How Tobias Jesso Jr.'s Very Bad Week Led To A Very Good Year
RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Tobias Jesso Jr. is a 29-year-old Canadian musician whose songs sound like rougher versions of Randy Newman ballads. And by Indie musician standards, Tobias Jesso Jr. is getting a lot of attention right now. He recently played on Jimmy Fallon. There were rumors he was dating Taylor Swift. And his new debut album called "Goon" has gotten stellar reviews.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT YOU")
TOBIAS JESSO JR.: (Singing) I can't stop thinking about you. I can't stop thinking about you. I can't stop thinking about you.
MARTIN: But years before all the success, he was in Los Angeles just languishing in the music business. He'd been a backup musician for a pop singer. That fizzled out. But he stayed in LA, crashed on friends' couches for years.
JESSO: I wasn't the type of guy who was like, well, it's not really working out. K, I'm going to book my fight and go home. I was kind of like, well, it's not really working out. I'll give it another couple years.
(LAUGHTER)
JESSO: You know what I mean? But then I had the power of the universe kind of be like, oh, don't wait. Go home now.
MARTIN: When we spoke with Jesso, we wanted to focus on that moment when the universe stepped in, what he now calls his very bad week. That week began on a sunny California day in 2012.
JESSO: I was going for a bike ride, and I got side swiped by a car. And I rolled over the hood of the car, and the car's hood emblem went into my hand. And the car drove off.
MARTIN: His hand was brutally torn up. He walked to try to find some help. Along the way, he passed a group of homeless people.
JESSO: And I looked back, and one of the homeless people was on my bike. And he looked at me, and he waved at me as he biked away.
MARTIN: (Laughter).
JESSO: And just naturally, I waved back, you know. Like, I didn't even know.
MARTIN: With your other hand.
JESSO: Yeah - with, yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HOLLYWOOD")
JESSO: (Singing) And I pray, God help me. I've done the best I could. But I think I'm gonna die in Hollywood.
MARTIN: Later that week, Jesso and his girlfriend broke up. And then things got even darker. His dad wrote him a message on Facebook.
JESSO: And he said, you know, call home when you can. I said I don't have a phone. He said, well, call collect. It's fine. So I went to a payphone nearby and called collect. And he said, you know, well, your mom's got cancer. And I was like, OK, there's a sign. I got to move back to Vancouver, you know.
MARTIN: So what was happening for you musically at that point? I mean, when you went home, and your mom was sick, did you just stop writing, stop making music?
JESSO: No. No, no, I mean, I was always writing. I just wasn't really writing for the same reasons anymore.
MARTIN: What do you mean?
JESSO: It's kind of like, in LA, I always thought, oh, someone might hear my music and take it or give it to someone. And I always was trying to see if that would happen. And when I went back to Vancouver, I was like, there's no one knows here who's going to take this. Like, there's no one who's going to listen to it and be able to do anything with it.
MARTIN: So you were freed from professional aspiration.
JESSO: Yeah. Well, freed or I was - I don't know if it was a freeing feeling. It was kind of a lost feeling I guess like, oh, no more opportunity.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BAD WORDS")
JESSO: (Singing) Will you forgive me, forget the past? Or will you let bad words be the last?
MARTIN: So most of these songs fundamentally are you sitting at a piano pouring your heart out about some past failures or challenges. Is that your thing? Is that a space where you feel really comfortable in songwriting and performing? Or is the next album going to be, you know, sunshine and puppy dogs?
JESSO: Yeah, I hope the next album has a different aspect to it than that 'cause I wouldn't want to go and do the same press tour again, saying, oh, you know, I broke my...
MARTIN: Had another bad week.
JESSO: ...Or something like that. Yeah, exactly.
MARTIN: You'll never believe it.
JESSO: Here's the next one. I got hit by a plane, you know, or whatever.
MARTIN: (Laughter).
JESSO: But the whole, like, sad song thing, it's just - I think it is easy. I'm not a sad guy so the best way to describe it is, you know, you find comedians who are hilarious, but, like, there's a lot of them who are just, like, really depressed dudes.
MARTIN: Yeah.
JESSO: They have the capacity be really, really funny. And for me it's like, I'm just a super happy guy, and maybe sad songs is easier for me because I don't spend much time in that headspace.
MARTIN: How's your mom doing, by the way?
JESSO: She's good. She's better, yeah. She came to my show. I played in Vancouver. She came to the show. She brought all her friends along. And yeah, it went well. But they were the noisiest crowd of anyone I've been on yet. It was...
MARTIN: (Laughter).
JESSO: It was crazy, you know.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HOW COULD YOU BABE")
JESSO: (Singing) Well, have you lost your memories.
MARTIN: Tobias Jesso Jr. His debut album is called "Goon." It's out now. He joined us from member station KQED in San Francisco. Thanks so much for talking with us.
JESSO: Thanks.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HOW COULD YOU BABE")
JESSO: (Singing) ...Decided to forget my name 'cause nothing I can say to you could ever ease this pain.
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