In Conversation with Joe P on the Creation of “Glass House”

Joe P is an indie alternative artist from Asbury Park, New Jersey. We recently had the opportunity to sit down with him for an interview about his latest single, “Glass House,” in which he describes it as a “song about the physical proof we leave behind in the wake of relationships.” After the pandemic disbanded his long-time band, Joe P found comfort in his New Jersey basement studio, creating deeply personal music that gained the attention of millions online. 

Every song manifests differently. Was the process of writing and producing “Glass House” easier or more difficult than the average track off of your last EP, French Blonde?

I always feel like all the music stuff—recording, songs, lyrics—is just happening to me. I never sit down and feel like I come up with an idea and do it, feeling like “okay, great, that's perfect.” It's more like I look up in a week and think, “Oh, okay, this song wants to be more in this direction.” It takes time because of that, I think. This one particularly was sneaky. Every other week or day, I would be going in the opposite direction thinking, “Oh, what the heck?” I want to make it more like this or more minimal or add more stuff, so I was very indecisive with this one.

Writing it was cool. I wrote it in LA with K. Flay and Tommy English, and it was a different kind of song with a totally different mood. Then, when I got home, just for posting it on TikTok, as you do, I recorded a version that I was feeling, and it turned out to be heavier. There was a guitar element and distortion. I thought, “Well, this is different.” Initially, it was meant to be a lot nicer, like a calmer kind of song. However it took on this new direction, and I had no plan for that. So, I had to follow it down that road, but then I went too far, ending up with too many tracks. That process involved doing too much and then scaling back, but I ended up liking where it is because it's super minimal to produce.

‘Don't Wanna Love U’ is different, I think. It sounds very similar to how it sounds on the demo I made originally. Even a lot of the sounds I kept because I loved them. That one was really fun, though, because I thought, 'Oh my God, this is like a happy song, well lyrically it’s not, but its a happy song! How did this happen? I was waking up at 4 am during that time, flipping my own schedule. Instead of staying up until 4 am, I started going to bed early and waking up at 4 to see if it made any difference. Lo and behold, it's happier when you wake up at a normal time and see the sun coming up; this is great. That song almost sounds like that time when I was trying that. I held on as long as I could to that, but it's hard to consistently go to bed early. I'm back on my terrible schedule now.

If you had to pick a lyric out of this song that highlights your lyrical style best, which do you think has the most meaning to you? 

I really liked in the second verse, "what does it feel like to want, but not to need love? Now that the bruises are gone for good, well, I see we're losing touch." I remember writing it; it was one of those that popped out while I was just sitting with the acoustic guitar in LA. It just came out, and I was just like, it's weird. I always love lyrics where I'm like they’re simple, in the sense that I'm almost like, 'Oh, someone's definitely said that lyric, I gotta look that up.' And then you look it up, and you're safe, 'Oh, cool, I love that.' I always want them to be simple but still good. Sometimes you can write stuff that feels clever, and like there's no way anyone's ever said it. You're not even concerned because it's so unique, but then those are the ones that aren't good. They're good but they're not because you're too in your head and not in your heart. It's like you're really overthinking and playing a word game with people, but people aren't listening to your music to hear how clever you can be, you know what I mean?

I think sometimes it's easy to forget that because you're like, 'Oh, I'm doing a job of making a song because the person listening can't, so I’ve got to do it.' And then you realize, no, actually, I should always approach it as if I don't know how to write a song either. I'm just gonna do what feels good, and those are the ones that work. So I like that line because it's kind of like the best of both of those worlds.

How do you balance being vulnerable on your tracks but also not revealing too much?  

