Interview with WordSmith and the Concert G’s

Steph Freitag ’11 sat down with Wesleyan’s own WordSmith & The Concert G’s (Josh Smith ’11 and Jared Paul ’11) for an interview, posted below.

Check them out this Friday at Psi U.

WordSmith & The Concert G’s is one of numerous bands among a network of friends who practice and perform at 316 Wash. Their style is innovative, their lyrics are playful—easily one of the best bands on campus. They stay true to their unique backgrounds—in fact, WordSmith himself flat out refuses to front. Through defying genre boundaries, WordSmith and the Concert G’s have created a sound that is inherently their own.

Steph Freitag: When did you form WordSmith?

Josh Smith: Well, I am WordSmith so I formed myself (laughs). But I started rapping in probably 8^th grade. My friend’s godfather had a studio so we got some free time there and I just recorded a couple of tracks. Over the years I got more serious with it, recorded more songs in the city with my producer down there—his name is Illustrious. Hey Jared, want to talk about how the band started?

Jared Paul: Yeah, well we started making tracks last year, collaborating and this year we started more intensely doing that. Starting at the beginning of this year we decided we needed to put together a live band. We just happen to know a lot of really good musicians and actually had no trouble at all finding those people for our band.

JS: Yeah, we were at our friend Gabe’s party at low-rise and we had been talking that night about forming a band and all these people were out on the grass…

JP: And we were like Hey! (Silly voice) We’re making a band…

SF: Describe the song writing process, lyrically and melodically.

JS: Oh, that’s good.

JP: It usually starts late at night, pretty much we start with either a sample or a basic idea and we’ll be chillin’, some kids will be playing Smash and we will all record over it and Josh will go in the booth and blow everybody’s mind.

JS: We experiment a lot, everyone rapping, trying ideas out. For my solo stuff, my subject matter tends to be more serious and kind of gritty. Basically, I’ll hear a beat and usually a first line will come to me and a general feel of what I want to talk about.

Usually that original line will carry me through. I tend to construct my stuff pretty technically.

SF: Where can fans find your music?

JS: www.myspace.com/wordsmithmusic

JP: http://www.myspace.com/jaredpaulnc or http://www.myspace.com/wearethenoms