{"id":21858,"date":"2014-08-04T00:00:50","date_gmt":"2014-08-04T00:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=21858"},"modified":"2014-10-09T23:49:47","modified_gmt":"2014-10-09T23:49:47","slug":"feature-cj-wildheart-08-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/feature-cj-wildheart-08-14\/","title":{"rendered":"CJ WILDHEART – Come With Him (August 2014) | Features \/ Interviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

CJ WILDHEART – Come With Him<\/strong><\/span>
\nAnthony Morgan<\/span>
\nAugust 2014<\/span><\/p>\n

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CJ Wildheart<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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CJ Wildheart (born Chris Jaghdar) \u2013 guitarist of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England-based rock outfit The Wildhearts \u2013 began authoring compositions for August 2014 solo studio full-length album Mable<\/em> in May-June 2013, and continued to write and demo tracks throughout the summer and winter of 2013. Under the moniker CJ & The Satellites, debut solo outing Thirteen had been issued seven years earlier in 2007.<\/p>\n

\u201cI work on my own and I record on my own, so I don\u2019t have a band,\u201d CJ notes. \u201cMable<\/em> is the first album I\u2019ve recorded since 2009. The Wildhearts\u2019 last album was called \u00a1Chutzpah!<\/em> (August 2009), and we toured it that same year. At the end of 2009, I kind of knew the band was gonna take a long break. We\u2019d been touring for a long time, and the album hadn\u2019t done that well. Our audiences were getting smaller. I was about to hit 40, and I really just wanted to do something different and away from music for a while. I had no idea that I was gonna spend years away from music, but what I did do is start a cleaning company, run that for three years, employed eight guys, and just did the day-job, and didn\u2019t think about music for three years. Then a chance arose for me to leave London and move to Yorkshire, which I did. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Wildhearts started doing anniversary shows, and I kind of came back to music via The Wildhearts playing anniversary shows, having had a day-job for three years. I seem to have a lot of stuff to write about. It was a really grounding experience doing a nine to five job, but it was really important to me to do that, because I grew as a person. <\/p>\n

\u201cI actually hadn\u2019t recorded anything in over three years, so it was quite a painful process getting back into the whole writing and recording \u2013 just that mindset. I gave myself six months to do this album, though. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe way I work is I work on demos, and nine times out of ten my demos become the album, because I spend so much time on the actual songs. I spend a good couple of weeks recording a song, but it is one of those things where I treat it like a job. I start at nine and stop at six, so I\u2019m not drinking through the night and recording all through the night. I treat it like a job. I\u2019ve never recorded that way before but I thought I\u2019d break a habit, and it kind of worked.\u201d<\/p>\n

During April 2013, The Wildhearts performed a handful of UK shows to mark the then impending 20th anniversary of debut studio record Earth Vs The Wildhearts (issued in August 1993). \u201cIt was completely different,\u201d the axeman enthuses. \u201cI don\u2019t know why our audiences got smaller on the last tour we did in winter 2009. I have no idea what happened, but it\u2019s a completely different turnout since we\u2019ve reformed. The sales are much bigger, and so it\u2019s a different band. I\u2019ve no idea why, but it\u2019s just, yeah. I think maybe just spending some time away gave us a bit of a hunger for this. I\u2019ve got to say, I think the band\u2019s stronger than it\u2019s ever been. Me and Ginger started this band 25 years ago. We have a strut about us and a youthful sort of sound still, which is really cool.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got another 20th anniversary coming up in 2015, so we\u2019re talking about maybe doing some shows around that. We always talk about doing an album. The last album we did was in 2009, so if we do do an album, we\u2019ll do one any time in the next ten years (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

An extended absence perhaps lends music audiences time to miss artists. \u201cYeah, it must do,\u201d CJ agrees. \u201cWe were away for a good few years. It gave the band a breather, and our fans a breather.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of Mable<\/em>\u2019s lyrical preoccupations concern the vocalist\u2019s time spent in London during the past three years, operating a cleaning firm. \u201cA lot of my clients were extremely rich, and a lot of them were extremely poor,\u201d he observes. \u201cI was experiencing things I\u2019ve never experienced before. I\u2019ve played in bands since I was a teenager and I\u2019ve never had a day-job since I was 18, so it was a real shock for me \u2013 having played in bands all of my life \u2013 to be suddenly working on the streets of London, and working with people who knew nothing of my past, nothing about me, and working for a lot of very rude and obnoxious clients. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis album kind of charts these last three years, but I couldn\u2019t have written this album unless I\u2019d done that job. It gave me a wealth of things to write about, and with the next album, I\u2019ll still be writing about my experiences in London. I just met so many interesting people, and I had so many adventures running a day-job. It\u2019s new to me. I think people can connect with my experiences of being stuck in a van all day, and having to clean up for rich snobs (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

