About a week or so ago we received a message in our Facebook mailbox sent by a certain someone ‘shamelessly plugging’ himself and we are so glad he did.  If not we wouldn’t have been exposed to the refreshingly fantastic sounds and multimedia magic of KOORTWAH.    Combining pop sensibilities with deeper, introspective poetry, Jake Courtois, the man behind the curtain, cites Depeche Mode, Leonard Cohen, Smashing Pumpkins, Laurie Anderson and many more as his influences.   We have had a week to explore his music and live performances and are very much looking forward to February 11th when he graces the stage of Rock Bar in New York City.  We also had the chance to ask Jake some questions about his career and creativity so without further adieu…here is the newest Chauncey Chat with KOORTWAH!

How old were you when you wrote your first song?

Atypical as this may be, I genuinely didn’t start writing songs until my late twenties. Prior to that I think I lacked the confidence and motivation to initiate something I didn’t imagine would hold up to my own self-defeating standards. Even once I started writing songs, it took years before I had ones that I thought enough of to start playing shows with.

What instruments do you play?

I play rhythm guitar half-decently. I can play a little and will write on keyboards in the studio, but don’t feel inclined to play them much onstage. All the vocals on the songs are mine, and I do all my own writing, programming, and arranging. 

What was the first piece of music you ever purchased yourself with your own money?

Well, the first album I owned, tellingly enough, was Behaviour, by the Pet Shop Boys. My older brother bought me that, which seems, in hindsight, rather prescient on his part. I listened to that album pretty obsessively, and it was probably another year before I bothered buying anything on my own. If I remember correctly, my first actual purchase was Solace by Sarah Mclachlan. What can I say? I’m Canadian, and I’ll always have a soft spot for her. I would have it playing in my walkman on the bus to school, and think, “Sarah McLachlan totally understands me.”

What is your creative process? How does a song come to you? Does the melody come first or the poetry?

There isn’t any one particular way that songs come to me. I might have a lyric first, a melody, some kind of percussive rhythm… I also have a backlog of songs in my head that never quite came together the way I wanted them to, but still contain salvageable sections. New songs are sometimes Frankensteins – assembled from the parts of others that didn’t quite survive in their original form. 

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Describe the way you feel right before a performance compared to the way you feel immediately after.

Well, I’m not, to be honest, particularly fond of interacting with strangers. Crowds make me nervous, and I’m mildly claustrophobic. Before I perform I generally have the butterflies, and I worry about everything working technically. I don’t really have terrible stage fright, though, and certainly nothing a xanax and a beer can’t handle. I am, however, always excited to play shows, and once I’m on stage and in my own little world, it’s a great experience. Songs and performances are really about story-telling for me, regardless of how oblique the narrative may be. In as much, a successful show for me is one where the story I tell feels authentic to me. That’s something I have to do for myself. As far as the audience’s experience goes, I can only cross my fingers and hope for the best. The second the show is over, I start thinking about when the next show will be. 

With your recipe of audio and visual…you are definitely a one man show in all aspects. Do you create all the visuals yourself and when you perform live…do you have any musicians or technicians accompany you?

I create the visuals on my own. This aspect of the show is something that’s definitely evolving as I learn more about what works and what doesn’t. There’s technology I’d like to use that’s a little out of my financial grasp at the moment, so for now it’s a matter of experimenting with economical solutions. As I play more I look forward to expanding my understanding of the visual show, and will continue to refine its role. In terms of back-up, I currently play with a drummer who might also sing and play keyboards. I’d love to bring in a tech person to help with the visuals and sound, but I’ve gotta go one step at a time, and keep things affordable.

When artists make videos for their songs, it is often hard to hear the song without seeing the images chosen to represent the music. For example…when I hear “Enjoy The Silence” by Depeche Mode I almost always see the king walking across the hills and mountains. Since you create a visual representation for your songs when you perform them are you afraid that people will only attach the visual you have chosen for the song?

