Halfway to Someday interview: Jesse

And now, a rare and exclusive interview with Wild Child’s lead singer, Jesse Winters. Thank you for agreeing to do this, Jesse, I am aware that you have been rather reclusive as of late so I will try and keep my questions as brief and to the point as possible.

Thanks.

You’ve been playing music a long time now, in fact, according to Kyle, you were the one that taught him to play the guitar. What was the first instrument you learned to play?

Xylophone.

Seriously?

Oh yeah. All of my toys were education in some way, usually music themed. I remember this stuffed octopus with a different pitched squeezy ball thing at the end of each of its tentacles. My parents have videos of me squeaking away on it, kicking my feet and laugh-babbling while I did. They used to call it my first song.

So, music has always been a part of your life.

Since before I was born, apparently. My mom liked to tell stories of how she would be playing classical music to her pregnant belly and my dad would come in and start playing the blues on his saxophone, and whichever one could get me kicking was apparently the ‘winner’ for the afternoon.

Sounds like a pretty touching memory. It also sounds like they were very close and enjoyed life and each other.

Yeah, they really loved each other, I never had a reason to doubt that. Never had reason to doubt that they loved me, either, but sometimes it felt like they didn’t know what to do with me.

Care to elaborate.

Yeah, a little, I guess. It was just that they treated me like a mini-adult, not like a kid. Like they’d completely forgotten their own childhoods and wanted to make sure everything they gave me or did for me had meaning. I, this isn’t me being ungrateful, please understand that it was just, the kids at school would have action figures and games and bicycles and skateboards and I was always the odd one out because even if they invited me to join them, I didn’t know how to play.

So are you saying you never did anything fun when you were a kid?

Not exactly. I’m saying I never did anything just for fun unless I snuck and did it at Kyle’s house and even then, I had to be careful they wouldn’t find out I was learning to ride a bike or running around in the woods with him and a few of his cousins.

But because of the age gap, one of the cousins you never met was Ryker, at least, not until you both ended up snowed in at the same cabin on a Colorado mountainside.

Pretty much, though it was as much about distance as it was age. Ryker’s family lived in Vermont and Kyle and I grew up in Maine. With school being in session Ryker wouldn’t have been around on weekends the way some of Kyle’s other cousins were. I knew of him, and that Kyle always looked forward to his visits for holidays and summer vacation, but my folks insisted my summers be spent at band and art camps and for holidays we went to New York City each year. That’s where they met, in college there, and they loved going back when everything was all lit up and they could take in the concerts and plays and musicals.

And were those things you enjoyed too?

Some of them, and sometimes I wished they’d have left me back in the hotel room so I could watch cartoons or something on television. I did love New York though, still do, it’s an amazing city and there is always something interesting to do. I’d have gone to school there if I’d decided on that course.

Juilliard, right?

Yeah. I got in, I just, I didn’t want to go. I hadn’t even wanted to audition, that had been all them. I was just glad they never followed through on their threat to move us to New York so I could attend the school of music and performing arts in Manhattan. I wouldn’t have had the amazing career I’ve had so far.

So, you don’t think you’d have gone on to pursue music professionally.

Oh I would have, it just, it would have been different and I know a time would have come when I’d have realized that I wasn’t doing it because I loved it or because it was what I wanted to be doing, but because it was what they’d have wanted me to do and I’d have resented it as much as I came to resent them.

So, suffice it to say you had a rather complex relationship with them.

Very much so, and it was severely strained in the end. That is my one regret. That I never got a chance to prove to them that I wasn’t going to starve in the streets and wind up homeless and playing my guitar on the street corner for change. I tried to explain to them that the music I played took as much hard work and dedication as the music they wanted me to play, but to them, Alternative was just noise and no amount of listening to me play the music I was writing would convince them otherwise.

So, you were writing all the way back in high school?

Junior high. I loved playing with the way sound fit together. It was like unraveling something strand by strand to get the notes and chords to form something beautiful. Those early attempts, especially at lyrics, were extremely amateur but they laid the foundation for the things I would go on to write later. The more I saw and got to experience, the more I had to write about. That’s when I started to realize just how limited a scope of experiences I had before leaving home.

Must have been pretty eye-opening.

Yeah, it was. It was also how the band got its name. Kyle used to say I was suddenly like some wild child let loose on a city whenever we’d go someplace new and it just sort of stuck after a few months.

What was the name of the band before then?

We went through a few, actually. Sometimes the space between towns would seem like it was endless and we’d amuse ourselves playing license plate drinking games, writing lyrics, and trying to come up with a better name for the band than Bangor Badasses, Cherryfield Goatmen, Ghost Brides, Maine Mist or Pocomoonshine Monsters, and yeah, we took a lot of our name ideas from Urban Legends associated with our state.

Ghost brides, how does that work when there’s only one female member of your band, shouldn’t it be ghost bride?

Not…exactly. I went through a phase of liking to dress in those mini school-girl skirts and putting my hair in pigtails. Got really good at strutting around stage in heels too, so, yeah, that was sort of a thing. Honestly, all we were trying to do was come up with something that wouldn’t be forgotten or that would make people stop and look twice and wonder what the fuck. Wild Child was so common, I was the one offering the most resistance to it, at first. Then Kyle reminded me that our music was going to make people sit up and take notice, so to relax and get used to the name. Considering I’d been outvoted, I had little choice but to take his advice. Fortunately, it grew on me.

And yet, you admit to wanting to shed the wild child reputation some have given you over the years.

Because it isn’t accurate. I might have been a bit overeager at times to experience new things, but I wasn’t out of control. I was never out of control even when my band seemed to think I was.

Sounds like there is a lot of bitterness still surrounding those particular issues.

And probably will be for a while now. Maybe it’ll blow over. Maybe it won’t. Only time will tell.

Well, I want to thank you for this talk, it’s been extremely enlightening and good luck in your upcoming project. All acoustics I hear and very dark?

Yeah. I’ve gone through a lot of phases, emotionally, in the past year and putting those feelings into music has been cathartic.  Keep watch for the first few singles to start releasing on Spotify in the next month. It’ll be…something. Exactly what I’m not sure yet.

Guess we’ll all have to wait and see. 

Halfway to Someday

Coming January 27, 2020