Interview with John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood - MMW

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Bass Solo [2001]

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John Medeski of Medeski, Martin and Wood Interview
Kent Kessinger

Kessinger:  You fly out to Japan, Spain, NY, and California and play about one show at each spot.  Why four shows in NC?
Medeski:  They were asking for us.  Billy Martin (drummer) had a girlfriend in Chapel Hill so we used to stay there when we played shows.  
Kessinger:  Is there an overall theme to ”The End of the World Party” because you have track names like ‘Anonymous Skulls’, ‘Bloody Oil’, and ‘New Planet’.  
Medeski:  (Laughs) I don’t know what do you think?  We don’t talk about it too much.  It’s influenced by our personal lives and everything around us.  It’s based around a party we had in Hawaii in a shack in a jungle.  We would set up a generator on my friend’s lawn.  One of the parties was named “The End of the World Party, (just in case)”.  The title had a much lighter theme at the time.  We like to leave it up to your imagination.  
Kessinger:  What would you call the music that you make?
Medeski:  We have spent 15 years trying to figure that out.  We gave up.  We call it MMW music.  Our music is on the fringe of a lot of different things.  We appeal to people looking for something different from the norm.  We were called acid jazz but that style solidified with a hip hop base and we said ‘We are not exactly that’.  Then the jam band thing came and we are not exactly that.  We are not trying to play anything in particular, we are just trying to express and communicate, we don’t think about it.  We are dedicated musicians with discipline.  The music we play doesn’t sound like anything exactly.  Maybe you can come up with a good name; there is a reward for that.
Kessinger:  I’ll work on that.  Most of your music is improvised, right?
Medeski:  That is the main element to our music.  There is an aspect to improvisation that does what no other music does.  It has energy unlike any other music.  When we cover a song we find something recognizable of the song and we find another side that is open for interpretation.  
Kessinger:  “A whiff of high societies perfume choked you into pulling away from classical music scene”, would you rather break new ground musically or get radio play?
Medeski:  We’d love to do both.  But if we had a choice, break new ground.  These days you have to have lyrics and a singer to get on the radio.
Kessinger:  What would you say has been the biggest improvement in MMW’s music since 1992?
Medeski:  Our vocabulary has gotten bigger.  Our language has expanded; we have a bigger palette for improvisation.
Kessinger:  You have had 68 sows in 2005 at this point and probably 78 by time this paper comes out.  With benefits for Habitat for Humanity and New Orleans and movies like “Go Further” with Woody Harrelson, how does spending all your time with the band work out?
Medeski:  That’s a lot less then we used to do.  We were doing up to 200 shows a year.  We find a balance to grow personally and musically.  If that happens, we are happening.  The key is finding how to keep the magic alive.  We are family at this point.  
Kessinger:  You say you enter a trance when you play.   
Medeski:  It’s hard to put into words.  It’s a certain place that fills you and illuminates.
Kessinger:  Has drugs influenced your music?
Medeski:  I would say no.  Things are around and we have definitely experimented.  But I can’t say its been a major factor.  Psychedelics open the human mind and shows things that are already there.  That view of the world is available to us at all times.  John Coltrane said he did acid once or twice maybe.  It was valuable to him for experimentation.  He said the key is to not rely on chemicals to take you there.  Psychedelics are just a quick way to show you something.  The key is to keep that mindset alive.
Kessinger:  What would you like to be remembered for?  
Medeski: (chuckles)  I’d rather not be….  For being a decent guy.