Songs John Garcia Kept Underwraps

The food, the people, the environment – the singer loves everything our country offers. It’s why Garcia is travelling to Oz to introduce his self-titled album to the world. “I want it to be very special, exclusive and intimate,” he says of this debut tour under his own name.

John Garcia marks the first time the Kyuss/Vista Chino vocalist has ever released an eponymous full-length. It’s a goal that he’s been reaching for his entire life, though he’s never had the chance to realise it. But after “getting tired of saying yes to everything”, he’s had the chance to properly flesh out a collection of songs that up until this point had been “neglected” by the California-based musician. “I had to say no to everything and had to finally say yes to me,” he summarises.

“I had to say no to everything and had to finally say yes to me,”

This collection of songs has been corralled together by Garcia over the course of many years, with the origin of some tracks going back two decades, when the 43-year-old was sharing an address with Kyuss bandmate Nick Oliveri in Palm Springs. “Most of them average about five to ten years old,” he says. “But these are songs that are not B-sides, are not leftovers – these are songs that I kept for myself, that were special and close to me.”

Garcia adds that there couldn’t be a better time than now to get these tracks out into the world. “I love what I do with the record, and all the players on it,” he says, with guest musicians involved including The Doors’ Robby Krieger, who plays flamenco guitar on acoustic album closer Her Bullets Energy – “a highlight of the record” – Canadian rocker Danko Jones, and bass playing mentalist Oliveri, amongst others.

Having already started rehearsing a band to accompany him on this solo sojourn Down Under, Garcia reveals enthusiastically that it’s “all desert local guys” joining him for the tour, including War Drum’s Ehren Groban (guitar) and You Know Who’s Mike Pygmie (bass) and Greg Saenz (drums).

“I didn’t want anyone from over in Europe or Atlanta or Wisconsin or wherever, I wanted all local guys,” he explains. “And so far I’m kinda pinching myself, going, ‘This is great, why didn’t I do this a long time ago?’. So I’m excited about it.”

And after working through courtroom drama and fractured friendships – the well documented Homme/Reeder Kyuss Lives! lawsuit of 2012 completely in the rear-view mirror – Garcia says it feels unbelievable to be able to concentrate on his songs once more.

”In the music business there’s always going to be some things that don’t go your way, major and minor, and Brant [Bjork] and I went through some of those things,” he reflects. “But to put that in the past and move forward and not let it taint anything [feels great]. I can’t just hang it up because something bad goes wrong – nobody really is allowed to take my joy away, nobody is allowed to take my happiness away, I won’t allow it, I won’t let them. Life’s too short, and you can’t fear anything.

"these are songs that I kept for myself, that were special and close to me.”

“I’ll tell you another thing – it’s not any lawsuits or any deals that have gone bad that I’m thinking about [right now]; it’s me getting to Australia and finishing this little four-show jaunt, and being able to fly my wife and my son over and [trying] to figure out what type of fishing bait we’re going to use when we go fishing – that’s important to me. And keeping my eye on the ball and being able to do those things, and forgetting all the bullshit.

“Some of the things that I’ve been through in the past that I’ve had to experience were two guys on the other side of a fence with two sticks, and they’re trying to poke each other. I wasn’t a part of that, I was just a bystander of that, but what an adolescent thing to do. And again, it’s not worth wasting my breath over, [I’m more interested] in family and moving forward with them.”