Well, the video content used in the show is very different from a music video. There aren’t a lot of hard cuts, and the imagery is meant to be more meditative/supportive. There’s a lot of looped and repeated material, and the idea is to create an environment for the music, as opposed to something that could stand on its own. 

Here is a video clip of KOORTWAH performing live in NYC in October of 2010. Check out more clips and some demos of his songs on his YouTube Channel here.

Forgive our naivete but it seems that you have certainly popped out of nowhere to grace the NYC scene with your talents. Where did you come from and how long have you been at this?

This is my eleventh year in New York, but, as I alluded to earlier, it’s taken me a long time to get really comfortable with what I’m producing, so it’s only been in the last year or two that my artistic intentions have really galvanized. In that regard, I’m kind of a late bloomer, which is something I’m learning to appreciate about myself. As Jean Genet put it, “A man must dream a long time in order to act with grandeur, and dreaming is nursed in darkness.” 

Your voice, although quite an original one, has echoes of Michael Stipe in our opinion and various other talented musicians throughout the years. It has a gritty and soulful quality with a strong uplifting promise. What vocalists and songwriters have been your inspiration throughout the years?

Thanks, that’s nice to hear. I often get compared to Michael Stipe and Billy Corgan, both of whom I enjoy. The singers I tend to respond most instinctively to are the ones who sound the most genuine. Some of them have beautiful voices (Annie Lennox, Emmylou Harris), some of them sound broken (Lucinda Williams, Tom Waits), but their performances always ring true. They sound like they’ve really experienced the story they’re telling, and that gives the story teeth. The writers I admire most are the ones who can take complex content, and treat it in a straight-forward manner. Leonard Cohen is a perfect example of this ability. 

Click image below to visit the KOORTWAH website

We discovered you by your self proclaimed “shameless self promotion” in the form of an email through Facebook. Being a completely independent musician, what has been your main method of marketing yourself. What has worked and what has failed?

I’m very pleased to have made some connections through Facebook. That was really one of my first attempts to self-promote a little. It’s not something that comes naturally to me at all. I’m probably the worst person to ask about effective marketing, but I can attest to the following… You have to believe in yourself to the extent that you can survive being rejected or even ridiculed by others. That may sound trite, but I think it’s the underlying foundation to everything that comes after. That being said, I think that entitlement will fail most people, and even if you manage to make it as an entitled person, you’ll still be a douchebag. 

Click image above to “Like” the KOORTWAH fanpage on Facebook

If you had the choice to anoynymously write an original song for any musician or band, living or dead, to record and perform…who would it be?

I’m sure I could give you a different answer to this every day, but today I’ll say Nina Simone produced by Brian Eno. 

Who would be your dream duet?

Right now, I’d have to say Robyn. She’s simultaneously smart, fun, and self-aware – a shockingly rare combo. 

Where can one purchase your music online?

That’s something I’m still working on. I could have put the songs up for sale ages ago, but I’m still pondering how to best release them commercially. They’ll be available this year, though. Until then, you can come to a show and buy a CD from me. They’re cheap, I promise. 

What advice would you give a young musician in following their artistic dreams?

Well, I’ve really only just started down the path myself, but I guess would-be artists should be willing to struggle at first. At the end of the day, art and music are work too. If you’re really meant for this, you’ll do it despite everything else. You’ll watch your friends buy apartments downtown while you’re still renting a room without a window in Bushwick. Instead of going snowboarding in Colorado, you’ll put all the money you’ve saved towards recording demos that don’t turn out that well. You’ll reach a point where declaring bankruptcy to clear your credit card debt seems like the best decision you ever made. Finally, when your banker/lawyer/doctor friends tell you how amazing they think it is that you’ve sacrificed financial security to do what you love with your life, you’ll just roll your eyes – even if it’s kinda true.

What can we expect from your upcoming performance at Rock Bar?

It’ll be a short, sweet little set with some colorful video, a beautiful girl on the drums, and me in all my introspective glory.

Thank you so much Koortwah for doing this interview!  Looking forward to your show on the 11th!