Winter Trek by John Paul

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His choices of collaborators on the album have been very deliberate. “Being a drummer at heart, I wanted real good drum sounds and I knew Wyman was the man to create those sounds,” he said. “Mike Lambert worked with me on the other half of the album, he has recorded all my past bands (Stillview and The Posters) so I knew I’d like to work with him as well.

John Paul and Lambert recorded the rest of the album over breaks from school. “It took a long time to record because I played everything on the album,” he says.

That’s quite an accomplishment considering that his musical career has only spanned 10 years. Beginning with drums in 4th grade, he added turntables a few years later; then guitar, bass, piano and vocals. “I can also play a mean tambourine when needed,” he says.

The first song he wrote and recorded was at 16, an homage to a cute girl with whom he thought he was in love. “It was called Real…we listened to it in her car outside of her house with her mom looking through the kitchen window to make sure we didn’t make out,” says John Paul. “I wrote and recorded all parts of the song from drums and bass to guitar and lyrics.”

His songwriting has developed since that first effort. John Paul characterizes the sound as “schizophrenic.” “In one song, I am making fun of pop culture—in the next, I am talking about doing certain romantic things to girls, then hating my life and denouncing the female gender,” he says. “But I’d like to think this is the beauty of my music: it’s not the same songs over and over, they tell different stories, and a listener will have a good time with this record.”

Along the way, he’s received plenty of recognition for his work. In 2003, his old band Stillview was in the Portland Phoenix’s Top 10 for record sales for nine consecutive weeks. The next year, John Paul was honored as Best Drummer and Best Songwriter for Reindeer Records Rock Off 20, the statewide battle of the bands in Maine; and his second band, The Posters, won the national Got Milk! Contest for the State of Maine in 2004.

Fueled by this critical success and his own evolution as a musician, the audiences are getting bigger and bigger—but what about the dream gig? Under the lights, on the stage at Boston’s TD Banknorth Garden. “I’d be opening for Death Cab for Cutie a few years from now once the world realizes how amazing that band is,” he says. “My whole family would be there and my brother would jump on stage to play a few songs with me at the end.”

His brother gets most of the credit for keeping him on track with his musical career. “I stopped playing music for a little bit right at the beginning of high school when my parents divorced,” he says, “but my brother moved back to my house and became a kind of father figure to me. He was at every show, whether it was in a band, acting in theater, whatever.”

The impression he wants to leave with listeners is pretty straightforward. “I’d like them to think ‘he’s got a good sound, he’s a little corky and cute on stage, maybe even a little shy, but man he’s got his shit together.’,” he says. “Maybe they’ll buy the CD with a bottle of wine and ride the emotional roller coaster with me.”

What comes next? John Paul wants to work with a label that takes the time to develop talent. “Too many bands are ‘in’ one second and out the next,” he says. “The best part would be able to play out constantly and not have to worry about setting up your equipment or getting more people to a show to make a club happy.”

If John Paul stays on the road he’s on, the clubs are going to very happy indeed.

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