John Otto Young is a Connecticut, USA keyboardist, musician, and songwriter who has been playing and recording in a number of projects over the last 6 decades.
As a weekend warrior, he co-founded the Center Street Bandin 1989. While they did some great cover music, they focused their efforts on songwriting and released two locally successful albums (both co-produced by John), “Reason for Living” (1993), and “Take You for a Ride” (1996).
Since 2011, John has been the keyboardist with Howard Eldridge (former vocalist with Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy) and the Soul Potatoes, which also features 2016 BMA award nominee and Connecticut Blues Hall of Fame lifetime award inductee, Paul Gabriel. In 1999, John had the honor of playing keys with Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member Hilton Valentine of the Animals and Rick Rivets, founding member of the New York Dolls.
In this interview spotlight, I chat with John Otto Young about his music, technology, challenges and more.
Full Q&A along with links and music below.
Where are you from and what style of music do you create? (In your own words, not necessarily in marketing terms or by popular genre classifications.)
I’m from Shelton, CT (USA), which is about 75 miles east of New York City. I’m really all over the place as far as music creation and song writing. I really don’t adhere to a specific genre or style of music, although behind most of what I write, there is definitely some kind of rock theme.
What led you down this path of music and what motivates you to keep going?
I started out taking accordion lessons as a kid, playing all kinds of standards and some pop music. I was a teenager during the British Invasion when I migrated towards organ, piano, electric piano, and anything else keyboard related and became more influenced by rock and blues. As a keyboardist I was a weekend warrior for most of my life. I had a wife, kids, house, and a day job to pay the bills. But I loved those weekend gigs and I feel like I always spent 5 days a week getting to Friday and Saturday nights just to be able to do what I truly loved to do, which is play music. Now that I retired from my day gig, I have the freedom to pursue the thing that I have always been most passionate about. Music will be my primary focus for the rest of my life. And I am very fortunate, because I will be able to do it for love, and not necessarily for money (although it is nice to land a good paying gig…).
How is this new release different than previous ones? Were you trying to accomplish anything specific?
This is my first solo album, in which I wrote and arranged all the tunes. I had been with a band called the Center Street Band that released a couple of albums in the 90s (Reason for Living and Take You for a Ride), which had some success locally in Connecticut. I wrote and co-wrote several tunes on those albums and I co-produced both of them. What I really wanted to accomplish with Sunset Tour was to write, and produce and entire album all by myself. While I had a lot of help from my co-producer and engineer, Paul Opalach (of Long Hill Recording), and was able to recruit some really good featured artists, the songs, the arrangements, and the concept were all mine. I’m very proud of what I accomplished.
Name one or two challenges you face as an indie musician in this oversaturated, digital music age? How has technology helped you (since we know it does help)?
I’ve been following music from the 1950s to the 20-teens and in spite of the many changes in technology, the challenges are really the same for every musician. First, you need to develop your craft, whatever it is. You need to be realistic and objective about what you produce and how you perform. One thing that current digital platforms have done is increase the competition. You hear some really good music out there that goes nowhere, and you also hear some pretty mediocre music that gets a tremendous amount of airplay. But I guess its always been like that. The key is to listen to what people say about your music and not be offended by criticism. It will only make you better. As far as technology, the good news is that it is actually relatively easy to get your music heard. Between the variety of digital platforms to make your music available and the social media platforms to promote yourself and your music, there are a lot of things that you can do now for yourself that were impossible to do years ago.
What was the last song you listened to?
Ha…. I listen to a lot of music during the day and I have a lot of Facebook friends that suggest things to listen to. It just so happens that the last thing I listened to was “Go Now” by the Moody Blues. Great track. But there are millions of great tracks… lol…
Which do you prefer? Vinyl? CDs? MP3s?
I am not a big vinyl fan. I know it is making a comeback, but I remember the days when nobody really knew how to handle vinyl records and some of the best albums in your collection had a big scratch on them because your drunk friend ripped the needle across the record when they were taking it off the turntable. (I actually had a guy put his cigarette out on one of my Allman Brothers albums…)
I still like CDs. I often take 3-4 hour trips and I love to have a variety of CDs I can put in the CD player in the car and listen to them while I’m cruising. They can be anything and everything. And its my choice. MP3s are really convenient for any kind of digital situations and MP3s at 320 kbps are just about as good as WAVs. As long as the original track is well mixed and well mastered, the track should sound good.
How about this one…. Do you prefer Spotify? Apple Music? Bandcamp? Or something else? Why?
I would say that I prefer Spotify at this point, because I’ve had some success with it. They seem to have developed a community of sorts, so if you get to understand how it all works, you can navigate your way around to get your music on some decent playlists. I haven’t had much luck with most of the other platforms. If you have a decent video, then YouTube is the place to be. I have also put some of the old Center Street Band tracks on SoundCloud.
Where is the best place to connect with you online and discover more music?
Here are my links:
Website: https://johnottoyoung.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/johnottoyoung
Sunset Tour on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/1oNSv41yajOcrAUQLlzsiy
Sunset Tour availability: https://johnottoyoung.hearnow.com
My email address is johnottoyoung@gmail.com
And… if you are interested in some Center Street Band tracks
https://soundcloud.com/center-street-band
Anything else before we sign off?
To me, indie music is kind of like craft breweries. You start out doing it out of love for your craft and personal satisfaction. And if you are good enough and fortunate enough, you can make a living out of it and do so on your own terms. It is not an easy thing to do, but playing your own music at a 200 person venue and getting a great response can be as rewarding as playing a 20,000 seat arena (not that I would know about that…).
Thanks for the questions. I enjoyed this.
