Forecast: Sunny Skies Ahead – An Interview With John Mailander

You could go an entire lifetime and never come across another artist like John Mailander. His musical voice resting on the precipice where beauty meets power. His even temperament balancing the sheer virtuosity that lays beneath his finger tips, riddled with character, grace and soul. The robust palette that he paints his sonic landscapes with is vast. Deep and pulling shades of blues and greys mingling with brilliant gold and saffron, covering the full breadth of emotion and vibe in even a single given tune or arrangement. 

What I’ve found most intriguing and enviable about John and his music over the nearly decade I have known him and his songs in some capacity is his seamless ability to allow other artists around him to shine. His ability to slide gracefully between supporting role and band leader is inspired. Even more so, his genuine desire for those moments to happen is a beautiful testament to his being and light as both a performer and human. His music is less about the destination and the experience of getting there. Both in the creation and unity between the musicians creating the music and allowing the listener to take away their own nugget from the experience. Its a beautiful and special experience to be able to participate in.

It was an absolute pleasure to catch up with John to talk about his latest project which is named “John Mailander’s Forecast” and the new record under that moniker called “Look Closer”. Read on below and be sure to get your copy of the record today.

RLR: I want to go back a little bit to start, not super far back, but I feel as though this question plays into your the current landscape around you and the “genre” that is ever present around us…and this project. So, tell me a little about your time in Boston at Berklee and the community around that whole situation. How did being in a place like Boston/Cambridge shape you as a community member and a player?

JM: Man, Boston was such a mind blowing experience because before that I was going to local bluegrass jams in San Diego every week and a festival here and there. Once or twice a year. It was mostly with people older than me. I was so fortunate to have learned the bluegrass standards through those kinds of jams, but it wasn’t until I moved to Boston and got totally immersed in that music community that it was with other like-minded musicians who were my age. All learning at the same pace, together and discovering things together. That always had such a huge impact…that kind of became what music has been about for me. The energy between people, rather than only what you’re putting out yourself. And also, what does this combination of people create and what kind of mood or connection can you find with different people, who you love first as friends, and how does that translate into the music.

So the Boston thing and going to the Cantab every week was such an experience of that feeling. It has certainly been an influence in the Forecast project for sure.

RLR: Continuing a bit in that same vein, in addition to you own work you weave in and out of the fabric of this vast and vibrant musical tapestry. So, what is your approach to say writing and performing your own compositions vs sitting in for a 3 or 4 night run with Billy Strings vs when you are on tour as one of the Noisemakers with Bruce Hornsby? Do you have a different frame mind for your approach in those varying situations? Or, is it like you at the core, as an instrumentalist or songwriter, and taking everything from the outside in?

JM: Thats a good question. It’s always in kind of a changing, a state of flux I think. It depends so much on the collective. Like, what’s the collective mood of that night?

It’s all about the people you are with. I know my level of freedom, in music, really comes from who I’m surrounded by. If the group is collectively riding a wave on a certain night, I love those times when you can catch that and all be in it together. I think the more good nights I have on a gig, the more often it happens, I think. It’s kind of like practicing being aware of when it is going to be a magic moment. Being able to tune into that. It can be hard. I’ll sometimes trudge through a few really difficult shows and then get to that one show that’s magic. That’s a reminder of why I am doing it in the first place. It definitely changes from group to group and even from night to night within a group.

RLR: Yeah, I find that interesting, because from where I sit, I have been a fan of your playing for  a number of years now, since that first solo record you put out. I’ve described it as something like – I am paraphrasing here- “you are one of the masters from the Golden Age of art and the bow is your paintbrush.” I think about that more intently and it’s really interesting. A fiddle is a fiddle, right? There are a lot of fiddle players out there but you have this style and swagger to your playing that is just unique. As a fan I can listen and say “oh yeah, that is a John Mailander break or melody”

JM: That means so much, thank you.

RLR: So I want to ask this as it relates to writing. You were one of the first for me, at least as it relates to our contemporary group of roots musicians, you know coming out of the conservatory or Berklee that really, you know aside from getting together and playing fiddle tunes together, I got really into YOUR instrumental music. And in maybe the past two years there has been a new influx of fairly heavy instrumental music that I feel really tells a story and isn’t just something pretty to listen to in background, its visceral and thought provoking. I think of all 3 of the (Andrew) Marlin solo records, a wonderful pianist/composer Ben Cosgrove from around New England, Christian Sedelmyer’s recent release.

When you set out to write something that has no words to it, only notes and emotion and still tells a story, do you have a set frame of mind for that or a landscape or specific event in mind that plays into that or does it tend to be more melody and mechanics for you (this is the A part, this is the B part)? I think of that in terms of naming of instrumental songs and I am so impressed when I find myself closing my eyes and visually being taken to a place or mood or whatever it may be. I feel that with your songs.

