Let The Hunting Begin With Jason Darr

During our trip to the Family Values Tour 2007 in Boston (Mansfield), I had an opportunity to talk to Jason Darr of Neurosonic. We met up with Jason behind their tour bus a couple hours after their set. According to Jason’s recent blog entry, they had to cancel the Detroit show because Jason wasn’t feeling well, so we really appreciate him taking a few minutes out of his recuperation time to speak with us.

Be sure to check out Neurosonic on the main stage of the Family Values Tour 2007, in support of their latest release, Drama Queen.

Type 3 Media: How are you are feeling?

Jason Darr: I’m on the mend. I’m still a little congested and the throat was a little raw today, but we got it done. We had a couple of dropped songs though. A couple of the songs… there’s just no way I could’ve pulled them off today. So rather than butcher them we just played a slightly shorter set.

T3M: It was so hot today; did the heat get to you?

JD: I don’t even notice the heat anymore.

Photo by Kristen Pierson

T3M: Not even with the jackets you wear on stage?

JD: Once you do a couple of shows in those jackets the heat isn’t even an issue anymore. We did however invest in fans… each guy has got a fan in front of them. That makes things a lot nicer.

T3M: I’ve had your song “So Many People” stuck in my head since the first time I heard it. Do other people come up to you and tell you the same thing?

JD: All the time.

T3M: How does that make you feel?

JD: Fantastic. It means I’m doing my job. It means I’m good at my job. It’s nice. It’s reaffirming to know that you’ve done something that is making people react. Because the opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. I’d rather people hated me than not have an opinion about it either way. So go ahead and hate me.

T3M: Have you received any backlash from the song?

JD: No, not yet. We kind of half expected them to do it, and then we thought ‘no’ they would just be fueling the fire, even if they’re pissed off about it. They’re probably going to have the approach like ‘who is this band’, ‘nobody cares about that band anyway.’ That’ll all change.

T3M: Are you working on any new material?

JD: I’m working on new material, but it won’t be released for a while. We’re still riding hard on this record. It’s our number one priority.

T3M: It seems like you’re becoming much more well-known over the past several months.

JD: It’s climbing, it’s definitely climbing. We’re getting some spins on radio which is nice. We were at number 45 this week, so five more positions and we’re top 40.

T3M: We’ll have to keep requesting it.

JD: Absolutely. Request the fuck out of it.

T3M: How are things working out with your new bass player, Jacen?

JD: Incredibly well. He’s a fantastic singer… he’s a good dude… a hard working guy. He’s of the same mind space as everyone else in the band. He’s a team player. It’s the way things should be. It’s like he’s been in the band for a hundred years.

T3M: Right, that’s how it should be because it’s that family that you’re going to be living with for long period of time.

JD: That’s exactly right. If you’re on tour with somebody and you don’t feel that way, it’s destined to dwindle.

T3M: Have you had any downtime at all recently?

JD: We did. We had a little downtime. We supposed to do a tour with Kittie. We got four or five shows in on that tour, then pretty much said ‘see you later, we’re going home’. Like Cartman says, ‘screw you guys, we’re going home’. It was just not the right tour for us to be on. We didn’t get along with anybody. It was the wrong fanbase for us. We were just treated unpleasantly by the headliner’s crew. It seemed like they gave us obstacle after obstacle, and every time we came back with a solution, they gave us another obstacle. It got the point where we were like ‘ah, fuck this’.

T3M: Something good did happen around that time though.

JD: That’s right! The day we walked off the Kittie tour was the same day we announced Family Values. We were pretty excited about that.

T3M: Close one door and open another.

JD: That’s right.

T3M: Speaking of Family Values, how are things going so far?

JD: I got my ass kicked in poker by Jonathan Davis the other night, but other than that, it’s all good. At this rate, I’m gonna be broke by the time the tour is over though. It’s all fun.

T3M: Jason, thank you very much.

JD: You’re welcome.

T3M: I hope you feel better and I hope to see you guys again soon.

JD: Thank you, it’s good to see you guys again.

www.myspace.com/neurosonic