J. Hubner (goodbyewave + sunnydaymassacre)

D.M Jones: What led you to start up Sunnydaymassacre? This is all you, correct?

J. Hubner: Yeah, SDM is all me. Part of the appeal of doing this project was getting back to just me in the basement and recording. If I wanted to write and record a song on a Sunday afternoon I could. Not having to demo it, then give it to Jack(GBW drummer Jack Long) to learn it. Then schedule a time for him to come over and record what I’d already done was kind of a freeing feeling. I wanted to have a project that gave me that feeling I had when I was 20 years old and just learning to write and record. The spark that lit the creative fuse was the unknown. Then discovery blows up in your face. GBW has been going at it for sometime now. We’ve been writing and recording nonstop since 2006. We’ve put albums out every year since then up to this year. I think I’d run out of creative steam doing what we were doing in GBW. And what we were doing I’m proud of. But I needed a change and SDM has let me be the jangly, lo fi rocker I’d hoped I could be. Another reason that led up to this project was a conversation I’d had with a friend. I’d mentioned that the thought of getting ahold of an old 4-track cassette recorder was floating around in my head. The simplicity of analog recording was an exciting thought. It was January of this year, and it was cold and snow-covered out. I may have been suffering from cabin fever, who knows. Anyways, the friend said “Do it. You need to do it. You should do a 4-song e.p. or something.” So with this encouragement, or dare possibly, I tracked down an old Tascam 414 Portastudio. I hit up Radioshack for some Maxell blank cassettes and SDM was born.

DMJ: Anything you’d like to say about the name? Any thoughts on the runningtogetherness this name shares with Goodbyewave?

JH: I think I’ve basically backed myself in a corner here with these band names. It was never my intention to make it some sort of ‘thing’ with me to have these multi-syllable band names. It just sort of happened that way. There’s no hidden meaning. It’s just laziness on my part. As far as the name itself. I’ve had the idea to have a side project called sunnydaymassacre for a few years. It goes back to a single picture of my eight-year-old daughter who at the time was five. She liked taking my cell phone and doing self portraits of herself as we drove in my car. Well, usually one of those pictures out of 25 shot during a 15 minute drive turns out really well. This one pic was a side shot of her face, with the sun in the corner of the frame. It was this amazing picture. I was floored when I saw it. The phrase sunnydaymassacre just popped into my head. Unfortunately the picture got deleted. Otherwise I would’ve used it as the album cover.

DMJ: What possesses a guy living in Warsaw, IN to not only make great- sounding indie pop, but also be so prolific?

JH: I think it might be the Aspergers Syndrome caused by the large amounts of chemicals that have seeped into the ground water that I’ve consumed in the 37 years I’ve lived here. No, but seriously, I had no idea I was prolific. It’s just what I do. I think if you ask any artist, be it musician, painter, graphic designer, writer, and they’ll tell you they have no idea how they got to where they are artistically. If you wear your talent like some sort of badge of honor then I think that artist can’t be taken seriously. You do what you do. You do it because you have to. You have to get it out or you lose your mind. Since I’ve started writing and recording it’s always been about me wanting to create for an audience of one. Me. It’s an amazing feeling when someone other than yourself loves and appreciates what you make. But if no one were to hear this music I make in my little basement studio, located on the map between Nowhere and Nothing, then I’d be cool with it. As far as the music goes, my influences vary greatly. The Beatles and Wilco have pretty much been ground zero for me in where I start with a song. Great melodies, vocal harmonies and jangly guitar. Once those are established, for me, the rest comes naturally. John Lennon and Jeff Tweedy have been essential in shaping how I write a song. A song for me needs to take you somewhere. Whether it’s somewhere in the past, or a story in the song itself. Songs are escapism to me. I wanted to be a writer when I was 18 or 19 years old. I realized pretty quickly that I  didn’t have the patience for it. I couldn’t imagine spending 6 months, a year, even years on a single artistic statement. The great American novel wasn’t in my future. So I soon realized that songs are like short stories. Whether they’re literal like a Sherwood Anderson story, or off kilter and strange like Kurt Vonnegut. Songs could convey whatever you wanted to convey, in 3 minutes or less. So my albums are basically collections of short stories. And I want the short stories to be as interesting and enjoyable as possible.

DMJ: How did you get started?

