Big Jaw

From note one of Big Jaw’s Appetite for Construction disc, it’s obvious that this Clint Roth fellow possesses massive recording chops. Not such a surprise, considering that the Fort Wayne native had a hand in tracking big-time albums by such luminaries as The Donnas, the Isley Brothers, Third Eye Blind and Barenaked Ladies, (just to name a few).

But, it’s one thing to know your way around a mixing board and another thing entirely to make a great-sounding album of your own — complete with, you know, songs and stuff. Here, Roth (with help from monster drummer Adam Aaronson) delivers on all fronts. The album’s title may or may not be a sly nod to Roth’s time spent in L.A., but it certainly gleams like a sleek sports car in the sun.

There’s also a strong hint of SoCal songwriters/producers extraordinaire Jon Brion and Michael Penn seeping through, from the polished harmonies to the deceptively complex progressions in “One Thing.” Roth manages to pull off here what the best pop (and by “pop,” I mean “listenable, accessible rock” in the best possible way) songwriters do: create well-crafted, passionate songs packed chock full of hooks — and make it look easy.

Remember one-hit wonders Fastball and their, uh, one hit, “The Way?” There’s a starting point for you. In a perfect world, driving-yet-jangly gems like “Wait” would be blasting out of convertibles everywhere this summer. But, see, the vocals aren’t robotized and injected with auto-tuned sterility. There’s no hip-hop guest appearance in the middle. There is, however, an undeniable hook and a simple and universal sentiment (“I’ll wait for you”) at the center of the song.

And, as a bonus to you indie-cred scorekeepers out there, you even get some Sparklehorse-ish weirdness at the end. Bonus! Roth shifts gears on “Number 8,” which somehow simultaneously calls to mind Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer,” Stevie Wonders’ “Superstition” and maybe even a touch of “Bad Company” — yet it sounds utterly modern.

Big guitars are all over this album, and they’re especially prominent on the closing track, “We Can Have It All.” Kids, here’s proof that you don’t have to play metal to sound huge; this is absolutely arena-ready stuff. Let’s welcome this accomplished slice of L.A.-style power-pop into the heartland with open arms. (D.M. Jones) - Whatzup Magazine

Can you remember that first record that blew your socks off? You know which one I’m talking about. It was the first time you heard an album, or just a song, that stopped you dead in your tracks and made you, by unforeseen force, sit and listen. That record that changed you, man. “Thriller was the first record that I remember being enthralled with”, says Clint Roth, the man behind the rock ‘n roll machine known as Big Jaw. “The next record that had such a big impact on me was years later when I was about 12 and I found AC/DC’s Back In Black in my sister’s cassette collection. I don’t know where that came from. I don’t ever remember her listening to it. I had never even heard of AC/DC up to that point. I think listening to that tape at that time had just about as much effect on me as any piece of music could have on anybody. That record completely changed how I felt about music.”

Clint Roth, in his own way, is making the kind of music that will someday fall into the hands of some kid living between “nowhere special” and “nothing doing” and will change that kid’s perspective on life and open his eyes to the world of rock ‘n roll. Roth is the mastermind behind the modern-rock-alternative titan known as Big Jaw. As Big Jaw, Roth makes music that lies somewhere in that realm of heavy rock where Queens of the Stone Age like to dabble and cover Zeppelin riffs in street grit and glitter. Where Stone Temple Pilots and Sly and the Family Stone get together and trade riffs and shots of Maker’s Mark. Roth’s own take on the heavy groove and even heavier riff is a magical one. But none of this musical goodness was instantaneous. Like everyone, Clint Roth had to start somewhere. “I am from the Fort Wayne area”, says Roth as we talk about his formative years near Fort Wayne. “I grew up in Leo and lived there until I went away for school in Florida. After school I moved back to Fort Wayne for a few months, then headed out to California. The plan was to move to L.A. and try to intern at a recording studio or a label. While I was at school in Florida I made a friend who was moving to San Francisco after graduation and he and his fiancee invited me to visit them for a few weeks so, they being the only people I knew in California, I took them up on that. I stayed with them for about three weeks and while I was there I made phone calls to every recording studio I could find about interning in San Francisco but had no luck. So, I got a number of a friend of a friend in Pasadena who was willing to let me stay at her place so I decided it was time to pack up and head south. I told my friend I would be leaving at the end of the week and the very next day I went out to my car to go buy some LA maps (this was way before smart phones and GPS) and found that my car had been stolen. The cop that came to write the report told me to write it off and forget about it because it was more than likely parts in Mexico by then. So, I lived in San Francisco for two years.”

