ben wakeman : : Journal

Meeting John Gorka

March 16, 2007

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This last Sunday morning I had the opportunity to interview one of my longtime songwriting heros for my Take Me to the Bridge podcast. For over 15 years I have been a huge fan of John Gorka's music. I distinctly remember being 22 and totally burned out on all of the music that used to inspire me. In fact, I remember going out to the record store to buy Springsteen's "Lucky Town" CD and being utterly disappointed. There was nothing new there for me. Two days later I went back and was thumbing through the bins and came across Temporary Road, Gorka's fourth record. I bought it, took it home and listened to it non stop for a couple of weeks. That record changed the course for me as a songwriter.

So, you can imagine what an amazing thing it was for me to sit alone in a room with John for a couple of hours on a sunny Sunday morning and talk about music. It's often scary to meet people whose work you admire for fear that knowing them might forever ruin your love for their work because --- let's be frank, many times they can turn out to be assholes. I'm happy to report that John is every bit the person that comes across in his songs and he incredibly humble and gracious.

I picked him up at his motel and after stopping for coffee in Decatur, we headed over to Kristian Bush's studio where we recorded the podcast. John has such an easy, low-maintenance way about him that we easily fell into conversation and I pretty much felt like I was talking to someone I've known for many years --- I guess in many ways I have known him for years. I guess the important take-away here is that he did not treat me like a goofy song nerd (which we all know I am) and he did not treat me as a stranger. I guess I should not have been surprised, but I tend to be a glass is half empty kind of guy and I'm often preparing for the worst.

I think probably the coolest thing was having John play a couple of songs on my guitar. This Taylor of mine was a graduation gift from my parents that I received about the same time I started listening to John's music. I still remember playing about every guitar in Nashville one weekend in the Spring of 1992 before deciding on that one. When I played that guitar, it spoke to me. It had a deep rich tone that felt solid and worthy of the years of effort I planned to put into it. Having John play it was like witnessing something come full-circle. It's a wonderful feeling to be 37 and realize that two major musical choices you made when you were 22 turned out to be the right ones.