McKinneyNews.net interviews Duncan Sheik

by Brett Ryder of McKinneyNews.net

In 1996, the record industry, with the help of what sounded like every radio station in the galaxy, took up the musical cause of a then 27-year-old singer-songwriter from the East Coast, Duncan Sheik. Sheik was hot, his newly released single, "Barely Breathing," assaulting every radio-listening eardrum on the planet with a driven acoustic guitar anchoring a strident, angst-ridden lyric about – what else? -- love gone bad.

The single, after hanging around the Billboard Hot 100 for a staggering 55 weeks, struck gold, pushing sales of Sheik’s eponymous debut album beyond 500,000 copies, garnering him a 1998 Grammy nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance along the way.

But there was a problem: The song wasn’t particularly representative of the often times melodically mournful, lyrically introspective and rhythmically unhurried 39-year-old Sheik, a Brown University-educated Ivy leaguer who bristled at the thought of being neatly sequestered into a vacuous pop star pigeon hole with the likes of the Backstreet Boys and Brittany Spears.

In the ensuing eight years, the singer-songwriter would turn out four more albums to largely positive critical review while his initial burst of commercial success waned.

But then things began to pick up for Sheik when he and poet/lyricist Steven Sater began to collaborate on a collection of songs that would become the melodic and rollicking heart of Spring Awakening, a 2006 Broadway musical that explored the multifarious issues surrounding teenage sexuality.

For his turn toward musical theater, Sheik was rewarded in 2007 with two Tonys, one for Best Orchestration, and another for Best Original Score. Sheik also walked away from the Spring Awakening project with a Grammy for Best Musical Show.

With his once barely breathing career decidedly on the rebound and feeling confident about his relationship with musical theater, Sheik released his latest musical offering, Whisper House (Victor Records/SonyBMG), in January.

“Whisper House” finds Sheik -- his deft talent for blending chamber pop orchestration with folk-rock sensibilities still very much in hand -- composing a collection of narrative pop songs for a forthcoming musical about a child', a ghost and a World War II-era Maine lighthouse.

Last week, a reflective Sheik spoke to McKinneyNews.net by telephone from his home in Manhattan.

McKinneyNews.net: You haven’t sold millions of albums. For those who do remember you, they remember you for “Barely Breathing,” a song released more than a decade ago. Yet you’re still around. Why?

Sheik: (Laughs) If you put everything together, I’ve sold a million albums. Let’s just say after my first record came out, I went through scenario where my first album and subsequent four other albums -- it was kind of like a very, very frustrating six or seven years, I felt like I was doing good work, doing my best to push the envelope as a singer- songwriter, but the music wasn’t reaching the audience I hoped it would reach. It was a difficult struggle. Then I started working on theater projects. “Spring Awakening” saw the light of day Off Broadway and then transferred to Broadway and became kind of a huge hit. In a very bizarre way, New York theatre kind of saved my life, saved my career, and reinvigorated me.

McKinneyNews.net: For those only familiar with “Barely Breathing,” what would you tell them about Duncan Sheik to try to turn them on to Duncan Sheik?

Sheik: I’m not really in a position to sell myself (laughs). “Barely Breathing” was a pop song on my first record. It was the first single I ever released and sat on charts way too long, frankly. But if you listen to rest of record, that song was at least a little bit of an anomaly. I didn’t listen to a lot of radio growing up. I listened to lots of import records from New England that weren’t getting airplay. The idea of being on radio caused a cognitive dissonance with me. I didn’t feel any connection or kinship with the other artists on the radio at the time, to the super pop music of the time. That was tricky. I was psyched on one hand, hearing the song. But on other hand, it wasn’t that representative of me as an artist.

McKinneyNews.net: In a Times article you mention “the beauty of the sadness” in relation to Rachel Yamagata’s work. I saw you in Fort Worth years ago and you told the audience your mother had admonished you that your music was too depressing. Why the mournful streak in Duncan Sheik? Why is sadness beautiful?

Sheik: It’s just a kind of -- it’s something innate. If left to my own devices, I would sit there and probably write one sad, melancholy ballad after another. I need to be pushed to write other energetic, upbeat kinds of music. I like to wallow in that [dark] place. It’s some kind of yearning, that space of like really needing and wanting something and having that thing unrequited. I think the truth -- you need to be kind of honest about the human condition. In America in general – at least in the past few decades -- you need to be productive, to consume and be happy and upbeat about things: the general positive qualities associated with living in America. But the human condition is much broader than that, there’s much more complexity including darkness and sadness in modern life. This needs to be acknowledged in art.

Duncan Sheik - White Limousine

McKinneyNews.net: You talk about a “conspiracy of happiness,” in one of your songs, “On A High.” I get the sense that you’re telling us that we’re all fooling ourselves with the ubiquitous smiles stretched across all our faces.

Sheik: Yeah. That song is kind of like a trick song. It’s meant to seem like a completely positive and upbeat kind of song that bounces along, In fact, it’s a song about a person who’s just in denial.

McKinneyNews.net: Have you struggled with P.R. or marketing or A&R trying to manage you career, maybe pushing you to take it to a place you weren’t interested in going?

Sheik: Not so much in terms of A and R. I was always allowed to record the music I wanted. But the way things were marketed and promoted -- ultimately it wasn’t serving me as an artist. It was frustrating. There were lessons to learn,

McKinneyNews.net: For example?

Sheik: Going on Beverly Hills 90210 and playing the Peach Pit. That probably wasn’t a great idea for me with the kind of music I was trying to create.

McKinneyNews.net: You’ve mentioned you’re a music before lyrics person, that lyrics don’t affect you unless they’re really good or really bad. Is a sense of melody in terms of composing music something you either have or you don’t?

Sheik: When I’m writing songs, I write music first, then lyrics come afterwards. I use a lot of alternate tunings. My songs grow out of a harmonic motif rather than a melody. I usually start with a chord progression that will suggest a melody, which in turn might suggest some words.

McKinneyNews.net: Name an artist who’s gotten both right (lyrics/melody) consistently.

Sheik: There are a few artists that might be kind of obvious – Bjork or Radiohead -- where an artist is consistently unique in their musical and lyrical approach. It’s personal to them, specific to them. It’s interesting and always pushing the envelope. That’s important to me.

McKinneyNews.net: What is the artist’s task? What is art for?

Sheik: I think art is around to help people have a catharsis. It exists because it’s able to lift people up, even if it’s music that’s sad or melancholy -- that can have the power to reawaken the listener and make them feel something powerful and maybe fix them in a certain way. That’s what really great music has done for me, at least. I’m trying to return the favor.

McKinneyNews.net: I’ve got this ongoing debate with friends: Why can’t Billy Joel or Elton John or McCartney write good songs any more?

Sheik: (Laughs) I’ve gotten into trouble answering this kind of question before. What I will say is McCartney made a record [Chaos and Creation] with [producer] Nigel Godrich that I thought was really good. I think they’re capable of writing interesting music. It’s a question of whether they’re in that headspace or not.

Duncan Sheik, with nine-piece band in tow, will appear Saturday, February 14 at 8 p.m. at the McKinney Performing Arts Center.