Interview with Man of the Moment, Willie Herath by A.L. Harper
I love summer music, particularly in the dead of winter. It reminds me of the fun, happy, energetic days of sun, sand and BBQ’s. I like my summery music to sound and even smell like summer; you know the kind of thing, no deep morose subject matter or scathing social commentary but lively, fresh, animated music. Music that inspires you to feel young, vital and eager for activity – my mother called that sort of feeling twitterpated.
“He is physically active, enthusiastic and spiritual and his music mirrors his life.”
Willie Herath’s (pronounced like Harris with a lisp – his words not mine) music will make your heart smile with glee and summery anticipation. Barenaked Ladies mixed with Jack Johnson, doing the funky chicken with Fountains Of Wayne. It is a perfect reflection of the man who makes it. Best known for the numerous commercials he has been in, Willie is now pursuing his music, releasing his debut album Cohgie Never Landed in 2006. Which is filled with his breezy musical mixes, buoyant lyrics and Willie’s own lively, guileless, vocals, the perfect accompaniment for this imponderous music.
We picked Willie as our man of the month this month because he and his music perfectly represent the Earth in this month’s theme Earth and Sky. Willie seems to be a typical Southern California guy except that he was born and raised on a farm in Illinois. He is physically active, enthusiastic and spiritual and his music mirrors his life. It’s the only music I can imagine listening to when camping on the beach after a day of lobster diving – a hobby of Willie’s – cooking over an open fire and singing songs.
I have interviewed Willie before know that he is an enchanting character, filled with the vivaciousness of healthy eating, lots of exercise and being madly in love with and married to his high school sweetheart and soul-mate. Recently I got to chat with him again and we talked about, lobster diving, his healthy lifestyle and his most recent projects.
Hello Willie! Thank you for sitting down with me again to chat. Let’s start by talking about your last album, your debut Cohgie Never Landed. How long has it been since you released it?
It has been… let’s see it was June? July? It was July of 06. So it has been, it will be two years this July. It’s funny because as soon as I was done recording Cohgie Never Landed, I was already writing and working on the next album. It takes so much time to get an album going but it’s one of those things where it brings you so much gratification to get it done. Packaged and pressed, the bar code and iTunes. It’s been fun. We did a lot of touring. We did some shows all around the country: Indiana, Arizona, Illinois, Iowa, tons in California. It was well received for my first album. I can’t complain.
Tell us about your next album.
My second album is of the same vein, I’m doing all the songwriting and everything. But we are doing it a little bit different. I started paying attention to trends nowadays and, people put their albums up on iTunes right away and it’s very, very rare that somebody downloads the entire album. It’s usually one song at a time, and they go back and find another song. Maybe over the course of a few months they end up buying close to the whole album but people aren’t buying full albums anymore. So I thought “how can I make my music fresh and try to come out with album faster than two years?” So about six, seven months ago me and my business partner Rob Heskin, who is also my lead guitarist, we sat down and we started talking about what we would like to do.
We’d like to record music and release music all the time. We hate the in between stuff. In the seventies when the album became this huge thing where you would put it on and turn out the light and you would just listen. If you had a lot of money you had one of those boxes that had the lights inside. It was a whole experience. And people don’t do that anymore.
People now want a hit. A two and a half minute, three minute tops, hit and that’s all they want to listen to. I’m one of those people, I enjoy making my music but I also want to be able to sell it. So I thought let’s come up with three really strong songs that we like, that our friends like and let’s just put them up on iTunes, as like three song EPs and let’s do that every eight months. As apposed to waiting three years to release a twelve song album. That’s really what our next album is going to be.
Is this work that you’re just finishing up part of that?
This is going to be a three song EP, yes.
What’s it going to be called?
We’ve been toying with the idea of Just Three Songs, or EP Number One, or just Number One but we don’t know.
Is the sound significantly different than your album?
I think it’s going to be sounding almost the same when it comes to the style of music and the chords and the lyrics. The main difference between the two is this isn’t going to sound like I recorded it alone in my house. It’s going sound like I got to record it through a major record company. (For the record, in my professional opinion Cohgie Never Landed didn’t sound like it was recorded in his house. The production quality is very high for an independent release.)
So the reason ATG have chosen you to be our Earth Man of the Moment is because you are the earthiest person I know really. This summer you went to Costa Rica and lived off bugs (laughing) really, didn’t you?
And wild fruits and berries. (laughing)
One of your hobbies is lobster diving?
Yeah, I started lobster diving… I think I started five years ago and I think it took me three years before I caught my first lobster. I don’t know anybody who can be that dedicated and be such a failure for so long. (laughing) Lobster have got to be the fastest animal under the water. When they flick their tail, when they know you’re coming close they can go into a little rock or cave or crevice and just disappear. They can be so hard to catch. I think the main reason it took me so long to catch one is because people kept telling me they were nocturnal… and once I got over my fear of night diving, that’s when I started catching tons of lobster.
Are they easier to catch in the dark?
They are just as hard to catch, you just see more. So you’re chances of catching one goes up.
You seem to have an intrinsic connection with the earth. Even your music is earthy and beachy, that must come from you. Do you feel an intimate or an elemental connection with the Earth?
I do. I think it probably has to do with my mom. She was organic and self-sustaining and self-sufficiency stuff, before it was popular. Before you could go to the grocery store and buy organic milk even. So I was born at home, on the farm and we had a well and that’s where we got our water. We had a huge two acre garden my mom would can. And we had dairy goats and we would get all of our milk, butter, cream, cheese and ice cream. I was home-schooled.
“Being a human is all about outside.”
When I moved to LA and it was complete culture shock. (laughs) I need to find the thing that was missing so much and I realised it is the earth. It is being outdoors. I just feel at one with God and myself. Being a human is all about outside.
You can hear some of the tracks from Cohgie Never Landed on Willie’s MySpace space. It is also available to download from iTunes. You can also purchase Cohgie Never Landed at Willie’s secure online shop and for more information about new releases and get a free music download you can sign-up for Willie’s mailing list.
A.L. Harper is a freelance writer and motorbike fanatic originally from Salt Lake City, Utah but now living in Scotland. In edition to being the Managing Editor for All Things Girl, A.L. is the Assistant Music Editor for Blogcritics.org and a freelance writer for hire.
