INTERVIEW : 2008-06-17 Joseph Arthur Is Damned, But Optimistic (by Chart Attack)

Musician and artist Joseph Arthur has become accustomed to seeing his work get dismissed as diluted and pretentious, simply because of the staggering efficiency with which he releases records.

He's also been labeled self-indulgent. And who could blame the press for doing so after he opened a gallery called The Museum of Modern Arthur to display his own paintings?

"I think you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't," Arthur surmises.

The New Yorker has released more than 10 discs of material since 2002, and he doesn't plan on slowing down. Arthur has already released three solo EPs this year (Could We Survive, Crazy Rain and Vagabond Skies), while Foreign Girls will follow on July 8.

As if that weren't enough for one year, September will see the release of Arthur's latest full-length, Temporary People, with his band The Lonely Astronauts (guitarist/keyboardist Kraig Jarret Johnson, guitarist Jennifer Turner, drummer Greg Wieczorek and bassist Sibyl Buck). Arthur agrees that he'll always be in danger of supersaturating the marketplace, but he insists that there's no other way to make music.

"I think people in the prime of their creative lives — the people I like the most — put out lots of music in short periods of time. And I think that's when some of the strongest work gets done. Let time sort it out. I think you have to strike while the iron's hot... It's better to get it out than to hold it back. Those are the chances you take.

"Look at The Beatles — their whole book was made in five years. Neil Young and Dylan used to put out two records a year… and that was just expected of you if you were an artist. Now if you do something similar, people tend to view it with raised eyebrows, like that means you're not editing yourself."

Arthur's musician's eye may be fixed on the past, but he certainly isn't the type to let the present pass him by. He sees the survival of the music industry in the internet, scattershot releases and digital distribution. That perspective prompted him to create Bag Is Hot, a blog of sorts that he's using to release music, poetry, photography and artwork for free at a sporadic and fluid pace.



"I usually break it down to what's the most interesting thing to do," says Arthur. "For instance, blogging poetry, or something like that. There's a certain vulnerability and risk in doing that. You have to ask yourself: 'Is it more interesting not to do that or to do that?' You break it down like that. And right now, I think it's more interesting to do it."