Jason Mirek Interview
Q: Can you talk about your history as an artist?
A: I actually started kind of late. I bought an acoustic guitar when I was 17 and was a very slow learner, but I always had a love for music so I kept on trying to figure it out and eventually I started to piece things together. I did a lot of open mic nights when I was younger, but I never got the same rush out of doing cover songs as I did when I sang a song that I wrote so I started focusing on coming up with my own things. I guess it was a blessing that I was never all that comfortable playing cover songs. Stylistically, I feel like I give myself a lot of freedom. I don’t think I could stick to just one specific thing even if I tried. It’s not that I can’t decide, I just grew up loving so many different styles of music that when I sit to write I go with what ever bubbles up that day…could be a country blues thing, a rock n’ roll song or an ambient instrumental or anything in between.
Q: What is your recording process like for Best Way To Be Free?
A: In the years leading up to Best Way To Be Free I always recorded demos on whatever I had available in my home studio, or if it was an idea while I was on the road, I would record on my iPhone. In early 2019, for a number of reasons, I called a friend (Ken Rutkowski/Outer Limit Studio) that I hadn’t talked to for many years. I knew he had built a successful studio in Buffalo. I told him I had a bunch of songs that I was interested in working on. As it turned out, that call was a turning point in the whole process. I had never recorded in any type of proper studio setting before so the learning curve was relatively steep, so his decades of experience and past familiarity helped a great deal. I booked sessions in two and three hour increments which gave me an opportunity to learn at a gradual pace. With the exception of John Calvin Abney, the other musicians on the records were studio musicians that Ken believed would fit the project. He was absolutely right. I gelled with that group immediately. John Calvin Abney’s appearance on the record was the result of a conversation I had with John a couple years prior to the recording of BWTBF. We discussed songwriting and music after a John Moreland concert and hit it off. I said I was working on a batch of songs and we corresponded on and off until the songs were tracked in the studio. When he heard them he said that he’d like to be part of the project. It was during the pandemic so we worked on tracks remotely over the next month or so and bounced tracks from Buffalo to John’s studio in Oklahoma. John’s a veteran of the Oklahoma music scene and a consummate pro, so I was very honored he chose to be part of the project and elated with the parts he added to the album.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: I love to write, but I don’t have a lot of time, so I write down ideas, rhymes and potential lyrics as they come along on little scraps of paper all day long and try to make sense of them later. For the past couple of years I have taken a more consistent approach to writing. In the past I wrote quite often, but sporadically or in waves. In late 2018 I decided to rededicate myself to writing with more intention. Around this time, I stumbled upon a book that helped me shift my mindset toward writing. The book was called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. He’s an accomplished novelist and he shared some of his philosophy on why writers don’t write. It all seemed to translate to my personal experience. The basic premise is to simply “show up” everyday. So now, rather than wait for inspiration, I make time each day to sit and write for at least 15 minutes. Some days, when time allows, I will write for a longer time, but the 15 minute a day minimum gets the ball rolling. I’m at almost 1,000 days in a row and adding consistency to my process has helped me stumble on some good ideas and eliminate a lot of not so good ideas.
Q: Can you talk about your history as an artist?
A: I actually started kind of late. I bought an acoustic guitar when I was 17 and was a very slow learner, but I always had a love for music so I kept on trying to figure it out and eventually I started to piece things together. I did a lot of open mic nights when I was younger, but I never got the same rush out of doing cover songs as I did when I sang a song that I wrote so I started focusing on coming up with my own things. I guess it was a blessing that I was never all that comfortable playing cover songs. Stylistically, I feel like I give myself a lot of freedom. I don’t think I could stick to just one specific thing even if I tried. It’s not that I can’t decide, I just grew up loving so many different styles of music that when I sit to write I go with what ever bubbles up that day…could be a country blues thing, a rock n’ roll song or an ambient instrumental or anything in between.
Q: What is your recording process like for Best Way To Be Free?
