[Opening Monologue]
So this week has been pretty quiet for music news as one of the major news I can think of is that Ugenia (who?) is collaborating with Hard Sugar (again who?). Yep a quiet week for music indeed.
Tonight’s guest is probably the most well recognised names in modern music, 2 albums released and met with massive commercial and critical success. I’ve had 3 episodes of my chat show so far and he’s been mentioned in each one, I guess he’ll be mentioned tonight.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr Ryan Ross Hernandez.Jake: So your back with your 3rd record Let A Man Be Lost, It seems like you’ve been around forever, but I guess that’s just because you don’t rush things, would that be true or are you just lazy?Ryan: "I'm two things that can either work for me or against me, and that's that I'm both a perfectionist and a workaholic. Along with those, I'm somewhat obsessed with not sounding like anyone else out at the moment when I release the respective album, so when you take all those three elements and mash them up I need a lot of time to perfect it, everything on an album. Sometimes it's not even the recording process that takes the longest, sometimes, like with
Let a Man Be Lost, I knew even before writing a song for it that I wanted to live out a few things and experience new things. If I'm a singer-songwriter, who writes about life and his personal life, and about other people he has connections with family, friends, you need time to live those things out. If I was another kind of songwriter, who just thought about writing number one hits or an album full of three, four minute radio-ready songs, I would probably put out music in a more consistent form, which I could if I wanted to, but it would remove all musical credibility to it which I never want to do. I've been asked this question a lot of times which is, '
What do you want to be remembered for when you retire?' and I don't see myself as a guitar player or a singer or a blues musician or a pop musician, I see myself as an arranger of all those things and I get better over time at arranging those elements in my arsenal. It's really just a special little combination of things that I feel good about. I don't think I'm going to go down in history as a guitar god, but I think I'll go down in history as being able to do '
that thing,' pretty well, and that thing is putting music out on CD's they stamped a whole bunch of, that's still musical still has credibility to it, but reaches a whole bunch of people. I just wanna reach a lot of people.
By the way, I just wanna add because I'm looking at that clock behind the cameraman, that I will never be able to host my own show because I just took about five minutes answering the first question of the show." (chuckles)
Jake: Your personal life is one of the things people focus on more, you’ve dated a lot of fellow celebrity’s and your currently dating Nadia Berry of GirlSpice, are you finally with the right person?Ryan: "I know, without a doubt in my mind, that what I'm about to say is going to sound horrible and people will twist my words around to make me sound like an incredible ass but I'm gonna say it anyways. I'm twenty-five years old right now, as a twenty-five year old man who has been lucky enough to not only be successful in his career but has gotten the chance to meet some of they most intelligent and beautiful women in the world, I feel that I have a right with my age and my past to be at a place where I just want to live my life and enjoy myself whether I'm in a relationship or not. Do I think that my current girlfriend and myself will last forever, probably not because a relationship between two full-time musicians and entertainers never works out in the long run. And she knows this perfectly, I've talked with her about it, and she understands it. I honestly see myself as the kind of guy who women want to date, but not the kind of man a woman wants to marry. And that very well maybe because of my past when it comes to relationships and women, or because that's just the way I am. I do see myself getting married and possibly having a family someday, but not when my main focus is still being a musician, because when you're a musician who travels the world you meet a lot of people and have connections. I'm not saying that I've ever cheated on an ex, because I never have, I think when your in a relationship with some that means you have enough respect for the other to not cheat and be faithful to them. But I'd rather not get married if there is still the possibility of meeting other people. The day I get married, I don't want to last a few years then just to be caught on some major Tiger Woods like scandal."