But, with just a chance encounter the former Hoosier saw his life begin to change. “One of my Dad’s friends was very good friends with Kelly Harris’s (Von Iva) parents and without knowing me, she took me in”, said Roth. “She let me stay on her couch. She fed me. She introduced me to her friends. She was great. One night she took me to a warehouse party and on the way we stopped to buy booze and I bought a bottle of Maker’s Mark. On the way into the party she stopped to say hi to one of her friends and she introduced me. It was producer/engineer Billy Anderson and I recognized his name from the credits of a Mr. Bungle CD I had been listening to and reading the liner notes of just the day before. I asked if this was him and he said it was. I told him about not having any success getting any recording studios to talk to me and I asked if he had any advice. He told me if I shared my bottle of Maker’s with him he’d tell me whatever I wanted to know. I never made it inside that party (as far as I can remember) but we sat outside and drank whiskey and talked. He gave me a phone number for Toast Studios and the managers name and told me to call and tell them that Billy Anderson said to hire me. I called the first chance I got and got an interview and that turned out to be an amazing experience. I learned just about everything I know about recording there assisting for Jacquire King (who went on to produce Kings of Leon and a million other things), Jason Carmer (who produced Third Eye Blind, Kimya Dawson ,Explosions In The Sky and million other things), Chris Haynes (Grammy nominated mixer and also the guy who mastered my EP and mixed “Calling Out”). By the time I went to LA two years later (after they found my car in Napa) I was 23 and already up the ranks as a first engineer on a few major label projects. Rising up the ladder in LA where you can expect to answer phones for a few years before you get your big break to be an assistant and possibly never rise above that unless your lucky, I hit the jackpot by having my car stolen and being stranded in SF where there was considerably less competition but still some big projects being done. Possibly one of the most fortuitous car thefts of all time.”
By simple twists of fate, Clint Roth got in on the ground floor to some amazing recording projects(thanks in no part to someone stealing his car), but I’d wondered when he’d gotten the itch to make music of his own. “I think I was trying to play music before I even really understood what music was. Not that I really understand what music is now but I have a little bit better grasp on the concept of the world and the things in it than I did when I was six. Or maybe not. When I was five or six, my Mom started sending my older brother Duke to piano lessons. I don’t think it took very long before I made it heard that this was something I wanted to do, too. My Mom was all for it. We took lessons from a woman named Nancy Coolman. Her family ran an apple orchard outside of Leo so there was always apple cider in the mix as well. She taught kind of her own version of the Suzuki method which, in the beginning at least, emphasizes learning music by ear rather than reading notation. I think this had a really great effect, good and bad, on my life as a musician. I have never had a strong grasp of music theory. I still, embarrassingly, couldn’t tell you the names of the notes on my fretboard without counting and only a handful of years ago learned about common chord shapes and the names of the chords (some of the chords) I’ve been playing for years. If you talk about any kind of music theory, no matter how basic it might seem, I’m usually pretty lost. Every few years I make a big push to try to learn and I usually glean a little bit of information that sticks with me but it is a huge effort. On the flip side of that, I’m very appreciative for being trained to focus on hearing what’s happening rather than focusing on the math of written music at such an early age. When I started getting interested in guitar around the time I was 13 or 14 I had even less patience with learning anything that wasn’t directly related to making the sounds I was interested in. I skipped learning scales and modes and guitar theory (which I couldn’t really grasp) and instead jumped in and tried to learn Metallica songs by listening to the tapes. So basically, Metallica taught me how to play guitar. For the first few years I played and learned by listening, reading tabs from guitar magazines, and getting occasional pointers from my friend Jason Howey (Autovater) who was a grade above me at Leo and was a big inspiration while I was learning to play. Later on in my teens I did have the honor of briefly studying with the late great George Ogg, but we focused more on the feel aspects of guitar than the technical. Even more recently, just a few years ago, I had the pleasure of studying and picking up some tricks with the amazing Kenny Taylor.”
