How can one introduce such a well-known singer as Jeff Scott Soto? Anyone who listens to hard rock or heavy metal has heard his work at least 1,000 times. Known as the young boy who was the front man for Malmsteen, to the growing artist with Talisman and, of course, for his solo work. What you will see below covers his musical upbringing and his musical growth as well as his view on his past endeavors and new one to come. A few hours before the concert with Danger Angel I sat down with him with a few questions that multiplied rapidly throughout as we ended up having more of a discussion rather than an interview.  Here is what he had to say… 

Solid Rock: Who put W.E.T together?

JSS: W.E.T was the brainstorm of the president of Frontiers Records.  It was an idea that he had.  He wanted me to do this style album after my exiting from Journey and that’s the last thing that I wanted to do since I was working on “Beautiful Mess” years prior. That was my priority; to finally release that album and he said, “Let’s do your solo thing and then we’ll revisit this idea later”. So we did! I heard some of the songs and thought it was a great idea that, musically, it was where I should go and we went for it.

Solid Rock:  So he said “we’ll put a member from Work of Art”…

JSS:  Exactly, it was his idea based on the songs of both Robert Sall and Erik Martensson.  He loves the way they write. He loves the kind of style they write and so he thought, “Let’s see what that would sound like, as a combination together, then put Jeff in the mix”. It’s almost like his own little “wet” dream…No pun intended!

Solid Rock: (laugh) Well, it was a great idea and really worked out well.

JSS: Yeah, this is one I definitely have to pat him in the back real good.  Sometimes he gets the idea like “you’re just doing this for you, aren’t you?”

Solid Rock: Now I want to mention a couple of names and bands and in 1 or 2 words I want you to say the first thing that comes to mind.  Yngwie Malmsteen.

JSS: (pause) The first thing that comes to mind... Oh jeez I don’t think you can put that in print (laughs). Ummm… (Pause) I’m trying to think of the right things. I don’t want to be…

Solid Rock:  Mean?

JSS:  No! Well, it’s easy to be mean…harder to be nice! (Laughs)  Yngwie, I’d say, mad genius.

Solid Rock:  Mad genius? Very nice. Marcel Jacob (R.I.P).

JSS:  Brother in Arms.

Solid Rock:  Axel Rudi Pell.

JSS:  Axel umm…Jesus, it’s been so long since I’ve seen him.

Solid Rock:  Well, say something that you remember from the experience, from all the albums you’ve recorded together.

JSS:  Well, overall I just love the guy so I’d have to say…good friend is not good enough. (Pause) Cool guy. I don’t know what to say.  He’s a cool guy.  I don’t know what to say.

Solid Rock:  Alright I’ll take that.  Journey.

JSS:  Disappointment.

Solid Rock: Hmm…I figured. Talisman.

JSS: (Pause)

Solid Rock:  Best years of your life?

JSS: I probably would have to say that.  I mean ‘cause…yeah! Yeah, you said it for me!

Solid Rock: There we go.  W.E.T.!

JSS:  The new best years of my life to come.

Solid Rock:  Great!  Danger Angel.

JSS:  See that’s a difficult one ‘cause I just met the guys 2 days ago.  And I only know the one song I sang with them so…

Solid Rock:  You haven’t heard the rest of the album?

JSS:  No, not yet.  I just got it yesterday.

Solid Rock:  You’ll hear it tonight at the concert.

JSS:  Yeah, exactly.  Great bunch of guys.  It’s too early to tell but so far we get along great and they’re really really cool guys.

Solid Rock: Yeah.  Tell me bout your musical background from your early years.

JSS:  Well, I started mainly on R’n’B and Soul and Pop music. I didn’t get into hard rock/heavy metal till much later.  All my friends were into it way before me. I thought it was a bunch of noise and crap. And I’m glad that I had that upbringing of music before I got into hard rock ‘cause there are so many artists, without putting anyone down, that are missing another element of music, that they could be applying to what they are doing and that’s one of the things that I was able to bring into the hard rock stuff.  Kind of like what Steve Perry brought to Journey.  He came from a very heavy Motown/R’n’B black music influence and Journey was primarily a rock band and he made them sound more like an R’n’B…a black rock band, so to speak. They had this singer who was crooning this R’n’B thing and they wouldn’t have had the success they did if they didn’t have that style blended in and kind of morphed into their sound. It’s kinda what I’ve been saying, my early years, I’ve brought into what I’m doing now it’s a little different if I were just a rock singer and all I listened to was Robert Plant and KISS and all that stuff like all my friends did.  I think I added a different element to things than if I hadn’t had that stuff.

