Interview with Angie Aparo

by Alison Wood

You may not know his name, but you've surely heard his music. Angie Aparo -- the man behind Faith Hill's hit single "Cry" -- has released three albums of his own, one of those with a subsidiary of Arista Records (Melisma), and has a fourth in the works. Dreams Awake caught up with him by phone to talk about artistic expression, artistic integrity, and controlling the universe.

Dreams Awake: For our readers who aren't familiar with your music, can you give us a little explanation of what to expect when they listen?

Angie Aparo: Coming up, you mean? On this tour?

DA: Yes.

AA: Well, I'm working on a new record, so we're probably gonna do ... half the set will be, probably, new songs. And then the other half will be part of The American, and part of my first record, which is Out of the Everywhere. Maybe a cover, from the cover record I did last year.

DA: Okay. And how would you describe your sound?

AA: Oh, God. [laughs] You know, it's weird. My philosophy is, you just write songs, and they can be produced a thousand different ways. It's kind of a luxury of not having a band, not being, you know, the Counting Crows, or whatever. I don't really have a sound that's specific to certain players. I do this thing where I just try to write as good a song as I can write, and kinda communicate what I feel, and then we go in the studio ... and my first record was really intimate, and just kind of more of an acoustic record, and then The American was kind of this big, produced thing. This new one is kind of in the middle somewhere. But when we tour, then ... I kind of write the songs, make the record however you hear it, but then when we tour we kind of do acoustic versions of all the records. So touring, this will be like, a trio, and it'll be more of a-- We mix some electronic type sounds in with it, but it's kind of this mix of organic and electronic music.

DA: Who would you say then, in your songwriting, are some of your influences?

AA: I'm a huge Neil Young fan. God, there's a bunch of them. I'm trying to think, without leaving people out. I really try to stay influenced by artists that kinda came before me. I don't like to be too influenced by my contemporaries; I just think things get watered down. So I listen to a lot of old stuff. I mean, I listen to everything from Billie Holiday to Neil Young, and everything in between that. And then the stuff I listen to that's now, or the bands I would buy now: I like the Flaming Lips, I like Beck-- But I'd say it's somewhere between Neil Young, and Billy Joel, and Elton John, and that era probably influenced me more.

DA: Now, you mentioned a little bit about your songwriting, and going into the studio. Can you tell us a little more about your songwriting process? Are you someone who tends to start with a guitar, and goes from there? Do you tend to start with poetry, and turn them into songs? AA: I really have no process. My process is no process. My whole belief about songwriting is that it's bigger than songwriting; it's really expression. I try to get to the base of what it is. I look at it like, if God hadn't given me a voice, I'd be a painter, you know what I mean? Or I'd be a poet, or-- The medium is kinda incidental. And if you can get to that point, it frees you. Because I don't have to start with a guitar. I don't have to start with a melody. I don't have to start with words. What it is, is: I see something that makes me happy, and my senses-- I'm instantly available to anything, to any influence, you know what I'm saying? If I leave myself open to that, I don't say, "Oh, there's something happy, I wish I was home with my guitar." So I can be moved by something, and a melody will come to my head. Or, three words. And I just carry a little electronic digital recorder with me, and I record everything. I record everything I feel, everything I ... a melody, a word, a poem. I'll hear a bird chirp and I'll record it. But what's really weird, is I find that when you're writing ... I just kind of write constantly. I don't really sit down to write a record, I just write and write and write and write, and when it's time to make a record, I see where my life is for that six months, or whatever. But what's really weird is that it's just this ongoing conversation with yourself. But I think if you make it more that than the process of writing songs, you just kinda have all these ... the songs end up being like blossoms on your life, as opposed to the point, if that makes any sense.

DA: So even if you, for example, you're going to be recording an album with a producer like Matt Serletic, with all the kinds of orchestral backgrounds, versus recording an album that's gonna be primarily you and guitar, that doesn't change your approach to the writing?