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CJ Wildheart with his favourite hen Mable<\/em><\/b><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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\u201cMable<\/em> is actually the name of my favourite hen (laughs). I keep chickens, and Mable<\/em>\u2019s my favourite one. She\u2019s really noisy; she always complains, and she\u2019s always begging for food. I started to record this album, and I was sat in the garden one day looking at my hens running around. She came up to me, and I just went \u2018Mable<\/em> sounds like a cool name.\u2019 It\u2019s like a title that Weezer would probably have for one of their albums, so the name just stuck. My favourite hen, of all things (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

CJ personally enjoys the somewhat quirky side of American melodic rock. \u201cI like Pixies, Weezer, Fountains Of Wayne, and I also like a lot of New Wave as well,\u201d he cites. \u201cMy album incorporates a Weezer, Pixies kind of sound. There are a lot of keyboards \u2013 New Wave, sort of Elvis Costello-type keyboards on there. There are also elements of dance music on some tracks, but it\u2019s all held together with rock guitars. That\u2019s where I come from, but yeah, I like mixing it up. I work on my own, so I can get to experiment. The fact that I don\u2019t use a band and I have my own studio, I have time to experiment, so I can play around with different beats and sounds \u2013 it doesn\u2019t cost me anything. My album is quirky, but it\u2019s fundamentally held together with rock guitars.\u201d<\/p>\n

All of the guitarist\u2019s studio equipment is computer-based. \u201cI have a spare bedroom I\u2019ve converted into my work space, so it\u2019s a room I can make as much noise as I want to in 24\/7, which is really important if you\u2019re making music \u2013 to be able to make noise,\u201d he informs. \u201c I\u2019m just lucky that I can do that at home, becauseit doesn\u2019t cost me anything to record albums. It\u2019s just time, and at the moment I seem to have quite a bit of time, so there\u2019s nothing stopping me. To be honest with you, it isn\u2019t the 70s or 80s anymore. I know people who record albums on their laptop. It\u2019s not so much the equipment, because everyone can have the equipment on their computers now \u2013 it\u2019s at everybody\u2019s fingertips. It\u2019s just having the knowledge to know how to record music. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been making music since I was 18. I\u2019m 46 now, so if I didn\u2019t know how to record music on my own now then I would be a bit of an idiot, I think. I\u2019ve spent many, many months in studios, and watched lots of people make albums for me and for other bands. It\u2019s something I\u2019m fascinated by, but I do struggle with mixing, so on this album I called in a guy called Lee Wray to mix with me, who just has amazing ears. I wouldn\u2019t have been able to make the album without him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mable<\/em>\u2019s drum parts were programmed. \u201cIf I could play the drums, I\u2019d play them,\u201d CJ stresses. \u201cI enjoy working in a band, but I just needed to do this album on my own. I wanted to just kind of lock myself in my home studio, and just get on with it. The whole band thing is great, but you\u2019ve got four to five people trying to make decisions. Bands are just kind of dramatic \u2013 that\u2019s what bands are like. I prefer the peace of working on my own. It\u2019s almost a zen-like experience recording on your own, and you work at your own steam. The fact that I can record at home means that I can record whenever I want, and so if I don\u2019t fancy recording tomorrow then I can just do it in a few days time. It doesn\u2019t cost me any money, and I am my own boss. I kind of like it that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The majority of solo artists employ session members. \u201cI suppose,\u201d the singer muses. \u201cI took the word literally (laughs). It\u2019s like it\u2019s a real solo effort; 99% of the album is me on my own. I called in a couple of voices for gang vocals; I called in a guy called Chris Catalyst, and my mixer and producer Lee Wray helped on some gang vocals, and then Lee Wray also did some keyboards for me. But yeah, 99% of it is just me on my own. Some people say they like the sound of a band, but at the end of the day it\u2019s 2014. Things have changed. If you want to record somewhere on your own, you\u2019ve got the ability. It\u2019s very easy to do that now, because the technology\u2019s there. I loved the 70s, loved the 80s, but it\u2019s 2014 and I\u2019m living in the present and not the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Had Mable<\/em> been cut during the 80s, record company capital would\u2019ve been needed to fund album sessions. \u201cTo be honest, I would never have been able to make this album on my own back then,\u201d CJ admits. \u201cIt would\u2019ve cost a fortune. The reason I can do this album is because it came out as a pre-order via the PledgeMusic.com site, and it was fan-funded \u2013 funded by my fans. The fact that I can record on my own means I can make albums very cheaply. If it wasn\u2019t for those two points \u2013 the fans and the fact that I can make albums very cheaply \u2013 I wouldn\u2019t be talking to you right now, because I don\u2019t have a massive fanbase. There\u2019s a lot of stuff that I have to do on my own, just to bring costs down. It\u2019s great. I treat this like a job, and it is my job. I just happen to make music, and it is a job at the end of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

