pinned down, but it might be a little bit longer before we find out or before we actually even mention. But, yeah, then of course there are plans to get on the road and headline and do a large proper tour.

Do you like doing the college tour better or the bigger ones?

I mean, I like doing the college shows a lot. I'd always prefer doing shows where everyone can get in and [the shows] are promoted in a large capacity, but the college shows are a really awesome way to sort of make extra connections … It targets a more specific demographic. When you do that, a lot of the time you have greater penetration in the market because you have a group of people who see each other regularly, or share similar experiences on a regular basis. And if they share a good experience at one of your concerts, it's going to help grow your base. And I think college kids are like high school kids - really invested in their music. But of course when you play a show that is geared at high school, college kids, everything, on the perimeter you have a show that's a little bit more well-rounded as far as the support you get from the crowd.

What would you say to the aspiring college musician?

I would say play often. And try and get out and just see an audience, whatever audience that is, on a regular basis. If [the musician's] aspiration is to be in a band, on tour and on the road and whatnot, my suggestion, to anybody in a band not just college students, is to actually just play your hometown and whatever town you're living in. Find a gig; find a venue; get your friends out. You're gonna find out quickly if people want to come back. But, it's so hard to give counsel to anybody in the music business, especially with how f**ing disastrous the music business is right now. You know what I mean? It's like you gotta have a huge amount of killer instinct, a lot of ambition and a lot of perseverance. And I think if you have those things, and you have the talent to back it up, or at least a level of connectivity with your audience, you can still get through. It's hard, you know. It's never easy doing anything on that kind of a scale that involves so much rejection. And there's always the "stay in school" thing, but I never really subscribed to that philosophy.

Well, you never had a chance to!

Yeah (laughs). I never showed up.

Post Crescent Interview - April 9th, 2008

2008-06-22T12:05:00.000-07:00

By Sarah Owen
Source

You can just picture him. Milling about his So-Cal kitchen or running afternoon errands, oblivious to things like the dog barking or traffic as he throws his head back to laugh in mock-rebellion, declaring that “they” — producers, managers, anyone — don’t have him at all today.

“I got me,” said Jack’s Mannequin lead singer Andrew McMahon.

A day off from non-stop studio work on “The Glass Passenger,” the followup to 2005’s debut “Everything in Transit,” his voice is eager and brimming with energy. Just ask him whether he’s looking forward to opening for Ben Folds when the two perform Thursday, April 17 in Oshkosh.

“I’m freaking out!” McMahon blurts. “I am such a fan! … I was the googily eyed fan at Ben Folds concerts for years.”

With a tour and album release slated for summer and a personal film project, “Dear Jack,” in its final stages, McMahon, also known as the frontman for pop-punkers Something Corporate, feels a bit freer these days, ready to close the door on a tumultuous last few years. From videotaping his 2005 battle with leukemia to the dawn of new music, the singer/songwriter opens up to Weekend.

Q: Your trip to Oshkosh is coming up fast, and you’re sharing the lineup with Ben Folds.

A: Ahh, yes! I’m freaking out!

Q: Big fan, huh?

A: I am such a fan! It’s funny. There weren’t many piano-playing icons for piano players when I was a young kid into rock music, so seeing him come out … I was hanging out as a freshman in high school after a show when I got a copy of his first record. I’ve got pictures of me and him with my buddies when we were kids, meeting him outside club gigs. It was pretty cool.

Q: And this is the only show on the tour you get a chance to share a lineup with him?
A: Yeah, just this one. I’m really excited but also kind of terrified, because he’s eight million times the piano player I am.

Q: What’s the experience like for you, in general, when you’re sort of looking out into a crowd of your peers in a college atmosphere?

A: It’s great. I mean, for me. We obviously started in Something Corporate … coming up in the punk-rock scene it was much more typically a high-school fan base. Then toward the later years with Something Corporate and the transition to Jack (in 2004), it became a hybrid of high school and college kids. It’s nice playing a gig where they’re there to listen to the band and dig the musicianship and want to wrap their head around what we’re trying to do on stage.

Q: And did we hear something about “The Glass Passenger” being released this month, or was that just rumor?

A: (laughs) We put that date out there when we thought I would make a record quickly, and I did anything but that. It’s taken a lot of time for me to pin down completely what I want it to be. We are pretty much in the final stages, wrapping it up, so sometime mid-summer. We’ll be out on tour, so hopefully it’ll be out by late July.

Q: You’ve obviously been touring and playing a lot the last few years between releases; have you debuted some songs that might make it on the album?

A: We’ve sort of been throwing one or two in every gig. As time’s gone on there’ve been a couple songs we were throwing in we thought would make the record that (laughs) aren’t anywhere near to making the record. So some stuff found itself out into the world that probably won’t make the record, but I’m pretty protective of (the material). We’ll throw one or two into the Oshkosh show, probably, depending how much time they give us for the set.

Q: It’s been a long road getting to this album. I’m sure there were a lot of directions you could’ve taken with it.

A: I look at it as time you actually get to dig in, take this job I have — which is so awesome — and make art with it. I take time when I make records. Most people get down on me occasionally because there’s been three-year lapses between records I’ve made, but I’m sort of an autobiographical writer, and when life throws a lot of different things at you there’s a lot of directions you can take.

Q: What ultimately steered you, and where do you see it winding up?

A: Obviously the past few years have been pretty eventful in my life. The cancer was an interesting thing, kind of a tough subject to broach in the form of a pop album (laughs). So that was a little bit of a stumbling block for me, but I feel I got some good material (from) it, yet I didn’t want it to be just a record about that either. And I got married in the last couple years, and that’s an interesting subject, too, especially when a lot of your fans might not know what that’s all about.

Q: What sort of insight will fans get this time around?

A: The last record very much had a theme, a definitive subject matter — coming back to Southern California, losing love and finding love and everything that happened along the way. This record, if there’s any constant theme it’s just about how you can get sort of knocked down, get back up again and find the hope in similar difficult situations. It’s really taken a long time. I’ve been working on this album the better part of a year now; even some of the songs I worked on in the year before that, as well. Finally in the past few weeks it’s started to shape up and started to sound like an album for me.