So at an early age, Clint Roth gets the bug for music, and by the time he’s in his teens he’s teaching himself to play guitar thanks to Metallica and Guitar World magazine. Then by the time he’s 23 years old he’s pushing faders on some pretty swanky records. When does Big Jaw come into the equation? ” I moved back to Fort Wayne from L.A. in 2006. At the end of my time in L.A. I had pretty much stopped engineering records and was writing music for commercials. I kind of had this idea that I could do that from anywhere and wanted to be back in Ft. Wayne where I could be near my family and friends and live for cheap while I spent some time exploring making my own music after about a decade of recording music for other people. I messed around with a bunch of ideas and then finally got serious about making an actual record around 2008. While I was visiting friends in Toronto for Nuit Blanche, I got inspired to really commit myself to the project and get it done. When I got home I started writing Appetite for Construction and started Big Jaw. My initial thought was to play everything myself but after awhile, I wondered why I, as a mediocre drummer, was playing drums when some of my best friends are great drummers. So, I enlisted my friend Adam Aaronson to play drums on my records. He’s a really amazing drummer. When he was young he studied with Tony Williams and went on to play with bands including My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult, and most recently We Are Scientists. I would love for him to be an official member but he’s not so interested in touring anymore and that’s the next step for me. So, right now, Big Jaw is just me but I am not Big Jaw. I am Clint and I have always intended for Big Jaw to be a band and accrue other members along the way.”
Roth just released his second Big Jaw album called Photophobia. It’s a great little nugget of crunchy riffs, catchy hooks, and some truly impressive production work. I asked Clint about the time between the releases and differences between the two albums. ” Yeah, this record took a very long time to make. A little over a month after I released Appetite for Construction I lost a close friend in a car accident and everything flipped upside down for me. It was an intense period and one of the ways I tried to work through it was by playing music. Which helped until it didn’t and then I stopped. I left the music alone for awhile and when I came back to it I found that I had started all this hyper-emotional music and I didn’t know what to do with it because I’m a fairly private person. It was really very uncomfortable for me to open that part of myself up for criticism, but that’s art I guess. Now that I have put myself out there in that way and that part of my brain that freaks out over things like that can see that it’s not the end of the world to show that you can be vulnerable, I hope I can be be free to say what’s on my mind and in my heart without so much of an internal struggle next time.”
Besides his amazing songwriting prowess and studio wizardry, Roth is a damn fine artist as well. I asked him about the album artwork concepts for his musical projects. “For Appetite For Construction my initial plan was to do a very basic cover for the CD along the lines of Muddy Waters Electric Mud. One day I was randomly looking around some art sites and stumbled on a feature about an artist named French. He did some really great pencil drawings and one in particular struck me as a great idea for a record cover and that was the rooster standing on the skull. I emailed him and told him I was self-producing a record and paying for it myself and asked how much he would charge to give me the rights to use it on my cover. He responded and told me to go had and use it, no charge. It still amazes me how generous that was that a stranger would just say ‘go ahead and use it’. Then my friend Tim Litton, who is a professional graphic designer, helped me put it all together and took photos for that first record.
For Photophobia I wanted to commission my friend Brian Phillips to do a painting that I could use as a cover. He agreed and made a really great painting but I kind of had him do it prematurely. By the time the record was finished it was evident to me that what I asked him to do really didn’t fit with how the record turned out, so I’m hoping to use that painting for the cover of the next project (which I already have a title for.) In the end I used one of my own paintings for the cover. I was kind of hesitant to use my own art for the cover because I’m not as confident about my art as I am my music so I was afraid that if I did the art I might decide that I don’t like it later on. But I felt like this painting really worked for this record so I went for it. I’m not a graphic designer or anything but I have been painting for a handful of years on my own and I really love it. I started painting about the same time I started Appetite for Construction and it has really become a part of my life. The past year or so I’ve mostly been doing mixed media pieces.”
So what’s next for Clint Roth and Big Jaw? “Next for me is getting a live show together and starting to try to get the word out in earnest. I love playing live and interacting with people and I’m looking forward to getting back out there. But where its truly at for me is recorded music. I love listening to records. I love making records. It is the form of creativity that is the most meaningful to me. The most exciting part is that by making my records and putting them out into the world I have become a part of something that I love and that can’t be undone.”
Check out Big Jaw’s music at http://bigjaw.bandcamp.com/, and you can check out Clint’s art at http://www.clintroth.com/. Keep up on all things Big Jaw at https://www.facebook.com/bigjawband. And when Clint hits your town, get out there and see Big Jaw. - Backseat Mafia