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A pre-order campaign for Mable<\/em> was organised through PledgeMusic.com. \u201cGinger has done really well via PledgeMusic.com,\u201d the axe-slinger reckons. \u201cHe actually mentioned it to me a few years ago when I was out of music, when I was doing my business down in London. I had a drink with Ginge. He was just about to start his 555%<\/em> album (March 2012), and he asked me if I would come down and play on a couple of songs. I said \u2018Yeah, I\u2019ll come out of retirement and help,\u2019 but then he was saying \u2018Why don\u2019t you think about doing something yourself?\u2019 I kind of went \u2018Yeah,\u2019 but I left it a few years. I\u2019ve seen how well he\u2019s done and I\u2019ve seen how well other friends of mine have done, and so it was the obvious thing. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m 46; I\u2019m not gonna get a record deal. I\u2019m definitely not gonna get a record deal where I\u2019m gonna get enough money to live off of, so the PledgeMusic.com thing is the obvious route for musicians who do have a fanbase out there, and who also want to sell direct to their fans and make a bit of money, because it\u2019s really important. If you\u2019re gonna work really hard at something, you should get some return from it. We\u2019re not kids; none of us are kids. We have families to feed, mortgages to pay \u2013 we have to bring home the bacon. It\u2019s a really proud feeling when you do something that you love, and you can provide for your loved ones as well. PledgeMusic.com enabled me to do that, and it\u2019s enabled a lot of musicians my age and in my position to carry on making music and involve their fans. It\u2019s a really, really good platform.\u201d<\/p>\n

Generally speaking, crowd-funding initiatives such as PledgeMusic and Kickstarter offer a greater variety of incentives the more fans to pledge to donate. \u201cTo be honest with you, I didn\u2019t really pay much attention to PledgeMusic.com until I had to put an album of my own out there,\u201d CJ confesses. \u201cI looked at some of the artists, and I don\u2019t know how some of them can sleep at night. Some of the stuff they are offering, it\u2019s ridiculous how much money they want to have a night out with them, or a day with them. It\u2019s crazy. I would never whore myself; I would never expect my fans to pay to have dinner with me, or for me to take them around my neighbourhood. That\u2019s like prostitution. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf someone\u2019s gonna give me money, then they\u2019ll get a product at the end of it. If you give me your money, then you can get an album, you can get a T-shirt, you can come to a special show. I also released a chilli sauce to coincide with this album, as well. There has to be something at the end, which is an album, or a T-shirt \u2013 something that they can physically hold onto. Some musicians do take the piss. I don\u2019t know how they can sleep at night. It\u2019s an odd one, but I\u2019m doing another album now that will be coming out through PledgeMusic.com. Again though, I\u2019m not gonna rip off my fans. They\u2019ll get value for money; they\u2019ll get something at the end of it which they can put on a shelf, put in their CD player.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some fans pledge arguably excessive sums to receive a phone call from their favourite artist, to highlight one unscrupulous incentive. \u201cIf somebody does that, I don\u2019t care who the fuck they are \u2013 they could be friends of mine,\u201d the frontman begins. \u201cI don\u2019t think any of my friends are putting that up on their pledges, but that\u2019s just being an arsehole. If you honestly think you\u2019re that special that you can… At the end of the day, we are just musicians, and we just make music. We\u2019re not changing the fucking world; we\u2019re not saving lives. <\/p>\n

\u201cSome musicians are so fucking up their own arses, and they think they\u2019re so precious it\u2019s like \u2018Fuck me. Get over yourself, man.\u2019 We make music, we write tunes, we go out, and we do a show. We entertain people. If we wore big red noses and big shoes, we\u2019d be clowns. Some people really, really need to wake up and sniff the air, man. We\u2019re no different to anyone else out there. That infuriates me, that someone wants to charge that sort of money just to talk to them on Skype. It\u2019s bizarre. I\u2019m on my soapbox now (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