Q: You’ve also got a film nearing completion, “Dear Jack,” which is pretty personal for you. What’s the status with that project?

A: Like the record, it’s a constant adventure. I’m not a filmmaker, so I’ve been dealing with a lot of great people trying to find a home for it. We thought about releasing it straight to DVD, but it’s not something I’d consider just a fan piece. It’s a pretty fascinating look, and personal look, into what happens to a person going through diagnosis and recovery and survival of a disease. It’s one of those things, to get that out to the larger public is important.

Q: Now that it’s near completion are you, I don’t want to say looking forward to closing the door on that chapter, but …

A: Yeah. (laughs) It’s been sort of this beautiful, this struggle of my last year. The chapter in my life where obviously it’s been a long road out of it and back to where — not to say where I started out, but being as healthy as I was. I look at the release of this record, the release of this film as my closure to what was a trying but very important chapter in my life.

Q: What is it like, now, going back and watching the footage?

A: It’s pretty intense. At this point, I would say I’ve been slightly desensitized to it, having to see it several times over the course of several months. I start to learn to accept what it was, and that’s been an exceptional healing tool to me. The first handful of times I came face to face with the footage … I shot most of the footage myself just on my camera, not with any intention of it coming out, in sort of a period of time where I had videotaped almost all of my life up to that point so I just kind of continued. So seeing it sort of essentially from my own eyes the second time around, definitely the first time I watched the movie I woke up the next day basically feeling as sick as I did the first day in the hospital. You find when you’re in that situation, there’s an intense connection between the mind and body. For a while I put my body right back to where I was.

Q: What’s the hope you have in showing it publicly?

A: Like anything, I think my goal has been since the day I got that … sickness … I felt like somehow instinctually the goal was to bring some amount of hope to people … to try and find something positive in any hard situation. I started playing piano when I was nine years old. It was a direct reaction to losing an uncle to melanoma, and his sort of motto through life and as he was passing, he wanted everyone to be positive. It was the connection to him where I found my heart. It seems like it’s only an extension of that motto, to pass this message of positivity to people even in the face of difficult. It’s to hope, to tap that hope and make it something to live by. I think in a lot of ways getting sick, for me, and everything in this aftermath is something to validate that point.

Q: With everything we go through in life, we hope it makes us stronger. Do you feel like you more know your place in life or have more a sense of direction and future?

A: There were times in the past couple years I’ve been more lost than I’ve ever been, and I say that with a smile on my face. I assumed I’d get to the other side, have this wisdom, and it’s (bull). I think there are some things I have a better grasp on, but I truthfully feel we’re all wandering around just trying to figure out what … we’re here for. And I enjoy the journey and accept it. It’s not like I’ve come out some sort of sage or something (laughs).

Suburban Horror Interview - August 14th, 2007

2008-06-22T11:49:00.000-07:00

By Suburban Horror
Source

Being a Something Corporate fan, I was glad to catch up with Andrew McMahon of Jack's Mannequin at the San Diego Warped Tour. We then proceeded to talk about almost everything, even some things you may have wanted to know.

Suburban Horror: So, you, I bet, always get compared to Something Corporate.

Andrew McMahon:(laughs) Yeah it has happened.

SH: How do you feel that you are different?

AM:It’s probably a better question for someone more objective than myself. (laughs) Obviously, it’s a much different configuration. I did this record sort of on my own with my producer Jim and sort of just used it as an opportunity to kind of experiment with some different kinds of sounds. Approached the recording of the record differently - the way we sort of built the record from the ground up was much different, it was not really alive. Usually we’d go in and work songs out live with the band, where there was no band when I started this. We’d sneak in and program drums and build the tracks mainly in the studio, which lead to a spontaneous energy. What we did wasn’t really calculated. It was very loose and fun. We’d just throw everything we had in the song. Whereas you’d usually go in to record a record over a month or two, we’d go in for a couple days at a time and work on one or two songs and it took us a year/ year and a half to make it. I think, in that sense, the record benefited in having a little more perspective than I’ve had in the past to make records. I was able to digest these songs over the course of many months and refine them. I think, sonically, there is a lot of different sounds on this record that people haven’t heard on the Something Corporate record.

SH:What is your favorite song?

AM: Probably Dark Blue on the album. It’s actually our next single and for me it was as the last song I wrote on the record. I always find that my favorite song is the last one that I worked on. I think that song for me sums up the record in a lot of ways. I wrote it to do that.

SH: Okay, so how did you get involved in Warped Tour?

AM: I did my first Warped Tour in 2002 with Something Corporate. We did the whole tour. And then ever since then, I guess the summer after that we played a few days on the tour while we were on tour with 311 most of that summer, so you could see the whole thing with them. Something Corporate was booked again for last summer, and I had literally, two or three weeks before we were supposed to go on those dates, been diagnosed with leukemia, so I got stuck in the hospital versus actually being out here. But Kevin, said if I had days I could come out and do this summer to give him a call. I was home for day and I was like, Warped Tour’s passing through San Diego. I gotta come down! So the whole band drove down from L.A. today to play the show.

SH: Are you guys going to do any more dates?

AM: We actually are going to be on tour all summer with a band called O.A.R.

SH: Of A Revolution?

AM: Of A Revolution. Yes exactly, you know. Not as many people on the west coast are as familiar with them. But, yeah we’ll be doing their amphitheater tours in support for them. Unfortunately, I can’t do (Warped). When they were booking this tour I was still pretty sick, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to tour during the summer. Needless to say, I am now (laughs) But we were glad to get on at least a date with (Warped).

SH: I’m glad you guys picked San Diego.

AM: Yeah I love it. It’s probably the coolest date they have all summer as far as weather is concerned.

SH: Okay here are the random questions. If you could go on tour with anyone alive or dead, who would it be?

AM: Alive or dead? Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. I love the whole band. I’m a big fan. Their new record is just going to blow people’s minds for sure.