BEFORE WE BEGIN BRO.

SCROLL DOWN AND HIT PLAY BRO.

YOU FEEL THAT IN YOUR UNDERCARRIAGE BRO?

Whoever the Fuck Big Jaw are, they have fucking rock testicles with fucking wifi they're so perfectly welcome in my face holes.

JESUS BALLS ON A TURQUOISE CORSICA I WANT TO DRINK TECATE AND SPIN IN CIRCLES WHILE A CLEARANCE AISLE SPRINKLER SPRINKLES ME WITH WELL WATER TASTING WATER DROPLETS THAT REMIND ME OF OVERSEAS TRAVEL AND STOMACH UPSET.

Big Jaw starts their six track album, Photophobia, with such insanely massive riffage, it's a wonder I even got past the first thirty seconds let alone the first fucking song. This shit feels like Foo Fighters gang raping the Black Keys while Helmet's Betty album spins in the background and everyone's got those Black Hole Sun melty faces happenin' bro. You can smell the sex in the air.

Big Jaw is fucking b'dass, bro bro.

My taste for bar chord driven, unwashed long hair twirling distortion wanes on occasion, I mean I can't always wear these studded leather cuffs bro. But, shit, I am so fucking thankful that my waning was wiped away by the wane wipers in Big Jaw. The rock fists this band shoves in its weathered denim vest pockets are swol bro. Full of cuts and scrapes, with finger hairs the width of lawn darts. They look like they're perpetually chewing toothpicks bro, even while sleeping, which they never do because the fuzz is on their tail bro. Mothers shield their children's eyes from the likes of Big Jaw, with their sexual energy broadcast like a Scotts lawn spreader spreads fertilizer bro. And if you look close enough, those little fertilizer pellets are little skulls bro.

It's so bad ass it's fucking adorable.

The entire Photophobia album is a perfect modern Alice In Chains with a 6 month sobriety chip. It's aware of its past, is making steps to right done wrongs, but it's tough out there for early 90's alternative rock meets Dazed and Confused Original Motion Picture Soundtrack meets Sons of Anarchy casting call meets declaring zero on your tax return living a life on the run bro.

Do I really need to type any more words to make you shove five fucking dollars in the taut rear, ripped jeans pocket of Big Jar bro?

I didn't think so.

I just have a few more sentences and then you can get to spendin' bro.

UM, BUT YEAH SOMETHING HAPPENS WHEN THE FIFTH SONG STARTS THO.

"Calling Out" bro.

Imagine this burly rush of pochards all sitting on their respective Indians or Harleys parked outside a random diner, with its pink neon sign flickering EAT with no particular rhythm, the sun setting in the north (THIS IS TATOOINE BRO, THERE IS NO LOGIC IN THIS COSMOS BROSMOS), a slight breeze rustles the greasy manes of the Big Jawans, drifting listlessly in front of their still-sunglassed ojos brojos. The leader of the Big Jawans nods to another man in similar cultural dress, but with bushier brows of eye, and he starts singing something that immediately grabs you by the theatrical testicles AND THEN EVERYONE BREAKS OUT INTO THREE PART HARMONIES ON LIKE THE POWER-POP AFTERNOON DELIGHT SURPRISE OF THE fucking CENTURY.

If you were with me, back in the diner, fisting down some fucking bluebrry flapjacks (yea, bluebrry, I know a guy from the British bro), and you were staring at these menaces (menaci?) to society, you would drop your fork bro. Bluebrry flapjacks, half chewed, would fall out of your agasp fucking front face hole.

Out of fucking nowhere Big Jaw is on par for arena tour pop music stardom, BUT THEN HALFWAY THROUGH IT GOES ALL ELECTRO WITH THESE TASTY SAMPLES AND OVERLAYERED DRUMS. THE SONG GOES FROM HUGE TO HUGER BRO. And then it pulls a Thom Yorke dance meant to give you a percussion concussion, and then towards the last minute it's all of a sudden Muse live in concert and my hands are interlocked behind my neck, with a confused yet satisfied look on my face.

And then if you weren't already confused enough by my synopsis of the musical traipse that is Photophobia, the final track on the album, "Light" is this spectacularly introspective missive to longing. This shit feels like the song that plays while you board a bus in the middle of nowhere and head towards the back, find your seat against the window, and then holding your army green duffel bag on your lap you put your head against the glass and watch the yellow stripes gallop along, the reflection of power lines the only peripheral inclination of any steady pace of forward momentum.