The greatest tragedy is the fact that the most fervent fans purchase such packages; essentially, said artists are exploiting their most ardent listeners. \u201cI\u2019m aware that I have a small and very loyal fanbase,\u201d CJ recognises. \u201cI\u2019m aware that there\u2019s a very small percentage of my fans who will buy anything and everything that I put out there, so I have to make sure that everything I put out there is value for money. I would never, ever fall into that trap of thinking that this is really easy money, and I\u2019m getting a high return for practically fuck all for doing fuck all. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have to really make sure that whatever I do I put a 110% into, and I\u2019ve worked really hard to make sure that everything is the best that it could possibly be. I think it\u2019s one of the ethics that The Wildhearts have \u2013 Ginger never rips off his fans. It\u2019s something which is really close to myself and Ginger, and everyone who\u2019s been in The Wildhearts. We give value for money, and I think that\u2019s why \u2013 although we\u2019ve never had the biggest fanbase in the world \u2013 we have one of the most loyal fanbases out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The multi-instrumentalist\u2019s chilli sauce issued to coincide with Mable<\/em>\u2019s release is dubbed Devilspit. \u201cMy father is Indian while my mum is from the Seychelles, so I grew up with spicy food,\u201d he shares. \u201cMy mum has always made her own chilli sauce, so I love food \u2013 I\u2019m really into cooking. Lots of people have always said \u2018Why don\u2019t you make your own chilli sauce?,\u2019 and I had an opportunity. A local company called Chilli Devil Sauces in Yorkshire, I hooked up with them and basically put a few of my favourite things in a bottle. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe sauce is called Devilspit, and it\u2019s a combination of beer, barbecue and chilli all in a bottle, and it\u2019s also quite close to my mum\u2019s own recipe as well. I\u2019ve got another two chilli sauces coming out in 2014 as well. Again, if I hadn\u2019t had done PledgeMusic.com, I wouldn\u2019t have been able to do the chilli sauce \u2013 PledgeMusic.com enabled me to do that. It\u2019s great that being a musician, I can do something completely different with my album. So yeah, I feel quite privileged.\u201d<\/p>\n

As referenced, CJ comes from an immigrant background. \u201cMy parents both joined the British Army and moved to Britain in the 60s, but most of my family live in the Seychelles and New York,\u201d he divulges. \u201cWe have very few family in the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n

Immigrant workers tend to harbour a strong work ethic, something reflective of the axeman\u2019s parents \u2013 not to mention the axeman himself. \u201cMy dad worked in the British Army for 25 years, so he has a very strict work ethic,\u201d he compliments. \u201cI employed eight Sri Lankan guys to work with me when I was running my company, and the reason why I employed the Sri Lankan guys was because they\u2019d keep up with me. Sometimes I don\u2019t wanna have a break, and they\u2019re the same. They just work, and work, and work, because my attitude is the quicker you get the job done, the quicker you can get home and get on with the rest of your life. <\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people were surprised seeing an English guy turn up to clean. I had it all the time, that you don\u2019t see English people cleaning. They were like \u2018Wow. Why are you here?,\u2019 but my attitude was if I worked on the job with my boys, it\u2019s one less person that I have to pay a wage for, and that wage stays in my pocket. Plus, I enjoy working, and my Sri Lankan guys were really nice guys to hang out with. But no, there\u2019s nothing worse than lazy people out there blaming the world for their misfortune. If you want something, get out there and work for it, and try your hardest.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the foreseeable future, CJ will be an extremely busy gentleman. \u201cMable<\/em> has come out as a commercial release, and I\u2019m about to become a father for the first time,\u201d he ponders. \u201cThis is what I do for a living; I make music, and I also make chilli sauce. I work from home, and I\u2019m about to become a dad. My wife\u2019s gonna be on maternity leave for six months, so I\u2019m basically gonna be recording and changing nappies and feeding over the next six months. I\u2019m not touring until 2015 \u2013 I\u2019m basically off the road now. I\u2019m at home, and I have to work. I\u2019m about to start another album, and hopefully I won\u2019t be writing all of the songs about my new baby (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Home for the vocalist happens to be a small town named Knaresborough in North Yorkshire. \u201cIt\u2019s very rural, very peaceful, very quiet,\u201d he describes. \u201cI like it, though. I\u2019ve lived in cities for most of my life, and so I moved from London to be here. At first it was a bit of a shock, how quiet it was, but I\u2019ve found that I just work more here. There\u2019s a quality of life here which you never get in a city like London. A place like London, it doesn\u2019t matter whether you\u2019re rich or poor. You\u2019re just living in a big pot of shit, and that\u2019s what London\u2019s like. Everyone, the rich and poor, they all walk down those streets and they all breath in that crappy air. When I was a kid I could never live in the countryside, but I\u2019m not a kid anymore, and the peace and quiet definitely has an effect on my life and my music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mable<\/em> was released independently on August 4th, 2014.<\/p>\n

Interview published in August 2014.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CJ WILDHEART – Come With Him Anthony Morgan August 2014 CJ Wildheart CJ Wildheart (born Chris Jaghdar) \u2013 guitarist of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England-based rock outfit The Wildhearts \u2013 began authoring compositions for August 2014 solo studio full-length album Mable in May-June 2013, and continued to write and demo tracks throughout the summer and winter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1454,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cj-wildheart","category-features"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21858"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21858\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21920,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21858\/revisions\/21920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}