SH: Okay, explain your favorite tattoo.

AM: Of mine? That’s a hard one. I don’t know- well this one, the simplest one of all. It’s a quote from a Hermann Hesse novel called Siddhartha, which most college students have read. I just think it’s a great statement about life. I’m proud to have it on my body. (laughs)

SH: Your favorite author?

AM: I’ll be honest: I should read a lot more than I do. I’ve read a lot of stuff. Bacalski is probably my favorite author at this point.

SH:And are you a movie buff?

AM:It’s funny I feel like I am. It’s been so long since I’ve been going to movies regularly. I went and saw the Devil Wears Prada the other day.

SH:I saw it too. What do you think?

AM: I thought it sucked. I was really bummed out. I don’t know it seemed boring to me; I wasn’t in the mood for that movie. But I’m much more into older movies. Whatever is on HBO. I love a good movie.

SH:What do you do to keep sane on tour?

AM: To keep sane on tour? I used to have a harder time to be sane on tour. Now, I just love to play. I spend a lot of time on my cell phone talking to people back home and doing a lot of work and stuff. But for the most part, I’ve been trying to take a different approach to touring. I used to spend 10 or 11 months on the road. I’ve been going for three or four weeks, going back for a couple of weeks, going on; it’s been a lot easier to stay sane because I’ve been monitoring my schedule a more closely than I used to.

SH:What instruments do you play?

AM: Piano and sing. And I take a shot at the guitar every couple months and go “I know how to play piano better.” I’ll play about anything. But pretty much piano and vocals are my best.

SH:Were you forced into piano?

AM:They tried when I was in 1st grade. I had two lessons then boycotted. Then I found it on my own. I’d been writing poetry since I was a kid. When I was in 4th grade I had a close family member pass away and I sat at the piano we had in our house and started writing little songs. That’s how I started. Eventually took lessons. I went to the crazy German piano teacher, Ms. Zeizringenhousen. And, yeah, she beat me up and got me into shape. Studied and played ever since.

Popzap! Interview - August 1st, 2007

2008-06-22T09:15:00.000-07:00

By Curt Baker

When vocalist and pianist Andrew McMahon announced that his band, Something Corporate, would be taking a break and he would be pursuing a solo endeavor, the pop-punk community held its breath.

“I had built such an amazing fan base with Something Corporate and I wanted it to be something that would be viewed independently. I hoped that kids would be able listen to it, and maybe they like Something Corporate and they don’t like Jack’s Mannequin, maybe vice versa, maybe they like both,” states McMahon. “I just wanted people to listen to it with fresh ears, irrespective of what I had done in the past and would hear the songs on their own.”

One of the genre’s most recognizable frontmen was taking a blind leap into an ambiguous new project, financed on his own for the majority of the venture, but managed to shrug off any pressure.

“There weren’t really any expectations going into it at all,” says Andrew. “I suppose going out of it, into releasing the record there was some pressure. But, the thing about the process of writing it and recording it was that it was really what felt good, what felt right, what felt natural. It was first about creating something pure that I felt I could believe in. Once I believed in it of course, then I was like ‘I hope it does well.’”

Jacks’ Mannequin’s debut album, Everything In Transit, did in fact “do well”, debuting at number 37 on Billboard’s Top 200 albums chart. Even without being able to tour because of Andrew being diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the album delivered beyond hopes.

“The label did great with reaching out to as many different places as they could to get support, but obviously without being on the road it’s tough. It has delivered beyond any expectation I’ve had, to get to come here [Milwaukee Summerfest] and headline a festival as Jack’s Mannequin is amazing. My hope was to be playing to maybe 1,000 kids as Jack’s Mannequin in the lifespan of the record and we’ve being playing to 2, 000-4,000 kids a night.”

Now, Andrew is focused on writing the follow-up to Everything In Transit, but is careful to steer clear of being stereotypical.

“I try really hard not to write songs that were about [my sickness],” tells Andrew. “Not to say they weren’t influenced by what happened the last two years with getting sick, but I didn’t want to write a hospital record you know? I mean I lived it and I think people expect me to go back and write that. Theme wise, I think Everything In Transit was so much about getting me to the place, but I think it’s always going to be about evolving, it’s always going to be about moving forward. I think this new material is going to be more about me having learned so much and picked up so much. I mean it will be urgent, but I don’t think it will have that same kind of clinging urgency, it will probably be a little more settled in. I like what I’ve heard so far. It’s hard to really expound upon it when I haven’t really gotten there.”

Thus far, the writing process has been laid back and allowed to grow on its own.

“These records creep up on me. I mean I wrote and pretty much finished the Jack’s Mannequin record before there was even a record label involved, and now there is a label involved and so I’ve sort of had to adjust to that. You know there’s a tendency for labels to want to push and facilitate the process. And I love my label actually, they’ve been really great to me, but it finally got to the point where I said, “You guys I can’t, I can’t work on your timeline. I can’t work with your producers.”

Despite writing the second Jack’s album on new terms, Andrew has been able to find his groove.

“Over the course of the past year there’s been a handful of songs, maybe 3 or 4, that I’m really proud of that I’ve recorded just sort of sneaking into the studio,” says McMahon. “So there’s a little bit of a basis for a beginning. I went in this week and recorded a song that I’m just fucking thrilled about. It got in my head and it was like, ‘Okay I can do this again.’ It’s been a long time since I’ve been studio bound, which is really what I kind of consider my real home. So to be honest, that was huge just to be back in the studio and sort of rekindle the whole deal. So yeah, we’re ready to go. I wouldn’t say I’m far along, but I would say I’m in the middle of the process.”

Scene Point Blank Interview - November 2006

2008-06-22T09:03:00.000-07:00

By Graham Isador
Source

Scene Point Blank: After the release of your last album, Jack's Mannequin went out on a very well received headlining tour. The dates you're doing now, with Panic! at the Disco, see you having to cater to an audience who aren't necessarily there to see you. I was wondering what the crowd reaction has been like, and is there any expectations you have about people are seeing you for the first time?

