BEN KWELLER

High As A Kite

One of the US’ most treasured songwriters, Ben Kweller’s critically acclaimed albums have surpassed half a million in sales, and earned him a die-hard global fan base. On the eve of the launch of his latest studio album, Go Fly A Kite, JENNIFER PETERSON-WARD chatted to the Texas-raised songwriter about his 15 years in the music biz.

Having been immersed in the complexities of the music industry since the age of 14, Ben Kweller’s career has been the stuff of music legend.
In 1997, when he was 15, Kweller’s Greenville-based garage band, Radish, was involved in a major-label bidding war, with labels reportedly throwing around seven-figure record deals in hopes that this precocious, home-schooled pop savant with an unapologetically Nirvana sound might be the next big thing. Ultimately, the band’s one major-label album (released by Mercury Records in 1997) was a flop, but luckily Kweller found greater fame by putting the punk aside and reinventing himself as a singer-songwriter.
“From the moment I started making music, I just got really fucking lucky. There have certainly been times when I’ve thought ‘I wish I could give it up’ but the truth is I’m just not good at anything else. I never had any fallback plan. If a young kid comes up to me and asks ‘should I pursue a music career?’ I always say ‘if you’re better at something else then definitely do that something else’,” he says, adding that if he had the chance to reinvent himself he’d love to be “a professional bass fisherman”, graphic designer (“I love Photoshopping”) or work in a national park (“Park Ranger Ben has a nice ring to it”).
Kweller’s four solo albums have ranged stylistically, from the giddy Cheap Trick-style pop of Sha Sha (2002), On My Way (2004) and Ben Kweller (2006) to his first record after moving to Austin in 2008, the appropriately country-themed Changing Horses. His latest full-length release, Go Fly A Kite, touches on elements from all of these albums.
“The new record has been drawing a lot of comparisons with Sha Sha and I’m happy it reminds people of that record, but they are very different albums. Every song on Sha Sha is either ‘guitar, bass and drums’ or ‘piano, bass and drums’ whereas the instrumentation on the new record is more complex. But the new record’s energetic vibe definitely harkens back to that album,” he says, going on to explain that his new tunes also differ because of their “aggressive” lyrics and themes.
“Songs like Gossip and Jealous Girl are about real people who’ve screwed me over by talking about me behind my back. Basically just about relationships gone bad,” he says. “I’m not out to hurt anyone, the songs just come to me and I write em.
“Truthfully, I am worrying about the backlash from some of the people I sing about, which is probably stupid of me, it’s just that I believe in magic so I’m real superstitious. Like, I’m the kinda person that believes that if you have a special stone and rub it every day you can turn it into something powerful,” he continues. “So I have a habit of weaving secret words into my lyrics, in order to empower myself. I’m not trying to seduce anyone or anything like that; it’s just some personal magic.”