Scott Chasolen is a part of The Machine, but he is also so much more than that. The keyboardist, quite literally, performs as part of Pink Floyd tribute band, The Machine, but one look at his website and you’ll see show listings for nine other outfits. Perhaps the one most dear to him though is his own project, the Scott Chasolen Trio, SC3. Press Pass caught up with the New York-based man of many musical hats for a quick Q&A this week.
Scott Chasolen is a part of The Machine, but he is also so much more than that. The keyboardist, quite literally, performs as part of Pink Floyd tribute band, The Machine, but one look at his website and you’ll see show listings for nine other outfits. Perhaps the one most dear to him though is his own project, the Scott Chasolen Trio, SC3. Press Pass caught up with the New York-based man of many musical hats for a quick Q&A this week.
Mike Hume: You seem to play in a ridiculous amount of bands. How do you balance your time between them all?
Scott Chasolen: Hmm…I never actually counted them. There are probably only four or five bands that I consistently play with, and a whole lot of projects that I join up with if I happen to be in town and they happen to be playing and needing a keyboardist. It is tricky to juggle so many things, but it’s really about finding a balance between playing gigs in order to live and playing gigs in order to love. It is so very important to have both. Often it is a scheduling nightmare, but it always seems to work out somehow in the end!
MH: Does playing with so many different outlets help your creative process for your songwriting career?
SC: Definitely. I have always worn many musical hats, and after a decade and a half, they all seem to be forming one giant hat now. In other words, all the different subtleties and styles of these bands have manifested themselves in one way or another through my writing.
MH: With a number of albums under your belt, how do you think you’ve grown from album to album?
SC: Every album is a complex journey from the moment of conception until its release. It’s the closest thing to having a child. You give birth to the songs, nurture them and raise them, and then set them free into the world. I have learned so much from each of my albums and they are all so different from each other. Probably the biggest changes have been in my voice and in my writing. I feel I can express a particular emotion or sentiment now in ways that weren’t possible before and hope to keep learning more and more and challenging myself to grow with each passing day.
Fracture, my latest, was very close to how I imagined it. And that is really all you can ask for.
MH: Where do you draw your influences from as a songwriter?
SC: Mostly from life experience actually. Things I’ve personally been through, witnessed, dreamt of, feared, wondered about – both positive and negative. Some of my most inspirational moments have been staring through a van window while on tour somewhere, watching the world pass by and imagining what life is all about in any random small town or farmhouse that whizzes by. My ultimate goal is always to express an honest emotion.
MH: It seems like you picked up a passion for music at a very early age. What drew you to it and kept you sticking with it?
SC: Well, it’s an interesting story. In my earliest years, around age 3, all I did was draw pictures with magic markers. I would create these evil monsters and valiant heroes battling. I invented my own video games and drew all the different boards in sequence from the game. I drew blueprints for roller coasters that I’d one day build at the New Jersey boardwalk, so my mind was always busy living in some fantasy world.
When I accidentally discovered I could play music by repeating melodies by ear from the radio onto a cheap Casio calculator/keyboard around age 12, that was it. I never drew another picture ever again. Music was a more direct way to and from the soul, and that was what I was searching for.
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For more on Scott Chasolen, visit www.scottchasolen.com.
