We had the good fortune of connecting with Phill Jackson and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Phill, what habits do you feel play an important role in your life?
Resilience is super important. In any form of creative venture, you gotta be willing to accept that there will be people that think your material is shit or will be indifferent to it. I used to be incredibly timid when it came to releasing my material for that reason. Once I got used to putting things out, it made it easier for me to keep writing, get into my flow and embrace my creative nature.

Other than that, just staying focused and being open minded. It can be easy to get discouraged and quit what you’re doing when it isn’t great initially, but you have to give things a chance to live up to their full potential. Personally, even if i end up having something I don’t like how I’ve written in a song, I save it anyways. Sometimes revisiting it later can give you a fresh perspective and you know what you can do to either improve it, or you just realize ‘oh this is actually tight’. Or it can just be straight up shit haha but that’s just when you keep moving on!

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I guess where I got a lot of my music taste was through skate culture. I grew up skateboarding and watched skate videos religiously, and a lot of what I was digging was in those videos (from Dinosaur Jr, Interpol, The Cramps, Bloc Party, etc.) and if it wouldn’t have been for growing up into that I’m not sure if I would have discovered a lot of these bands.

As for going into music creation itself, I started playing guitar when I was about 13, after a guitar had been sitting in the house for a couple of years basically untouched. I started self-teaching, picking up things through guitar tabs then eventually got to the point where I could just start picking things up by ear. I did take guitar lessons for about a month but wasn’t really into that kind of learning at that point, I liked learning on my own time as opposed to being on a schedule. Soon after, started picking up other instruments, like bass, drums, and keyboard to get to the point where I could just start recording on my own instead of needing to rely on others to write songs. This started when I was about 16, and have recorded like hundreds of random demos and it helped shape me up as a writer.

My biggest challenge growing up was just my timidness, I was incredibly shy about showing others my work out of a fear of rejection. Getting over that was literally just, y’know, jumping in the pool. Just release it anyways, if no one really dug it, then keep moving along and work on the next thing.

Primo is really special to me, I started writing songs for this when I was at my lowest and it was just therapeutic writing a lot of this work. I was carving into my depressed and anxious feelings and riding those through the earlier songs with the project. What’s made it particularly valuable to me now, is having people reach out to me saying that my songs have helped them mentally and get through rough times. Being at those lows myself, it’s rewarding knowing that my pain in these songs is having people reach common ground.

All that being said, with the band, I like adding contrast by making incredibly energetic songs that are danceable but lyrics a lot of the time will be about darker topics. So that I can bring my real feelings into these, while making the shows as fun as we can for everyone there.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Haha I always struggle with this…. I like visiting art museums myself, like the DMA & Contemporary in Dallas or the Modern in Fort Worth. If I’m going out, doing weird shit in Karaoke is always fun. Usually go to some fun dives for this, like Charlies Star Lounge or Single Wide (SO TO MY FAVE KARAOKE DJ JAVIER SOMOZA). There’s a lot of good food here though, it’s hard to say. I’m not picky myself, and being a songwriter, I’m not going out like a TON. Besides, everything is too expensive in this day & age.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
A lot that I am probably forgetting, but off the top… my dad for sure. He did a good job of raising my brother and I and he’s one of the strongest people I know. My best bud Drew, for being there and being super supportive of the project and helping wherever he can with photo/video work.

My bandmates (Shane, Austin, Pat, Blue) for being awesome and helping push the vision.

My buddy from school, Ian Wortham. He’s been super helpful with helping with artwork with the project and is just all around a very good dude.

And to my friend who is no longer here, Laura Hall. She was the first person I showed my demos for this band to then pushed me to keep going with it when I was at a low point in my life. She even got me some art for free for our first single ‘Through the Cracks’. Super appreciate of her pushing me along to start this up and think about her quite a bit.

Website: primodanger.com

Instagram: instagram.com/primodanger

Twitter: twitter.com/primodanger

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/realPrimoDanger/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf-zt4W-KuJJihHg38o-WXg

Image Credits
Katie Loftin – Personal Photo Single Artwork – Ian Wortham All Other Photos- Drew Herring

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