Jake: I’m a huge fan of your work but I can’t help but be jealous, your confidence with women is just so annoying, I myself am the most awkward/nervous guy around and you just seem to get who you want, do you get a lot of guys come up to you and say something less than complementary because of jealousy?Ryan: (laughs) "Yes that's happened a few times in the past, but I've also had a lot of guys who come up to me and give me high-fives they're like, '
Dude, I hook up to your music all the time.' and I'm like good on you, it's not creepy when you do it. I can't make that work for me, I can't get high off my own supply. You know how hard it is to being having sex with a woman and use a wah-pedal at the same time. (chuckles) Let me tell you what I like to do to pick up women. When I'm having a really good time, about drink one, one in a half, and you're making her laugh, you just look at her and say '
Hahaha! I gotta tell you one thing, by the way, I'm not sleeping with you tonight.' 'cause that's their line and you steal it from right under them. And then they got nothing, their like '
I wanna suck your (censored),' because that's just what's hiding behind that line in the first place. But back to your question, I honestly wasn't the '
ladies man,' or whatever you want to call it, just a few years ago. If you look to early on in my career, I use to avoid alcohol, clubbing, '
red-carpet' events, dating celebrities and anything else that I felt would detract from his focus on my music. However I experienced an extreme '
anxiety bender' episode in my early twenties that motivated me to be less reclusive and at the same time it let me go out and enjoy meeting women. But all in all, nowadays I love how some dudes hate me for dating their fantasy girl, as if they were going to if I hadn't."
Jake: Your signed to Studio60 Records, and you were the first signing they made there, why did you decide to go to a brand new label with no acts?Ryan: "I decided to sign to Studio 60 Records because they offered me a Fort Knox sized record deal, that I could not possibly turn down. (chuckles) No, additionally to giving me a check with two numbers and a whole lot of comma's and zero's following it, Studio 60 Records felt like the best possible fit for me to take my artistic talents to. The most important thing for me when it comes to record deals is for a label to give me complete creative and artistic freedoms and that's exactly what Studio 60 gave me. No where did they say, '
You have to release these many singles and we need an album for you by this date,' other labels that I spoke to wanted to control a lot of things which I can't stand. One worry that I had, which was because a new label, was a worry of financial support for the record but once I met up with Greg Walls in Los Angeles, he showed me a lot of financial records which took most of my worries away. In all honesty I think Studio 60 is at the very brick of becoming a huge record label and I'm glad that
Let a Man Be Lost could possibly be what brings this record label a lot of success. A verbal deal that I made with Walls was that, I'll give albums that you gotta press a whole bunch out to and send 2 million copies in the US on the release date to stores, if you give me unlimited financial support and just basically let me do whatever I want on my records. And I'm not saying that to sound cocky or anything but I think I've earned being that confident with the amount of success I've had in the past."
Jake: You’ve worked with a few people in the past including, Stephanie Fierce, Miss Vanity, Axiom and Alicia Lena, what is it like working with such popular musicians and what difference did they bring to your recording?Ryan: "Well you know, one thing that I enjoy doing when I work on other artist's songs and albums is bringing in my musical style and tweak it in a way that it's still me but at the same time fits in with the others style or genre. I have this certain gene in my body that allows me to understand what another artist wants from me when they call on me or e-mail me and say, '
I have this song or this idea for a song that I think you'll be great for,' and that's why I think I can collaborate so well with so many different artists because I'm bringing what they need without losing my own. And that's the same when I called upon Miss Vanity to be featured on a record on
Let a Man Be Lost, I knew if I was going to offer her to collaborate on a song I wasn't going to send here over a ten-minute blues jam, I was going to send her a song that she could very easily hop on to and bring her own style. '
Devil in a New Dress,' is very dark by nature, it's a experimental pop-ish, R&B song. It's one of only two songs on the album that don't have blues influences or blues elements upon it. I like to make people uncomfortable when they play on my records. Usually when I play on other people's records, I'm more calm and charming but when it's my records, I feel I have the right to keep the other person around for twelve hours working on one song."
