INTERVIEW/ARTICLE/REVIEW:
This was a good one. I like the part where he talks about the fan mail.
It really got to me about the suicide notes and stuff. I tried to send a letter to the mailing address he's talking about, I think it was around January or so- it got sent back. I never knew why until now.
And the fact that so many people would connect with everclear's music, and feel the same way I do about it, and write such personal letters- it just amazing to me. I mean the power or everclear is even overwhelming for Art.
By Ben Rayner -- Ottawa Sun
Art Alexakis has learned the price of honesty in songwriting.
Sift through the Everclear frontman's press clippings, and more often than not you'll find him patiently explaining that his lyrics -- vivid, Jim Carroll-ish excursions into the land of drug addiction, family dysfunction and romantic and psychological turmoil -- are not, repeat, not strictly autobiographical.
"I've had people argue with me," says Alexakis, quoting an insistent fan. "'I know Esther from Heroin Girl ... I know Amy, Amy from your song (Amphetamine). I met her and she says she's the girl in your song.'
"I have to tell them Amy is a created person. She's me, me and other people I've know who've kicked drugs, who've gone through that whole thing ...
"It shows that it's connecting, right? And that's a good thing. But how people react to it can be kind of freaky."
Granted, Alexakis admits, his writing draws on his own, oft-invoked history -- former junkie, clean since 1984, now a doting husband and the proud father of a five-year-old daughter -- but it's not like he's turning daily diary entries into four-chord rock songs.
That strong realistic streak, most recently showcased on last fall's So Much For The Afterglow album (the follow-up to Everclear's 1995 million-seller, Sparkle And Fade), has led some troubled fans to place the Portland, Ore., band in the unwanted position of therapist.
Alexakis and his bandmates, Greg Eklund and Craig Montoya, used to answer all their fan mail, but no longer can for legal reasons. Still, he recalls past letters contained some "terrible things" -- tales of addiction and abuse by parents, even a couple of suicide notes.
"We get all this sh--. Kids will look at me like their father figure," says Alexakis. "And it's flattering to me that people look at my music as a good thing, as a protective thing, rather than a destructive thing ...
"But I go to my therapist and he says 'You can't be a father to all these people; you're a father to Anna -- that's your job.'"
Of course, his other job is playing in a rock band, something he'll do tonight when Everclear opens up for Toronto's Our Lady Peace at the Corel Centre.
"I hope the weather's going to be friendly," he says, wary of another ice storm. "I really want to play. It killed our Montreal show, so it's been three or four days without playing. I hate that."
