Passion and Strength: A Conversation With JD Weaver
I recently listened to and reviewed JD Weaver’s ‘Eagle Song’. There is a strength in his voice and the way that he plays. It wasn’t until after the fact that in a follow up convo with JD I really understood where that strength pours forth from and how difficult it can be to muster up. JD told me that he has a disability called Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy which requires him to be wheel chair bound. But still, that strength shines in this guy and his music. His passion and fervour for spreading the word about the creation of art and overcoming adversity is inspiring and wonderful. This gent has a lot of heart and a lot to say. So read on below to hear more about what he has to say and support this fine musicians music today…
RLR: So, why don’t you just tell us your story. Why did you begin to make music?
JD: Being disabled is bloody hard and there are so many wrongs within society that I have been faced with due to this new synthetic title that’s been handed to me. Disability isn’t the health, disability is how people treat you because you are sick, disability is losing friends because they can’t relate to you, disability is the mental trauma placed on you and more accurately disability is being repressed in a brokensociety and being seen as insubordinate.
Upon seeing the problems I now faced and the restrictions I now faced I had to now have a good hard look at what I could do vent my frustrations and fine something constructive to do, when all my friends were out there playing football. I turned to music and the music I fell upon reflected the emotional upheaval I went through and naturally I decided to search for what ‘meaningful’ music was. You hear the cliché phrase ‘music is my life’ but when everything is taken away and your opportunity to succeed in the world is limited, then music is the only thing that gives my existence meaning, as it allows me to have an honest relationship with those who choose to listen, and say ‘I am angry and this is what I have to shout about’.
I am constantly shut up and told to be grateful for what I get, which is little, but this is my time to say, ‘I deserve the same as you, nothing more nothing less’. After battling for funding, due to the costs of healthcare and finding work hard to come by, I managed to create an EP that is essentially me and my beliefs on the world in a nutshell.
RLR: Tell us a bit about that EP project. What inspired you to write these songs?
The EP is called Where Eagles Fly and is one of three music projects to role based around the concept of two characters within my piece, the Native Man and the Eagle. I wanted to confront disability head on, but I feel my duty is to make my music accessible to all humans. So I took a step back and waited for perspective to hit me, and thought, ‘I need to make my music universal, because if my message is just for disabled people then I segregate other communities from what I have to say’.
I have always been deeply moved by the strength that indigenous populaces, in particular the Maoris, Native Americans and Aboriginal Australians, have and still show in the face of a disgusting history of treatment towards them, and even though the repercussions of that still deeply affect them they stay strong and fight!
I am with them in this fight, I don’t intend to appropriate cultures that aren’t mine,it’s not how I roll, and I can’t even fathom the problems they must face still in a modern context.
However, I want to share my pain with communities other than my own, because I understand what it’s like to be mistreated because of past mistreatment. My very future is most likely not in my control, my health and governments dictate where I will end up, and so I am reaching my hand out to my brothers and sisters of the world who face inequality to say lets share our pain and rise up against the problems we face.
I won’t rest until I make my voice heard!
RLR: So there seems to be a common theme and empowerment ideal in your music. Want to elaborate on that?
My music is about encompassing all ideas of discrimination/inequality whilst adding my perspective as a disabled person on the wrongdoings of society, and Eagle Song no matter who no matter where, I feel it can burrow its way into most people’s hearts. For the majority, we all feel some in-justice; we are disgusted when we see wrongdoings never redeemed, so the song is like an Eagle. It’s flown away and has its own life. Human existence and the frustration you aren’t heard and those in power are forcing you into a future (due to factors you have no control over) runs parallel for a huge chunk of people within the world and in past generations. It echoes throughout time…
Furthermore, it is making a statement to people who are ignorant to issues that don’t affect them. What I like to call it is the ‘ignorance is bliss’ culture, and the idea that because something doesn’t affect or is too uncomfortable to really look, is dangerous. It is holding many communities back. Some don’t dare look at the fact thousands to millions of disabled people have and still wrongly euthanized/institutionalised in many corners of the world, and now socio-economically we are mistreated and in times of economic downturn we are the ones (like the homeless) who are attacked and made to feel like burdens. People don’t dare to look at the institutionalised racism that has and still exists, which every day we see the affects. People don’t dare to understand for some to have freedom, Native Americans, Aboriginal Australians, Maoris and many other indigenous populaces were killed and had their freedoms wrongfully thrown away. Every day the people I have listed (disabled people, women, African-Americans, indigenous populaces, the LGBT community and many more) are forced to look at their history, because their history for the most part is still their present. For many the struggle goes on no matter how much has been achieved, there is still a huge section holding the rest of the world back. Not looking or caring about an issue doesn’t make it go away, it just means that these issues manifest themselves in less overt ways and fester and grow into even bigger problems.
It’s not enough to just accept these problems or turn your back, because what you do when you do that you make human existence worthless, you make the people who are affected by those issues irrelevant, and you concede your own future to.To deny someone else’s freedoms and rights to do whatever they should be allowed to, you scrutinise your own right to something, thus these issues will affect you maybe not in a way you will see if you are ignorant but trust me they can and most likely will if we do not take a stand. Not being actively anti-racism. Anti-ableism, anti-homophobic etc, means that we settle for these issues and set a horrible precedent for the future, and these issues will continue to affect millions and truly hold us all back.
Furthermore, to pretend that we live in a dream world where disability doesn’t exist is really stupid. It always frustrates me when people are so ignorant and just apathetic to people who are sick, I am not the most disabled person, but I go through more than the average person, but I realise through my own existence that disability isn’t just for the damned few who are given that title, but the whole world is tarnished by disability. Not one person in this world will not be sick in their lifetime, be that through age, condition or just an illness, we all will eventually need assistance. No longer should we turn our back on the vulnerable and those who need help, because we all will need help regardless of whether you think these issues won’t touch you or that you live in a land of rainbows and cotton candy. All these issues affect us… UNITED WE STAND TOGETHER WE FALL. This world has one heart that connects everything that is living. To deny one person freedom, is to deny the whole world freedom.
If not everyone is free and feels represented, then none of us are free and represented. I really want to thank those who’ve taken time to listen to my EP, around 20,000 different human beings have take time to listen to what I have to say, and for that Iam grateful. This EP has skyrocketed really and gives me a lot to be positive and hopeful for in the future.
RLR: So what is next for JD Weaver?
Despite not having the money, I want to keep making music (need to get an album out this year, with my health progressing the way it is) in the hope that one day these issues I don’t have to speak about because they have been fixed. I hope together we can make a society where nobody has to feel mistreated and unloved.I may not be able to make another album or music if I can’t this year, but for now I feel so passionate about what I am doing, and no society or crooked politician will be able to take that away from me, and its allowed me to meet up some beautifully diverse people, that’s what life and music should be about!