Jake: Who would you like to work with who you haven’t yet worked with, also please don’t say Nadia that’s just too predictable?Ryan: "No, I'm not going to say her or GirlSpice in general because I don't like mixing my professional career with my personal life when it comes to collaborations. I'm not sure, I mean like you mentioned before I've worked with some great artists and I think we're in a state in the music industry whether you are either a very popular and well-know artist or band, or you're just new to the scene. To be honest, I don't think I want to do many new collaborations in the foreseeable future. I believe even above of collaborating with another artist, I would love even more to produce for other artist, which I've done in the past but I really want to get more into it in the future. Most of the music these new kids on the scene are making is boring, not in the sense of being down-tempo but more in the sense that, it doesn't excite me, it doesn't inspire me. Especially these bands that have their young fanbase, they completely forget about musical credibility, like I was speaking of earlier. It feels like these young kids just don't give a crap about credibility and just want to put music out then hope and pray that they have one breakthrough song."
Jake: And you’ve caused a lot of controversy in the past, do you say things which are likely to cause problems on purpose?Ryan: "I have this incredibly just like, veracious need to express, that's just what I am. I might be a little jazz handy but I'm not trying to sound like, '
the bad boy,' or anything. But here's a question for everyone. If Chris Brown, on his last record, had his first single been the most out-of-control sensational music you've ever heard in your life would people had boycotted it? Probably not, probably not. Everyone get's a fair share in music. My point is that I've seen, I don't want to be jaded, but I've seen the best of approval and the worse of disapproval, and they pretty much cancel each other out. So, I've learned that I could better spend my time making a sandwich or building a model ship or something, rather than giving TMZ or Access Hollywood the chance to over-analyze the living hell out of something I say one night after I come out drunk from a club. Now I'm just like trying to not block out the media and paparazzi's but nor I'm I embracing it, because I've tried both ways and you don't end up well either or, so I understand that if X is outside taking my picture then that equals, I should probably make sure I got a nice coat on. I already know they are going to be there so you start thinking like the lens."
Jake: Your huge in the US but would it be a fair assessment to say that your not very well known in the UK or Europe?Ryan: "Yeah, my life is a little bit like Superman and Clark Kent right now. I am huge in the United States but I'm nothing, absolutely nothing in the UK and Europe. I love the questions I get asked when I'm over there. '(with British accent)
In the States you're quite large, in fact you're massive, but when you get to the UK we would not piss on you to put you out on fire. Their is a saying here we have called human garbage and we say you sort-of get passed over for a bowl of mash potatoes here.' It's like I don't know how to answer that. No, I mean I feel like I'm bubbling under let's say. I understand it, I know where I stand. In the States, I know how to deal with it now but when I play the UK and other European countries, but it reminds me of a time where in the US when I was first coming up, when I was just not sure and that just takes more energy. That's when people come up to you and you're like '
Yes I know, can I sign something for you?' and their like '
No, your flies down.' so it's still a bit awkward over there just because I don't know how to roll over there. But for the most part I just assume nobody knows who I am when I'm outside of the US, which is why I always ask people over there, '
Don't you know who I am?' Even if I'm not as big or don't have the same success in other places as I've been fortune enough to have in the US, I still love playing in those places and perform for my international fans.
Actually, this is an exclusive because I was told about this two days ago, so it's an exclusive for your show. Aside from some offset shows I'll play in the US before year's end, the real big, official
Let a Man Be Lost 2011 world tour, will begin in February with the Asia leg of the tour, then continue in March with a Europe leg that includes a couple UK shows. So I'm excited to play all those places I haven't played at in a while. It's really special because I've usually just played the big countries or big cities, but with this tour, I really want to go into it very extensively and go deep into Asia and Europe, there's a lot of places that I want to play and haven't gotten chance to do so, this time I hope I'll be able to. It's gonna be a huge tour and it's probably gonna expand through out most of 2011 and don't be surprised if I drag on this album cycle well into 2012 also. I'm currently in love with
Let a Man Be Lost, and I don't think I'll get bored out of playing those new songs easily."