Solid Rock:  Favorite artists that you listened to growing up?

JSS:  Growing up there was a lot of Jackson 5. I mean a lot of that Motown stuff that I was saying. Sam Cooke who is still one of my favorite singers of all time. And then as I got older, Terence Trent D’arby was a great influence and then he was basically my peer and in the same age group and coming in at the same time.  He was just someone like, “Oh my God, listen to this guy sing”!  He brought all that stuff into his own vibe as well.  So yeah, I guess I listen to more RnB/soul base things to than Hard Rock, especially these days I try to blend it all. If I have too much RnB I need to get my rock on.  If I listen to too much rock/metal I need to get my jazz and my soul and my classical…

Solid Rock:  All mixed together…it’s the perfect blend.

JSS:  Thank you!

Solid Rock: Were you trained vocally?

JSS:  No. Both my mother and father were singers. Not trained but they were really good singers and I guess it’s just in the blood. I just picked up singing since I was five or six and just listened to the radio so my whole education was just listening to the radio and singing things that I loved to hear…loved to listen to.

Solid Rock: We’ve seen you play the keyboards at your concerts. Did you learn that naturally too?

JSS: We grew up really poor but for some reason we always had a keyboard in the house and nobody played!  It was kind of an ornament, just a decoration in the house. It was one of those things where I had natural perfect pitch and ear. If I hear something I’d pick up the main melodies and play on the keyboards. And once I started in middle school, that’s when I wanted to take music classes and that’s when I learned to correlate the difference between these notes that I’m reading now and what’s on the keyboard. And then I taught myself how to find chords on guitar charts…Well that is a G so here in the G, oh and that’s an A chord.

Solid Rock:  Any other musical instruments you know?

JSS:  Bass guitar. I used to play trumpet in school. Yeah just the basic tools you need to write pop and rock music.

Solid Rock:  Great!  Well I’m sure you get demos from left to right. (displays a demo he received earlier that day)  Well there you have it!

JSS: Yeah well…

Solid Rock:  What intrigued you about Danger Angel that made you say, “Yeah I like this”?  Even thought it was only one song, what sparked your interest?

JSS:  Well it came from my promoter here Alex (Politis) who is actually working with the guys and he’s doing what he can to help get this stuff out there and promoting it and everything.  And so he came up with the idea “Why don’t we have Jeff come on in one of your tracks?” and they loved the idea and to see I would do it. And Alex is an old friend.  He’s one of those guys that it’s difficult to say “no” to because he’s always there for me and has done so much for me and I said, “Mmm, let me hear the track first!”  And when I got the track it reminded me of a sound that I’ve done many many years ago and these guys and recreated it. They were influenced by that sound and it kinda fit like the way my voice fit back then so I said, “Absolutely I can do it.”

Solid Rock:  With constant touring and recording how do you keep your voice in shape?  When do you have time to relax?

JSS:  I don’t! (laughs)  Luckily I’ve learned, in my recent years, the things you need to do to keep it in shape ‘cause I was never really a big drinker, I never smoked, I never took drugs back in the day and those are the things that will kill you early on especially with heavy schedules.  But one of the things I had on my side was the early years of my career I wasn’t touring a lot. I was mostly doing recording. I mean when I’d go on touring it would be like six week out of a year and the rest was we’d sit home and wonder what’s next. Because we weren’t touring like Bon Jovi and Warrant and all these bands in the 80’s who were so much. My heavy touring didn’t start until about 7 or 8 years ago.  So I kinda got the education of how to keep my voice in shape but also learn other tricks and trades making sure you don’t blow out.

Solid Rock:  Definitely. Now I want to take you back to the “Rockstar” soundtrack.  You did amazing vocal work there.

JSS:  Thank you!

Solid Rock:  The movie really tapped into the 80’s rock movement and its transition to the 90’s grunge movement.  Some artists are kinda bitter, from articles and interviews that I’ve read. How do you feel about or how did you feel about that? And how do you think the movie has epitomized the reality of that era?

