Joel isn’t a nobody.
Joel Switzer, is perhaps one of the most prolific Panama City area musicians. He is currently in five different active projects, several of which release a steady stream of new music.
“Joel nobody is probably what I spend most of the studio time on,” explains Joel Switzer of his primary studio project. “but every chance I can, I’m practicing with ViTAmin SEIZUre – that is more of a live project.”
“The other projects are pretty much just improvisations. It isn’t always improv in the sense that we sometimes talk about what we are going to play before we play and sometimes there is more thought put into a set than others. Sometimes we won’t talk about it at all and see how that affects the outcome of that particular session.”
Joel’s other projects include: Pico Dorado, SmokE SignalS (which is on indefinite hiatus), Non-Occupants, (s-gurd), and Immigrant Rugburn.
“I have done lots of more song-y things in the past, and lots of recordings that never came out. But pretty much as of at least 2012, Joel nobody has been almost nothing but improvisations.”
So how does one become focused on improv driven music? “I started to get into more unusual music when I was a teenager. I was into Nirvana for a long time, and from there I got to Sonic Youth. I really liked the weird part of the songs and it seemed like there was a lot more to listen to, than having to follow some sort of set path. You don’t have to have a song go verse-chorus-verse again.“
It was a Pig Chicken Suicide show in 2007 that exposed Joel to like-minded musicians in the area. “I was under that impression that no one around here really felt the same way (about music). I realized that there were people around that were doing things that were really interesting.”
“Improvisation is kind of a tribute to the particular place you are at. You don’t really know where things come from – it just takes over. I love the idea of incorporating improvisations into songwriting too.”
Here’s a timeline of Joel’s projects:
2007 recorded/ released first recording as Joel nobody on tape.
2011 began playing with Pico Dorado.
2012 Released second Joel nobody album “Reflect”.
2012 First (real) Net Release with Joel nobody.
2012 started recording under the name Non-Occupants and (s-gurd).
2013: Started a project called Immigrant Rugburn.
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