Jake: I’ll admit, I was hugely surprised when I saw you star in Something’s Missing, and even more surprising was that you wrote it as well, any plans to continue writing outside of music in the future?Ryan: "Something's Missing was almost made out of an experiment of mine. The movie is about the examination of a philosophy. What if you decided to live hub to hub, with nothing, with nobody? I had this song on my first record of the same name, that dealt with the idea of having everything, or superficially having everything but having this feel of always missing something even if in reality you aren't. But when it came to writing the screenplay, I never took it as being written out of the idea of that song but more of just this idea I had gotten one night and I just started writing, initially I had no idea what I was going for, if it was just a really big idea for a song. But honestly the screenplay it took me two years to write, and then almost six months to actually get both a director who was willing to direct it without changing the fundamental story that I was trying to get across with the dialogue and base story line. And it also took sometime after that to find a studio and distributor that was willing to financially support the film. So it was a very long and stressful process even before we actually shot a scene, but I enjoyed the process of dealing and getting the feel aspect of film making both in front of cameras and behind it. I do plan on doing more acting in the future, not sure if I would do more screenwriting, at least film screenwriting because brilliant ideas just have to come to me so that I'd been able to. As to my songwriting process and I can't force any of my writing out, it has to come to me very organic. What I really want to do next because it fascinates me, which I usually do most things in my life because they fascinate me, is to deal with television, some sort-of television whether it be TV series as writer or actor. Things like that are getting my attention right now and I do plan on doing either or soon."
Jake: That Rolling Stone interview caused a lot of issues, what was your thoughts on the media storm that surrounded after it was published?Ryan: "Ah yes, well it took long enough for you to ask. (chuckles) That Rolling Stone interview this past February was one of those rare moments where I felt like I had done some people wrong, without being knowledgeable of it until after it was out there, after it was published. I'd always been a media staple for both good and bad, but that was the first time where the media just completely ate me alive, which even as much as I tried to play it down, it was impossible because it was literally everywhere. And that really wasn't what affected me most, but what did was when I tried to call exes and old friends who I disrespected or said the incorrect comment about or towards, didn't answer any calls or voice mails or e-mails that I had sent to them. And the people that did family members and such, just told them that they felt disappointed of me, and that's one thing I can't stand. I can't stand the idea of letting someone down, my mind is just incapable of being okay with that. But I've learned, I learned from it, I learned don't talk to see if you have something to say, talking to find out you if you have something to say is a really bad way of finding out that you had nothing to say. It also taught me that the media is never your friend, so that keeps me more in focus to not over share anymore in interviews and such, and just try and be more mysterious in general. There is now a fine line between my public persona and my personal life."
Jake: You’re the quintessential Hollywood superstar, with a Los Angeles villa, a Hollywood mansion and your first two albums became number 1 records, is it ok for me to dislike you because of your success.?Ryan: "Well you forget about my four million dollar apartment in New York City, and how both albums are multi-platinum times four and six, respectively. (laughs) Sure, I can see why people do. But I don't feel so bad about it when I know that I was able to gain this level of success because of my music, because of what I love to do. As long as I can keep telling myself that I have this bulletproof armor, my music, knowing that I have a record. That I have a reason to be here. I'm considered a celebrity, but I'm comfortable with it knowing that even with being a celebrity I have reached this level of success and fortune because of my music, doing something meaningful. It makes me sick to think that we live in a generation where so many people, celebrities, reach that status or make millions of dollars a year just because they have a reality show or something like that. I'm not famous for being famous, I'm actually earning my profit, whether it be making music, playing music, acting, whatever, all my income comes from doing something, I'm not just just sitting down and money is falling from the sky for me. It's terrible to hear how many kids these, new kids, when you ask them what they want to be when they grow up, fifty percent of those kids will tell they want to be famous, they don't why or by doing what, but they just want to be famous because they say all these heirs and reality starts who don't do anything, don't have talent yet they are still on TV, in headlines. So it's like when people say they don't like me because I'm a celebrity or I've dated these famous girls or I've had this massive success, it doesn't bother me because I respect a person who tells me 'I don't like your music,' because that's fine everyone has different music taste they have a right to either like or dislike my music, but I don't pay attention to people who just don't like me because of any other reason. And hopefully if I've done music correctly, I can transcend them from what they think they know about me, into just a world of emotions."