BIG JAW HAS LEFT ME COMPLETELY, and welcomely, CONFUSED.

I fucking love this shit. It's like the WB-aired episode of that one show that everyone watched in junior high, and they're discussing the topic of herpes.

What?

WHY THE HELL ARE YOU LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT?

YOU DON'T HEAR THE HERP?

Whatever. - SYFFAL

Big Jaw, the brainchild of guitarist/vocalist Clint Roth, crafts a grimy, bluesy rock sound full of dirty riffs and huge sing-a-long choruses tailor made for wild parties and bars. The straightforward raunchiness of "I'm Gonna Take You Home Tonight" and "One Thing," will provide a soundtrack for plenty of guys' nights out, while "Darla" and the melodic pop rock and gentle, harmonious guitar bends of "Wait" reveal a more vulnerable side. Take a listen below: - Indies and the Underground

You'd never expect a guy dressed like Don Draper to rock, but Clint Roth, the mastermind behind Big Jaw, proves he's up to the task. Though only six tracks long, Appetite For Construction shows great versatility and personality.

"I'm Gonna Take You Home Tonight" mines gritty, blues-based rock territory in both sound--a wall of huge power chords and searing solos--and lyrics, with Clint singing "I know you're feeling/What I'm feeling/Just know that I'm gonna take you home tonight." "One Thing" continues in the same vein, combining monster riffs with an "I'll make you mine" lyrical manifesto.

"Darla" shows a flash of introspection, as Roth nervously contemplates the idea of always and forever. "It always seems like no one's ever happy/With what marriage brings/Why would we mess with a good thing," Roth sings to his lover, encouraging to her to take mind off matrimony and live in the moment. The new wave sounding "Wait," with its tender "doo doo" background vocals, bouncy, harmonic guitars and subtle electronic effects, is another standout.

Roth returns to blues-rock for the explicit kiss-off "#8," and album closer "We Can Have It All." The latter track finds the singer both reminiscing over and trying to mend a broken relationship. "Come be with me/Let's try to have it all/At least right now," Roth pleads. Perhaps Roth is more like his fashion inspiration in more than just appearance. Like Draper, he's living like there's no tomorrow, because there isn't one. Appetite For Construction transforms this urgency in a fun, versatile album. - Indies And The Underground

Hi guys, welcome to VENTS! How have you been?

Thanks for having me! I’ve been great! I finished up the new Big Jaw EP, Photophobia, at the end of 2014 and recently have been busy recruiting players to join the band so we can finally get this show on the road in 2015! I’ve found some really great Austin musicians who are excited about the music and I’m grateful to have such talented guys who are willing to invest their time in this band. Rehearsals are sounding great and we already have some Austin shows booked in February.



So you guys released your EP Photophonia – what´s the story behind the title?

Most of the new EP is about me dealing with the sudden loss of a close friend. It roughly traces the stages of grief I went through, not necessarily the classic “7 stages” but my own experience. A lot of denial, pleading, drinking, and a kind of newly cynical search for meaning. The first song “Walk Away”, is my denial song. In this song, she has already passed away and I’m allowing myself to believe that there is a chance that she could still be alive by calling her phone and pretending she doesn’t answer because she’s safe at home sleeping. I ask her to make a promise that we’ll live forever simply by choosing to walk away from, rather than into, “the light”. The last song on the EP is “Light” which at this point in the record I’ve accepted that she is gone and am now reminiscing about the best night we spent together. In this song I’ve flipped the meaning I attached to the metaphor of “light” at the beginning of the record, which was the light at the end of the tunnel of death, to light being a symbol of life and a woman full of love. Photophobia is the fear of light. So, naming the EP Photophobia with the context of this record is acknowledging that it’s just as easy to be afraid of life and love as it is to be afraid of death.



Can you talk to us more about the recording and writing process?

