Speaker 1: This is later with Lee Matthews the Lee Matthews Podcast.
Speaker 2: More of what you hear Weekday after Do is on
Speaker 2: the Drive. You know Jac chaise As as a singer, songwriter,
Speaker 2: and producer and artist within Sync. He's also written for Elton,
Speaker 2: John Area and a Grande Aerosmith and many others. Jimmy
Speaker 2: Harry is also a Golden Globe winning songwriter for Madonna, Pink,
Speaker 2: Britney Spears, and many many others. So when you get
Speaker 2: two great writers like this together and an unusually inspired project,
Speaker 2: you know a something special is going to come of it.
Speaker 2: I welcome Jac chase As in sinc and Jimmy Harry,
Speaker 2: creators of their new album Playing with Fire. Hello, guys,
Speaker 2: good more. Let's start with you. Jac. This, I said,
Speaker 2: head is an unusual inspiration. What is it?
Speaker 3: It's well, the source material is Mary Shelley Sprankenstein man.
Speaker 3: So I know that maybe a lot of people don't say, hey,
Speaker 3: that sounds like music to me, a story about frank
Speaker 3: Stein and his creature. But that's exactly what it is.
Speaker 3: It was inspired by and Jimmy and I just kind
Speaker 3: of put ourselves out there. We read an adaptation that
Speaker 3: his mother wrote Barbara Fields wrote an adaptation of Frankenstein
Speaker 3: and called it Play with Fire, And after Jimmy had
Speaker 3: shared it with me, we went down the rabbit hole.
Speaker 2: And Jimmy, your mother was she normally a playwright of sorts?
Speaker 4: She definitely was a playwright. She was a traumat at
Speaker 4: the Gus three Theater in Minneapolis for a very long time.
Speaker 4: She founded the Playwrights Center, and she was well loved
Speaker 4: by the community.
Speaker 2: What's the plot, Jimmy, of her adaptation of the Frankenstein story.
Speaker 4: I think what sets it apart from other Frankenstein's is
Speaker 4: that it's essential. It's a conversation with doctor Frankenstein and
Speaker 4: the creature, his creation well after the events of the story,
Speaker 4: and basically creature approaches him and says, hey, I need
Speaker 4: to answer some questions, tell me why, And after I
Speaker 4: know you hate me, so after you've answered my questions,
Speaker 4: you can kill me. I don't care anymore. And it
Speaker 4: takes you on this journey through the through you know,
Speaker 4: what is the body of Mary Shelley's books, but you
Speaker 4: kind of it's also about this relationship how these people
Speaker 4: sort of you know, come to actually love each other
Speaker 4: even though they've done horrible things to each other and
Speaker 4: if they make peace. Because it's a it's a father
Speaker 4: and son's story.
Speaker 2: Spin spine tingling. J Chess says, not unlike maybe a
Speaker 2: father son relationship.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's that is that's that's what we focused in on,
Speaker 3: you know. And and the the interesting thing about what
Speaker 3: we try to present in the music and in our
Speaker 3: musical is, you know, it's from the perspective of each
Speaker 3: a person in the conversation. So really the first.
Speaker 4: Half of the story, the half of.
Speaker 3: The musical is through one lens, and that would be
Speaker 3: through Victor of Frankenstein's lens. When we're hearing the songs
Speaker 3: and where he's taking us into his memories. We're seeing,
Speaker 3: you know, life play out through the lens of Victor Frankenstein.
Speaker 3: And in the second half of the musical, you're really
Speaker 3: getting the story through the perspective and lens of the creature.
Speaker 3: So instead of just observing all the events, you know,
Speaker 3: as a third party viewer, we're really getting to feel
Speaker 3: what it's like to be each one of these characters
Speaker 3: and how the events played out through their eyes.
Speaker 2: And I think that's the unique perspective Playing with Fire
Speaker 2: is the album. I still call them albums. Guys. Sorry
Speaker 2: for release we go ahead.
Speaker 4: Said so do we okay?
Speaker 2: Good? Because I used to play the vinyl back in
Speaker 2: the day. Uh we go. Center Stage Records is where
Speaker 2: you can find a copy of Playing with Fire. Jimmy what,
Speaker 2: let's go through the song list? So this is it?
Speaker 2: Can I guess it could be considered a concept album,
Speaker 2: but it's also a soundtrack.
Speaker 4: It's a music. It's a concept record for a musical.
Speaker 4: I guess that's what it is. It's sort of like,
Speaker 4: you know, there's been a history of people putting out
Speaker 4: concept records for musicals before their stage. They think it
Speaker 4: started with Jesus Christ Superstar, but more recently, Kadies Town
Speaker 4: and U six have been you know, have had concept records.
Speaker 4: So it just kind of gives you a picture, you know,
Speaker 4: a sonic picture into what the musical could be.
Speaker 2: I guess and jac chazays along with U with Jimmy
Speaker 2: Harriet creators of Playing with I gather the title is
Speaker 2: in reference to fire in Frankenstein and Frankenstein's Fear of Fire.
Speaker 3: It's well that there's a piece of that in it,
Speaker 3: but really it's just about, you know, hey, be if you.