Jake: You write with such honesty which as we’ve touched upon it does create problems, does your openness annoy you sometimes?Ryan: "My openness when it comes to songwriting, doesn't annoy me. It never has and It never will, because that style of songwriting has earned me a living without it I would probably have a job that I hated right now. Songwriting started everything for me, before I ever picked up a guitar, before I ever tried to sing a note or melody, the first thing I ever did was pick up a pen when I was fifteen years old and went deep into a notebook and just wrote lyrics. And back when I was fifteen I wrote about my life, and people in it, and experiences that have happened to me. That's never going to change. Whether I'm fifteen, twenty-five, thirty-five, forty-five and so on, as long as I'm a singer/songwriter, I will continue to write about life and as long as I keep living my life as long as I'm breathing, I will continue to write about it. I'm a pop star but I'm not a party pop star, if that makes sense. I sing and write about life, and life ain't always pretty. I'm never going to sing about going out to a club and how got plastered, no, never. The music I create from scratch, especially the lyrics and writing, means a lot to me, it's therapeutic even for me and I don't feel bad doing it, or writing about people in my life because it also means something to the people who listen to the records and can connect with them and put their own life and situations into it.
In all honesty, I think people should be scared of even getting near me in a personal stand point because I do write about my experiences. I've been fortune enough to be successful, and as I have gotten more successful and have grown up, I've always stayed true to when it came to my songwriting style. Just because now more people are interested in the subject material of those songs more so, because of the women I've dated also being celebrities or being famous as well. I'm still going to continue to write about my life and people are going to continue to speculate about who's the songs about and I'm going to continue to never tell them who the songs about. I never give people who I write about a fair warning beforehand, so they are just going to hear it when they hear. Especially this new record, I'm excited to hear the feedback from some of the people who I write about on the record. I'm just not afraid of telling people the whole story inside a story from music, because I think I process both good and painful emotions more easily because I can tell myself, 'Wow. This is gonna make a really good song somewhere down the line'. It comes from my world to the listeners' and they would hopefully apply it to their own lives and their problems. If I sing about something that someone listening to it is going through, I think I could make difference for that person because then they feel like it's not just them going through it. I don't care if you're an A-list Hollywood scarlet, who's been around for the last ten years, or not if I'm in a relationship with you, by now any girlfriend or just anyone in my life really should know that I will most likely than not write a song about them."
Jake: What's next, what happens now for Ryan Ross Hernandez?Ryan: "I'm just going to promote the living hell out of this new album. And as I said before, go out on the road and tour the world with this new album cycle. At least for the next eighteen months I do not want to see a recording studio when it comes to my own career. Maybe if their is a collaboration that's offered to me that I can't resist, I might hit the studio with that person before then, but if people thought I took a long time putting this record out, they haven't seen anything yet because it will take sometime for me to be able and head back into a studio with the mindset that I can make a better record than
Let a Man Be Lost. And at a personal standpoint just chill out and get my head straight. Just try to talk less, which of course this interview proves that it will take some work to get that one down with. (chuckles) But I'm not saying I plan on taking another eight or nine months hiatus from the public spotlight, but I'm just going to try and appreciate things more. There is a lot more Ryan Ross Hernandez for all of you, I can promise you all that. This ride has taken a couple of bumps and downturns but the best is yet to come, in all aspects."
Ladies and Gentlemen please give it up for a true music legends and despite what people think, a genuinely nice guy. Again Ryan Ross Hernandez.
