Interview with Phil Headway: The Answers Are in the Process
1. You describe your songs as honest, human conversations. Where does that voice come from? Do your ideas start with a phrase, a riff, or a story you need to tell?
The voice comes from truth. And truth never fails. I’m just an instrument in service of the music, and the music plays with me however it wants in that moment. And the more equipped we are, the more ways it shows up.
2. What does your creative process look like day-to-day? Do you have a specific ritual, time, or place to write, or do songs just catch you in the middle of life?
The best ritual of all is living in truth. When we live in truth, we see creativity in everything, because creativity is creation, and as co-creators of the universe, our function is reproduction — that is, to revive what was given to us. That means all matter is re-matter, we are recyclers. God gives us the tree and we make a house, God gives us DNA and we make a child. Music is the same thing.
3. ‘The Answers’ has this confessional, almost diary-like energy. How do you balance being completely honest in the lyrics without censoring yourself too much?
Does a volcano analyze when it’s going to erupt? Does a tornado call you to ask what day it can swing by your town? If there’s one thing that kills creativity, it’s thinking about the consequences. I see music as a weather condition — it just comes, and I don’t give myself the right to intervene. So please, don’t shoot the messenger. I just write what comes to me.
4. Every songwriter gets stuck at some point. When creativity doesn’t come, what do you do? Do you push through, walk away, or pick up a different instrument to get unstuck?
I don’t see myself as separate from inspiration, and I rarely deal with creative block. It’s completely dysfunctional to separate an artist from the art he lives. Art isn’t a conventional 9-to-5 job. An artist has to give himself permission to wake up in the middle of the night to jot down the inspiration he had in a dream without beating himself up for losing sleep. Creativity is easy — what’s hard is truly surrendering to it. But once you decide to live like that, all the block goes away. You know, you can find a reason to create in any circumstance, even in laziness. Just start the song by saying, “I’m too lazy to write but I need to stay focused.” Creativity comes from truth, and truth is everywhere, even in the desire to tell lies.
5. You play a bit of everything. How does the instrument you choose change the story the song is going to tell? Is a song born on the harmonica different from one born on guitar?
The instrument is an extension of the story, it’s the materialization of the idea. Choosing isn’t really the right verb here. Breathing might be a better verb. We don’t sit around thinking about breathing, right? We just trust it and it comes naturally.
6. Your sound is so warm and organic, almost like we’re in the same bar as you. Is that a conscious creative decision from the songwriting stage, or does it happen during production?
Organic brings people together. There are mixes that filter so much that they strip out the entire essence of the music, and then it sounds robotic, lifeless. I still see people who are used to eating shit without even realizing it, but on the other hand I also notice a growing group of people who are seeking to live in presence, off the grid. We are interdependent beings, like cells in a body, we need to interact with each other, we need human warmth, sweat, smell, taste. In the very near future, I believe the music industry will see an insane growth in festivals and massive live shows. Just like the stock market goes up and down, musical and behavioral trends never follow a straight line.
7. Your tracks blend advice, irony, and catharsis — like in ‘Cannies of Truth.’ How do you keep a song from getting too heavy or too much like a joke? Where is that balance?
The balance is in the metaphor. It’s the listener who draws the conclusion. A true artist doesn’t give answers, he asks questions.
8. The album is called ‘The Answers.’ After writing, recording, and releasing it, do you feel like you found a creative answer you didn’t have before? Or does creating just lead to better questions?
I used to be vegetarian, and at the time it seemed like a good answer for me. Today it’s not. Maybe one day it will be again. But I don’t think about it. No answer is permanent, it depends on context. The answers are never in who we were or who we think we are. That’s an illusion. The answers also aren’t in anything we’re told, because everything we’re told has been filtered through the minds of thousands of other people, with their beliefs and realities different from yours. Looking for answers outside just confuses things. Maybe the best thing to do is to find more questions.