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An Interview with Christopher Jon of I, Parasite
Posted: Tuesday, February 02, 2010
By: Breda Massmann
Writer

Six years after the release of the epic album On This Cold Floor, New York's I, Parasite, lead by songwriter and singer Christopher Jon, offers us the successor, The Sick Are Not Healing. Appearing with a more rock-driven direction, the dark, experimental blend of electronics and guitars, atmospherically deep melancholy and aggressive noise attacks manages to captivate right from the start. The Sick Are Not Healing offers multi-faceted details and sounds that spiral their way into the ears. One meets rumbling explosions with an industrial rock feeling, hard-hitting, punk-driven rudiments and noise décor ("Obsessive Repulsive"), sprawling trips with sinister doom-laden riffs, bittersweet synth melody splinters and psychedelic auras ("The Stone Doctor"), restrained apocalypse scenarios with acoustic guitar ("Garbage Man") as well as introverted electronica melancholy which duels with noisy roaring and toxic outbursts of fury ("Moths"). Jon's vocal work meanwhile is as diverse and charismatic as the music, at times yearning and clear, at times loudly screaming. Also noteworthy are such contributing musical guests as Rob Caggiano of Anthrax and Lars Hansen of Oneiroid Psychosis. Overall, this record is a complex, intense treat for the ears, full of exciting edges, so the long wait between I, Parasite albums was all worth it. Christopher Jon took the time to answer ReGen Magazine's questions. Compared to On This Cold Floor, your new album in my opinion appears to have a more rock-driven attitude. How do view this? How would you put your musical evolution from your debut to now into words?

Jon: I was on a pretty big post-rock and sludge/doom metal kick around when On This Cold Floor came out. That definitely influenced things as I got into writing for The Sick Are Not Healing. The subject matter seemed to lend itself to the sound, and they fed off of each other. As far as my musical evolution goes, I feel that I'm much less restricted now than when I started. Back when we were working on Turin in 1998 I really wanted to create a straight up dark electro/industrial album. While I still think it was a good album for the time, I quickly got bored of doing just that one sound and needed to expand without creative restrictions. On This Cold Floor was kind of scary at first, because I was stepping out onto shaky new ground, but it was a turning point for me, and I feel liberated now.

It was a long and rocky way to finally get the album out. What was the most difficult part, when you look back?

Jon: Really, the most difficult part was keeping faith and believing in myself. The last several years have been littered with financial and personal issues that created one delay after another. I was very frustrated and sometimes wondered if I would ever be able to release the album properly at all. But over the last two years I've undergone a great deal of personal growth and finally persevered to get this fucker out. It's a great relief to finally be able to hold this package in my hands.

The album features an exciting and intense interaction between melancholic, thoughtful atmospheres and aggressiveness. How difficult was it to get those contrasting feelings into balance? Did one of those feelings dominate your mood while you wrote the songs?

Jon: I certainly didn't look for a balance, I just let it be whatever it was. Somewhat of a corny cliché, but I just channeled what needed to come out. I suppose I also don't really see it much as a contrast. All of the emotions in the album are tightly woven together for me.

This album has been influenced heavily by the art of Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel the Elder and Albrecht Dürer. Could you deepen this a bit? How is their art related to the music on the album?

Jon: Generally speaking, visual art inspires my creativity much more than music does. I surrounded myself with their work in my studio and just immersed myself. Much of the imagery, especially from Bosch, directly inspired the music I wrote; the most obvious examples are 'The Extraction of the Stone of Madness (The Cure of Folly)' and 'The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things.' When Paul Komoda (who did the album's illustrations) and I discussed the album artwork, we wanted to draw upon images and symbols found in their work and chose the woodcut style of Dürer as the general style of the illustrations. I printed the album packages on a letterpress to give Paul's art the tactile vibe of those woodcuts.

Another major influence on the album was Frank Herbert's Dune series. Can you explain to our readers in which way?

Jon: The major influence was in the realm of human evolution and the drive to push the human mind and body to what is to us extreme abilities. Herbert's Butlerian Jihad pushed people away from relying on machines and developing themselves to greater heights. That's interesting to me in contrast to our world, as we become more reliant on technology while seemingly getting stupider. We have so much information but are less able to discern what is fact or truth. The Dune series influenced me in many other ways, as well; Herbert's views on religion, government, the environment and spirituality are very inspirational to me.

Could you please tell our readers some words about how you came up with the album title and how it relates to the album's lyrical content?

Jon: The title was inspired by a passage by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World Revisited, which is quite amazing. It's too long to repeat here, but I'll quote a small, essential part of it: 'They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness.' Why heal from a sickness you don't know you have?

If you'd have the possibility to make a movie based on the album, how would it look? Whom would you choose as director?

Jon: I don't know! Pretty grim, I would think. [Laughs.]

I'd likely have to find someone not in Hollywood – or America in general, for that matter – to direct, because I don't think there would be a need for many explosions or computer effects.

The album features musical guests like Rob Caggiano from Anthrax and Lars Hansen of Oneiroid Psychosis. How did those collaborations come up and how was working with them? Did they come over to your studio, or did you work the digital way via the Internet?

Jon: Lars and I have known each other for many years, and I've always been a fan of his elegant, direct guitar work with Oneiroid Psychosis, so I just asked him to play something for me! Lars and I worked online, sending files to each other. Rob and I were working on the Cradle of Filth album, Thornography, and he just told me straight up that he wanted to play on the new I, Parasite album, so I wrote something kind of fast and ridiculous for him, since he can shred like no one else I've ever met! We were already working in my studio, so he just came over one day after learning the part and laid it down. Then we experimented with some other stuff, which became the intro to the song.

You released the album yourself on Dark Vision Media. Where do you see the advantages and/or disadvantages in doing this?

Jon: The advantages are that everything is done on my terms, and I get to directly interact with the fans for distribution. There's no one telling me, 'Printing and assembling each package by hand is a dumb and impractical idea.' The disadvantages are merely financial: not having enough money to do everything I envision. But as I've learned, that can be combated with creative solutions, such as doing all of the labor yourself!

These days, it often feels like that the concept of a full album release is not that interesting anymore for many people out there; things are all about single hit songs and bits and pieces. How do you feel about that? Do you think listeners are going to appreciate the album format again one day?

Jon: It's sad. I'm an album listener as well. But I have to ignore it and do what feels right, even if it's not how some people consume music these days. Eventually it'll come around – retro-nostalgia always happens – and people will be hot for album epics, at least for a little while.

What's on your schedule for 2010? Any touring on the list?

Jon: We're making up for lost time in terms of playing live, which I've sorely neglected for many years. I'm also making it a priority to get us out to Europe, where I think people get what we're doing much more than here in the USA.