Brazil

Interview with Jonathon Newby of Brazil in October of 2006.

Please state your name and your role in the band Brazil.
My name is Jonathon Christopher Newby. I sing. I play keyboards. I write. I head discussions. I am a part-time driver. I’m the band psychologist.

The tour with As Tall As Lions and youinseries just kicked off August 16th. After that, you have a tour with Say Anything, mewithoutyou, and Piebald. How does it feel to be finally back on the road and playing the new songs to fans?
Feels great. We’re playing mostly new songs even though the album is still more than a month off. That makes it hard to tell if people like the new songs, but we erect a psychic bubble of fun around the stage and those sorts of thoughts take second tier to the having of fun. If you’re lucky, we’ll let you in the bubble.

The Philosophy Of Velocity is coming out October 3rd on Immortal Records. Why did you pick this particular title, and how does the title set you up for the mood of the album?
The title, like A Hostage and the Meaning of Life, has nothing to do with anything on the album. I liked the fact that it’s a slant rhyme and reminds me of Dr. Seuss.

If you could sum up the new album in a catch line to sell it to fans, what would the catch line be? Aside from catch lines, what are we to expect with the new album from Brazil?
Catch phrase: If you love philosophy…and if you love velocity.you’ll
love the new album!

We’ll sell millions.

PoV has a lot more pure noise. We pleaded and pleaded with our label to let us release the album on 8 track format, but due to fears of poor sales to a world that had moved on into the digital era, they wouldn’t budge. So we recorded it to sound like an 8 track in all its hissy, tapy glory.

How did working with Dave Fridmann go, and do you expect any further Brazil albums to be produced by him?
We hope to do many more records with Dave, if the heavens allow us to do so again. Dave is the Robert Crumb of record producers, right down to his absolute loathing of American culture. His space is not so much a recording studio, but a playground and a laboratory for extremely curious artists hoping to create a sonic version of thick-legged boot-wearing women.

Your album Hostage received incredible reviews from all over the place and really launched the band. Do you have any big publicity for the new album like a music video or TV performances planned?
We hope to be on TV at some point. David Letterman went to the same university we did, so we figure he will ask us at some point. I’m sure of it. There has been talk of a video, but nothing along the lines of my big plan, which is to shoot one underwater for the submarine song.

The coming of your album has also been the coming of the album leak online before the album has been released. What is the band’s position on music downloading and sharing, especially since your album isn’t due out for almost a month and a half?
Normally, I’m for file sharing if it’s the artists choice. It doesn’t take a financial genius to figure out if people are getting a record for free, then the artist eventually won’t be able to afford to do her thing for long and will probably eventually have to get her job back at Starbucks and not make anymore records. I don’t know who leaked our album, and really I don’t care. This time around, I just want people to hear it. If they like it, they can send us ten dollars.

How has efforts been with The Ministry, your street team? What can street teamers expect for promotional work with the new tours and album?
The push for the Ministry has been markedly less secret than I’d hoped it would be. I may kill it at some point. Operatives don’t like to be spotted. They’d bite their tongues off and bleed to death first. It will spring up again under a new name. You can never kill the Ministry.

What influenced you to initially start playing music, and later evolve it into a career? What artists continue to influence you today as you play and write music?
I never had a point where I “started” playing music. I was born into a family who, like their family before them, were extremely gifted musicians. My late grandfather was an accomplished Ozark country singer. My father is an accomplished jazz saxophonist. My uncle’s are extremely capable guitarists. In my blood cells, I have an X and a Y chromosome,
but I also have a C#.

Artists that inpire me today are David Axelrod, Bark Psychosis, The Beatles, Roxy Music, My Bloody Valentine, David Bowie, and TV on the Radio.

What is your favorite song to play live?
Probably Candles Cast Long Shadows. There is a lot of room for theatricality in that song, which I hope to exploit soon.

What are some underground bands that you believe should get a lot more attention from music lovers?
Zombi’s popping up on the radar. Maybe Pink Skull. Paavoharju from Finland. And this band, I’m not sure if you’ve heard of them. Called Coldplay. I think they’re gonna be big.

Do you have any final words to the readers?
Don’t make up genres. Listen to it all.