Every Time I Die guitarist Jordan Buckley is an artist – not just in the creative musician sense, he’s actually a bona fide maker of fantastic art. His art range – Jordan Buckley World Wide has some of the coolest prints, t-shirts and other bits that you’re likely to see and his love of art stems from way before ETID even started writing songs together. We caught up with Jordan ahead of their Montreal show at Les Foufounes Electriques on April 20th to dig a little deeper into his ‘other’ job.
So, art! Where did this love of art come from? Did it stem from doodling on tour or were you into it before the band?
No, I’ve definitely been doing it for most of my life, I just stopped for a little bit when the band went full time. I went to college to do art and then dropped out for the band, and when you’re no longer expecting to make a career out of something, you convince yourself that it’s not as important. That’s how I got into it the second time, because I missed it and it made me realise “woah, maybe I wasn’t meant to have a career in art, maybe I was just meant to do it and enjoy it”. Originally, it was just cartoons and comic books – even at a young age I realised that art could be more than reality could be… I noticed that you could have a flying dragon in a cartoon, but you can’t have a flying dragon outside, so I guess I was really just taken with the idea that there were infinite possibilities with what you can make, compared to real life where everything is already laid out in front of you.
So are comic books your main influences?
Yeah, I remember He-Man cartoons being big, Star Wars, even toys. I was big into Star Wars, I loved the toys and I loved the drawing and making of things, even if it wasn’t a drawing I was just in love with things that were creative. Since I couldn’t film a movie when I was 8, I stuck with drawing because it was the one way that I could make something that wasn’t real, much like Star Wars and I also loved Ghostbusters and Dick Tracy (because the bad guys looked cool). I just remember that I had a fascination with making things that had never been made – even though at the time I was just mimicking He-Man, but I had an interest in those created, animated realities.
Once you’d gotten back into art, what gave you the confidence to go public with it? Was it doing the artwork for the New Junk Aesthetic (Every Time I Die’s fifth album)?
That album probably was the first time I ever really put my foot forward. Early on, I got my confidence from just being good at it – I don’t mean in a huge field, I mean just compared to the rest of my elementary school. I specifically remember winning an art contest in first grade, and again in second grade, and that was how I was known in class – Jordan can draw. That gave me confidence to do things, and then I moved onto high school and got voted ‘most artistic’ and it kept building up. But, keep in mind that back then there was no Internet, no Instagram, so I wasn’t really getting much feedback other than kids I went to school with. Then, from the age of about 19 to 23 I didn’t draw a single thing because of the band getting going.
There were two main influences in me getting back into it; one was when I met my wife. Two years into dating her, she had never even seen me draw. She had heard that I used to draw and that it was why I went to college and I couldn’t just pull out my phone and show her pictures of my work – this was 2006, no-one really had pictures on their phone. I can’t believe I’m talking about something that was only nine years ago like it was ancient history! So I literally had to dig out my college portfolio to show her and she was like “holy shit, you were good!” and I was like “yeah, I was good” but I was so terrified to start back up because I was just so scared of having to face the possibility that I wasn’t good any more, that I’d lost it. Like a retired athlete who refuses to pick up a football, I didn’t want to try throwing it and find out that I couldn’t do it.
Not long after that my dad got me some art supplies and he was the second influence – I think he noticed that once the band started becoming popular and touring full time, and we put out DVDs where we were just drinking and setting my hair on fire, he was like “what about that art thing you were really good at?” and he got me some supplies. Looking back, it was probably his way of saying “you probably can’t be doing that other stuff much longer! Lighting your hair on fire is fine when you’re in your mid-twenties and you’re just living in the moment, but in the long run, what about this thing you were good at?”
This, what I’m drawing in front of you right now, I would never have been able to do that; I took three of four years off, then I took another year of wanting to try but being too scared. Then I took another year or two of just drawing privately – I couldn’t draw on a bus, I would have to find a completely empty, secret room and if someone knocked on the door I would have to cover up what I was working on and answer it, you know? So it definitely took a while to get back to where I actually felt comfortable showing people things.
I can actually remember the specific moment when I couldn’t be scared any more; we needed a backdrop and we just wanted something really simple – a hand giving the middle finger with ETID across the knuckles. We had this graphic designer and he tried photoshopping something, and then tried drawing and it was just terrible so I manned up and said “fuck it, I can do that” and I did. That was the first time I ever drew something and showed it to somebody since college. After that I just got rid of the whole “I might suck” thing and I just went for it, because I still loved it so much.
How do you get your art fix when you’re on tour – do you rely on the Internet or do you look for galleries and street art?