JM: That, with the naming of tunes, it feels really situational. It depends on the tune. I do keep a little notebook of tune names, like potential names that sound compelling to me that maybe don’t have a melody yet. So if I have a day when I feel I might try my hand at writing a tune, I’ll maybe have some titles to look at and see if any of these trigger some sort of melodic phrase in my head. A lot of times, like on this newest record, some of the tune names were something else first.

Like the first track on the record, I had named Bradbury. Joe K. Walsh was hosting a Zoom tune writing discussion every couple of weeks with some Berklee students and I started joining in on it too because it was just really a great regular hang at the start of the pandemic. One of the prompts for that was to write a tune that kind of evoked a character or a famous person or author or filmmaker or something like that.

So that first tune was pieced together from voice memos I had from over the past few years, different melodic fragments pieced together and it kind of reminded me of science fiction so maybe Ray Bradbury would be a good person to name this after. But when we tracked it in the studio, it was done on the first day, we were all back together and we arranged it together that day. We decided that each instrument comes in, one at a time at the top of the tune. It has different moments of building and dropping down, and building. So I changed the title to “Returning” later because that’s what it felt like. The song became something different once we all recorded it.

But yeah, it’s always different. The ‘Song for John’ track, which we did on the bluegrass record in 2014, we just re-recorded it on the new one with the electric band. That was one of those tunes that was direct, the melody came from thinking about John McGann and his sense of humor and that was one that just came out all at once.

RLR: I actually wrote down a note about that. Because I have listened through a few times and kept saying “oh, I know that. I know that melody” and I had to go back and realized that it was actually on your previous record, in a different form. I feel particularly with the entry of, what is that, a Wurlitzer? Swirling in the beginning and then the fiddle coming in. It’s just…that one, it hit. It really felt like a conversation between instruments, talking back and forth. It’s really special. Everyone has a chance to speak. Was there a specific reason why you maybe cherry picked that tune in particular to re-record?

JM: A few reasons. I felt like.. I don’t know where to start. When I first wrote it, I always envisioned it with this kind of band. With keys and with bass clarinet. So ever since the Forecast project started I wanted to try this tune with the band.

Ethan Jodziewicz and I had played that tune together before and he was familiar with it. It’s one of the tunes I have written that I am most proud of. I feel like on the Walking Distance record, it was so special to record that tune with Joe (K. Walsh) on mandolin, who studied with John McGann as well. It reached an emotional place when we recorded it then, but I wanted to give it a go with this band too. On the Walking Distance record, it felt, I think it was the track that was most authentic to my heart when I made that record. I am very proud of that record and it was a great experience, but it was also kind of like I felt I had to fit it into a mold. With it being “this is my first album”. It’s got to have a fast, progressive bluegrass tune, it has got to have a waltz, it has to have a song with a vocalist, it has to have a fiddle/banjo tune, a Celtic sounding tune. So I filled this blueprint of what I had in my head about what I thought it should be. And there are so many moments on it that I’m proud of, but that tune in particular was the one song on the record that felt like it just came from me, rather than having to fit it into a box that I thought I should do.

And that’s what this whole Forecast project is for me. It’s just trying to, the goal with it is to be this collective thing. It doesn’t have to be categorized. What it’s about is the communication between the musicians and everybody’s musical backgrounds. So it just seemed like a good choice to do with this band and re-contextualize it and also keep John McGann’s memory. I hope people will go check him out after hearing the tune.

RLR: I feel like people who even aren’t familiar with him, or I guess that “Song for John” could even be construed as a song for yourself. And in a way, I guess that it is. Allowing you to deal with loss and remembrance of someone who was so important in your musical path. But it does, it definitely comes across, if you listen to the two versions side by there, there are just two totally distinct feelings to them. Its’ a beautiful tribute and I keep finding myself drawn back to it.

JM: Thank you. We did that one and the first track on the record, “Returning”, those were the two that we did on the first day. I can hear in that version of “Song for John” everybody’s getting re-familiarized with what its like to play in a room with other people again. It was the first time I had done that, since early March, and we did it in mid-July.

So there is this kind of like this excitement to the energy behind that track. I really love how that one turned out.

RLR: It definitely shows in listening. So often you can hear the difference when a recording is done in a room with musicians vs. overdubs over and over again You guys definitely captured an energy, like you are there, which is truly special.

JM: Thank you.

RLR: Now this entire project is called that and you describe it on your website as “a platform for exploring new compositions, singular collaborations, and collective improvisation.”  I mean a name “John Mailander’s Forecast” I find equally really cool and a pretty heavy weight…its not just like “first name last name of a solo artist” its a collective, almost like you are the conductor of this organic living being of energy and sound. How has that dynamic changed from your last few records that were “John Mailander” to now being this collective? Is there more input from the members in the final outcome of things given there is this space for collaboration and innovation?

JM: Definitely, definitely. Yeah, the last record, that I put out under my name was called ‘Forecast’ and I think the process of making that was experimental in some ways. I had a clear idea of some of the tunes, but there were a lot that felt open ended and we were trying different instrumentation. I think that the result of that was kind of discovering the sound of what the band is by the end of making that record.

