Toad the Wet Sprocket is back together, much to my delight, and about to release a new record, which last happened during the first year of Clinton’s second term. I’ve been following frontman Glen Phillips’ career since then, watching as he’s had to reestablish himself as a viable performer and recording artist with little name recognition outside the Toad fan base.
In this interview with New Times Broward-Palm Beach, he describes a realization of what it actually takes to be a working musician:
We did well off the bat when we were young, actually really well nine months into our third record, so we didn’t really understand how how hard it can be, how much work it really takes, all the little jobs that have to get done. In the last ten or fifteen years, I’ve done all those jobs and done most of them badly. I kind of understand how lucky we are now, and how special this position is, and I think everyone else understands that too. So we kind of have to pay our dues on the back end, whereas most bands pay them on the front end.
It’s so refreshing to see someone who’s achieved success recognize how fortune played a role that may have been as great as, say, their talent. And as someone who once planned on making a career of this singer-songwriter shtick, I take heart that, yes, a lot of it, like everything else, is just a job.
Near-Earth Object 