JH: Being in “the lake city,” there’s not much of a scene for original music. In fact, there’s not much of a scene at all. There’s jukebox cover bands that play top 40, classic rock and blues rock. That’s it. There seemed to be, in the late 90s, a few local original rock bands in the area; but most just went east to Fort Wayne or west to South Bend. So being that I’m the only one I know buying Jason Falkner, the Grays, Supergrass, Sloan, Wilco, Adrian Belew and Eleven records in the early and mid 90s, I was sorta on my own to make original music. I didn’t know anyone that played bass, so I bought a bass and played it myself. I didn’t know anyone who played drums, so I bought a drum set and played it myself. I didn’t know any singers, so I begrudgingly sang my own songs. I had a 4-track cassette recorder, so I started making basement recordings in the small practice room my dad had built for me to practice in at their house when I first started playing guitar at 12 years old. By the time I was 21 I had this 8 X12 practice room filled with a desk with the 4-track and monitors, a five-piece drum set, a guitar amp, bass amp, two electric guitars, two acoustic guitars, a bass and as stereo for playback. It had to look like the musical equivalent of the clown car at the circus. Or a Michel Gondry music video. But it was great. I had everything I needed to make songs. I worked full-time at a local orthopedics company by the time I was 19 years old. It was second shiFort So I’d sleep till 10am, get up and go downstairs and record. I’d get home after work around 10:30-11pm and go downstairs and write and mix. I’m sure my girlfriend (now my wife of 15 years) loved that I’d become some sort of basement troll. She put up with me and I thank her for it. Thank you, dear.

DMJ: Any stories about early bands/projects?

JH: Back in 1998 I was in a band called Yellow Matter Custard. It consisted of myself and two of my cousins, plus a drummer who wasn’t in any way related. Anyways, we played around Warsaw, Nappannee, Syracuse and even Fort Wayne. The Fort Wayne gig was at this classy joint called Buster McNasty’s. By day a family friendly establishment that served sandwiches in baskets and plenty of arcade games for the kiddies to melt their brains playing. By night, it turned into a biker bar not unlike the juke joint in From Dusk Till Dawn. The owner was this little guy, maybe his name was B. Nasty, I don’t know. We take our PA system to the bar the Thursday night before we played so we didn’t have to mess with it the night of. Mr. B. Nasty shows up and starts talking to us about, I really don’t know what he was talking about (rumors of illegal substances were pretty much proven to be facts during this conversation). So Mr. Nasty grabs my hand and just holds it. Won’t let go. I have no idea what to do. So I just stand there holding hands with Mr. Nasty as the rest of the band look in disbelief at me and Buster as we hold hands. I eventually get my hand back. He tells us if we stick around for an hour that the bar will be full of bikers and we should stay and play. We left as soon as we could. He only paid us half of what he said he would and both nights pretty much sucked. It was so bad that Friday night our singer laid on the stage and just screamed into the microphone. Good times. We did played an acoustic set on Extreme 96.3’s morning show with JJ and Chad. I knew Chad from Warsaw when he worked at 107.3 and I used to send him faxes requesting Stryper as a joke. He responded with faxes back stating ‘”Bill Clinton is a Socialist.” Faxes. This was back before all that texting nonsense. After Yellow Matter Custard broke up my cousin Josh and I continued to write and record as Squarewave. Yes, the beginning of the run-on band names and “wave” references. We recorded one album together back in 2002. Selling A Dream was two years of writing and recording in basements and Sunday mornings of coffee and listening to music. It was a lot of fun.

DMJ: Can you list some influences who really inspired you along the way?