I’m kind of coming from a background in producing and engineering records for other bands. I got into engineering after a few less than stellar sounding demos I did with some of the bands I was in when I was a teenager. I decided I didn’t want the skill level of the engineer that I could afford to determine the sound of my music. So, I jumped in head first and before I knew it, my focus had shifted away from the original goal of making my own music to pretty much only working on other people’s music. I had a great time and learned a lot though, working with a ton of great bands including The Donnas, The Isley Brothers, Raphael Saadiq, Guster, Barenaked Ladies, to name a few. Eventually though, I was drawn back to making my own music and that was the start of Big Jaw. I’m very much the guy that locks himself in a room for a several months and comes out with a record. When I’m getting started I usually stockpile a bunch of ideas. I just play whatever instrument is around and see if anything inspiring comes out. Anything I come up with that sounds interesting when I’m noodling around, I’ll record it. A drum beat, a guitar riff, a vocal melody, whatever. Then I try to build on it. When I have a good amount of ideas I start trying to see if I can make any sense out them as a whole and I start weeding ideas out. When I got to a certain point on each record I flew out to L.A. and had my friend Adam Aaronson, who is a ridiculous drummer, replay all the drum parts. Then I took those tracks home and recorded the rest of the record on my own. It’s a tedious process when you do everything on your own but it’s rewarding to hear the final product. On Photophobia however, I did hire Christopher Haynes to mix “Calling Out” and I love the way it turned out. Working with Chris was a great experience and now I am definitely open to delegating a little more of the production workload to the right people on future projects.



Will you hit the road next year?

Touring is something that I absolutely want to do in the near future. I’ve always wanted to tour Japan and Europe and I’d like to figure out a way to make that happen as well as touring North America. The band I have put together right now is setup mostly as a Texas band but as soon as I find some guys or girls who are ready to join up and hit the road with me, I’m all for it.



What else is happening next in Big Jaw´s world?

I’m excited about 2015. I’m already thinking about my next record and I want to try a completely different approach from the first two records. I can’t go into it too much because I’m still figuring out how I want to do it, but it will be a departure for me and I have high hopes for great results. I’m also moving my studio to a new spot this month. I paint too and I usually like to have my painting gear and my recording gear in the same location so I can go back and forth when I’m in that zone. That has been tough the past few years because the spot where I have my studio now, doesn’t have any windows which means all artificial light. My new studio space however, will have plenty of natural light plus plenty of room to set up amps and everything else. So it will be the best of both worlds and I’m hoping that by the end of this year, I’ll have a lot of great work to show for it. - Vents Magazine

FORT WAYNE—Singer, songwriter and multi instrumentalist Clint Roth has just finished playing rough mixes of his newest album project to a couple of the guys with whom he is scheduled to share the stage with during a special homecoming show for his acclaimed band project Big Jaw at the Brass Rail on August 5. Even at a quick glance, it’s easy to tell this impromptu audience of relative insiders is stunned by the quality and depth of what they’re hearing.

Like any creative person who has devoted his or her life to making art for the public, Roth watches quietly but carefully while awaiting their verdict. Finally, they attempt to verbalize their reactions. Most of what they say can be reduced to one word: “Wow!” Go online and look up the band Big Jaw and you can experience Roth’s energetic, tightly crafted soulful hard rocking and sometimes poignant songs for yourself. Explore the band’s Big Jaw’s pedigree and you’ll see that they hail from two parts of the world—Austin, Texas and Fort Wayne, Indiana, the latter, proudly claimed by the band’s founder and guide Roth, who’s a proud native of the Summit City. He had already made something of a name for himself on the Fort Wayne music scene but circumstances—and an adventurous spirit—prompted him to pack up and leave.

“I moved to Austin from Fort Wayne in 2011 when I was kind of going through a rough patch. I had already started writing and recording my second EP, ‘Photophobia’ but was just feeling like I was in a rut. Although I always consider Fort Wayne to be my home, I'm a little nomadic and like to move around a little bit from time to time so I thought maybe it was time to move on for awhile and see if maybe some new scenery and new influences could help get me moving forward again. I was thinking about moving to Nashville or even back to L.A., but someone convinced me that Austin was the place where I should be so that's where I went, sight unseen. And I do like it a lot. I've met some really great people and I'm exposed to sources of inspiration on a fairly regular basis. For as much as Austin likes to advertise its music scene, the visual art scene there is amazing. There are some really good artists in Austin doing great work.” True to Roth’s self-professed nomadic bent, the road to Austin from Fort Wayne—and two creating Big Jaw—wasn’t exactly direct. While music has been the constant in his moves, it wasn’t always as a bandleader or a songwriter.

“I spent most of my 20s in recording studios in San Francisco and Los Angeles helping other people make their records. At a certain point I woke up to the fact that even though engineering can be a lot of fun and rewarding on its own, it's not what I set out to do. I got into engineering because I love recorded music and wanted to learn how to make my own records. Along the way I got sidetracked, and with the extremely long hours involved in record production, I realized I was devoting most of my life to other people's music. It wasn't a bad thing because I learned a lot and did have a lot of fun but it was time to take a step outside of myself and try to do something of my own.