It’s Internet and just working on my stuff. I mean, trust me, if there’s something cool going on in that town I’ll definitely try to get to it, but I’m not the kind of guy who needs to go to museums and look at French impressionist paintings. I definitely have my favourites and I love the Internet for that reason – the Internet has a lot of bad on it, but I just like to focus on the good and I fucking love the fact that I can take out my phone, go to my favourite artists’ Instagram feeds and just look at their work whenever I want – well, not whenever I want, whenever I have wifi!
If I hear about great street art I’ll definitely go for walks and take pictures – that’s way more more intriguing to me than a gallery. I have huge folders of cool graffiti that I’ve seen on tour and I’ll reference it when I’m running low on inspiration. Unfortunately, if something is not really close to the club, I’m probably going to miss out on it, but that’s my life. I’ve been to these cities a lot, so a lot of times I will wake up and think “I’ve already seen this city” and will just draw and hang out at the club all day. Then sometimes you take a 40-minute cab ride, get lost and have fun, but normally it’s not the latter!
How did you branch out from drawing again to making t-shirts and building your JBWW brand?
I think I can talk about this… I was getting sued and I was scared that I would owe someone a lot of money. When you’re looking down the barrel of that gun you have no time for thinking “I don’t wanna do this, I don’t wanna do that” and I somehow just got so ambitious that I decided to not just sit on my all my drawings any more – at that point, those drawings were for nothing, they were just for me to be satisfied with. Having realised earlier that just because I wasn’t making a career of out my art didn’t mean I should stop doing it, I came to the point when I was being sued where I thought “actually, I might need to make a career out of this”.
People nowadays don’t really have thousands of dollars to buy original artwork, but t-shirts were a way that you could make art for people in a way that they could afford – $20 for a shirt. That’s all it was – I couldn’t care less about fashion, I couldn’t care less about a movement. I decided that my point would be to make t-shirts without words on them because I hate wearing shirts with words on them, but that’s just me. I also just wanted to do something with these piles of drawings that were sitting on my desk.
Also, I was getting sued – thank God it didn’t happen in the end – but I was thinking that I might have to pay a man a large amount of money and at that time I just had to suck it up and do something with my art. Obviously I don’t draw for money, but if you can make money from your art then I believe you should. I mean, those art supplies cost money – how else are you going to buy them?!
So that’s where the JBWW thing came from. I never wanted to be the guy in a band with a clothing line, because I fell that that’s overdone, but I had to swallow that and say to myself “too bad, you’ve got to do it.” I always thought that starting a clothing range was just a cheap way that, if you didn’t really care about what you were doing… don’t get me wrong, there are guys who do care a lot about their clothing lines, but there are also a lot of people that don’t and they instead just think “how can I get another $20 out of my fans?” and that’s exactly what I didn’t want to be linked in with. So I made it very clear that, while I am in a band and I do have a clothing line, I hand draw every single design and hopefully that separates me from the pack.
To be completely honest, now I’m at a point where, luckily for me – and this is probably my favourite thing about whatever you call this, if you want to say career then I will call it a career – I’m now in a position where, if I want to make a shirt I will make a t-shirt, if I want to make a poster I’ll make a poster, when I want to do something for my band I’ll do something for my band and when I want to do something for another band I’ll do something for another band. I refuse to run that race of having to get a spring line out or a fall line, or thinking neon yellow is popular, I need to get some of that… I don’t ever want to be in that rat race. When I feel like making a cool t-shirt, I will do that. That’s what’s the most enjoyable; I’m working on my own schedule. I’ve really gotten into posters and prints in the last year – I should be working on t-shirts but instead I just go where my heart, passion and interest is.
I’m not going to lie, I like the shirts I make, but I’m not going to be the guy who’s like “click here and buy this!” – I hate being that used car salesman. Sometimes I like to just make some cool shit and be like “ok, I’ve made 100 of these, if you like them then they’re for sale, if you don’t want them then that’s fine too.” I don’t want to convince people to buy my art, I just want to make it and make enough of it for the people that want it.
You’re probably my favourite person on social media and I wanted to talk a little about you how you use it – I guess with your art, something like Instagram must feel like a God-send, not just for promoting your work but also for getting your fix on the road?
Yeah… at first I was definitely a big Twitter fan. I got into Instagram because I thought the filters were cool. I was actually a bit bummed at first as I didn’t want my pictures to be seen, so I didn’t like that people had to see them in order for me to use Instagram. This was 2011, whereas now every phone camera has its own filters.
I was at a festival we’d played and I was watching one of my favourite bands. I took a load of cool pictures and wanted to put filters on them and I was just bummed that, if I did that, it meant the world could see these pictures and I didn’t want that. But again I realised that those were the rules and next thing I knew I was on Instagram. Then a couple of my friends were on it, then all of a sudden some artists were on it and then it just clicked – behind the scenes pictures, process pictures… this could be a really good thing and that’s what I went with.
It’s also impressive that you will actively engage with your fans on those platforms – like if someone posts a picture of their new JBWW shirt. Was that a conscious decision to talk to your followers so frequently?