A: In the years leading up to Best Way To Be Free I always recorded demos on whatever I had available in my home studio, or if it was an idea while I was on the road, I would record on my iPhone. In early 2019, for a number of reasons, I called a friend (Ken Rutkowski/Outer Limit Studio) that I hadn’t talked to for many years. I knew he had built a successful studio in Buffalo. I told him I had a bunch of songs that I was interested in working on. As it turned out, that call was a turning point in the whole process. I had never recorded in any type of proper studio setting before so the learning curve was relatively steep, so his decades of experience and past familiarity helped a great deal. I booked sessions in two and three hour increments which gave me an opportunity to learn at a gradual pace. With the exception of John Calvin Abney, the other musicians on the records were studio musicians that Ken believed would fit the project. He was absolutely right. I gelled with that group immediately. John Calvin Abney’s appearance on the record was the result of a conversation I had with John a couple years prior to the recording of BWTBF. We discussed songwriting and music after a John Moreland concert and hit it off. I said I was working on a batch of songs and we corresponded on and off until the songs were tracked in the studio. When he heard them he said that he’d like to be part of the project. It was during the pandemic so we worked on tracks remotely over the next month or so and bounced tracks from Buffalo to John’s studio in Oklahoma. John’s a veteran of the Oklahoma music scene and a consummate pro, so I was very honored he chose to be part of the project and elated with the parts he added to the album.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: I love to write, but I don’t have a lot of time, so I write down ideas, rhymes and potential lyrics as they come along on little scraps of paper all day long and try to make sense of them later. For the past couple of years I have taken a more consistent approach to writing. In the past I wrote quite often, but sporadically or in waves. In late 2018 I decided to rededicate myself to writing with more intention. Around this time, I stumbled upon a book that helped me shift my mindset toward writing. The book was called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. He’s an accomplished novelist and he shared some of his philosophy on why writers don’t write. It all seemed to translate to my personal experience. The basic premise is to simply “show up” everyday. So now, rather than wait for inspiration, I make time each day to sit and write for at least 15 minutes. Some days, when time allows, I will write for a longer time, but the 15 minute a day minimum gets the ball rolling. I’m at almost 1,000 days in a row and adding consistency to my process has helped me stumble on some good ideas and eliminate a lot of not so good ideas.
Q: What are some of the themes that are touched upon your release Best Way To Be Free?
A: Best Way To Be Free addresses quite a few different themes, but I guess it weaves its way through some heavier things like loss and grief, but the bigger message is one of redemption and forgiveness. I feel like a lot of songwriters share a common urgency to write the songs they are meant to write and hope that they find an audience with the people that are meant to hear them. I guess that translates or finds its way into my songs. At the risk of sounding overly philosophical or cheesy, we only have a brief amount of time and the challenge is trying to use it wisely, and say what we need to say, to the people we believe are supposed to hear it.
Q: Have you started playing shows now that the pandemic is almost over?
A: Not yet, but I’ve been working right along on a live set and hope to start booking some smaller shows soon. At some point in the near future I also plan on doing more live feed segments on Instagram and do some remote collaborative things as well.
Q: what else should we know about your music?
A: I just want to say thank you to all the people that have listened to the record and offered up positive feedback. Since the record came out I’ve made some very cool acquaintances and I believe I’ll have an opportunity to do some collaborative work with some other folks. And, I’ll be heading back into the studio in early November to start working on the next batch of songs. I hope to move everything we started forward and I hope to add more layers and experiment even more on the next record.
A: Best Way To Be Free addresses quite a few different themes, but I guess it weaves its way through some heavier things like loss and grief, but the bigger message is one of redemption and forgiveness. I feel like a lot of songwriters share a common urgency to write the songs they are meant to write and hope that they find an audience with the people that are meant to hear them. I guess that translates or finds its way into my songs. At the risk of sounding overly philosophical or cheesy, we only have a brief amount of time and the challenge is trying to use it wisely, and say what we need to say, to the people we believe are supposed to hear it.
Q: Have you started playing shows now that the pandemic is almost over?
A: Not yet, but I’ve been working right along on a live set and hope to start booking some smaller shows soon. At some point in the near future I also plan on doing more live feed segments on Instagram and do some remote collaborative things as well.
Q: what else should we know about your music?
A: I just want to say thank you to all the people that have listened to the record and offered up positive feedback. Since the record came out I’ve made some very cool acquaintances and I believe I’ll have an opportunity to do some collaborative work with some other folks. And, I’ll be heading back into the studio in early November to start working on the next batch of songs. I hope to move everything we started forward and I hope to add more layers and experiment even more on the next record.