In mid-2019 to early 2020 we started playing a monthly gig at the 5 Spot in Nashville and I just chose to call it ‘Forecast’ because it really is like ‘a band’. More of a collective really because we have sort of rotating members of the band and a different guest every month who we would work up 5 or 6 songs with that would be unique to that show. So it’s been kind of evolving since then and I wanted this record to be under the band name rather than my own. Everyone contributed so much in terms of arranging the songs.

I had the tunes charted out and a concept of how it would sound in my head. But it was really about being there together and tackling each song, one at a time, and really figuring out the arrangement together. On the third track, it’s called “But It Did Happen”, Ethan came up with the bass line for that track in the studio. It was missing some other element, besides the melody and the chords, so he and Mark Raudabaugh on drums, made that bass and drum groove that opens the song now. There were so many collaborative moments like that. It was important to me to really have collective improvisation rather than linear soloing. Another thing about the Walking Distance record, I had an idea it had to be arranged a certain way. It had to be guitar solo, fiddle solo, banjo solo, mandolin solo and everybody gets a solo. On this record I really wanted it to have open ended sections where its not necessarily a fiddle solo, its a band solo. Then it makes those moments when individual musicians are featured feel like they stand out a little bit more.

RLR: So were those shows at the 5 Spot when ideas for songs with vocal arrangements from Maya de Vitry and Kristina Train stemmed from. A Joni Mitchell tune and a Lucinda Williams tune. Or did you always just have an idea that you wanted to, you know, highlight a guest vocalist?

JM: It did kind of stem from that show, from that residency. We played “Borderline” once before, it was at our February show with Kristina. Kristina was our special guest that month and that had been in my mind, the first time I heard that song I was like “I want to put that song on my next project, with an amazing singer” and Kristina is so amazing. She learned the song for that show and we played it once and never again until the studio (laughs). She just killed it, she’s an incredible musician.

Maya was lined up to do the May show, I believe, at the 5 Spot, which of course didn’t happen. We’ve been friends for so long and I love her. She’s one of my favorite vocalists. She had tracked a song with us on the first Forecast record that didn’t make the cut in the end because it couldn’t really find its place in the narrative of the record. It kind of stood out as something totally different to me. So the track “Dust” on the new album was on the last day, that track we did with Maya. It felt like one of the most spontaneous ones, because we decided on that song the morning of. Like “we’re going to do something, but what song should it be” and we just picked that one, maybe on the day before or the morning of, and we did like three takes and that was take 2. It was so much fun. A fun way to wrap up the weekend of making music last year.

RLR: I want to hit on the other project that came from this recording. The “Sketches/Improvisations”. Where did that idea stem from? How did you find it to close each session? I would almost think doing that at the beginning of each day would be the more logical approach, but I can see kind of shaking the proverbial dust off of what you did that day to cleanse, head home and be ready for the next session. It really seems like a valuable and interesting exercise, so I’d love to hear more of your thoughts on it. Was the intention always to record and release them?

JM: It was always the plan to do some kind of free improvisations together, at some point during the session. Just because it has to somehow impact the music, that we are all in this weird time and environment and we’re all wearing masks. I think we were just looking to see what kind of music just organically comes out of that. We’d be so busy with tracking the main songs on the record each day that the improvisations turned into these night caps. A great way to end each day.

Ethan suggested an idea from the author W.A. Mathieu, who wrote “The Listening Book”. That is a wonderful short book of essays on different ways to listen and make music. So that’s where this idea came from of minute long compositions. We would have our engineer Daniel set a timer and he would signal us when the minute was up and we would try and find a way to organically wrap up what we were doing. Thats where all of those tracks came from on that EP.

I thought we would record them, maybe put them out, maybe not and maybe its just a document of our time together, but I felt what happened was really interesting and I think its a good companion piece to the main record.

RLR: So I wanted to just end in giving you the opportunity to share anything else you want to share specific to this project, and also the plans for it moving forward. Where do you see the future of music heading in general? What are your hopes for the coming months or a year down the road?

JM: I am really optimistic about it. I really hope by the Fall we will be back to having live music as a regular part of our lives. I am sure we will have to approach it in different ways. I have been to a couple of socially distanced concerts at this point and it feels really good. It’s so important for our mental health, I feel optimistic about it.

I really look forward to building the Forecast project locally in Nashville more. I’d love to do some road dates at some point but it really feels like a Nashville community kind of thing to invest in. Because it’s such a big band and such a big collective of people who play with us, so I really want to keep cultivating that. Really make it a band that we can explore locally when we are home from tour, since everybody has other projects they are doing as well. It has been a really rewarding outlet for trying new things and writing new music with the band in mind. So I’ll be working on it this year more for sure.

 

John solo photo by Michelle Stone

Band photo by Jake Faivre