Exclusive Interview with JOE SENSIBLE

Joe Sensible is a Scottish songwriter and musician. His self-produced second album promises to take listeners on a journey into a time capsule of songs he wrote during his 20s, where his intertwining vocals and acoustic guitar are the landmarks in a sweeping musical landscape. Check out the exclusive Interview below:

1. Your roots can often shape your journey. Can you share a story or moment from your early life that had a significant impact on your path into music?

JOE SENSIBLE: I always loved music but even as a child I realised that pop music was not for me. In my teens I discovered dance music and I found a community of like minded people. I had a digital keyboard with an 8-track memory and I taught myself to write music on it. Late one night I was listening to music at a party when someone swapped out dance music for ‘Shine on you Crazy Diamond’ by Pink Floyd. I was completely blown away and became obsessed with guitar music overnight. A few months later I discovered Jimi Hendrix. I still remember the moment I heard ‘Hey Joe’ and decided I was going to play guitar. I got my first guitar for my next birthday and never looked back.

2. Did your musical journey begin with formal training, or was it more of a personal exploration? How has that shaped your unique approach to your craft?

JOE SENSIBLE: My Dad taught me a few chords on the guitar when I was about 11 and I went to a guitar teacher for some taster lessons at school. It would be fair to say we didn’t see eye to eye! Afterwards he told me I would never be able to play guitar and he didn’t want to ever see me again! It was clear that formal training was not the route for me at that stage and I wasn’t really interested in the guitar anyway. Everything changed on my 17th birthday when I got my first guitar. I played incessantly and taught myself using tab. I didn’t really know what I was doing so I developed some pretty weird techniques trying to copy what my heroes were playing. When I was 19 I enrolled at college and had to learn classical guitar to get on the music course. I threw myself into it and soon became completely obsessed. My formal training started there and finished when I left college. Classical guitar had a profound influence on me. It opened up a world of tonal and dynamic possibilities and I learnt a lot about composition, musical theory and expression.

3. Who were some of the most influential figures in your early musical life, and how did they inspire your sound? Also, what’s the story behind choosing the name ‘JOE SENSIBLE’?

JOE SENSIBLE: In my early musical life my key influences were Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix and 90s alternative music. I soon moved onto blues, classic rock and anything else that involved electric guitar. It is hard to identify how specific figures inspired my current sound, but everything I have ever listened to and loved will always be in my music.

I wrote prolifically during my 20s but didn’t share my music for over a decade. I had no confidence in my vocals and I knew my songs were different to what other people were doing. In this world, different is usually a bad thing. I wasn’t ready for the personal judgment and rejection that comes with doing your own thing. When I started sharing my music it made it easier to be someone else so I became Joe Sensible. I’ve taken criticism for that decision too and people sometimes think I am being fake. However, using a different name actually makes me feel like I can be myself and deliver my music with honesty and sincerity. Everyone likes to pretend they are authentic but the reality is that we all wear a different face for the world than we do for ourselves.

4. What do you believe sets your music apart? How would you describe your sound to someone discovering you for the first time, and what emotions or experiences do you hope to evoke in your listeners?

JOE SENSIBLE: The common themes to my music are intricate acoustic guitar parts and meaningful lyrics. I often add strings, organs and anything else the music needs, but those are the foundations. Most of my songs are quite cinematic and have an ethereal edge. My aim is to take listeners on a journey with me through my songs. I don’t have a great voice but I do mean what I sing and I hope my music makes an emotional impact.

From a technical perspective I have a pretty unusual guitar playing style that has more in common with classical guitar than folk or country fingerstyle. The production on my songs often sounds fairly simple but my arrangements are quite musically complex. Most of my songs have unusual rhythmic features and they seldom have conventional structures.

5. For most artists, originality is first preceded by a phase of learning and, often, emulating others. What was this like for you? How would you describe your own development as an artist and music maker, and the transition towards your own style, which is known as FOLK?

JOE SENSIBLE: Like many guitarists, the initial enthusiasm of picking up a guitar soon turned into a discipline and then into an obsession. I focused on the music I loved but played everything from blues to heavy metal and jazz. However, I always valued originality and my aim was to develop my own style and technique. I never wanted to sound like anyone else. More than anything I wanted to make music that meant something.