JH: The biggest influence that made me want to be a musician would be my uncle Mark. At a young age he exposed me to songwriting and recording. I remember being a little kid and him bringing his acoustic guitar to our house when he’d stay with us. Then getting older and going to his house where I had access to a keyboard, guitar, a reel-to-reel 8-track recorder, then a 4-track cassette. I got to see firsthand how to build a song from the ground up. I’d build these songs with horns, strings, guitar, percussion and piano. At the time I thought I was just messing  around. But looking back I was figuring out the fundamentals of building a song. He would perform at churches doing worship music and I’d go along and run sound for him. He’d be playing hymns in the front while I listened to Master of Puppets on my headphones in the back. It was great. My parents encouraged my love of music and guitar, buying me an acoustic at 12 years old and paying for lessons. They knew I’d never join the football team, so this would at least get me away from the TV. They’ve always supported what I’ve done musically. They could’ve said “knock it off and go to college” or “play baseball” like my brother. But they knew that wasn’t me. It’s always been music. Even going back to being five years old and playing Kiss’s “Dressed To Kill” on my Play School record player. Music has been my main love and they’ve respected that. My wife Paige has allowed me to follow this muse since we first started dating 20 years ago. She’s been patient and understanding. She’s never told me to give it up. She’s supported me all the way. I wouldn’t be doing any of this if it wasn’t for her. My kids amaze and confound me everyday. They inspired enough joy and anxiety in me to write several albums, over the next several decades. Artist-wise, Adrian Belew’s late-80s/early-90s output was a huge influence on me. I highly recommend Inner Revolution and Here to anyone who loves Beatles-inspired pop music, with a bit of experimentation thrown in. Then at 18 I bought the Beatles’ Rubber Soul and immediately bought everything else the Fab Four had done. The Kinks’ Village Green Preservation Society was another record that completely blew my mind. I couldn’t believe Ray Davies wasn’t as heralded as John Lennon, Bob Dylan or Paul McCartney. Hearing that record made me want to be a songwriter. Wilco, Flaming Lips, Spoon, ELO, Jason Falkner, the Grays, QOTSA, Cream and The Who have been big influences on me and the music I write as well.

DMJ: In the past, you’ve recorded with a digital recorder. But, some of your new stuff is done on cassette 4-track. Was this a “back-to-your-roots” thing, or did you have other reasons?

JH: This was definitely a back-to-basics thing. I wanted to get back to the simplicity of 4-track cassette recording. I wanted to see the machine working, as opposed to just the buzzing of a hard drive and LED lights flashing. I loved the idea of taking the 4-track upstairs into the bathroom and recording vocals, or taking it outside to record acoustic guitar. I’m not saying digital is evil (maybe I am), but there’s a certain feel with analog recording. The ease of getting different sounds(that aren’t produced by plug-ins) is a big plus for me. Natural reverb is so much better than something produced digitally. Not that I’ve abandoned modern recording techniques. I’m recording new songs digitally, while integrating tape-recorded drums. It’s the best of both worlds.

DMJ: Describe, if you can, how you go from a song idea through the recording process.

JH: The songwriting process changes song to song. I’ve never really been a “music comes first, then the lyrics” or vice versa kind of writer. It’s whatever inspires me. I get a lot of lyric ideas at work, so I keep a notebook at my desk to write them down. Sometimes it’s just a song title, and sometimes it’s maybe part of a verse. There have been times that I’ve written an entire song in five minutes. Though, I have some of those songs still sitting in a notebook because I haven’t gotten the right music for them yet. I think for me the most inspired stuff is when you come across a chord progression while you’re practicing and it sends chills down your spine. You know the instant you play it that you’ve got something special. Those are the songs that seem to just come together in minutes and have appeared from out of nowhere. You’re not even trying to write, yet this song just evolves from simply wanting to get away from the noise upstairs. For me, the best songs are born from happenstance. When I try to write something, it’s all just terrible. The best art is improvised and free to go where it wants to. Then the process of self editing comes into play. We can be own best or worst editor. The creation for me is the easy part. The true art is in the editing. I’ve gotten better over the years when it comes to editing my songs. But I think I could always improve in that department.

DMJ: You’re proficient on several instruments. Is guitar your primary one? How did you become adept at playing all these things? Lessons?