JSS:  Well the main thing about that era….I kinda bowed out of it, the industry, at that time. I can adapt to many different things but grunge wasn’t one of them. I love all that Rob Zombie and Korn came out. It was different, it was cool. But the grunge thing I just could not get into and I just happened to not be doing much. There was this cover band in L.A called Boogie Knights and it was kind of a retro/disco band and I used to go see them every week just out of boredom and they would really stack out the place and it was great fun to see them. I mean this is the music that I grew up with. I knew every song and every lyric and it was by chance one of those hanging out backstage, really good friends of mine and I said, “Man, I wish I could be doing this every week as well.” They were like “are you serious? You could be in a bunch of affiliate bands’ and they said “we could get you a band and you could be doing this every week as well”. So I joined the Boogie Knights in ‘95.  Thank God for that ‘cause it was something that kept me active, kept me busy and I could earn my keep while kind of bowing away from what was going on musically and waiting for things to change.  It was in 2000 when I got the call to do the Rockstar thing that I thought this movie is gonna make an impact ‘cause I know a lot of musical genres when they happen and they kinda disappear they re-evolve. It’s like 20 year cycle.  I remember in the 70’s when I was growing up the whole 50’s thing was huge; Sha-Na-Na, Happy Days, the movie Grease there was such a wave of the 50’s.  They brought back that music and then the 80’s they were going through the hippie movement. They were trying to bring that 60’s sound, Prince and all those people.  Everything was psychedelic again. Lenny Kravitz came out and it was the whole psychedelic era.  And then I thought the 90’s was obviously the Boogie Knights and the whole 70’s thing was big. And I think the 2000 are gonna bring back the 80’s hard rock thing and I was glad to be a part of the beginning of that researching of this sound.

Solid Rock:  I think Frontiers has really helped with that.

JSS: Oh yeah! Absolutely!

Solid Rock:  From everything that you’ve done musically which album or albums, I’ll let you name 2, are you most proud of and you can relate to the most?

JSS:  Till this day the last Talisman…no not the last Talisman. The Talisman we did in 94’ called “Humanimal” is still one of my favorite of all time that I’ve ever sung. And one of my proudest moments one would be “Beautiful Mess” the last solo album. It’s a no brainer for me.

Solid Rock:  Is there anything you haven’t done musically that has left you a void?

JSS:  I don’t know yet.

Solid Rock:  Any genre that you’d like to try at some point?

JSS: I don’t know ‘cause I haven’t done it. (Laughs) 

Solid Rock: Ok.  What are your plans for the next 5-10 years? Where do you see yourself?

JSS:  Hmm… (Laughs) Well, definitely still doing what I’m doing in the sense of still performing and recording music. Obviously I have a role to keep it rising and keep it on the rise. I don’t like doing this and no one like doing that so it’s just to keep growing, you know?  This is my 25 year anniversary doing this stuff and I feel like I’m reborn again.  This is like part 2 of my career. First one was part one and now it’s part 1 getting ready for part 2.

Solid Rock:  So the next 10-15 years you think you’ll be in part 3 or still in 2?

JSS: Probably part 2. ‘Cause if we go in decades and increments I’d rather say it could be the next 20 years. As long as I don’t look like I’m forcing it. As long as its still fun and I’m not forcing it that’s what I’m interested in doing.

Solid Rock:  How do you feel about young artists who are trying to make it in the business, specifically in the hard rock/melodic rock/AOR scene? How do you see it as in someone making a living out of it? How difficult is it?

JSS:  Extremely difficult. I do have the years on my side in the sense of my past that was able to keep me doing this and making a living out of it. A lot of bans especially like Danger Angel, bands who are struggling in this genre, the only good thing they have going for them now, as I said, is their sound. Now it’s about clambering for the top spot, who’s gonna be recognized and who’s not. Especially back in the 80’s when there was so much cluster-fuck of bands. Everybody was sounding like this band and that band. The room was too crowded. I guess the grunge thing was a little bit a blessing in disguise and that kinda cleared the room. It’s like “all you guys in metal don’t belong here”.  And the bands that started the genre are still there. The “Bon Jovi’s” were still able to drive, still able to record new music and keep going and I think that’s what’s still happening now especially with the industry and how it’s changing now the digital format and it’s another world now. As long as these bands are smart they will be able to stay on top in this business.

Solid Rock: Well there are a lot of music based reality shows now. But nobody leaves there singing hard rock songs. They might audition with a Journey song but that’s about as far as it goes. What’s your view on these reality shows?

JSS:  They’re just entertainment you know. There is a lot of talented people in the world and if you’re willing to sell your soul they probably wouldn’t know what to do with you much more than I would. So I think it’s great exposure. It’s here to day, gone today as far as I’m concerned but it’s great entertainment. It’s as entertaining as watching a car accident. You are driving by and you stop to look, you have to see all the gory details but once you move on you’ve forgotten about it. You have a few exceptions, of course, but for the most part of it it’s entertainment.  It’s a shocking hit and run but a lot of it is what these shows are about.

Solid Rock: Well that’s it from me. Thank you so very much and have a great show tonight.

 
JSS:  Thank you!

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