Andrew McMahon: The crowd on this tour has really been incredible. For us, being able to play for ten thousand people a night is pretty awesome. The only others times I've gone into arenas, aside from one off shows that I've done with Something Corporate, was with Good Charlotte. Not to slag those guys, but it was a much different audience then what we were really going for at the time. The label told us we needed to go out on the road, and it was what it was. This crowd, though it's still kind of a pop crowd, is made up of mainly young females, you know: sixteen/seventeen year olds. It's a good demographic for us to be playing to and they seem to be really getting it. We have a lot of kids who know the words to the songs, and a lot of kids who know "Dark Blue" and "The Mixed Tape" cause they've been on the video channels that Panic! at the Disco's been on. That's been awesome, and I couldn't ask for anything more.

Scene Point Blank: For the kids who are hearing you for the first time, is there ever a notion of needing to impress anyone?

Andrew McMahon: Well, yeah, kind of. It's our job to put on a show that makes people want to see us again. I mean, it's a lot easier to play to people who know your band, and know your songs, and will be into it in some way no matter what happens. The real challenge is trying to get someone who doesn't know you at all, and doesn't have any kind of expectation going into it, to go from not knowing you period to being a fan when they leave. For me especially, this tour worked out really well in the field of my recovery, cause I finally feel like my head is finally catching up to my body. After being sick, to be on these big stages has really been convenient. I won't lie, in the summer and the subsequent headlining tour that we did, I was definitely getting better but I had some nights where I just wasn't feeling so good. You know what I mean? It was a little bit of a toss up how the show would go, and how my body would react to the show itself. On this tour, the past seven shows, I feel like I'm at a level which is very similar to what I was doing before I got sick. I don't go out and poll the audience at the end of the night, but seemingly from the crowd reactions, and the people that we've had in the audience because we always send our friends out to go see what the vibe is, it's been pretty good.

Scene Point Blank: Mentioning your sickness; I don't want to dwell too much on it, but in your lyrics, and website, deal with some issues which are very personal to you. Other artists in similar situations tend to be rather secretive about these types of things, while you've been quite forward during the whole process. Does there ever come a point where it feels like too much exposure? Why do you feel the need to be so open with what's going on?

Andrew McMahon: I think at some points, more so recently than ever. Strangely enough, I probably gave more away when I was sick, and recovering, and in the middle of the whole thing. For whatever reason that felt like a really natural part of my whole healing process, or whatever, and I felt really comfortable with the whole thing. Now that the whole thing is kind of behind me, it gets kind of redundant at some points. I'll be doing a radio interview for instance and, well, in my opinion, who listening to the radio wants to listen to somebody talk about having cancer. I mean it's your rock station, and you've got some local rock DJ trying to Barbra Walters you into saying some heavy shit on the radio. I don't see that as an appropriate medium for those types of discussions. I've had a couple of situations where it's been a little invasive and a little prying, but it was sort of my fault for putting so much out there to begin with. I think people think I'm pretty comfortable with the whole thing, but I also put that stuff out there when it was on my own terms. I was in a space where I was comfortable, and sometimes when people hit you over the head with it or won't let it go, it gets frustrating. When they want an interview only talking about my sickness, I'm thinking "Well I'm fifteen months in remission" and granted a large part of that remission was a recovery process but still this happened to me over a year and a half ago and I'm trying to move past it. It's still a pretty relevant part of who I am and most people are pretty good about it but some times it gets to be a bit much.

Scene Point Blank: Along those lines, the personal content of your lyrics in Jack's Mannequin has varied quite a bit from the Something Corporate days. What made Everything in Transit come out like it did?

Andrew McMahon: I definitely tried to be a lot more pointed with this. I did my best to be as direct with this album as possible. A lot of that had to do with when I was writing this, I was writing it as a love letter to someone I wasn't really speaking with at that point, and frankly, I wasn't sure if I was ever going to again. With a lot of Something Corporate records I think it was very easy for me to dodge certain things and hide behind the way I would articulate certain lyrics. With this record I was like: fuck it, I'm putting it all out on the table and I don't want there to be even a question, at least when it came to who I was writing for, that this is who I'm writing for and this is what I'm trying to say. I learned a lot. For me, as a writer, that's a much more challenging thing to do. To write good lyrics that are meaningful and sound nice, in terms of the syntax and in terms of how they actually play out, but also really say what you're trying to say and not hide behind anything. That's a tough thing to do, as a writer and as a person, but I feel that I'm better when I do that. I hope that I can continue to take that approach but when it comes to music I've always created for me first and everyone else second. In turn, a lot of times I end up saying things that people may be shocked I would talk about in a public scenario. I think that's what makes artist's good; that in some sense they can wear their heart on their sleeves but in other sense maintain their silence and leave it in the art. I'm sure there will be a lot of things that I try to put to rest on my next record, and that'll open up a whole new wave of questions which will have me responding " Oh, just listen to the record please!" (laughs) It is what it is. It's a part of what I do, and I would hate to not be as telling as to keep someone from knowing exactly what's on my mind.

Scene Point Blank: Though it's obvious that you're writing music for your self, as your fan base increases and people become more and more fanatic, do you ever take into account that you're songs are going to be judged by other people?

Andrew McMahon: Um, no. It's a factor, but I think I can say I write for me first because I want to present something that I connect to, but on a universal level something others will connect to as well. I know that sounds a little backwards, because I say I'm doing it for myself, but that's how I like to write. The music I grew up listening to was largely pop and radio music. Not what I would consider pop in the sense that it lacks credibility but just music that was so well written that from one sense you could get that they were saying something that meant something to them, but also something that really did connect at a larger level. I don't really feel a large sense to go beyond that and maybe find producers that are the " now/it" producers or try to really shoehorn myself into what's going on at the time. I think that's where I differ from some of my contemporary's who are going out of their way to fit the scene, or mold that's going on. Good song writing is good song writing and those songs will stand the test of time. I don't want to create music that intentionally sounds like something popular now, because my hope is that I can make songs that will be good enough to be successful on their own, or at least successful enough that I can keep doing my job.