That’s my approach to the band and I let it be my approach to life – you’ll catch me later tonight at the merch table hanging out with kids. Don’t get me wrong, some people are annoying and I’m not even going to pretend that I don’t get aggravated by some kids – two kids tried to kiss me yesterday! I don’t want to be kissed! But, at the heart of it I do want to meet everyone. I do completely understand that they’re the reason I can be in a band and/or be an artist. I’m not so cool that I’m like “I don’t care if anyone likes my band, I don’t care if anyone likes my art – I’m making this for me.” I’m not stupid; of course we do this because we want people to like it and so I love spending time with kids after the show. When I’m out on Warped Tour for example, I’m out at the JBWW tent all day – and that’s around 10-12 hours a day – and I love taking pictures with kids, taking pictures of their tattoos and shooting the shit with them. That doesn’t mean I don’t get aggravated by the ones who have too much to drink and cross the line. Like yesterday, these two kids ask for a pic and then tried to kiss me! They’re the reason that sometimes I leave the merch table a little early!
But no, I do leave comments; I will respond to pretty much anyone on Twitter. I always find it weird when celebrities will make a big deal about them doing that, do you know what I mean? Some people will be like “20 questions – go!” whereas I’m thinking “I do 20 questions all day long, how about infinity questions?? Ask me a question and I’ll answer it.” That just always came with the territory for me – if you’re going to be in a band, if you’re going to play music for kids and those kids have enough wherewithal to write to you to say thank you, send you pictures of their t-shirts and get tattoos of your band and ask you those questions, the least you can do is make them not feel like it was a waste of time. Imagine if you had a tattoo of a band and showed it to someone in that band – how fucking shot would you feel if they weren’t thrilled? You’d be looking at that tattoo and thinking how you don’t like it any more because you don’t like that person any more.
With Every Time I Die, we appreciate the time, the money, the energy the kids put in. Even those that don’t have money – I’ll have kids message me saying “I wish I could see you tonight, you’re my favourite band but I’m broke” I’ll sort them out with a spot on the guest list… why not, you know?
You mentioned earlier how you like having the freedom to do what you want and follow your interests. You’re about to become a father… any chance of a JBWW baby line? Or some dog clothes for the two canine children you already have?
I absolutely am open to anything. If you’d told me two years ago that I’d hate making t-shirts and all I’d want to do was make concert posters, I’d have been doubtful, but I really am open to anything. ETID already does baby clothes and we do dog clothes, I’m just currently going through a print infatuation and I’m sure it will end – like most interesting things, you become uninterested in them.
Merchline Print, vol. 4 : JBWW from Merchline.com on Vimeo.
Could you ever see yourself having an exhibition of your work?
Yeah, that’s a bucket list thing, but it’s also something that I would have to commit a lot of time to. One of the things I don’t like about my process is the length and speed of it – I don’t feel like I’m very fast and I don’t feel like I can crank out a large number of things in a short amount of time. For an exhibition I would have to commit to doing nothing else for at least half a year and, with a kid on the way, I don’t know if I’m ready to do that – I might have to stick with some things that are more financially beneficial at the moment.
Finally, if you were to describe yourself now, would you say you were a musician who draws really cool shit, or an artist who plays in a really awesome band?
I often think about this – not exactly worded that way, but I often wonder. I do wish I was a better guitar player and I wonder how good of a guitar player I would be if every hour I spent drawing I instead spent practicing guitar. I’d probably be a really good guitar player because I will pull some ten hour sessions without even batting an eye. I’m not tooting my horn here, but there days when I will wake up, start drawing, stop to eat, go back to drawing, stop to eat again, go back to drawing and then stop to sleep and that could be drawing for as much as 14 hours in a day. The worst part is it might be something that I throw out!
I think if you consider the time spent then I would be an artist first, but I think I get more joy out of being a musician. I love playing shows, I love being on tour… so I would say I’m a musician who draws.
And I suppose being a musician gives you the time to do the drawing?
Exactly. If I wasn’t a musician, right, I wouldn’t have the free time because I probably would have had to be doing something else. I only have to work half an hour a day on tour! Just kidding… we soundcheck, so that’s another half hour!
But I’m not stupid; without ETID, without music I wouldn’t be able to do this. There are people out there far better than me at drawing, at art that nobody knows about because they don’t have the platform that I am blessed with. It’s very flattering nowadays when I get people who are surprised when they find out I’m in a band because they’ve found out about me through artists – that’s rare, but it’s always very complimentary to me. I’m in this music bubble, but instead of trying to get out of it, I’m just grateful to be in it.
Every Time I Die play Les Foufounes Electriques on April 20th. Support comes from Marmozets, The Eeries & In The Name Of Havoc.
To buy tickets CLICK HERE
Interview and b/w photo – Dave Musson
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