I guess you have to be vulnerable, or else no one's going to connect with it. Also, out of boredom, I can't imagine writing a song that's just a good song but feels like nothing to me. It has great lyrics, maybe great melodies, super catchy, the whole thing, but I don't feel anything. I don't feel anything when saying or singing it. So, I'm thinking that it happens out of boredom. If I'm going to be on stage or singing this forever, let's make it fun or actually feel like something. It starts with that, and then I think the reason it seems like nothing is being revealed is because I'm not trying to do that. I'm actually trying to reveal as much as possible. But I think it's funny how in doing that, you can't actually let someone fully in because it's a 3-minute song. You're trying to make things rhyme and whatever, and sometimes the more vulnerable and honest you are, it's really specific to your own life, so in a weird way, you think it sounds super clear because you're the one in that story. Like in a dream, only you can really understand it, and then when people hear it, they have a totally different meaning for it. They're never going to see it through that exact perspective and lens. So, I think that's kinda what's funny about it. People come up to me and are like, 'I love THIS song because THIS happened,' and I'm like, 'Woah, that song isn't about that at all, but that's kinda awesome that you've taken it there and it's meant that to you.' That happened to me, and I remember thinking like, 'Oh, ok, from now on when I write a song, I'm not expecting it to be for people to be like, 'Oh, I had that exact experience.' It's more like, as long as the feeling can be achieved, I think that everyone will take it down their own kinda avenue.

Do you have any plans for an upcoming album or EP, and if so how does “Glass House” and “Don’t Wanna Love U” fit into it so far? 

I was working on an album right before the tour, but then I put a halt on it because I had to leave. I'm halfway through it, I would say. “Glass House” and “Don't Wanna Love You” are cool and fit in a really interesting way. It's like I have this fast, upbeat song and then this heavier kind of song. I’ve always been able to do the slower, acoustic, built-into-a-band world thing, so I'm just trying to cover those. It's kinda like three big ends to that spectrum that I'm seeing now with those existing. It's like a kind of upbeat fun thing, then the more dark but big rock song, and then the stuff that I just love doing always, which is like starting quiet and getting loud, like alt-rock/indie rock.

How is “Glass House” translating live so far? Do you think it shines more on the record or more on stage? 

It’s weird, it’s taking us time to get right. What kinda stinks is, you record something, and the muscle memory of recording it is very different than playing a live show. Also, things just don’t work live as they do on a record; it's just a different thing. That part where it's just guitar forever is cool, but then I thought it would be nice to get some drums going because that will make people feel something different. You speed things up live usually because on the recording, it sounds fine. But then, you play it at that tempo live, and all of a sudden, you're like, 'Woah, it feels so slow,' because now the context is totally different. And we’re all standing in this room sweating, and it's like, 'Okay, we want to be a little more amped up, let's pump it up a little.' So, we are still working it out, but I like everything better live.

I will always love things more live because, to me, it's fully impossible to capture what's happening at a live show in a recording. That's literally the reason it hasn't changed since the day live shows were invented. So, I think I will always like them better live because I like the fact that something might get messed up, a mistake might happen, and I might forget a lyric or sing the wrong note or whatever, because that gives that person a more unique experience and gives that song a new life. Whereas whatever's on Spotify or Apple is gonna be there just like that.

With tour and so many shows coming up, how do you prepare yourself for life on the road? 

It's not possible. To me, the key is knowing that it's completely insane, inhumane, and not cool. But going in, knowing that, your brain is more ready for all the things that come with it. Your relationship when you're on tour is now, 'Okay, you're in this long-distance situation now.' Your time zones are completely opposite. I used to think every time I would get better at it and be like, 'Oh, I'm going away, I'll call you more this time or we’ll FaceTime more on off days, we’ll do this.' Really, that isn't the key. The key is to be both more and more aware of what an insane and impossible scenario this is. Let's just be aware during it because that will make it better than trying to improve on something that is set up to fail. Because if you do FaceTime or call someone more, all of a sudden, like, 'Yeah, we are gonna talk more.' But there's nothing to talk about because you're sitting in a van, and they're doing the stuff they've always been doing back home. They ask, like, 'Oh, what happened today?' and you're like, 'Oh, you had to be there.' So you're almost better off just not doing it and trying to fake it. Then you're on the phone in silence; you're almost making it worse by doing it rather than just acknowledging space is what you need. The space is the better thing to take in, and every once in a while, you call and you say how bad it sucks and whatever. But it's not worth acting like you're beating the system because it doesn't happen. That's the main thing, but everything else is just like a sleepover where you're like, 'Ugh, I wish I didn't sleep over at my friend's house, I just wanna go home.' It just never goes away. And I get excited about tour. There is something about this lack of responsibility that you have. But it's cool; I definitely like it. It's just not a natural thing that I think humans are meant to be doing.