Scene Point Blank: You've spent the better part of your adult life playing music, and being more or less in the public eye. As all of this is so well documented, do you ever look back at what you've done, or something you put out a couple years ago, and cringe?

Andrew McMahon: I think that it happens, but it happens to every artist. When I do cringe, it's not with a lack of respect for what I've created in the past. I'm sitting there thinking, "I'm so young, I can't believe my voice sounded like that" or " Why did I think it was okay to say that?" You do it, and then you back off, and realize well that's where I was so of course I was going to say that. You grow, and you evolve, just like anybody does in his or her own life. Somebody who is a writer, a singer, or a painter, or anyone who does what they do on an artistic level leaves a trail of who they used to be. You look back on it as the same way someone might look back on their teenage years and think "Can you believe the stupid shit we were doing?' Even my buddies and I look back on the stuff we did on the weekends in high school and just wonder how we ever thought that was cool. In that same way, sometimes you look back at what you did when you were seventeen or eighteen years old and it's incredibly profound and really say something about where you were at the time. You take that away and know that this song is a piece of me, it will always be a piece of me and I'm glad I said it.

Scene Point Blank: I remember some weekends friends and I spent throwing donuts at pedestrians.

Andrew McMahon: That used to be a huge part of our weekend, not the donut thing, but water-ballooning pedestrians. It was horrible. We'd run out of water balloons and just throw whatever takeout we had in the car. I remember this one time throwing a cup of guacamole at somebody.

Scene Point Blank: Ketchup was always a favorite of mine.

Andrew McMahon: We had our asses handed to us one time by this high school football team. We were like fifteen at the time and could just drive and I made a mustard packet into this guy's window. He chased us down and stole our money and stuff. We stopped doing that after awhile.

Scene Point Blank: Me too. One thing I've been trying to do is get all the artists I've been talking with lately to pick one of their songs which they feel best defines them, what would be yours?

Andrew McMahon: I'd say "Made for Each Other."

Scene Point Blank: Parts one and two?

Andrew McMahon: Yeah. For me that track as a whole is really repetitive. And the reason I made it last on the record is because it spells out an over all philosophy. It definitely is in line with who I am, and what I believe.

Scene Point Blank: I haven't got much else um, if the moon were made out of barbeque spare ribs would you eat it?

Andrew McMahon: Would you eat it? Would you eat it?

Scene Point Blank: I know I would. In fact I've had seconds. Your thoughts?

Andrew McMahon: Cubs win! Cubs win! You've got your ear to the ground, Graham.

Scene Point Blank: Thanks a lot for everything, Andrew.

The GW Hatchet Article - October 27th, 2005

2008-06-22T08:58:00.000-07:00

By Amanda Pacitti
Source

Andrew McMahon, frontman of contemporary rockers Something Corporate and newly formed Jack's Mannequin, proved to be a quiet warrior as an inevitably righteous California rocker. Recovering from a battle with leukemia, Andrew said that he hopes to be back on tour "… as soon as my doctors say it's healthy."

Jack's Mannequin, which Andrew calls his "side project," has recently released Everything in Transit, described by McMahon as "more piano-heavy" and "more adventuresome sonically" than his work with Something Corporate.

"I wasn't really trying to get away from Something Corporate or get away from anything in particular … I just had a lot of really personal thoughts and wanted to put them down," McMahon explained in an interview with The Hatchet.

Though not a complete departure in sound, McMahon boasted of the freedoms the Jack's album allowed, such as the storyline concept and the spoken word element evident in the album.

"When did society decide we have to change and wash a T-shirt after every individual use? If it's not dirty, I'm going to wear it," McMahon quirkily proclaims with a fluidity only to be characterized as Californian in the track titled "I'm Ready."

McMahon openly compares Everything in Transit to The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds (considered an ego-album for The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson), though McMahon does not consider himself the Brian Wilson of Jack's Mannequin.

"Ahh … the ego-record," said McMahon, laughing. Mainly, the influence of Pet Sounds was in perception of sound. "Everything didn't have to be so rigid and contrived," he said.

McMahon described the effects his leukemia recovery would have on his ability to perform. With a hopeful laugh, he explained, "The jury's still out on that one." Performances in the near future will most likely be in the California area due to travel restrictions.

He described the track "Dark Blue" of Everything in Transit as that which was "most strangely foreshadowing" of his illness, and potentially most meaningful. "I wrote that on a stage on a college campus, actually," he said of "Dark Blue."

McMahon described an experience watching the Counting Crows on "Saturday Night Live."

"That was kind of what really woke me up, I think, to music," explained McMahon, The Counting Crows album serving the "escapist filament" that he understands music to be.

Though subscribing to no particular religion, McMahon considers himself to be a spiritual person, invested in Eastern philosophy more so than Western thought.

"I believe in a powerful energy that commands the universe," he said, adding that meditation and yoga brought spiritual strength while he was hospitalized.

Music has inspired McMahon deeply. He described an experience of listening to music in his hospital room as "a shot to the vein."

"It's kind of that visceral connection, you know, that people can feel, that inspires me most about music," he said.

More material is expected "when the clouds clear." Here's to brighter days.

Everything in Transit by Jack's Mannequin, released in August, is in stores.

EU Jacksonville Interview - October 12th, 2006

2008-06-22T08:42:00.000-07:00

By Kellie Abrahamson
Source

Jack's Mannequin at Plush
A terrific performance for a worthy cause

Lounging on a dark colored sofa in the backroom of Plush Nightclub sits Andrew McMahon, lead singer of Something Corporate and Jack's Mannequin. He looks right at home, dressed in a white tee shirt, shorts and flip flops, exuding an air of calm despite the fact that in a few hours he will be performing extremely personal songs for hundreds of people. He also looks a little thin, even for a rock star. You see, Andrew McMahon is a cancer survivor. Last year he was diagnosed with Acute Lymphatic Leukemia and after going through chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant, here he sits; a little thinner, a little wiser and, most importantly, alive.