AA: No, not at all. I mean, "Cry": we did it our way, Faith [Hill] does it her way, and I do it completely different every night. Really, you know, writing a song, there's like two art forms involved, and they're completely separate: the writing art form, and the recording art form. And then there's the performance art, which is doing it live. And they're completely different. And a great song, once you get to producing it, you're really just-- Producing is really just searching for a language. You've got this thought, and the production of the record is just searching for what language you want it to be spoken in. Do you want to speak to pop culture? Do you want to remain kind of intimate with yourself? Do you want to keep it abstract? To me, that's where you kind of search for your audience ... or not. Out of the Everywhere I didn't search for any audience, I was like "Screw it, this is for me." And people love that too, they can get close to that, because something intimate is intimate. But the idea is that it doesn't really change the way you, or it doesn't change the way I write.

DA: Now, you are doing a bunch of live shows right now, and they seem to be primarily in the Mid-Atlantic and the Southeast. You're obviously local to the New York/New Jersey area, but does the draw further south come from your being from Atlanta? Or is it just that you've found that it's a good place to play?

AA: I don't know what your facts were on me, but I do live in Atlanta now.

DA: Oh you do, okay. [Ed. note: the "facts" came from an apparently outdated web biography.]

AA: Yeah. But the South, the whole East Coast is where I got started. I started kinda getting noticed in New York, but I had been playing that whole, from Boston to Florida, forever -- for three or four years, it seemed like forever. So it kinda was the springboard for the record. When The American came out it was kinda like, okay, here's his base, and that's kinda the radio that we went after immediately. And then the West Coast and all that stuff kinda came later. And that's definitely more in pockets. I've connected more dots along the East Coast, because I spend a lot more time on this side of the country. But it's interesting, when you go into other parts. We do pretty well in the Southwest, and we're starting to do good in the Midwest. And then you get to the West Coast ... the other problem with that side of the country is everything's so damn far apart. [laughs] It's like, play a city, drive for eight hours. It's nutty.

DA: So do you see yourself doing a more widespread tour coming up sometime soon? Or do you think you're gonna stick to the East Coast for a while? AA: Well, what I do is I try to hit the East Coast, like the South and the Northeast, I try to hit it three times a year. And then the Southwest I try to hit a couple times, and the Midwest maybe once. We haven't been getting to the West Coast, after 9/11, we kinda ... We used to fly all our stuff, and it's just, you know, kind of a financial thing. We could do it, but if you drive it, you're gone for a month. So, I don't know. We're gonna have to address that, 'cause we were starting to do really well out there. But yeah, I think for now, because I'm really trying to go for the next record deal, and this new record is, I'm gonna definitely release it independently, but it really is to try to set up the next deal, and hopefully someone picks up the record and helps me release it further. But because of that, I'm not gonna go too crazy, with the touring. Also Nashville, the thing with Faith ... I'm kinda curious about Nashville. I want to check that out.

DA: Now, can you tell us a little more about the path you've taken with labels, and working independently?

AA: You mean, as opposed to working...?

DA: Well, I know your first album came out independently, and then you were working with Arista, and then you were working independently again, and it sounds like you're now hoping to get back on a label. So I was wondering if maybe you could talk a little bit about maybe the pros and cons of working with a label versus independently? Those kinds of things.

AA: I don't know. To me, you're always independent. Labels, all that stuff, those are business relationships. You look at a label and you go "Can they gain more fans for me?" That's really, at the end of the day, that's all it is. When I say "label" it could be a major, it could be an indie, it could be-- I don't know what it-- But the basis would be two things: do they understand what I'm doing, and will they stay out of the way of it artistically as much as possible? And number two, can they gain me more fans? Can they help spread what I believe in? So sometimes the large labels make sense, and sometimes they don't. And sometimes it makes sense to not be with anybody. But I feel like I'm at a point where, if I could get a push again, and get-- What you find is that you're just kinda, the problem is radio has become so fragmented, it's just awful. It's just not good, with three companies owning the whole, y'know ... nuts. But without radio support, you're just kinda ... the touring becomes difficult. I keep touring because I want to keep my fans engaged, and when you're not on the radio it's the only way they can hear you. You've gotta somehow give them some live ... some experience.

