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Developing bands and projects
Creed Ink Issue #2
An interview with The Color Green
Jon Kahn of The Color Green resides on the opposite side of the country from where the members of Creed call home. Through pure chance, Scott Stapp became familiar with the Los Angeles based band and has been a huge supporter since. TCG makes their first appearance with Creed at their Staples Center show in early October 2002. We talked with Jon leading up to their arena rock debut.
INK: Give us a little background on the band and you as an artist.
Kahn: I didn’t grow up playing music at all. Didn’t play a note until I picked up a guitar about 8 years ago. Taught myself to play using one of those books that shows you where to put your fingers. When it was time to put together a band, I hooked up with our bass player Michael Grate and he brought in guitarist John Thomas. The band has changed formations since then but Michael, John, and I are still the core of the group. After a few years now, there is a shorthand between us. Todd Wolf, our drummer, is our most recent addition out of Chicago. He’s added an amazing energy to the band and he’s got great instincts for these songs.
INK: How did your relationship with the band and Scott come about?
Kahn: Unusual story actually. A friend of mine was hanging out with Scott in Orlando when frankly, she was supposed to be at our show in LA. She talked to Scott about our band and he suggested to her that I send our disc It’ll Be Alright so that he could hear it. I overnighted the disc, and Monday morning while checking my email, she sends me an instant message “Scott’s putting on headphones to listen to your disc.”
So while Scott’s listening to the disc, I’m asking for live updates from her and she’s typing things like “his eyes are closed,” and I’m thinking…good…eyes closed is good. It was very cool.
A song called “One Step forward” was the one that initially caught his attention. Scott called me after listening to the entire disc and said he wanted to be involved with our band. I was blown away that an artist at this level of success and credibility would take the time to listen to unknown bands. Next thing I knew, Scott and Jeff Hanson flew me out to Orlando for a few days where Scott and I listened to the record from beginning to end, and discussed what my goals were for the band. Scott and Jeff signed on as executive producers of our project and have been mentors for us. It all happened very quickly and seemingly out of nowhere. Scott’s response to our music really made us feel that we were on the right track.
INK: How would you describe TCG to someone that hasn’t heard the music?
Kahn: I’d say we’re somewhere between Springsteen, The Wallflowers, maybe a little U2, and now a little heavier with Scott’s influence. We’re just trying to write songs that mean something to people and hopefully they can sing along with. We really focus on lyrics and melody to create songs that hopefully won’t come and go as the trends seem to in the music world.
INK: the name, is it a vibey image, or a specific situation or place that it is derived?
Kahn: I wrote a group of songs for a movie a few years back called Girl. The name of the fictional band that performed the songs in the film was “The Color Green.” I lived with the movie for so long, that when it came time to pick a band name, it seemed to make sense. We also like it because “Green” has so many different connotations.
INK: How much material has the band put together?
Kahn: We’ve been working with producer Rami Jaffee of the Wallflowers for a while now. He’s produced our last 21 songs, including “It’ll Be Alright”. We’ve got a group of older acoustic songs that we plan to record as a full band. I’m constantly writing and we’ve got a whole new batch of songs we’re developing and hope to record soon with Rami.
INK: What has the response been from the live perspective, as well as the people that have heard the recordings?
Kahn: We’ve had a great response to our live shows in LA, which isn’t the greatest city in the state for live music. We’re working on getting out on the road. We get so many emails from people through our website asking us when we’re playing their city. LA’s a cool city but there are a lot of places we want to go where we think our music would make sense.
As far as the recordings go, we couldn’t be happier with the response. The internet has been a powerful tool for us in terms of getting our music out to those who might not have access to it right now. “It’ll Be Alright” was recently the number one selling disc at MP3.COM. There’s a lot of momentum right now and a lot of interesting things being talked about for us. We like how our sound has developed and the response it has been getting so we’ll just keep writing, recording, and playing live.
INK: You guys are opening for Creed in LA. How does it feel to be playing in the big house?
Kahn: Feels kind of surreal. I remember walking out of a concert at the LA forum when I was 18 and being so depressed thinking how amazing it would be to play music in front of all those people…and that I should never have quit piano lessons. To think that we’ll be opening for Creed at Staples Center, is just simply amazing for us.