"You're a lot more aware of the frailty of your existence, at least your physical existence," Andrew said, explaining how his life has changed since battling leukemia. "In turn I think at times that makes you almost more energized to do more and more and more and at times it makes you more contemplative and more restful and peaceful. I think I have more peace in my life in general now. I think when things spin out of control and get a little crazy, I think I find it easier to step back and go 'oh, wait a minute. It's cool. Here I am, right here. And I'm in it'. I think in that sense those lessons were invaluable."

By the time I had arrived for my interview with Andrew three hours before the doors were scheduled to open, a line of enthusiastic fans had already formed. When the crowd was finally allowed admittance, the line had quadrupled with a steady stream of 20-somethings and teens still coming. These are fans that are used to waiting. The release date for Jack's Mannequin's first album, Everything in Transit, was pushed back twice, once due to the addition of a song that would become their second single "Dark Blue". After much patience, the fans got to hear the album on August 23, 2005, the same day McMahon received his bone marrow transplant from his sister. The album did very well right out of the gate, debuting at #37 on the Billboard 200.

Jack's Mannequin is currently on tour with Copeland, Daphne Loves Derby and The Hush Sound. The 19-city "Tour for the Cure" will benefit the "Dear Jack Foundation," a nonprofit organization McMahon founded to fund cancer research. The tour made it's way to Plush on October 4th. For McMahon, this is a way to give back to those who may be diagnosed in the future and to the medical community that helped save his life.

"I saw an opportunity to go out and raise a ton of money to try and contribute to charities that were funding good research and were having success with advancing protocols and trying to increase survival rates and lengths of remissions and things like that… I just took my opportunity and that's what the foundation is about and that's what this tour has been about and I think largely that'll probably be what a lot of my life will be about going forward; just doing what I can to make sure if somebody has to hear the words that they have cancer that hopefully the next set of words will be 'we know how to fight it'."

A few years back I went to a Dashboard Confessional show and was so impressed by the atmosphere. The audience knew every word and sang them at the top of their lungs and it was this camaraderie I had never seen before or since… That is until Jack's Mannequin took to the stage! Andrew and the rest of the band (which consists of Jon Sullivan on bass, Jacques Brautbar -formerly of Phantom Planet- on guitar and Jay McMillan -formerly of River City High- on drums) had the audience enthralled from beginning to end, performing every song on Everything in Transit and a few extras, including a cover of Simon and Garfunkel's "Homeward Bound". Even when the upbeat songs gave way to quiet ballads, the room maintained an energy that was almost electric.
The "Tour for the Cure" comes to an end this week in Sacramento, but their days on the road are not over. Starting November 7th, the band will go on tour with Panic! At the Disco and Bloc Party and will be performing at the UCF Arena in Orlando. Jack's Mannequin is a band that is as good in the studio as they are on stage so if you missed them at Plush, be sure to make the trip to see them next month.

What made you decide to start Jack's Mannequin?

I didn't really like decide to start it, to be honest, it just sort of happened. I don't know, I mean [with] Something Corporate we were all very tired, we were ready to go on a break. There had been discussions of us going in to record another album and I had a good amount of songs written and… we were just at a point in our relationship as a band, at a level of burn out, where we sort of just didn't feel comfortable going into the studio to record and decided to just kind of take as much time off as we needed and take a break… Out of that I continued to write and continued to record as I always do and I think it coincided with a period of time that was extremely prolific and sort of profound as far as the place it holds in the timeline of my life and the songs just took a certain shape… All of a sudden I was sitting with 8 or 9 songs that I felt were very different than anything that I had ever put out with Something Corporate and were very personal and I saw them taking a shape as a story and I kind of going in a direction that wasn't Something Corporate at all and from there I decided to put them out on their own as its own project.

I read that you are always take time to talk to fans after concerts. Based on what you've heard, how have Something Corporate fans reacted to Jack's Mannequin?

There's sort of a philosophy that most bands know to be true which is that your fans always will tell you they like the last thing you did the best. That being said, we've sold more tickets on this tour than we did on the last Something Corporate tour. And the record, without me being able to go out and physically promote it, is rounding the 200,000 mark which as far as albums are concerned is getting right up there with the Something Corporate records. So I don't really know. The reality is this is where I'm going, this is what I'm doing and I love my fans and, like you said, I do everything I can to take time out to spend time with them but I don't write music for them. I write music because I try and create honest art and my hope is, obviously, always, that the people that liked my honest art from the past will like my honest art of the future. But at the same time when you start shackling yourself to perceptions that people have of you from a time of your life that is not now all you can do is try and play catch up or chase your tail. I don't think any real progress comes out of that. But, seemingly they're coming out to the shows, they're singing the words and we're selling a few thousand copies of the record every week, it would appear that's a reflection that people are enjoying it. But I guess I can't say for sure… You know, it's a funny thing. If you look at a Something Corporate audience from the last show Something Corporate played to a Jack's Mannequin audience, the audiences looks totally different. The Something Corporate kids have definitely come along and have stuck with me which has been awesome. But, it's funny with the Jack's Mannequin project… Something Corporate used to be really well known for essentially having a "teeny bopper" kind of audience, which truthfully, never bothered me. The fact is people were coming to see the shows and I was very happy about that and if that was 14 and 15 year old girls then so fucking be it, you know what I mean? But with this record we see almost an even split of guys and girls and almost an even split of high school and college kids which is, as far as albums that I've put out and shows that I've played, it's the most diverse audience that I've played to… Which, largely, was the goal of the project; not to diversify the audience but to make something that was so universal that nobody felt like it was exclusive to any one group or scene or crowd. That a fraternity guy in college could stand next to a freshman high school girl and sing the same words and still have them mean something to both of them and not be ashamed to be in the same room together. The shows have been really cool in that sense.

Beyond the music, you've got a lot of other stuff in the works. I read in your blog you'll be launching a clothing line (River Apparel) and that you're considering writing a book or making a documentary about the last year or two. What's the status of those things?

