Josh Heinrichs (photo by Alex Stocksdale, Alex@TAGsgf.com)
Former Jah Roots frontman Josh Heinrichs revisited songs he wrote for the band which are featured on Heinrichs’ new album, aptly titled Jah Roots. Heinrichs was on SGF Local Live fresh off playing Reggaefest and talked about Jah Roots the band, and Jah Roots the album. He also covered an old school Art Bentley tune. Here is a portion of the interview, check out the podcast to listen to the entire show. Jah Roots (the album) is available now on iTunes. (Interview was live on 4/17/11)
SGF Local Live: You’re just back into town from Austin, how was Reggaefest?
Josh Heinrichs: It’s awesome. There’s like 10,000 people every year so it was just an honor to be a part of it. I did it a couple of times when I was in Jah Roots a few years ago, and it was insane. They asked me to be a part of it again.
Local Live: Your reach has grown beyond the Midwest. For instance Hawai’i has really embraced your music, how is it different out there?
Heinrichs: The first time I got there I was hearing my songs on the radio, I couldn’t even believe it was like that. In Hawai’i, reggae’s like … you know how US97 is a staple here and it will never go away? Like everybody wants to hear Lynyrd Skynyrd in Springfield, you know what I’m saying? In Hawai’i they want to hear reggae 24/7. On Oahu alone there’s three 24/7 reggae stations.
Local Live: How does that reflect at the shows?
Heinrichs: For instance, me and Cas (Haley) played a show, just did an acoustic show at this place called Tropics in Honolulu. It was sold-out and it was a small little place like The Outland. I figured it would be a regular acoustic show, 100 people if we were lucky, and it was packed to the gills.
I played a Saturday night at the Pipeline Café there were 1,700 people, and it was sold out. We played with this band called The Green who had the Reggae Album of the Year on iTunes for 2010. They invited us to come play with them … I don’t know how I lucked out to be in these really cool situations, but Hawai’i5 really embraces reggae like no other. I got lucky and just happened to be in the right place.
Local Live: How did your last album Josh Heinrichs & Friends come about with so many artists involved?
Heinrichs: To be honest, the song “New Love” with Clear Conscience, I didn’t even write that song. I covered it one time, and they hit me up and asked me to do it with them for their new album. That spawned into doing another song with another friend of mine. Then someone said to me: “you should make a whole album with people you’ve worked with in the past.” So I contacted everybody I possibly knew. I talked to everybody from friends of mine to people I’ve opened up for, some big bands, the Marleys, everybody, and I was totally surprised by the people who responded.
Local Live: The new album, Jah Roots is a collection of songs you wrote while with Jah Roots, right?
Heinrichs: Aside from a few songs Aaron (Berger) wrote, I wrote all of the songs on all five albums. I’ve put up (several) versions of me playing the (Jah Roots) songs acoustically on YouTube. Someone had taken (the audio) of the songs I’d done acoustic and made a mp3 folder of them to download on torrent. But it was crappy quality, because it was from YouTube videos. It’s a way to redo my songs. I did them with Jah Roots, but these are my songs, and I love them and I want people to know I can still play them, too.
Local Live: Is the album bittersweet at all? Do you ever wonder what it’d be like were the band still together?
Heinrichs: For sure. I love all those guys with all my heart. I truly do. Maybe things will change some day in the future. I hope, but things happen and people go their own way. It was a little bit weird just doing it, but at the same time I’m tired of people passing around crappy quality versions of my songs. It’s not about the money. I’d put it out for free if I could, but iTunes won’t let you put out a whole album for free. So I put $1.99 on it.
Local Live: Is there some closure to it with the new record?
Heinrichs: Yeah, this is it. I’m done. I’m getting these songs done, getting them recorded and the next album is going to be all new, original material.
Local Live: That was the next question … if the next stuff was going to be new stuff. Do you have a plan in mind or a timeframe?
Heinrichs: It’ll probably be this winter. I was going to do another Josh Heinrichs and Friends, because there was a lot of people that I did songs with that didn’t make it (on the album) and there were people that it didn’t work around their schedule to do a song with, and I think I just might do that in 2012, a volume two. But, for now, I just want to work on doing all my own songs.
Local Live: Your 4/20 show was in St. Louis this year, why not Springfield?
Heinrichs: We did a Bob Marley birthday bash here in Springfield and it was crazy. There was a lot of people there, a lot of kids came out, but the way it went down, (nobody) could drink, not even water. Everything got switched around last minute and it was just too much chaos for me to try and mess around with it again.
It got down to the last 10 minutes when they told me it wasn’t going to be an all-ages show and I had a line of kids out there. I’m not going to tell them “no,” and make (the fans) mad at me. It was just too much politics, crazy stuff I don’t want to deal with. I’m sorry that Springfield didn’t get that show, we’ve got to work on that. I’m not trying to take a stab at Springfield. I want to do a show here, but …
Local Live: Everybody’s frustrated with the minor ban, especially surrounding the music scene. Minors deserve to be able to see live music.
Heinrichs: Exactly. People want to know why I don’t play in Springfield, that’s why, because I know I’ll catch a lot of slack for not doing an all ages show.
I’ll probably do a show here soon, Patton Alley or something that’s 21 and up, but I would like to do a show that’s (all ages).
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