1. Where did you grow up and, how, if at all, has your environment influenced your work?
Born under the blue line L Train in Chicago, my parents were very poor college students and worked downtown. My father was a fantastic trumpet player... played for The Supremes and the Temptations among others. He started me with Piano lessons at 3 and I haven't stopped since, formally studying more than 10 instruments over 25 years (I turned 30 this January). I would say my growing up in Chicago has influenced my music by giving it a down home sound, kinda like folk does too a rambler. I grew up around a lot of Blues and Jazz and around 15 I started to pursue jazz as a professional methodology. Still am too... and you can hear allot of 7ths and 9ths in my rock and roll now. Chicago has given me a unique eclectic sound I would like to think no one else in this genre has.
2. What did you really, really want to be as a child?
I always said, since about 3 years old and throughout my childhood that I wanted to be an artist or an inventor.
3. Who are your mentors? Your influences?
The drummer for House of Blues House band Cleotis Cole (Big James and the Playboys) took me under his wing as a teen, became like a father to me really. He told me, "Joshua, you gotta get that school paper under your belt 'cause these days nobody will take you serious otherwise." He was right too, it's a new world for musicians. Too many of us. Too many producers, too many chiefs have over-saturated what's left of the professional field... so I moved to AZ and got my degree in audio engineering from the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences. Besides Cleo, Paul Simon has been a great influence to me and my lyrical writing. Those old melodic punk bands like the Descendants have really influenced my rock. Playing drums in countless hip hop and jazz groups has given me a pocket I think most rock lacks these days, "the pocket" is the art lost in rock and roll but held in highest regard in all other contemporary American genres.
4. How, if at all, does your work engage social history or commentary? Do you worry about making a "statement"?
I heard an artist say he was the voice and the advocate of love. Most musicians are, or strive to be a conduit of love as do I. When God gives you some kinda lime light, it's a HUGE responsibility. It's the universe telling you you have something special to spread around. If you abuse that, or exploit it or even claim to have birthed it... well God have mercy on your soul. It should be bigger than you and not visa-versa. Truly talented cats like Kanye West have it absolutely backwards. So much talent and yet they had nothing to do with the gift. That's why it's called a gift, 'cause it's given to you aside from your own hard work. Beware of claiming to have created God's Gift. It's like claiming to be your own creator, like taking credit for your last meals digestion! You have no part in it other than to foster the gift. Unfortunately very few humans are humble enough to stand up on MTV and give God the credit.
5. Do you have a "day" job?
I LOVE my day job! 9-5 creative director of activities at the Flushing House in Flushing, Queens NYC. I schedule and administer creative social activities for independent living seniors at our retirement community here. I wake up every morning and can't wait o get to work! I was working at Electric Lady Studios for years 100-120 hours a week on salary with no benefits. Worked out to less than 1 dollar an hour with 10,000 kids trying to rip my job out from under me every day until I ended up in a hospital bed. It was why I moved to NYC, and I got to work side by side with guys like Lil' Wayne, Al Green, Jeniffer Lopez and more but in the end I am an artist not a silent stool pigeon so I moved up up and away. You can also check out my credits at jmldesigns.net as well as my own music
6. Do you experience boredom or "blocks"? How do you deal with them?
If nobody ever told you, let me tell you a universal truth. Artists approach art differently, we all have different techniques. We all start from somewhere different and obviously end up somewhere different from the next guy but one fact remains true to ALL artists no matter WHAT. True art is inspired, not manufactured. This isn't a birdhouse you make from a diagram, this is a craft of creativity. If pure, it comes from raw emotion either positive or negative but like they say, the greater the suffering, the greater the reward. This rings truest with any artist. You get comfy, you fall off. That's why God made artists so sensitive! We are receptive delicate creatures susceptible to the tiniest amounts of emotions. I can step on a bug and a flood of song ideas enter my head... poor little bug... wonder if he felt that? I wonder if his life energy just shot up my leg? Where did it go?? Song.
7. Do you have a favorite scripture, quote or motto, piece of advice you received and live by?
To whom much is given, much is required.
8. When you're not working or creating you are....?
Dead.
9. Five words to describe you would be?
Alive, faithful, hopeful, ardent, aloof...
10. How can people contact you or get a hold of your work?
They can pop onto my web site guaranteed to keep them up all night at www.jmldesigns.net or purchase my album online in every major online store including iTunes under "Joshua Lutz". My music can also be found at MySpace.com/JoshuaLutzMusic