I did an interview an hour ago, and that "independent versus record company" thing was a question, and, I dunno, you're kind of in the same boat, either way. Because really, they don't-- If you have a good deal with a major, if you have the right deal with a major, then they're looking at you as this artful person that they trust, artistically. And if you have the wrong relationship, then you're a puppet. And I think it's easier to have that-- I think artists look at indies as-- That's the only relationship an indie will have with an artist, is when they trust him artistically. And the big ones just have the ability to make things that aren't really there. They can develop things-- They have money; they have tons of money. But to me, the radio is ... it's not the key, and I don't mind doing indie records, but at the end of the day, do you want to be playing three hundred shows a year for the rest of your life? I love playing, but I'd love to be able to sleep.

DA: Now, I read that you once said, "As soon as you let something go, everything opens up," when you were talking about your career. Do you still believe that that's true? AA: Yeah, it's always proved itself to me, or proved itself again to me. I think when you're out to get what you think you are, it's just a complete mess. Because the bottom line is, I dunno, I just think God has plans for you, that you don't have to-- It's just this whole, like, constant lesson of letting go or trying to be in control of everything. And at the end of the day, there's nothing to control. What the hell-- It's so egotistically driven. It's just so ridiculous. There's really nothing out there, but just to be and express, if you're an artist -- I think everyone's an artist, 'cause you create your life -- but that's all it is. And you get so caught up in the industry side of it, and the industry is all business and da da da, and that's all planning, and that's all control, and it's just a mess. And the more the artist gets talked into that, the worse I think his output becomes. Because the bottom line is, I don't mind if someone thinks they have to control the universe, but it doesn't have to be me. I mean, what needs to come out of me is something that speaks to as many people as possible, and connects moments.

DA: Do you have any other words of wisdom for young artists who are looking to make that leap from frustrated aspiring artist to working career artist?

AA: Oh, God. [laughs] Well, that in and of itself is a myth, too. Because a career is-- When I put out Out of the Everywhere I had a career. It was selling ten records a night, but I lived in a car. It's completely relative. If a career is trying to make a million dollars, I would say go into another line of work. Up until the last fifty years, artists never made any money. And even as of now, the only ones that do are in performing arts. Just the whole idea of an art form being a -- well, it was, it's probably gone down now -- but definitely a multi-million dollar industry, just the notion of that is new. Artists died poor. All of them. Mozart included. So it's like, I would say first that the frustration is gonna be there, always, but hopefully it's not frustration over career, hopefully it's frustration over not being connected enough to write the stuff that you think is glorious.

What happened to me when I put Out of the Everywhere out, I said to myself, I'm tired of judging myself based on the success that ... I mean, I love capitalism, and all that, but it definitely can be detrimental to the art, to the artist. It can be great to expose your art to many people, but when it starts to infiltrate the mind of the artist ... and these artists today, a lot of young kids today, because they've grown up on MTV, and everyone's a rock star, and it's just a joke. You spend two hundred thousand dollars on a record, which comes to about twenty grand a song, and you spend half a million on one video. Now what does that tell you? What's more important? So, that's what artists see. And when I set out to do Out of the Everywhere, I just was like "You know what, I'm gonna be successful in that my goal, my rule of what makes me successful, and my definition is gonna be different. It's gonna be that I've written the things that moved me, and I have put them out, and I can go support them happily." And that was kinda that whole "once you let it go," because what I was letting go was the notion of being a rock star. Or the notion of whatever it is. You don't even know what it is, that's what's so ridiculous.

If you asked-- I had to ask myself, but when you ask yourself, you're like ... it took me weeks just to figure out what the hell even the false success I thought was 'cause it's so many-- It's like, "Well, you know, having enough ... not being poor," or "being famous," or "having more respect." It's just all egotistical bullshit, there's just nothing to it. So when I did that, what I found out was that I was so pure, artistically, that stuff started happening. That's the only way I could explain why it all happened. Because I made the record, and I never shopped it. I was like, "I'm never shopping this record." That was my rule. And somehow Matt Serletic found it; how in the hell, I have no idea. You know what I mean? It's really bizarre. But that's a constant battle. I'm always leaning towards -- it's just human nature -- towards "Gotta control it. This Faith Hill thing happened, how do I parlay this into..." and I'm always pulling myself back. It's just wild.

For more information on Angie Aparo, visit his website at www.angieaparo.com.