One of Oberlin’s brightest musical stars, J. Goss, finds time in between classes to sit down with me in Wilder for a chat about the good old high school days and his musical growth at Oberlin. Goss has been seen around campus performing his fancy acapella with the Obertones and packing crowds into the Cat for his solo acoustic shows.

Blake Wilder: What are your early influences in playing guitar and doing music?

Jason Goss: I have been singing ever since I was very young. I was one of those boy sopranos. The first solo that I got was auditioning for this Memorial Day parade song in second grade. At one point I sang the national anthem at a Pawtucket Red Sox game in this squeaky, cracking voice. It was god-awful. As for the guitar, my friend, Brian Canniff, had this little strat and one day he showed me how to play “Wipe Out” on the guitar and I was hooked. I got one for Christmas when I was in sixth grade and started playing electric guitar. That was when grunge rock was coming out so I kept trying to grow my hair long, but my hair doesn’t grow straight down so I always ended up looking like Greg Brady, which wasn’t exactly cool.
I had a rock band in high school and started writing songs. The first song I wrote on acoustic guitar was about my high school music teacher; it was called “Hightlite” and was named after this annual show he used to put on. I also took some singing lessons in addition to the rock music. But, tragically, the band sort of broke up, and so I started focusing on my own acoustic songs. I was really influenced by Dylan, Van Morrison and stuff like that, but also bands like the Smashing Pumpkins.

BW: I was just listening to Siamese Dream.

JG: That’s a great album.

BW: Speaking of your rock band, I was actually in band with [senior] Logan Boyles. I heard something about a Battle of the Bands.

JG: Yeah, he kicked my ass. My band Hubris — actually the name of the band is funny because we were supposed to do this other battle of the bands before the Boston battle and we didn’t have a name. My brother was a senior in high school and taking these classes on Greek tragedy. He was like “Hubris, that’s a great name.” No one was thrilled with it but we decided if we won, we’d keep it. We actually won that one, so it stuck. At the second Battle of the Bands at the House of Blues, Logan’s band came in second and they beat us down hardcore. Actually a good friend of mine, double-degree fifth-year Jonah Berman, he was in the first battle of the bands that we were in. He recognized me in one of my first classes here at Oberlin. He is still mad cause we beat his band and he pushed my bass player, who retaliated by giving him a power wedgie. He still has the scars . . .

BW: How has being at Oberlin impacted your musical career?

JG: I remember when I first got here I thought of trying out for OJE, I was like, ‘hell I played Jazz guitar in high school, how much different could it be?’ Then I saw them play and thought I would reconsider, maybe start a CCR cover band. I don’t know if you remember Chris Parello [OC ’99], an amazing guitar player, I just remember watching him and being like “holy shit!” My first performance here was the freshman talent show. I played a song I had written about the movie Cool Hand Luke. I got a pretty good response from that. I kind of had the idea of coming here and trying to make a little name for myself in the folk scene.
It’s funny because my style really started to change when I got into the Obertones. Singing lots of a’cappella and getting more into R ‘n’ B stuff started to really bleed its way into how I sang my own stuff. I was listening to more Stevie Wonder and Maxwell, more R ‘n’ B and blues stuff, and my singing style was growing, where as before my singing was more linear and straightforward. When I used to write music, I would just try to write these thick songs and my first priority was to have a song where my voice was really loud and could showcase that I could sing. Now, I try to be a little more stylistic, more crafty and more musical instead of just getting out there and screaming like an idiot. Although I still like screaming once in a while, usually when I’m drunk.

BW: I hear you are doing an Honors Project on Tom Waits. How did you come up with that topic?

JG: In terms of the Honors, I feel like I was approaching it the wrong way at first. I was looking for something to culminate my academic career here, something stuffy and all serious and then I realized that’s baloney. So I started with asking myself what I am most interested in studying for a year? I was like, Tom Waits. It all made sense. I just sort of stumbled on it. Now it’s branching out into the realm of performance theory and how nonverbal elements can manipulate or effect literal meaning. Since Tom Waits is off the wall, his music is just a great showcase of that.

BW: So you played “Hallelujah” in your last show. That’s putting yourself up against some pretty big names — Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright. Do you think about that when you are choosing songs?

JG: I am very conscious of it. A lot of the covers I play are sort of trendy ‘obscure’ covers but not obscure because everyone who tries not

to be trendy plays them, which is everyone trying to play guitar. I do sometimes feel intimidated especially at Oberlin because I find I’ve never really had an audience this critical, which is great because that’s what makes music here really what it is. You’re not just getting assholes at the corner bar yelling “Play ‘Freebird.” But when I play “Hallelujah,” I know that it has this reverence to it, but also I just really love the song and I really love singing it. I feel like if I really want to play something that will always outweigh other concerns. I tend to like things that are over the top. I guess I was led in that direction by Zach Hickman [OC ’01]. We used to do medleys of Bon Jovi songs. But, with “Hallelujah,” I saw Rufus Wainwright sing it at his show which was amazing, I do feel like I do it in my own style.

BW: What do think about the fact that a lot of your audience is attracted by your good looks?

JG: [laughs] Do you think that’s true? I don’t know if that sort of comes from the Obertones because they are something of an enigma here. The response we get sometimes is just weird and crazy, definitely fun though. I don’t know if it is a take-off on that — you know, carrying over into my folk stuff. I don’t know. If people come to see me play, that’s all I care. I just love to come out on stage with some people out there. I don’t know. . . I don’t want to come on stage and just be this weirdo who’s trying to be all cute and, oh yeah, I play guitar too. Boy, I don’t know, but hell, I’ll take it, you know.
In my group of friends back home — well, most of my friends are these big jock type guys — I was always the sort of strange kid. I never carried that kind of response with people. The first thing that anyone ever said to me at Oberlin was this junior who lived next to me in East, he said, “the only thing you have to remember is the men are all crazy and the women are all desperate,” and I was like, “Okay.” It’s funny because you’re so idealistic when you come here, and now, sometimes I find myself getting dragged down into the Oberlin cynicism. I’m like “Arrrrrrgh, I gotta get out of here!”

BW: Speaking of getting out of here, got any good plans for your post-graduation life?

JG: Plans. . . uuuhhh . . . aaahhh. . . I don’t know. I should probably get on that one. Maybe I’ll do a Barnes and Nobles national tour -- hit every goddamn one of ’em. I am really close to releasing my first album, which I have been working on all summer. I am really excited about it. I have also been playing with this backing band . . . it sounds scary but I definitely want to give music a try and see what happens. We’ll see, who knows.