JH: Guitar was my first instrument. Well, I take that back. I started playing the harmonica when I was eight or nine. I even taught myself to play a couple songs out of the songbook that came with the harmonica. The harmonica was the consolation prize my parents gave me in lieu of a guitar. I didn’t want to take guitar lessons because I was afraid they’d set me up with some psychotic guitar teacher that would eventually kill me. I was somewhat neurotic growing up. So the harmonica came first, then at 12 I got my first acoustic guitar and started taking lessons (from a great guy I’m still friends with). I took lessons for a little over five years. The late 80s were all about how fast you could play, and at 15 years old I was following the herd of wanna-be guitar gods. At 16 I even played in the 1990 Hot Licks Guitar Contest that was held at the now demised Music Spectrum that was located on State Street in Fort Wayne. I came in 4th place. I’m sure a mullet was involved somehow. But as I got older, I wanted to write and record. I didn’t know any other serious musicians in the orthopedic wasteland that I lived in, so I just started playing everything. I bought a bass and bass amp. Then in the mid-90s, after recording with an Alesis SR-16 drum machine for years, I bought myself a five-piece Ludwig drum set. My playing was pretty primitive. But I could at least play well enough for my songs. I bought a keyboard but never really learned to play it well. I used it more for textures. So for a long time it was pretty much guitar, bass and drums, with a healthy dose of stomp box magic. Then four years ago I bought an old Wurlitzer console piano, under the guise that my daughter was going to take piano lessons. She did take lessons for over a year, but I started playing the piano as well. Whenever I’d have free time I’d sit down and play. I started writing songs on it. It became my main instrument. I’ve sort of gone back to guitar as my main songwriting tool. I’ve always had an affinity for picking up an instrument, any instrument, and getting something out of it. I’ve got an accordion that I try to play. At one time I had access to a banjo that I even used on some really early songs. I’d love to get a hold of a xylophone, mandolin, a Fender Rhodes, and another banjo at some point. I’ve never had an opportunity to mess with horns. I’m the type of musician, though, that would rather get a sound from a real instrument, as opposed to a synth sound or plug-in. So I may try to track down some older brass instruments and have a go at them.

DMJ: The Internet obviously makes it easier to get your music out there, given your location. Do you have any plans to promote it live?

JH: For now this is just me. And as much as I admire those that can go out and do acoustic shows flawlessly and comfortably, that’s just not me. I need that barrier of noise between me and an audience. I need that chunk of wood slung over my shoulder and the beat of a kick drum. I need the bass buzzing. I work much better in a band environment. Maybe I should step out of my comfort zone and play some acoustic shows. I’m working on getting a repertoire put together of my songs. Unfortunately, not having a band to practice with, I get in the bad habit of writing, recording and then moving on. So I tend to forget my songs fairly quickly. I’m working on that. It’s hard for me to go down into the studio and just practice songs. I always want to keep moving forward and write new songs. Having said all that, I really would like to give this thing a go. I’d love to put a band together. Two guitars, bass, drums and maybe a keyboard I think would be the best set up. These songs would be a blast to play loudly and in front of a crowd. So I just need to find some willing participants. For the time being I’m sending CDs everywhere that people will take them. I’ve got some set up in Indy at Luna Music and here in Fort Wayne at Wooden Nickel. I’m on CD Baby and iTunes. Pretty much every digital retailer will have SDM set up. I love brick and mortar stores. That’s where it’s at. But the truth of the matter is that digital distribution is the easiest way for me to get my music out there. For a guy that doesn’t play out and strut his wares for the masses to see, iTunes is my friend. I want people to have the physical copy and enjoy the package as a whole. But I also want someone in Europe to be able to click and buy my record as well. If I can get something put together, I’d really love to take SDM into a live setting. These songs were written with the spirit of live music in mind. Guitar, bass and drums at maximum volume.

DMJ: What do you hope to do with SDM in the future?

JH: Well, if it can workout, I would like to have a group of guys that are willing to learn these songs so I can play a couple shows. Try to promote it the traditional way by playing these songs in front of a crowd. But until then, I’ll hit the internet and blogs and chat boards and social networks and the like. I’m already working on a new album. It will be a sunnydaymassacre record. Studio-wise, I’ll play everything. I’d love to collaborate with some local musicians. I’ve done it in the past and I love it. It’s great to try and interpret what you think someone would want to put into their own song. Or better yet do something that they never would’ve thought of and they end up loving it. So, if you’re reading this and you think you might be interested in collaborating or doing some live gigs, send me an email. Overall, SDM is a chance for me to get back to just writing songs that I’d love to listen to. Sometimes with GBW I felt obligated to write a certain type of song. Have so much of this and that. It was starting to become kind of like stock songwriting. SDM has been a truly freeing experience. It’s like those days as a teen and setting up your instruments in a friend’s basement and just trying stuff. Experimenting for the sake of experimenting. Or just jamming on a chord progression for an hour. Not because you’re trying to write the best song no one’s ever heard, but because it’s fun and it feels good. If I can get that feeling, plus write some great songs along the way, then plan on seeing sunnydaymassacre around for a long, long time.

Read J’s blog at http://jhubner73.com/ or contact himvia e-mail at sunnydaymassacre@gmail.com.