Is there a specific venue you’re really excited to play on these upcoming tours?  

Honestly, the last show in Jersey City, I'm excited because I have never played or been there. I’m just kind of happy that it's a Jersey show, so it's like a hometown thing, but it's not like the actual hometown thing, where it's truly the town that you live in. That seems like it would be sick, but it's not because everyone's there because you're the thing to do that night. It's like, 'Oh, he's coming back to town to play,' but they're not there the way the fans are there when you've played in Kansas, when it's like, 'Ah, this is so sick, like who knows when he is coming back.' It's just a little more like a high school reunion or something. It feels like everyone is just talking, and they're like, 'Ah, yeah, don't try and act cool like we know you up there.' It just changes it a little, but it's fine because they're all your friends. But also, you realize how stoked you were to be on the road and go places where no one knows you, but they know your music, and that's a cool freedom when you step on stage.

But when you go back home, everyone knows how you joke around or what you look like when you eat a burrito. It's harder to let loose on stage because you see the friends in the crowd, and it's like, 'Cool, everyone is here,' but it's definitely a little different. But this venue is big, and not in the actual hometown, so I'm kinda excited for like a real show, but still far enough from my actual hometown. 

If you have time off in a city, whats your favorite thing to do? 

I love visiting cool little clothing shops because I like the randomness of what you might find. Maybe the most perfect cool sweater or cool pants, and you just throw that in your suitcase for the rest of the tour. So I love doing that. I relatively recently started drinking coffee, so I enjoy drinking coffee in good places too. The thing that stinks is that there haven't been many off days, and when there is, I'm doing a bunch for the radios. I go do radio stuff while everyone else in the crew is like, 'Sick, we can actually go do all these fun things around the town.' So I'm usually stuck actually going somewhere.

I flew to Boise, Idaho from Sacramento the other day after a show to play a radio thing and then flew back right after that to San Francisco; it was crazy. In less than 24 hours, I was like, 'This is insane,' and then the crew went to the beach, and I was like, 'Dangit,' so it's kinda funny because that's how that works out. But I think today we will be in LA a little later, and tomorrow's an off day. There's radio stuff, but it'll be enough time to actually get to chill a little, which is nice. 

Okay one last fun one, can I ask what the inspiration around the black cat was for “Glass House?” I have a black cat and I thought it was awesome. 

In my phone, I have a ton of photoshoot or music video ideas, and I had this idea for a black and white photo, a studio-style shoot, with a visible backdrop. I'd wear a black suit and have a black cat next to me. Literally, the idea was just standing next to a black cat, and I loved that simple photoshoot concept. We ended up doing that shoot, but then I thought, "Well, we're all here, so let's also do a little lyric video thing." It was great, and we did it in color.

People have been asking, "How did you get the cat to stay there?" And it's actually a trick. The cat was such a good cat, she was great, but anytime I played guitar I think it was too weird and the cat would get up and walk away so we couldn't get through a whole take. We thought, "What if we just get the cat to chill in the spot we want her to chill and then set a timer for the length of the song?" Essentially, everyone held their breath, didn't talk, and didn't move. So the cat you're seeing in that video is truly sitting there, but we were all just sitting around in silence, and that cat is looking at us like what are we doing, what is going on here? That was the only way to get her to sit still.

Then, we didn't move the tripod that the camera was on, and I went up after, and we overlaid the videos together. I think in the bridge, I look down at the cat, but I’m really just looking at nothing, it was the only way to do it. It was really fun though!