Spontaneous in Paris
Bruce Sherfield (aka Mc Jester) is the voice of Spontane, a musical team of “six graceful punks” performing extensively in New York, Amsterdam and France. Bruce is also an accomplished poet, dancer, and visual artist. Right now he lives in Paris. Spontane was started in New York city in 2002. Early in 2005, Spontane signed with a Parisian label: Dad Records. The finished album is now available and distributed by Differ-ant. Some of Bruce’s work can be experienced online at dadrecords.com, myspace.com/spontanecity, and spontane-music.com. Bruce answered these questions for KnowingArt.com via the Internet.
PJ Brunet: As an artist, has the Internet changed your work relationships?
Bruce Sherfield: The medium itself has garnered vast visibility, opportunity and service, but I don’t believe the tool itself can improve real relationships. It is the luck that comes with the exposure that makes people connect. I would think this way, but for others it is a crutch–the power too readily at hand for them to know what to do with it. Myspace is a great, logical frontier, like Craigslist is, but I still don’t see it enhancing relationships, just resurfacing the inner needs of people to feel not alone.
PB: What role does online visibility take on for artists? If financial needs were met, would you be online?
BS: Not for art, no. But for a person as tough as I am to get along with, I like the ability to say what I want to say. To reiterate how the medium can spoil others: visibility w/o responsibility equals disaster, or decay, on a big scale, like lifetime scale and such.
PB: Are musical ideas advancing faster now with the Internet?
BS: Ideas are never advanced by any form of media–only exploited until used up. Not a negative way of doing it, but in a competitive way; Great ideas come from a little dark place where life grows and no one knew it was there.
PB: What is the “business” of art?
BS: The goal of business is to make money, good or bad. Art is a commodity like flesh, but the twist is that art makes people feel like a new thing is happening, and sometimes it does, but mostly art now is people expressing themselves, and that’s OK too.
PB: Will artists be able to take full control of their careers with technology?
BS: No, you must realize that there will always have to be a commodity–something to sell, and somebody to sell it. Worth and identity are the most powerful tools for making money ever: I am somebody, and this is who I am.
PB: Have you ever been presented with (difficult) contracts? Could you still communicate in a more commercial context?
BS: Of course, right now! Tomorrow I have a supermeeting with my produce, tour manager, promoters, distributor, and my band, so we can see what the hell the strategy is: business, vision, plan, target, investment.
PB: How is the social sphere of music changing? Do you see any big changes coming?
BS: Soon a powerful movement will happen, on the scale of rock and roll or hiphop. It always does happen, but who knows what it will be, and when it first comes everyone will think it sucks. Reggaeton is not it.
PB: Do you have any comment on the American Idol craze?
BS: Fame is a symbolic disease, especially for the middle class. Poor kids want a baseball glove, but suburban kids just want to be somebody, but to do it with no class.
PB: How do you decide where you want to go with your art or music?
BS: Pete, I work and work and work. I have a system, called the neo context system, where one medium influences my response time to help me act faster in another. Basically my arts cheat off of each other and are jealous of each other, but won’t admit it.
PB: As you mature as an artist, is more of your art coming from within you, and less from outside?
BS: My art never comes from the outside, just my influences or a tidbit of an idea here or there, but I have always let me do the piloting. I do work, then I compare it to others, to see if my decision training has paid off.
PB: Are you willing to help new artists? Do you see yourself as a leader or a teacher?
BS: I have always been a motivator for others. Emotional and gut thinking keeps you down. You must love yourself and always emote–always know it’s OK to feel and express that thing.
PB: What is neo context now?
BS: For me now, I have a chance to display and use all my talents to help achieve one goal, such as the music. I did the entire album in collage and it is my best work to date. I dance on stage. I design the backdrops with old paintings. I write music and songs and novels to get ideas for the music. I am inspired by someone who never has to stop because of a medium. If I can meet artists like that, without it being a renaissance cliche, then that would inspire me. I swim, I go to the gym, I designed my tattoos, I eat good, jump rope, dream of having a boat to work on, write my novel, and I never have to think of what the new idea is. And, I sing all day long and I’m actually OK.
PB: What was the point of no return for you as an artist?
BS: When I knew it was going to be almost impossible for me to find a wife, and I would be OK alone for the rest of my life, the drawback is, you have to give up something sometimes…
PB: Have you ever had an artistic epiphany or peak experience?
BS: When I knew I was the most humming person in the room, and everyone else knew it too. When your person hums, it is a signal that disrupts all others, and also submits to all others too.
PB: Why are you doing collage now?
BS: I am the best of Bruce when I do collage, and when you see it you’ll know why. All decisions, no wasted time. Scissors, glue, exacto, and like a computer it is all yes’s and no’s. 1’s and 0’s. Elecctric!!!!!