Speaker 3: If you're going to do something, be careful, be thoughtful,
Speaker 3: treated with respect.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: It's like fire is a wonderful technology, right, it keeps
Speaker 3: us warm when it's cold, but it's also something that
Speaker 3: if it catches the wrong thing, it can just destroy
Speaker 3: the world around you. So it's something that you don't
Speaker 3: you shouldn't.
Speaker 4: Really play with You should.
Speaker 3: Be thoughtful and show it the respect.
Speaker 4: That it deserves.
Speaker 2: JAYC. Child says in sinc Jimmy Harry a songwriter and
Speaker 2: the son of the playwright of which this is an
Speaker 2: inspiration playing with Fire, which is out. Now, let's go
Speaker 2: through some of the song titles. Jimmy and if you
Speaker 2: can explain to me what we're seeing or what we're
Speaker 2: supposed to be seeing. In the story you used to Touch Me,
Speaker 2: You used to Touch.
Speaker 4: Me is actually about really how before that happens. Doctor
Speaker 4: Frankenstein tells a creature how he was made. You know,
Speaker 4: he said, I made you from dead body parts. I like,
Speaker 4: I spent so much time. I know every stitch on
Speaker 4: your body. You know, I loved making you. And then
Speaker 4: creature says, well, why won't you look at me because
Speaker 4: you're hideous? Oh, but you used to love me? What
Speaker 4: went wrong? And so it's sort of like this basically
Speaker 4: as saying, hey, you know you loved me enough to
Speaker 4: make me, why don't you love me now?
Speaker 2: And jac Chad says, when I talk to songwriters, I'm
Speaker 2: always intrigued because I love music, I read music. I
Speaker 2: play a little bit on the guitar and the ukulele,
Speaker 2: But I'm always intrigued about what comes from for you.
Speaker 2: Is it melody or is it lyric or is it both?
Speaker 3: It's it's different every time.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: Look, sometimes you sit down at a piano and you
Speaker 3: start tinkering and and something memorable pops up. But then
Speaker 3: sometimes it is the word. Sometimes it's the words that
Speaker 3: drive everything home. So it really every every beginning is
Speaker 3: unexpected and uh, and it's it's a it's a process
Speaker 3: every time.
Speaker 2: And Jimmy, is it the same for you?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean everything's different. You know, it depends on
Speaker 4: what the situation is, for sure. Sometimes it starts with
Speaker 4: the concept, Sometimes it starts with a melody. Sometimes you
Speaker 4: just it all magically pours out your you know, your
Speaker 4: singers and your singing, and it's all of a sudden
Speaker 4: you have a song.
Speaker 2: And Jimmy your mother was a creative person. You are
Speaker 2: a creative person? Did she? What were there? Was there
Speaker 2: anything in particular she did to inspire you or to
Speaker 2: to spark your creativity?
Speaker 4: Everything? It was, you know, we used to like improvise,
Speaker 4: you know, like lyrics in the backyard. He had me
Speaker 4: reading you know, all the classics at a very young
Speaker 4: age and just being you know, being in a room
Speaker 4: with some really famous directors like in my in you know,
Speaker 4: my dining room, my living room and watching them run rehearsals.
Speaker 4: I just was it was. It was like a graduate
Speaker 4: school education at like you know, age seven or eight
Speaker 4: or something like that.
Speaker 2: The album is Playing with Fire. It's with the instincts
Speaker 2: Jacy Chazzez and songwriter Jimmy Harry, two great songwriters that
Speaker 2: have come together to write this soundtrack, this musical. Uh
Speaker 2: are you working on getting this produced? JC?
Speaker 3: Yes, So that that's the main goal. Look, you know,
Speaker 3: we want to make a musical. We want people to
Speaker 3: see not just here, but see what Play with Fire is.
Speaker 3: But we we know that it's a long process to
Speaker 3: make a musical, and so we decided, you know, to
Speaker 3: take it upon ourselves to at least bring what we
Speaker 3: can at the very beginning, you know, and not wait.
Speaker 3: We wanted to share the music with everybody, and hopefully
Speaker 3: so when they see it, there's a bit of familiarity
Speaker 3: and they can enjoy it a bit more and when
Speaker 3: they hear the songs they like, they.
Speaker 4: Can sing along.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good idea. Get the music out there first,
Speaker 2: get people singing along with it, and then then they
Speaker 2: can see the visual that goes along with it. Jimmy,
Speaker 2: is there one particular song that you've written or corroborated
Speaker 2: on in this album that you now say, I think
Speaker 2: that's going to be the hit.
Speaker 4: I think the whole thing is going to be the
Speaker 4: It's it's a great record. I think people are listening
Speaker 4: to the whole album old school. I think if you
Speaker 4: want to take one song just to be like a
Speaker 4: mirror into the soul to the record, if you want
Speaker 4: to just check it out out of us, say listen
Speaker 4: to how Do You Sleep? That's the that's the template,
Speaker 4: first one we wrote, and it's kind of shaped everything
Speaker 4: we came after it.
Speaker 2: Look forward to listening to it. My friend, my friends
Speaker 2: j C. Chazazit and Sink, Jimmy Harry, I love the
Speaker 2: work that you produced so far, and I know this
Speaker 2: is going to be another big project. So thanks for
Speaker 2: joining us and bringing it to us today.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Later with Lee Matthews, the Lee
Speaker 1: Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen to The Drive Live
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