SPILL FEATURE: CONSIDER INFINITY AND BLOW YOUR MIND – A CONVERSATION WITH TERRY DRAPER (EX-KLAATU)

CONSIDER INFINITY AND BLOW YOUR MIND

A CONVERSATION WITH TERRY DRAPER (EX-KLAATU)

Since Klaatu called it a day more than 40 years ago Terry Draper has established a very successful solo career. Since his debut solo album, 1997’s Light Years Later, Draper has released 14 studio albums, a live album and a children’s album. Infinity, his most recent release, is his 15th. For Draper, writing and recording music is something he enjoys doing, which explains how prolific he is.

“Some people like to eat, sleep and breathe. I like to write and record. It’s just something I do. It is like watching television. Rather than watch television, which is pretty mundane in this day and age, I just go to the studio. I usually have some ideas that are hatching or have hatched. I found a piece the other day that I recorded maybe five or six years ago. It was four or five minutes long and it was called “The Odyssey”. And I thought, ‘this is interesting’. I started playing with it, and then wrote some lyrics for it, and it keeps me entertained.”

Infinity, however, has just been released and we turn our conversation to his brilliant new album that encompasses old and new songs. The title track is one of the newer songs on the album.

“It is something that I have pondered, often, so I decided to sit down and write about it, Infinity. Perhaps in questioning about it, looking at it, turning it upside down, I would get a better understanding. But no such luck. I have no better idea of what infinity is than I did before. It’s a bit of a conundrum, you know, you live in the middle of infinity…you are the centre of the universe if you believe in infinity. So no matter how long you live you are going to live and die at the same time in the middle of time. I put it into the lyric, “yes, it is still a mystery to me.” But it was fun to explore.

For Draper, songs seem to come to him easily through various methods. He never seems to be without an idea for a song. “Inspiration comes from the strangest places. I remember, years ago, I was reading National Geographic. I was a subscriber, and I read it cover to cover, every issue. I found it interesting. I was reading this particular article one day and it was about this Polish climbing team. They were talking about climbing a particular peak, but they were going to do it on the hard side during the winter. They had bad weather and the hardest access and the interviewer asked, “why are you doing this” and the leader said “If I could change the world.” I thought to myself, that is pretty cool. So I wrote that down, and came back to it days or weeks later, and thought if I could change the world with a song, what would I sing, if I could change it with a novel, what would I write. Well, I would write ‘Yes”.

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Draper has always used music as a method of communicating and engaging with his audience. “It’s all about touching people, reaching out. When I put out the album Civil War…and Other Love Songs, the title track is called “Civil War (Not Very)” and it is a ten minute epic full of canons and musketry. It is about two brothers, one on either side, the old standard story of the American Civil war. I am fascinated with The Civil War and been to many famous battlegrounds. I got it out of my system and did a whole album about it and I remember getting an email from a fellow in Australia, and his father had just passed away and he had been in the Australian army, and they had a ceremony and they received a flag. He also got his father’s gun. And in this song, the young fellow dies and he dies with his father’s gun in his hand. I touched this fellow and he reached out to me to say thank you for doing what I did.”

“I stopped playing live about 10 years ago. It was always an unrewarding experience. We played my songs, but the other musicians hadn’t learned their parts properly and they made a lot of mistakes. My music is highly orchestrated in a pop fashion, so I found playing live unrewarding. The other side of that sword, however, is that you don’t get a response from the people. I write a song, then I spend six months playing with it, recording it, finishing it and producing it. Then six months later, I put it out on an album, and about a month or two goes by and I get some feedback.

A song like “Last Chance To Disagree” is one of the songs that touches people. It is a brilliantly written song about the end of a relationship. “That’s one of the ones that come straight from the heart, it just fell out. I was in the midst of a dissolving relationship, and it was over before I knew it. It was like she didn’t even give me a chance to disagree. She was just gone. I sat and wrote about how I felt. I thought I knew her…. however we are still very close friends to this day.”

Although Draper plays the majority of the instruments himself on Infinity, he does have some help from other players such as Jaimie Vernon, Tommy Solo, and Keith Hampshire. “I have a rolodex of musicians that I tap into and pick who I think can contribute the best. Depending on what I need is who I go to. I don’t play electric guitar, I used to play acoustic, but I stopped playing it, but I play piano every day. The Keith story is interesting. I met him in 1974. Klaatu was invited to go on the Keith Hampshire Music Machine television show on CBC. And we filmed it one Saturday afternoon. That was the day I met Keith. I was introduced to him and that was the end of that. About five or six years ago, I was down in Florida and a lot of musicians were on Facebook. I see this guy say, ‘Hi I’m at Madeira Beach, anyone around?’ I said, ‘Hey Keith, I am about 10 minutes away. Let’s meet up.’ So, we met up at The Friendly Tavern and as I was leaving, I said, ‘this has been great. We get to get together every 44 years and do this again.’ As it turned out, they lived near us in Florida, and we became very good friends.”

After all these years of making albums, what does Draper hope people get from his music and his new album? “I hope to walk away with their money in my pockets,” laughed Draper. “But seriously, I do a lot of different types of music, and I explore different genres and I hope that any particular person can find something on the album they like. That I can reach out to everyone, and not expect  everyone to like the whole thing, but if I reach everybody with a part of a song or a whole song, that will be enough.”

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Photo Credit: Saxe