As I developed, the technical side of the guitar mattered less and expressing myself through my songs became the most important thing for me. I slowly moved away from the electric guitar since acoustic guitar was a better tool for writing and arranging my songs. Some of my music is folk but I disagree that it’s my style. I love folk music but it isn’t my only or main source of inspiration. These days all acoustic music is automatically classified as folk but if I swapped my acoustic guitar for an electric then I could easily call many of my songs indie rock.

6. Music often transcends entertainment. What’s your view on the role and function of music as political, cultural, spiritual, and/or social vehicles – and do you try and affront any of these themes in your work, or are you purely interested in music as an expression of technical artistry, personal narrative, and entertainment?

JOE SENSIBLE: I think you have to be honest to yourself in whatever you do. At the moment my focus is musical expression. However, if your music is political and you want to share your views on society then I totally support you doing that. On the other hand, I have no interest in artists who use social media disingenuously to promote themselves by jumping on whatever is trending. It automatically devalues everything they do for me. Integrity is everything in my opinion.

7. Can you walk us through your creative process? From the first spark of an idea to the finished track, what’s the most essential part of your process, and how do collaboration or external influences shape your work?

JOE SENSIBLE: Most of my songs start with the guitar. I find an idea that I like and then I put a twist on it so it doesn’t sound like anything else. I lose myself in it and see where it takes me. At some point I start humming the vocals. Sometimes the lyrical ideas fall straight into place. Other times I can’t find the words for weeks or years. Sometimes I never find the words. I make a note of lyrics that come to me during everyday life. That can be really valuable for those times when the words won’t come. I don’t try to force a song to be about something. I just let the lyrics write themselves based on how the music makes me feel.

Collaboration becomes really important for me once the songs are mostly written and arranged. I used to try to do everything myself but constructive feedback and criticism are incredibly important. It is very easy to get lost in your own ideas otherwise.

If you are going to do something that someone else disagrees with or that makes your music less commercial, then you need to have a very good reason! However, if you can talk it through and justify your decisions then you can move forwards much more confidently.

8. What moment or achievement in your career so far has made you feel the proudest, and why? And let’s talk about your latest release and future plans.

JOE SENSIBLE: I am really proud of what I achieved with my upcoming album. I spent months on the final mixing and mastering just to ensure that the album holds together and takes the listener on a journey from start to finish. There are no fillers and I invested a lot of myself into every song. I have released the first two singles from the album so far. My latest release Window World is really mellow and reflective. I wrote it a few years ago while looking out over the city from my top floor window. It starts off sounding like a modern folk song but soon becomes something altogether different with the introduction of a church organ and string section. The music builds into a hummed bridge section before some mellow drums kick in and the song finally heads towards resolution. Window World has a really strange structure and no chorus, so it is a really unusual song to release as a single! It shows what my music is all about though. My next single Grey on Blue drops on the 15th November and will be something different again!

9. Creative work in a studio or home environment, or interaction with a live audience? Which of these two options excites you most, and why?

JOE SENSIBLE: Every part of the music making process can feel amazing when it is going well. There is an incredible excitement in knowing that a new song is coming together and you have created something that didn’t exist a few minutes earlier. The excitement of playing live is a different thing altogether though. Many musicians live for gigs when the crowd is going crazy. For me it is the quiet moments within songs that are the most special thing about performing live. My music is very dynamic and sometimes in the softer sections you can feel the whole atmosphere in the venue change. Everything goes very quiet, almost like everyone is holding their breath. When that happens it feels like you and the audience are completely together and you can do anything!

10. Do you think is it important for fans of your music to understand the real story and message driving each of your songs, or do you think everyone should be free to interpret your songs in their own personal way?

JOE SENSIBLE: I don’t know all the words to many of my favourite songs but some lyrics feel more powerful and stick with me. My hope is that listeners have a similar experience with my music. I try to be honest in my songwriting so I write songs that mean something to me. My lyrics are often abstract and complex so they can be interpreted in different ways. I always hope that some of my intended messages resonate with listeners. However, the most important thing for me is that my music means something to other people, whether they understand my story or create their own.