The members of the band The Jelly Jam – Ty Tabor (King’s X) on guitar and vocals, Rod Morgenstein (Winger & The Dixie Dregs) on drums, and John Myung (Dream Theater) on bass -- are known much better for those other bands they are in, and every music magazine profile about the power trio will tell you this.
What’s not likely to come out is how long this band has actually been together, in some form or another.
The three came together in 1998 with keyboardist Derek Sherinian (Planet X, Dream Theater) as Platypus. After two albums, When Pus Comes To Shove and Ice Cycles, Sherinian moved on and Tabor, Morgenstein, and Myung reconvened for the first eponymous-titled Jelly Jam album, released in 2002. Two follow-ups emerged: The Jelly Jam 2 (2004) and Shall We Descend (2011). Primarily a studio band developed by the constrictions of their regular bands’ itineraries, the collective did not have the opportunity to push their albums as effectively as they desired.
That is about to change. The Jelly Jam has released a new album, Profit, on the Music Theories label. The intriguing art on the cover has a forebodingly cloaked figure holding a balanced measure, a stack of gold on one side and the planet Earth on the other. The title of the album, to be thorough, is the word “Prophet,” crossed out with “Profit” substituted beneath. It suggests a Biblical allusion from Matthew 16:22, “For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul, or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” Powerful stuff, and this time the band is taking it on the road, with none of the gravitas missing.
New Jersey Stage had the opportunity to speak with Tabor and Myung about The Jelly Jam before their show at The Newton Theatre in August. We wanted to see how they made time for the new effort in what are already several busy schedules, and how a concept album emerges almost from happenstance.
How exactly did The Jelly Jam come into being?
Myung: It started about 18 years ago. I gave Ty a call and asked if he’d be into doing something together with myself and Rod. We were all up for doing something. Over the years we’ve been able to – if you include the Platypus stuff with the Jelly Jam albums, we’ve done six records together total – it’s just been this really cool thing we’ve been able to do on the side.
This record in particular just spoke to us and made us feel that we should do what we can to bring it to the next level, help promote it, do tour dates, and as such really raise the awareness of it. It’s something that I personally believe in. We love what we do and this is the next natural progression so we’re upping the promotion, letting people know we exist!
Profit is a concept album, judging from listening to the record straight through, reading the liner notes where a bit of narrative prefaces each song’s lyric, and seeing the very specific artwork interspersed throughout. What was involved with putting that together?
Tabor: It wasn’t actually planned. It sort of just happened. Usually when we get done hashing over the music, I take a little bit of time at home with it to just kind of see where the lyrics go. For some reason, everything just had a theme that fit together, and before long it became apparent that it could be a single storyline from beginning to end. All the gaps naturally came together to tell the story.
Truth is, it wasn’t originally intended to be so. It just kind of came about that way.
Because The Jelly Jam is comprised of three individuals from bands with very different musical signatures, how difficult is it to shed those to work in this group…or, is the existence of the group an extension of wanting to do something different? In that way, not being into those other sounds was a main purpose for this band’s being?
Tabor: I think it’s the latter. It’s a matter of, when we three play together it just naturally is something different than anything we do in our own bands. It was a nice surprise from day one. When we first started playing together, we realized that this could go to new places for all of us!
That’s really exciting, because we love to play together and we connected musically. There was no effort. In fact, it’s a bit like different ingredients in a soup – it became it’s own soup, it’s own unique thing.
Profit is on a new label for either Platypus or The Jelly Jam, being the Music Theories label. Music Theories/Mascot Music is making a name for itself with a very strong roster of artists with a high degree of musicianship: Flying Colors (featuring Neal Morse, Mike Portnoy and Steve Morse), Steve Lukather (Toto), Black Country Communion (with Glenn Hughes and Joe Bonnamassa), and Black Label Society being among labelmates. What’s the experience been like with working with this company?
Myung: They showed interest in us because they believe in the band and loved the record. They’re not focused on quantity, but are instead focused on music they relate to so it was great to start a relationship with a label with that kind of approach to helping meet a band’s needs and helping to promote a band.
That was one of the most unique things for us, in terms of having relationships with labels and how they thought about the overall business plan, the overall business model.
Because of the other bands you are all with – each with established fanbases – what’s been the experience you’ve encountered with them as many have come to The Jelly Jam for the first time?
Tabor: Miraculously it’s been overwhelmingly positive without any of that type of expectation from the other bands we’re in. People seem to accept it for what it is, which is a wonderful surprise.
So what was the recording process like on this?
Myung: Usually plan on having about ten days to get together and see what we can come up with. With this particular record, we got together twice to make sure we had enough material. So there’s two ten-day writing sessions, starting from scratch. Half (the songs on the) record were just bits and parts we had, that we felt good about, that we’d then develop structurally.
A lot of that involves sitting in the control room of the recording facility, hashing out the material on acoustics, and when Ty gets a sense of lyrical and melodic direction, that’s when things really start getting going. At that point, it’s as if the song writes itself.
The other half of the record – like Ty alluded to – were demos that he brought in. Some songs he thought were amazing, and those progressed to the stage of getting good performances down, good drum takes. So the Profit album is half of us collaborating in the writing process and spontaneously seeing what happens, and the other half are songs Ty had written beforehand.
And this is the first time The Jelly Jam is going out live?
Tabor: Yes, this is the first time ever that we’re doing live shows, and we’ve been talking about it all this time, all these years! But everything just came together between our own timing between our bands and, as John mentioned, an album that we really believe in. We’re just very happy with this album and very much want to…make it legitimate by getting out there playing!
We’ve done six shows so far. These are our first shows and they’ve been going well, so far, and it’s been a lot of fun. We’ve had a chance to find out in person (which material is working best in the live setting).
So far, everyone’s had a positive reaction to material from all four Jelly Jam albums! It’s been a big surprise.
So the audience has a good handle on the history of the band up to this point…
Tabor: No matter what song we start, everybody in the crowd is very aware of the song apparently. They seem to be very happy that we’re doing stuff from every album. For us, we had no idea what would be the case. We were wondering just as much if people would know all the music. But all we had to do was start the song and people would cheer. They know the song! That was a great encouragement.
Not to belabor a point, but the individual members of this band have been in music for many years. We have all heard and seen other artists that are either sticking with their old hits and hitting the road, or they put together albums that serve more a function of business than a function of creative enterprise. What is the feeling at this point to be able to put together an album you’re really happy with and want to get behind and push out to a wider audience?
Tabor: Luckily for us, it’s just not been a struggle. We’re so inspired when we play together, and always have been, going back now 18 years! When we play together, it’s exciting. We can’t wait until the next time we do it.
We’ve always had a natural drive behind it all that is something that’s not really an effort. It’s something the three of us want to do, and keep doing, and cannot wait to see what happens next. As people, we get along great. That’s the most important thing for any band – we like each other, we’re friends. We just love the privilege of getting to make music together.