The clothing line is a wonderful, wonderful concept that I so hope to be launched before Christmas of this year. I will see my first samples tomorrow in New York City. I get on a plane at four this coming morning to go up there and start working on that. I'm also in the process of signing the contracts for this independent label that I'm starting so there's a handful of bands that I've started to work with so that's a whole other thing. And then, yeah, the documentary is sort of luckily one of the things that I've been able to remove myself from in the sense that any movie that you are the subject of I tend to find your much better off letting other peoples opinions steer the boat on that. But, actually, you may be familiar with the band May. One of the members of the band May and one of his close friends started a production company and they are close friends of mine and they approached me… I had a stockpile of home videos that I had taken with my video camera starting at the recording of the Jack's Mannequin process through the beginning of the band into what was the cancer diagnosis and the subsequent fight. So, I film it all… We have been piecing that together over the course of the past year and just submitted the first draft to Sundance and we cross our fingers and are very hopeful for a debut at Sundance this January. There's still a lot more work to be done on it, but the submission draft has gone out so we continue to work on it and we'll submit it to the other festivals as well if Sundance doesn't take it. I think it's going to be cool. I think it's going to be powerful and hopefully it'll be inspiring to a lot of people and a good music movie that has a positive story to it.

What's the story you're telling in "Everything in Transit"?

I guess it's loose in the same way that everybody is living out their own story, you know what I mean? For me it was a period of time where I had come back and was sort of very detached… I think I lost a lot of my identity having spent so much time on tour with, not just four other band mates, but six or seven other crew guys and had done that for three or four years and it becomes easy when you do that without taking a break and never having anytime alone to even know who you are. And I left when I was 18 which is like the kind of crucial years for developing your identity, you know? A lot of the stories are the extremes I went through to access parts of myself that I felt I had lost; that I felt like if I didn't access quickly I might lose forever. I sort of broke ties with, not just my girlfriend, but my family and friends and a lot of people around me and just sort of jumped off the deep end for about a year and half and that's what I wrote about.

Do you think you'll do another concept album in the future?

I don't ever like to attach any expectations or ideas to anything. I didn't write it to be a concept record; it sort of just became one because it ended up mapping out a certain period of time in my life… In that sense I guess it has sort of a concept but it wasn't really like I had this master plan to create it as such. I guess after I had gotten through writing the bulk of it I was like "ok, wow, if I just fill in a few holes all of a sudden this paints a picture." Yeah, I did finish it with that in mind, but I just write songs, you know, and I hope they're good and yeah, it would be great if the next thing I wrote somehow was a continuation of where I left off or took on some sort of shape that made it a unique album experience. I feel like there's a lot that's been lost in modern music, in the actual crafting of the record. It's become a very, not to say "singles driven" market, but I think music has become so… its value has definitely seemed to decrease with the onslaught of how many bands there are out there that sound almost exactly the same. Songs become interchangeable from one band to the next and hopefully what ever I create next will, like the last project, be its own little pop art project; where if you get all the songs at one time and you put them in your stereo it's going to do something for you or create some sort of head space. That's how I like to make records.

Do you write lyrics first or the music first?

Generally speaking it all happens at once. It tends to be that it comes out of a mood or a thought process or something I'm trying to figure out that motivates me to start playing or writing. Often times there's like a lyric or single lyrical idea or thought that spawns a writing session. But I generally kind of write at the piano at least for the bulk of the song. Sit down and just sort of play piano and sing and bounce melodies and progressions and words off of each other until they sort of make sense. Sometimes it comes really easy, sometimes not as easy.

How do you decide which band you're writing for?

It's never really been an issue like that. When Something Corporate took a break I just wrote a recorded and everything I wrote and recorded was going to be put out with this project. At this point the same philosophy is true. There aren't any plans to do a Something Corporate record right now. I'm sure eventually there will be, but as it is this is the band I've been working on and sort of where my heart is, so it's not really a decision making process. I just write and record and hopefully when it's all said and done I get to put it out as a record.

I have to say, it was extremely inspiring to read your blog entries from the past year and a half. It seems like you remained extremely positive throughout the entire ordeal. Can you tell me a little bit about this tour and the Dear Jack Foundation?

I think you'll find with a lot of cancer survivors it sort of becomes a very immediate instinct, once you've gotten through to the other side… that makes you want to change what it is that put you where you were, just because this is [the kind of] trauma that you don't wish for anybody. And I saw an opportunity to go out and raise a ton of money to try and contribute to charities that were funding good research and were having success with advancing protocols and trying to increase survival rates and lengths of remissions and things like that… I just took my opportunity and that's what the foundation is about and that's what this tour has been about and I think largely that'll probably be what a lot of my life will be about going forward; just doing what I can to make sure if somebody has to hear the words that they have cancer that hopefully the next set of words will be "we know how to fight it." There are a lot of cancers that they do know how to fight and have great success rates. Leukemia for children has a great success rate but unfortunately for people in my age bracket most of the kids that I've encountered who have dealt with the same thing that I've dealt with aren't here anymore or might not be soon and that's something I feel a personal obligation to change.

Was music a large part of your recovery?

I think the motivation to get back to music was. Songs themselves and things like that. I think everybody had this image of me in a hospital room crafting some amazing piece of work because I was so… your hands don't work, your head hurts, you're sick, you don't want to leave the bed. Yeah, sometimes I would turn on some music to try and make it a little bit easier but the reality was I pretty much stared at a TV for six months and fought my ass off. But knowing that I had a record that I loved, that really was what I considered… sort of my one truly complete piece of art that I'd ever made that still had not been promoted other than what the label had done but I'd been completely excluded from... Knowing that was a huge part of my recovery because I pushed the shit out of myself to get to a level where I could physically be a part of the promotion of the album.

How has your life changed since battling Leukemia?

