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Matthew: When you’re making tracks in the studio, what sparks of the beginnings of a tune?
Tortured Soul: Every song begins differently. Some start as collective musical ideas that we come up with live or in rehearsal and then shape into a song. Other times the songs are inspired by real-life sort of matters and written completely before they’re arranged for the group to play.
Matthew: We producers live a life (at the start) of burning tracks onto a blank CD, for me, this can get a very tiresome experience! When you got together in Tortured Soul, was it a relief to see your music on an official CD?
Tortured Soul: We’re kind of coming from an instrumental background first, before the production side of things and we’ve all been making music since we were quite young. But yes, it’s always gratifying to see the finished product.
Matthew: John Christian Urich, Ethan White and Jkriv are the band member’s names in Tortured Soul. When did you three decide to get together and form this group?
Tortured Soul: The project began as a solo project of Christian’s with the song “Might Do Something Wrong”. The three of us were playing together in another band at the time, and eventually we split off and began to focus entirely on taking the Tortured Soul concept that was started with the first few singles and making it a live thing.
Matthew: Your music is soulful/dance sounding, which were your vocal/musical influences individually?
Tortured Soul: All three of us have a lot of musical influences but I’ll name a few for each so you can start to paint a picture:
Christian: Stevie Wonder, Prince, Rufus and Chaka Khan, Donna Summer, The Bee Gees, Michael Jackson, James Brown, Heatwave, Van Halen, The Police, Earth Wind & Fire, Roy Ayers.
Ethan: Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway, Duke Ellington, Djavan, King Tubby, M & J Jackson, Jimmy Smith, Ten City.
Jason: Jorge Ben, James Jamerson, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Expose’.
Matthew: Your label mate Osunlade, has just released an album. Do you know of him? If yes, do you inspire and help one another out for influences?
Tortured Soul: We know him. For the most part, our collaborations have been relatively distanced. He helped to turn “I might do something wrong” into an underground classic with an amazing remix. There wasn’t a ton of intimate back and forth when that piece was created. We did our thing, then he did his, and we each had a mutual respect and love for the sound of what the other did. I worked with him for a few hours once in his studio on another project when he still lived in uptown Manhattan; we both got busy and didn’t finish up. I look forward to working again with him in the future.
Matthew: What are your individual roots?
Tortured Soul: I grew up in NYC, Jason about 30 minutes North of it, and Ethan about 30 minutes West in Jersey, (Christian) was encourage from a very young age to be in the arts. Both of my parents were working professional actors my whole life. I sang in City Opera and the Met, took piano lessons and I played drums in the basement next to the laundry room in an apartment building on the upper West Side. Some kids joined the basketball team. I practiced drums and running around stealing candy.
Matthew: What does ‘Tortured Soul’ (it sounds quite dark) mean?
Tortured Soul: I think it means never satisfied. There is sadness and anger in many of the lyrics, which is one aspect of how the name came to be, and it’s also a play on words. The underlying root of it though is that I still always feel a burning drive and feeling of not getting satisfaction. An itch you can’t scratch. It is satiated from time to time for a few moments or maybe even an hour, but soon enough the dissatisfied feeling returns and intensifies until I make some more music or have sex or drink or write.
Matthew: What do you three do besides your musical life?
Tortured Soul: I hang out with my girlfriend. I try to cook a lot when I’m not on the road. I’m working on a coupe of video projects, I like to read. I like to try to learn languages to the extent that I can at least say a few coherent things as we travel to different countries.
Jason is a movie buff and a Bourbon collector.
Ethan has been keeping tight with his family and is very excited about his upcoming role as “Uncle Ethan”. His sister in law is expecting any day now…
Matthew: Now, the album has ten songs on it, all pretty lengthy. My fav’s are ‘Why’, ‘You Found Your Way’, ‘Enjoy It Now’, ‘Love Everlasting’ and at the top of my list ‘If You Want To Feel Alright’. What are your personal fav tracks?
Tortured Soul: I love them all. Really. These were the best of a certain period of writing and they were chosen because we all thought they were quality and special.
Matthew: What makes you laugh and what makes you cry?
Tortured Soul: Laugh: When in “trading places”, after Mortimer Duke (Don Ameche) says ‘bacon, which you might find in a bacon lettuce and tomato sandwich”, Eddie Murphy looks at the camera. Cry” G.W Bush.
Matthew: Who irritates you the most (in general) and what would you change about the world?
Tortured Soul: Irritates: G.W Bush, Ashlee Simpson, Bill O’Reilly, Fox News and Scientologists. Change the world: Pay teachers more money, provide a better health care for more people, fund the arts, so kids can take more of an interest in beautiful things.
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