“It took me a very long time to come to the realization that the only thing stopping me from writing a song of my own was fear.” Interestingly, he found his voice as a songwriter through another artform. “I had just turned 30, I had never written a complete song, I had never written lyrics. I didn't know if I was setting out to do a mountain of work just to embarrass myself. I started painting around the same time and was having a lot of fun with it and I think the big reason that I had so much fun with it, even though the final product wasn't that great, was that I was less focused on the outcome and more focused on trying to figure out what I was doing by doing it. I think that lesson was the key to getting out of my own way and getting my first EP finished. Accepting that it might be complete garbage but committing to trying to learn something from it regardless. Until you do something, you don't even have a starting point to gauge anything by.” That first successful outing, “Appetite for Construction,” prompted Roth to write and record the second record, “Photophobia.” The music on those two records—described by Roth as “the James Gang sharing a Coke and two straws with Queens of the Stone Age”—netted Roth and his band Big Jaw which he assemble to play his music a loyal following in the Austin area and a growing fan base around the country. And, while the music the band plays is Roth’s, their leader describes what they do onstage as a true musical collaboration.

“From the beginning, I intended it to be a band and not just a solo project, so I gave it a name and that was the beginning of Big Jaw.”

Not unexpectedly, the name has raised interesting questions from time to time.

‘I am not Big Jaw, the project is Big Jaw,” explained Roth. “If I would've known how much scrutiny that name would bring to my actual, normal sized jaw, I may have decided on a different name. But, I have t-shirts now so there's no going back.” Although he spends considerable time working on the live band aspect of Big Jaw, writing and recording is still a top passion for Roth. “I'm in the process of making my third EP right now and there is a lot of anxiety attached to making a record, especially when there is no one to blame for how it turns out but yourself. Starting that first one was a completely different animal though,” he said.

As great as Big Jaw listeners have found the the first two records, those who have had a sneak preview of Roth’s latest recording endeavor say this one is very different and is pushing the envelope even further. They say it’s the kind of record that should attract national attention—great, layered songwriting, comfortable to listen to but often surprising musical twists and a delicious sonic landscape that can move from being calm and hypnotic one moment to edgy and almost disturbing the next. And adept listener might be able to recognize bits and pieces of Roth’s admitted influences, including Queens of the Stone Age, Iggy Pop, Neil Diamond, Black Sabbath, Rolling Stones, early Aerosmith, U2, Stone Temple Pilots, Pixies and Paul Simon, but, in the end, what comes out is uniquely Clint Roth, especially when it comes to an important hallmark of Roth’s songwriting—his ability to tell stories to which people can relate in everyday life. He hopes to have that project completed soon. “The first EP took 30 years to finish, the second took four years, and the third will be finished in well under a year,” said Roth, adding that if he had his druthers, he love to have the time and resources to crank out a finished product much more quickly. “If I could afford to do it, I'd love to take three months off, rent a place in the middle of nowhere and do a project, start to finish. I think I could get it done in three months. Man, that would be great!”


Meanwhile, fans can still catch Big Jaw live in the Austin area—and in Fort Wayne at the Brass Rail during his August 5 show. For that special homecoming gig, Roth has assembled and been rehearse a group of old and new friends to accompany him. “Coming back and playing in Fort Wayne is very exciting. I played at The Brass Rail last summer with my friends from I, Wombat (most of the guys are now in a new band called WolfBearHawk), and it was a blast. I got so much support from friends and family and it was a really special night. I had so much fun that I couldn't help myself from doing it again. “I have some different players with me this year and I think it's really going to be great. Michael Patterson is handling guitar, Kelly Tellef on the bass, and Jamie Simon on the drums. I've known Jamie for years and have always loved his playing so I'm really looking forward to this. I think I got a good chunk of Fort Wayne's ‘A’ game playing with me for this show and I couldn't be more excited.”

For Roth, it will also be a night of sharing with folks he’s known and loved for sometime.

“Playing here, means a lot to me. It will be family and friends of course and hopefully new friends too. Basically, it is going to be a big, don't miss, party. We're sharing the bill with my good friends WolfBearHawk and another Austin band called The Lochness Mobsters. It's going to be a lot of fun.” - Beyond91