I don't know. Perspective shifts. You do your best to not get caught up in the minutia of the day a little bit more. I think you have a little more reverence to the fact that all of that stuff at the end of the day pales in comparison to physically actually being here... I mean a lot has changed and a lot is very much the same. It's sort of hard to even put your finger on it really except to say that you're a lot more aware of the frailty of your existence, at least your physical existence, and in turn I think at times that makes you almost more energized to do more and more and more and at times it makes you more contemplative and more restful and peaceful. I think I have more peace in my life in general now. I think when things spin out of control and get a little crazy, I think I find it easier to step back and go "oh, wait a minute. It's cool. Here I am, right here. And I'm in it". I think in that sense those lessons were invaluable.

What's your favorite song to perform live?

I love doing the covers. We've been doing a Simon and Garfunkel cover of "Homeward Bound" which has been a lot of fun every night. The covers are always to me the most fun because it's a chance to step away from your catalogue and try and do justice to someone else's songs.

What was the first concert you remember going to?

The first concert I ever went to was Billy Joel in Cleveland.

When did you know you wanted to be a musician?

Probably the first time I sat down at a piano and wrote a song which would have been when I was about 9 years old.

What do you do with your spare time?

I don't have any! I don't, I really don't. In my spare time I try and write music.

Favorite TV shows?

Entourage or Curb Your Enthusiasm, Big Love, all the HBO stuff. Arrested Development.

Favorite films?

I just saw Little Miss Sunshine. That was probably my favorite modern movie that's come out. My favorite movie of all time would have to be a tie between The Big Lebowski and The Royal Tennenbaums.

What's next for you?

It's just all happening at once. The Panic! At the Disco tour is what's next for Jack's.

So no plans to record any time soon with either band?

I record every time I'm home I generally record by myself just because I sort of find solace in that and I go from there. Ill be recording on and off throughout the year until hopefully I've got a collection of songs that's worth putting out again.

Driven Far Off Interview - September 26th, 2006

2008-06-22T08:29:00.000-07:00

By Michael Schneider
Source

This interview was written in August and done through e-mail, completed Tuesday, September 26, 2006 by Andrew McMahon of Jack’s Mannequin.

1. Your record sports a Parental Advisory sticker, what does the use of profanities contribute or detract from your music?

I write what is in my heart. If a profanity surfaces in a lyric and I feel that it is the most honest illustration of what I’m trying to say at the time I use it. My concern is creating honest art not albums free of little black warning labels.

2. I have read your blog every chance I have gotten over the past year, and you posted about the one-year anniversary of your diagnosis with Leukemia. Looking back on that time in your life, what elements of your battle, if any, would you have approached differently? Would you have made any different decisions with Jack’s Mannequin?

I try and live a life free of regret. There are always things we would approach differently if we had the insight of their effects on the future, but as that is not a luxury any of us are granted I do my best to approach each day with passion, live it to the fullest and leave it behind me.

3. From Something Corporate to Jack’s Mannequin your appearance changed quite a bit, you went from curly blonde hair to short and dark, it also seemed like the topics of your songs changed to a bit darker of a tone, do these two things correlate at all?

Towards the end of Something Corporate’s run I was in a state of arrested development. I felt like a hamster on a wheel pandering to everyone else’s needs but my own. When I came home I was exhausted and the quickest way to establish my freedom was to ditch the hair and the glasses and start fresh. I was ready to grow and stop living within the boundaries that I felt had been erected around me. As far as the sound difference I find that assessment interesting, as I think the Jack’s record is considerably more upbeat and hopeful than “North”, the most recent soco effort.

4. You control the musical future of Jack’s Mannequin, obviously, when in Something Corporate there were 4-5 who controlled the direction of the band, is there anyone whose opinion of JM that you would trust more than your own? Or should I say, you might compromise your opinion for their opinion?

First of all something corporate has four governing members not five and as far as Jack’s is concerned it is important to me that I maintain a very pure and personal approach to the crafting of the songs. I of course listen to surrounding opinions as I don’t think anything great can be created in a vacuum, but I prefer to keep the input limited to a very close and select group of artists.

5. Last summer at the Warped Tour JM had a booth following the tour where fans could write you letters, how many of those did you read? What impact did they have on you?

The impact was huge. When you are that sick just having a friend show up and sit with you for the afternoon can brighten your whole day. When thousands of people are sending you amazing and heartfelt letters it is so powerful and so motivating. Reading them personally was hard as my sight was greatly affected by the drugs I was treated with, but my family and friends were constantly passing along the kind words from the tour and for those fans I am forever grateful.

6. I read that you paid for the first production of the JM album out of your own project, was starting JM like starting over new, or did your fame in SOCO play a role?

I did not have a label for the majority of the Jack’s recording, so yes I was forced to pay the expenses out of pocket. In some ways it was like starting over, but really it was more like therapy. I wrote the songs because I was moved to write….a lot. I had made enough money from my days with Something Corporate that I was willing to spend it to create something that was pure and that spoke so directly to my passion for what I do, which is write songs.

7. Sent in from one of our readers: Do you speak any other languages?

I used to be pretty good with spanish, but lack of study and fewer trips across the border have not helped me gain much ground. One day I’d love to live in a spanish speaking nation and become fluent.

8. The amount you tour has increased exponentially over the last few months, how close to 100% are you feeling these days?

For the most part I feel 100%. I would be lying to say doing the headlining shows have not made me aware of some of the effects of my treatments. My lung capacity took quite a hit from the radiation and my legs are a lot weaker than they used to be. I’m doing my best to condition myself to a point where I will no longer notice, but that kind of training will have to wait until I have a bit more time at home to focus.

9. Tell me about the Dear Jack Foundation.

Simply, it’s a foundation I started to help appropriate money to charities that are making an impact on the research and awareness of Leukemia, Lymphoma and other blood diseases.

10. Can you tell us anything about the Dark Blue video?

Watch it! it’s cool. And if you have time vote for it on the video networks so more people will hear about the band.

11. Any last comments?

Thanks to my awesome fans for sticking with me for so many years. It’s been incredible being on tour and meeting kids who are in college now who have been seeing my shows since the were in middle school. What an honor. I am very lucky.